A branch-off the conspiracy theory thread for all your whines/rants/debates on the school curriculum and school teaching methods and approaches in the world.
I left the education sector in the UK about 10 years ago. The two main reasons were the whole academy / free school fiasco, and that no-one knew what to do with IT (my field) - we were either doing stuff that's 10 - 15 years out of date (typing, databases, etc.), or would be obsolete in 6 months (app development with specific bespoke software).
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Not Online!!! wrote: I am advocating for mandatory classes in philosophy, not the deep stuff, but just logic.
I recall my IT classes at even Alevel (which is well over 10 years now) were mostly learning "buzzwords" for how to work with IT (eg you'd use a firewall or a GUI or something for such and such a situation). They were rather "tickbox" style questions too where you'd get several "similar" sounding buzzwords and had to pick the exact same one.
The other half was mostly spending forever making a basic database in Access. The thing was it wasn't hard, but it took forever because you had to screenshot and document every single step. Which with Word and floppydisks of the day took ages. You fast learned to have the whole thing in laods of different documents so that adding a single line in one page didn't end up with every image in the following pages jumping to crazy positions.
It didn't help that our IT teacher went on leave during that time and our replacement was a lecturer who was mostly useless (he actually managed to miss an entire module for the other class and spent most of our lessons just browsing the net).
Suffice it to say that IT then sounds like its not gone very far. Thing is we are easily at a point now where most kids are going to be more IT Literate than course material. AT least for most basic things.
I'd also very much support life skills being a class. The problem with relying on parents to teach that is when you've parents who get it wrong. Students should get basic education in life skills.
One other thing I recall my maths teacher regularly saying was that students struggle with "advanced maths" not because they can't do it, but because the basics are moved off too quickly. The basic flow of advanced maths is just basic maths taken to a new level; but when your basic maths isn't second nature its much easier for students to get confused in what they are doing. They trip up on a basic point which then confuses them on how the more complex interaction works. Or on how they can link together multiple simple points into a more complex equation.
I think most people agree that citizens need to use more critical thinking, but I"m not sure this is something we can teach. Or, more specifically, we can teach (at least some) people how to think critically, but we can't make them actually do it.
And most people have a solid grasp on logic, it's the assumptions and facts that are most often flawed.
Speaking as someone approaching 40 my recollection of the Scottish education system was that it was well-intentioned but often fundamentally flawed. As an example, consider that we didn't start learning a foreign language until we were 12 or 13, seven years after starting formal education. Compounding that is the issue Overread points out where schools often don't spend enough time on the fundamentals. So in our case most of the class weren't clear on how their own language worked and didn't have enough of an understanding of adverbs, prepositions and participles and so on to allow effective teaching of a foreign language. It's kind of like trying to teach someone piano without first explaining how to read music - possible but definitely not the easiest way to approach things.
There's also too much emphasis on exams and teaching things that are examinable. I suspect that's why the fundamentals are so quickly skipped over. It's much easier to write (and mark) exam questions about specific concepts in physics than it is to write them about the scientific method, for example. Yet it's these exact fundamental deficiencies that universities often spend so much time trying to correct.
Polonius wrote: I think most people agree that citizens need to use more critical thinking, but I"m not sure this is something we can teach. Or, more specifically, we can teach (at least some) people how to think critically, but we can't make them actually do it.
And most people have a solid grasp on logic, it's the assumptions and facts that are most often flawed.
You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make him drink. However if you don't lead the horse to water they might never find it.
Also don't forget there are lot of people who use "I'm not trained/educated in X" as a mental crutch to not invest any time in X. It's also something that can undermine their self confidence. I think basic teaching in how to research a news story; how to "cross reference" and indeed in todays world how to use a search engine are very important lessons.
Indeed google is fantastic, but you have to know both how to use it and how it uses you. How it will select articles based on your search history patterns to better suit "you" which might mean its giving you bias in search results. How to frame questions to get closer to the answers you want. Even something so basic as teaching people that if they don't know the answer, google might not actually be the best tool since you will get lots of results that you won't have the understanding to sort through.
Even something so simple as how to check two or three different newspapers can be important for some people who otherwise might never think to look outside of one news source.
We live in an age of information overload. Where information is thrust at us from every angle and where any person with an afternoon can publish a website on the net; where the top result is not the most accurate but simply the one with the best key wording; search engine optimising and ultimately the "most popular".
Heck how many of us honestly look far past the first page of results when googling up a topic?
When my children started getting to elementary school I was surprised that they had some lectures in what roughly translates as "social behaviour" that we did not have when I was a child. Basically it was about friendly and polite behaviour, solving conflicts, standing up for yourself and others and empathy. Not a bad idea I think
Slipspace wrote: . So in our case most of the class weren't clear on how their own language worked and didn't have enough of an understanding of adverbs, prepositions and participles and so on to allow effective teaching of a foreign language. It's kind of like trying to teach someone piano without first explaining how to read music - possible but definitely not the easiest way to approach things.
So much this. I always think that because we speak english we end up being taught it fairly badly. We also don't get the reinforcement. At a young age we might actually know adverbs pretty well in parrot fashion. Give students a summer holiday or three and a few years never mentioning them again and suddenly adverbs in the French lessons are confusing because you're not quite sure what they are exactly (beyond perhaps a few examples) and then you're trying to use that to cobble together how they work in a separate language when you really aren't sure how they work in your own.
To keep it from breaking the politics rules, I'll just say I hate the way education is managed and funded in my country. It's a nonsensical delineation of funding and decision making responsibilities that produces pitiful results, but will probably never be fixed because 'murica'. The American education system enshrines anti-intellectualism into it's structure in disastrous ways, in the one institution that should be completely pro-intellectual.
To keep to a simple, and I would hope non-controversial example, Local/State school boards should not be ruling on what should be taught in the classrooms. A bunch of stay at home parents who never graduated highschool and are sitting on a committee because they ranted at the last town hall about how unfair it is that evolution is taught in school but not intelligent design should not exist and sure as hell should have zero decision making power on what teachers teach. You might as well put the last lady who asked for your manager to discuss her completely unreasonable request in charge of a nuclear power plant. At least then the disaster would be spectacular and maybe become an HBO series some day with great production values.
I'll go through and read the thread properly later, but to address the IT part.... IT and the teaching of it from a department that is severely underfunded in my institution is genuinely one of the most frustrating aspects of my job.
IT is quite a broad big banner at the college with many different qualifications coming under it, as to be expected... Now specifically they have a 'flagship' cyber securities course, which is great in principle. I'm sure it is a highly required job in the sector, however, the application process is rigorous and leads to chronic shortfall in student numbers, each year.... And then the cost to update the hardware and software each year is horrendous.
This is genuinely the sort of BS that the government shouldn't expect colleges to fund - just to be clear, colleges are funded by the government but they are businesses, so they claim funding from the government at a flat rate per successful student. Roughly £4k per year, per student that achieves... That course is loss making, even at full capacity, by a hefty amount I'll add... The government begs for these skills but won't pay appropriately for them, and all that happens is other courses get cut.
The issues with British education are broad and chronic, but funding is the key one... The state education system on a whole is broken, almost beyond repair.
I'll come back and re-state what I was talking about critical thinking in the other thread later, and my opinions on intelligence also which is linked.
Politics is inevitable when talking about education, especially in the UK... No one can argue though, Labour and The Tories have equally done an awful job with education throughout all the custody of it. It's a bit like the NHS is education, taxes should pay for it, but the government should not run it, experts in the field should.
endlesswaltz - I've seen colleges losing staff and courses mid year because of funding cutbacks appearing mid-year for the college. Staff in them all have the same attitude - they are being asked to do more; mark and provide more exams (even in places where students are generally there because they've not done well in exams and are after more practical course material); but they have far less pay/job security in general.
I agree there's a fundamental issue in funding and organisation from the top and the teaching staff sadly get the short end of the stick. I think it bares saying that many of the complaints of the schools system are often not so much aimed at teachers, but at the system they are working within.
It's a joke, honestly.... And the ideal education system as was being discussed in the previous thread where students are round plugs and placed into round holes, well, the logistics of that system doesn't exist.
However, yep, it happens. FE Lecturing is a rough job... And as they are predominately run by business people, in a business manner, e.g. students are customers that provide funding, they will never change, but also are not immune to poor business decisions... Another incredible bit of business decision making was spending multi millions on a new motor engineering centre that was to be funded by a local car plant via apprenticeships... It sounds like a good idea right? Until you look at the car industry, which is notoriously volatile in the UK, and then, incredibly the college expected this partnership to last 10 years and has effectively spent the money already...
Well, it won't take exceptional critical thinking to guess what happened within 3 years to all those apprenticeship placements....
Nearly every senior person linked to education in this country gets it so so so wrong, from heads of institutions, to the government, to the agencies that should be safeguarding education such as ofqual and ousted, and well, you only need to look in the press to catch on to that error.
I won't be working in education in 5 years time, I'm already building to get out, and I think most talented and previously enthusiastic teaching staff are thinking the same, the ship is currently sinking. It's usually the average to poor teachers that stay in the job to be honest as they know they will get found out in the private sector and won't be competent or skilled enough for most other public sector work... How depressing is that?
endlesswaltz123 wrote: It's a joke, honestly.... And the ideal education system as was being discussed in the previous thread where students are round plugs and placed into round holes, well, the logistics of that system doesn't exist.
However, yep, it happens. FE Lecturing is a rough job... And as they are predominately run by business people, in a business manner, e.g. students are customers that provide funding, they will never change, but also are not immune to poor business decisions... Another incredible bit of business decision making was spending multi millions on a new motor engineering centre that was to be funded by a local car plant via apprenticeships... It sounds like a good idea right? Until you look at the car industry, which is notoriously volatile in the UK, and then, incredibly the college expected this partnership to last 10 years and has effectively spent the money already...
Well, it won't take exceptional critical thinking to guess what happened within 3 years to all those apprenticeship placements....
Nearly every senior person linked to education in this country gets it so so so wrong, from heads of institutions, to the government, to the agencies that should be safeguarding education such as ofqual and ousted, and well, you only need to look in the press to catch on to that error.
I won't be working in education in 5 years time, I'm already building to get out, and I think most talented and previously enthusiastic teaching staff are thinking the same, the ship is currently sinking. It's usually the average to poor teachers that stay in the job to be honest as they know they will get found out in the private sector and won't be competent or skilled enough for most other public sector work... How depressing is that?
Privataising Schooling is imo, nothing more then admitting defeat .
Either failing to to teach teachers to teach or in the curriculum or in the baseline setup.
Not Online!!! wrote: I am advocating for mandatory classes in philosophy, not the deep stuff, but just logic.
Yup. if more people were aware of things like the socratic method, they would already be in a better place to critically evaluate information.
EEEEHHHHHHHHH debatable, i guess they would Technically be more capable but actually using this, is something of a training and memorizing issue.
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LordofHats wrote: To keep it from breaking the politics rules, I'll just say I hate the way education is managed and funded in my country. It's a nonsensical delineation of funding and decision making responsibilities that produces pitiful results, but will probably never be fixed because 'murica'. The American education system enshrines anti-intellectualism into it's structure in disastrous ways, in the one institution that should be completely pro-intellectual.
To keep to a simple, and I would hope non-controversial example, Local/State school boards should not be ruling on what should be taught in the classrooms. A bunch of stay at home parents who never graduated highschool and are sitting on a committee because they ranted at the last town hall about how unfair it is that evolution is taught in school but not intelligent design should not exist and sure as hell should have zero decision making power on what teachers teach. You might as well put the last lady who asked for your manager to discuss her completely unreasonable request in charge of a nuclear power plant. At least then the disaster would be spectacular and maybe become an HBO series some day with great production values.
Local people can run local schooling, that has never really been an issue,what becomes an issue is when the general standards are inexistent, and infrastructure disregarded because taxes = bad in the same vein as enlightenment = bad...
How's the swiss system? I read a lot about the German and Finnish systems, interested to know about others.
The UK education system, which hilariously still holds significant clout globally - Many UK universities are kept afloat by this myth via importing predominantly chinese foreign students who pay significantly more in tuition fees.
UK Universities aren't actually that bad, I'm probably speaking out of turn, it is a world class university system, but the whole education system rides on those coat tails when it just is not true, education holistically in the UK is not world class.
Not Online!!! wrote: Local people can run local schooling, that has never really been an issue,what becomes an issue is when the general standards are inexistent, and infrastructure disregarded because taxes = bad in the same vein as enlightenment = bad...
Don't disagree. I'm more lamenting the end results of the latter two problems, which have resulted in unqualified persons making decisions they're not qualified to make and a vehemence in education policy that makes it an insurmountable problem.
endlesswaltz123 wrote: How's the swiss system? I read a lot about the German and Finnish systems, interested to know about others.
The UK education system, which hilariously still holds significant clout globally - Many UK universities are kept afloat by this myth via importing predominantly chinese foreign students who pay significantly more in tuition fees.
UK Universities aren't actually that bad, I'm probably speaking out of turn, it is a world class university system, but the whole education system rides on those coat tails when it just is not true, education holistically in the UK is not world class.
it's a dual system, generally there's baseline schooling ( 1-6) then there's secondary which is split up according to capability, better students get a differing curriculum. generally A , B, C.This is mandatory
There are 2 ways torwards academia allready at this point either after 6 class base schooling or after 2 year of secondary. into the gymnasium ( equiv is about high school). which is 4 or 6 years respectively. afterwards you can go search a job or go to university or "Hochschule " (jobspecific university often more practically minded , think of it as an univeristy light kinda, )
If you didn't go that way you'd be expected to find an apprenticeship after secondary schooling, which is 60-70 % practical work in a company and 40-30 % (1-2 days) school in specific necessary capabilites but also includes general skills like making taxes or how to vote ( which is important because half direct democracy has brought some rather particular voting systems into the world). Btw, if you are good you may make a jobspecific matura(highschool degree) which then increases schooling days / week by one but allows you later on to make other choices in regards to specialisation or to enter Hochschulen. So another way to further increase specialisation
Then you turn 18 at some point and have in many cases either finished a apprenticeship or Matura / Highschool,. meaning if you are male, you get conscripted, if you are female you can volunteer, which is also kinda like school, except with more sports and shooting and dangerous material handleing. alternatively you can do civil service, which is duration wise a bit longer nowadays but a nice tool to help out social institutions, which you work in general governmental or close to governmental institutions be that nursery homes, etc. Pay is gak tho regardless what you do for this task
Then it goes on. WIth job and live.
Mind you there are some jobs that have other, specific requirements that you don't find in this rough draft addmitedly, like police officer requireing baseline allready a job accomplished or finished university grade on top of another 4 years as a cadet.
The problem the UK universities have is that the nation views a degree as almost a "must have" for almost any job just to get to the interview stage of application. However what the employers really want is students with actual work experience; whilst the university is only outputting students with limited practical understanding and much more of an academic approach.
Meanwhile people who go through and get a more practical background and skip the uni approach can find it hard to advance up the ladder because they don't have the academic paper to prove they can write an essay (but have all the practical skills for the job).
So the university system in the UK is sort of stuck. Its providing academic students when society would rather it provided practical students.
Of course this varies sector to sector, some subjects are just more academic from the get go. Lecturers in others are frustrated because they can see the pattern and want to give students the skills, but the system is locked into academia.
Not Online!!! wrote: Local people can run local schooling, that has never really been an issue,what becomes an issue is when the general standards are inexistent, and infrastructure disregarded because taxes = bad in the same vein as enlightenment = bad...
Don't disagree. I'm more lamenting the end results of the latter two problems, which have resulted in unqualified persons making decisions they're not qualified to make and a vehemence in education policy that makes it an insurmountable problem.
Frankly, just implementing or allowing states to form groupings to use experts and voted in officials that have experience ( or militia like system aka teachers themselves etc) and integrating feedback of teachers etc letting them organize and comparisons between states can allow those curriculums to be run pretty much with an open mind and nigh non preknown knowledge administratively atleast, the key however is cooperation and actual acceptance that political colour for that institution has to matter less then the job of said institution. TBF though teachers have over here a lot more leeway in regards to how they run their local schools and are only really under administration from government so that also helps that elected officials have less direct influence over the curriculum which pts are anyways generally implemented according to federal cantonal standards (seperate institution from the federal state as in this is basically just the Kantonal politicians and in this case mostly teachers deciding what's on it ) ,
Of course you can bypass this by the implementation of national level standardised curriculae, cue france,, but that is not a possibility for all states due to historic reasons...
Im gonna ramble a bit, mostly about science in school.
I have always had this problem with science in school sometimes just being "Facts" here is how X happens and here is the result. even experiments are not experiments, just arts & crafts with a scientific bent, which are fine when your are in elementary school.
But we are not taught how scientists reach the conclusions they do and why the sometimes might be wrong or the scientific process from conception of an experiment, to paper funding.
I think focusing on something akin for that can lead to a good outcome. But because it isnt "ULTRA COOL SCIENCE FACTS THAT WILL BLOW YOUR MIND" it isnt important.
hotsauceman1 wrote: Im gonna ramble a bit, mostly about science in school.
I have always had this problem with science in school sometimes just being "Facts" here is how X happens and here is the result. even experiments are not experiments, just arts & crafts with a scientific bent, which are fine when your are in elementary school.
But we are not taught how scientists reach the conclusions they do and why the sometimes might be wrong or the scientific process from conception of an experiment, to paper funding.
I think focusing on something akin for that can lead to a good outcome. But because it isnt "ULTRA COOL SCIENCE FACTS THAT WILL BLOW YOUR MIND" it isnt important.
quite frankly, teaching the scientific method, falsification, verification etc. and showing on a small scale exemple then extrapolating it with bigger exemples, might indeed be the best way to stop the hostility torwards academia.
However, that also requires academics to accept that people with "lower" educational standards are just as important. i can't tell you how many times i heard deamaning and belitteling comments of higher educated people torwards plumbers f.e. and then utterly breaking down after their toilet broke down...
Ultimately, the problem in American and English education systems is that politics is involved in the education systems beyond making sure there is adequate funding. Once funding levels are met politics and politicians need to STAY OUT OF IT and let professional teachers handle it. And that needs to be TEACHERS, not professional administrators saying 'no, you can't do that' who've never taught a class ever, not professional curriculum developers with a product to sell, TEACHERS in charge and running things.
Other problem here in the US is that private and religious schools need to be kept the hell out of any decision making processes that are for public schools, and vetted extremely heavily with regards to their curriculum for accreditation.
I went to a private school from kindergarten to 5th grade. US history basically glossed over 'the bad stuff' and heavily emphasized the concept of Christians 'saving' the US from itself.
I mean i would argue that private schools are nothing more than ways people try to maintain privilege and power.
That we need to do away with them if we want any semblance of america being a place where everyone starts off on equal footing.
ESPECIALLY RELIGIOUS SCHOOLS
I think there is a general issue in education where we focus too much on teaching students to regurgitate information while never really checking to see if they understand it. This is a problem in history because how K-12 education teaches history is almost a completely different field than what academic historians do. There's a overburdened focus on presenting 'facts' and little to no effort put forth on 'interpretation.'
History is made of interpretations based on facts. There is no 'fact' that the Roman Empire collapsed in 395 AD. You will find no one before the 16th century saying 'Rome fell in 395' and the Empire was over. There is a collection of facts that when interpreted make 395 AD as good a year as any to mark the fall of the Roman Empire. But teaching the later as a fact without addressing the former (that it is an interpretation of facts, not a fact itself) makes it difficult to get students to actually understand what historians do and how they do it.
Instead of teaching people history, you end up reteaching them 'new facts', like that the Byzantines didn't call themselves Byzantine, they called themselves Romans and that the Byzantine Empire, known to them as the Roman Empire, was a direct continuation of the Imperial Line and endured for another 1000 years, so did Rome really 'fall' or did its political center simply 'shift'? If so, why do we say 'Rome Fell'? Is the Eastern Empire fundamentally different from the Western Empire? Did both actually fall, but one managed to restructure itself and continue on? These are the kinds of debates Historians have at the most basic level, but you'd never know that from the way a middle school history book focuses on teaching kids to memorize names, terms, and dates and spit out a bargain bin explanation for why they're important.
One other downside of teaching "facts" is that it presents the idea that the subject is fully studied. When all students do is regurgitate and memorise facts and copy what's written in a single text book it reinforces the idea that we know all there is.
Now any student knows this is false with a bit of thinking; but at the same time the system isn't showing them where a student can fit into a potential job or line of work beyond teaching. As you say it presents the idea of fixed facts rather than more flexible research based study and understanding. Which in turn presents to students the idea of research, archaeology, text studies, multiple sources, debate within a subject, varying schools of thought.
hotsauceman1 wrote: I mean i would argue that private schools are nothing more than ways people try to maintain privilege and power.
That we need to do away with them if we want any semblance of america being a place where everyone starts off on equal footing.
ESPECIALLY RELIGIOUS SCHOOLS
Religious schooling institutions don't necessarily need to be singled out, when it is infact, the lack of oversight over the curriculum that IS the issue.
That is pretty much my problem with how science is taught.
I have seen so many people say they "Love" science when in reality they just love the product of science(Cool Hubble Telescope pictures or Cool Rockets) Because that is what we have been taought, too look at the product of science, as science.
hotsauceman1 wrote: That is pretty much my problem with how science is taught.
I have seen so many people say they "Love" science when in reality they just love the product of science(Cool Hubble Telescope pictures or Cool Rockets) Because that is what we have been taought, too look at the product of science, as science.
I like this way of putting it and will steal it in the future
A lot of the issues people have, specifically with critical thinking, and understanding how conclusions have been made are all covered under one umbrella term in the UK.
Research methods.
It also happens to be the lowest achieving unit/module(s) in terms of final grade and the module a student is most likely to fail... Not to mention (and this has been discussed before in the conspiracy thread) that research methods tends to be taught within scientific pathways (BSc) but sometimes not at all or in such rigorous standards in the art pathways (BA's), specifically in the sociological fields where a lot of the seriously bats**t crazy findings have been made of late in academia, namely because validity, reliability, accuracy and precision are seen as less 'vital' in such fields where plenty of qualitative research is accrued.
I'm not going to rehash the same debate we had there but yeah, I do relatively stand by my notion that critical thinking is not for everyone, for reasons I stated in the conspiracy thread, be it capability in terms of intelligence, processing ability under timed constraint, related to conditions the person has such as being on the spectrum etc...
I teach research methods myself mind, and the fundamental issue teaching it to students is that they find it boring... I base a lot of mine around human experimentation, specifically by the nazi's in world war II, nothing like a bit of gore to keep people gripped into a topic, it also gives a great opportunity to discuss ethical conduct and the product of the experiments. Undoubtedly they were wrong, and almost certainly would not be conducted in this day and age, however, how many lives have been saved because of the findings of this research? Whilst the research was evil, does this mean it should not be used? That is what would happen under modern day ethical guidelines, the findings would be immediately invalidated even though there is 80 years of research and practice to prove the findings are valid...
endlesswaltz123 wrote: It's a joke, honestly.... And the ideal education system as was being discussed in the previous thread where students are round plugs and placed into round holes, well, the logistics of that system doesn't exist.
However, yep, it happens. FE Lecturing is a rough job... And as they are predominately run by business people, in a business manner, e.g. students are customers that provide funding, they will never change, but also are not immune to poor business decisions... Another incredible bit of business decision making was spending multi millions on a new motor engineering centre that was to be funded by a local car plant via apprenticeships... It sounds like a good idea right? Until you look at the car industry, which is notoriously volatile in the UK, and then, incredibly the college expected this partnership to last 10 years and has effectively spent the money already...
Well, it won't take exceptional critical thinking to guess what happened within 3 years to all those apprenticeship placements....
Nearly every senior person linked to education in this country gets it so so so wrong, from heads of institutions, to the government, to the agencies that should be safeguarding education such as ofqual and ousted, and well, you only need to look in the press to catch on to that error.
I won't be working in education in 5 years time, I'm already building to get out, and I think most talented and previously enthusiastic teaching staff are thinking the same, the ship is currently sinking. It's usually the average to poor teachers that stay in the job to be honest as they know they will get found out in the private sector and won't be competent or skilled enough for most other public sector work... How depressing is that?
Privataising Schooling is imo, nothing more then admitting defeat .
Either failing to to teach teachers to teach or in the curriculum or in the baseline setup.
Not Online!!! wrote: I am advocating for mandatory classes in philosophy, not the deep stuff, but just logic.
Yup. if more people were aware of things like the socratic method, they would already be in a better place to critically evaluate information.
EEEEHHHHHHHHH debatable, i guess they would Technically be more capable but actually using this, is something of a training and memorizing issue.
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LordofHats wrote: To keep it from breaking the politics rules, I'll just say I hate the way education is managed and funded in my country. It's a nonsensical delineation of funding and decision making responsibilities that produces pitiful results, but will probably never be fixed because 'murica'. The American education system enshrines anti-intellectualism into it's structure in disastrous ways, in the one institution that should be completely pro-intellectual.
To keep to a simple, and I would hope non-controversial example, Local/State school boards should not be ruling on what should be taught in the classrooms. A bunch of stay at home parents who never graduated highschool and are sitting on a committee because they ranted at the last town hall about how unfair it is that evolution is taught in school but not intelligent design should not exist and sure as hell should have zero decision making power on what teachers teach. You might as well put the last lady who asked for your manager to discuss her completely unreasonable request in charge of a nuclear power plant. At least then the disaster would be spectacular and maybe become an HBO series some day with great production values.
Local people can run local schooling, that has never really been an issue,what becomes an issue is when the general standards are inexistent, and infrastructure disregarded because taxes = bad in the same vein as enlightenment = bad...
True, but as a baseline the socratic method teaches the asking of questions to determine the meaning of the things you are talking about. This deeper study should prompt better understanding of the issues at hand, and move away from any pre emptive opinions clouding the judgement. In theory at least.
hotsauceman1 wrote: Im gonna ramble a bit, mostly about science in school.
I have always had this problem with science in school sometimes just being "Facts" here is how X happens and here is the result. even experiments are not experiments, just arts & crafts with a scientific bent, which are fine when your are in elementary school.
But we are not taught how scientists reach the conclusions they do and why the sometimes might be wrong or the scientific process from conception of an experiment, to paper funding.
I think focusing on something akin for that can lead to a good outcome. But because it isnt "ULTRA COOL SCIENCE FACTS THAT WILL BLOW YOUR MIND" it isnt important.
quite frankly, teaching the scientific method, falsification, verification etc. and showing on a small scale exemple then extrapolating it with bigger exemples, might indeed be the best way to stop the hostility torwards academia.
However, that also requires academics to accept that people with "lower" educational standards are just as important. i can't tell you how many times i heard deamaning and belitteling comments of higher educated people torwards plumbers f.e. and then utterly breaking down after their toilet broke down...
It goes both ways, with "Blue Collar" workers tend to think that nothing beyond what they need to know is "extra" and other less savory words.
Mike Rowe gives a good idea of how people think that all you need to know is what it is go get the job done.
Overread wrote: Thing is we are easily at a point now where most kids are going to be more IT Literate than course material. AT least for most basic things.
IT has always been that way. I started my B.IT in 1994. Most of the kids in the class knew far more than the lecturers and the Uni's systems admin, whose job largely seemed to consist of finding and removing all of the installations of Doom that the students kept putting back on the lab PCs.
I did a Cert 3 in IT, focusing on webdesign in about 2002 (just as Dreamweaver was getting big... great timing there) and it was exactly the same, just with less Doom. The only part of that course that was actually new information to most of the students was the Access module, since nobody actually ever used Access for anything outside of IT courses, as far as I'm aware.
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hotsauceman1 wrote: That is pretty much my problem with how science is taught.
I have seen so many people say they "Love" science when in reality they just love the product of science(Cool Hubble Telescope pictures or Cool Rockets) Because that is what we have been taought, too look at the product of science, as science.
There certainly needs to be a solid focus on the mind-numbingly boring information-gathering side of science. At least enough to make students aware that it's there before they make career choices...
Yeah, Im just starting at 28, to understand science is 100% different from what i thought it was. Probably would have not a different way if I didnt just think "Well if i just learn this stuff, I can call myself X"
hotsauceman1 wrote: Im gonna ramble a bit, mostly about science in school.
I have always had this problem with science in school sometimes just being "Facts" here is how X happens and here is the result. even experiments are not experiments, just arts & crafts with a scientific bent, which are fine when your are in elementary school.
But we are not taught how scientists reach the conclusions they do and why the sometimes might be wrong or the scientific process from conception of an experiment, to paper funding.
I think focusing on something akin for that can lead to a good outcome. But because it isnt "ULTRA COOL SCIENCE FACTS THAT WILL BLOW YOUR MIND" it isnt important.
quite frankly, teaching the scientific method, falsification, verification etc. and showing on a small scale exemple then extrapolating it with bigger exemples, might indeed be the best way to stop the hostility torwards academia.
However, that also requires academics to accept that people with "lower" educational standards are just as important. i can't tell you how many times i heard deamaning and belitteling comments of higher educated people torwards plumbers f.e. and then utterly breaking down after their toilet broke down...
It goes both ways, with "Blue Collar" workers tend to think that nothing beyond what they need to know is "extra" and other less savory words.
Mike Rowe gives a good idea of how people think that all you need to know is what it is go get the job done.
Oh i absolutely agree hence why i think both sides should actually occaisonally be forced to atleast be exposed to such processes....
Vulcan wrote: Ultimately, the problem in American and English education systems is that politics is involved in the education systems beyond making sure there is adequate funding. Once funding levels are met politics and politicians need to STAY OUT OF IT and let professional teachers handle it. And that needs to be TEACHERS, not professional administrators saying 'no, you can't do that' who've never taught a class ever, not professional curriculum developers with a product to sell, TEACHERS in charge and running things.
Yeah... I don't really agree with that. I finished my undergrad at a what was effectively a state school that specialized in cranking out teachers (and a masters at another). They were woefully, woefully uneducated.
They'd have classes about crafts and holiday projects, but have a grand total of _4_ electives in their 'specialization' (history, math, etc). They basically knew nothing about the subjects they were teaching, just that they needed to teach to the standardized tests and not get caught drinking during their degree, else they'd be disqualified from the teacher's license. Most teachers (at the elementary and high school level) latch on to the minimum current state of knowledge in their field when they graduated and never get past that.
They don't have any business at all deciding what to teach.
Overread wrote: Thing is we are easily at a point now where most kids are going to be more IT Literate than course material. AT least for most basic things.
IT has always been that way. I started my B.IT in 1994. Most of the kids in the class knew far more than the lecturers and the Uni's systems admin, whose job largely seemed to consist of finding and removing all of the installations of Doom that the students kept putting back on the lab PCs.
Ugh- I started out in computer science (didn't stick with it for a lot of reasons), but one of the requirements was buying a UNIX system to work on. Catch was, no member of the department faculty used the system. The previous two years of students had to buy some form of Commodore computer professional system (which I didn't even know existed at the time), and the staff was still using Apples from two years before that. So the computer science department ended up finding a third year chem student who happened to know UNIX systems to teach us how to use ours, because they couldn't be bothered to get some for the department and learn how to use them.
Voss wrote: Most teachers (at the elementary and high school level) latch on to the minimum current state of knowledge in their field when they graduated and never get past that.
In fairness this is how many people are in work. They learn what they need to achieve their job to a minimum-decent standard and don't push further.
Which raises two points
1) In relation to the original point your commenting on - teachers being on teaching boards - I'd say that your minimum standards type teachers are less likely to put themselves forward for additional roles like that. In theory the "cream" should rise to the top and the better qualified and more experienced teachers would rise up. At least if the system changes to favour academic standards as one of the criteria.
2) I'd say that the whole concept of mark-schemes and curriculum actually feeds into lazy/unenthusiastic teachers. See when your students will only get points if they answer according to the marks scheme then as a teacher you've only any need to teach the points on the syllabus. Teaching outside of it is at best "wasting time" because your students will get no marks for it; and at worst could lead to students getting lower marks because you teach them something on the same subject, but which isn't "correct" according to the mark scheme.
I've spoken to teachers who have had both when marking exams - students that make good points that win them no points; and students who have put more up-to-date information in, which is correct, but which is "wrong" according to the mark scheme.
The worst part is that it also punishes enthusiastic students. Why learn more about a subject than what the teacher tells you when you could get lower marks or no net gain for your efforts. In theory students reading outside the text book and furthering their studies should be rewarded within the system. Universities seem to manage internal marketing and standards, but for some reason schools seem to be slaved to a system where teachers are not trusted to mark their own students work; or where material outside the mark scheme is not permitted.
In general its a symptom of trying to achieve a universal standard over a whole nation based on specific results. Such a system is always going to lag behind the latest publications or even quite recent ones. It's also going to lean heavily toward singular facts and viewpoints for many subjects.
National Mark schemes are also a thing i don't know.
Normally for us you get a Curriculum with x hours subject and what Level students should be and skills they should learn but Tests were often written locally or per teacher Basis on what they need to have taught you according to the Level.
I can't even fathom the burocracy involved in such a System.
Voss wrote: Most teachers (at the elementary and high school level) latch on to the minimum current state of knowledge in their field when they graduated and never get past that.
In fairness this is how many people are in work. They learn what they need to achieve their job to a minimum-decent standard and don't push further.
I'd agree with that in general. However, I'm personally more used to professions that push 'continued education' as a normal part of professional development, and find it rather baffling and offensive that teaching doesn't. (at least not in states I'm familiar with). Real estate does here, but not teaching.
When I was in Virginia, the teachers I knew would complain about teaching to standardized tests (the SoL tests, which is an unfortunate acronym, but accurate from the way they talked about them). Teaching outside the test material meant lower job performance reviews.
Voss wrote: I'd agree with that in general. However, I'm personally more used to professions that push 'continued education' as a normal part of professional development, and find it rather baffling and offensive that teaching doesn't. (at least not in states I'm familiar with). Real estate does here, but not teaching.
From my experience, most workplaces don't give a damn about your professional development (unless they're receiving a subsidy of some kind for it), they just want the work done. And on the flipside of that, a lot of employees are equally uninterested in development... they just want to show up, do their job, collect their paycheque and go home.
It's slightly different but the end results is the same in the UK education system in regards to teachers....
I've been waiting for the perfect opportunity to start my masters.... The job requires so much that I can't commit to it, I'm not spending £10k+ to do a below par job... I do, do my own research and knowledge acquisition to be fair as I continue to be interested deeply in the subject, many teachers see it as just a career/job unfortunately.
Anyway, all teachers are required to do CPD in the UK, however, it hardly ever relates to knowledge of the subject, it relates to the practice of teaching... It's accepted the teacher has the knowledge to teach at the level they are teaching, they are just continually trained to do it better basically.
I'm waiting to see how this year plays out, if I'm teaching at home a lot, or it looks like I will be, I may go ahead with a masters.
In regards to teaching to tests/exams... This is a fundamental issue with them, you inevitably will teach to the exam, because you want all students to pass/get higher grades, yeah there is a selfish element to that, but you must remember the students we teach are humans, we get to know them, on the whole we like them, they deserve good grades... We don't decide the assessment methods used to help them succeed, we have to go with the instructed process, so its logical we teach to the test. I don't agree with it at all mind, but I don't work for awarding bodies (something I actually may look at doing in future, try change them from the inside).
Voss wrote: I'd agree with that in general. However, I'm personally more used to professions that push 'continued education' as a normal part of professional development, and find it rather baffling and offensive that teaching doesn't. (at least not in states I'm familiar with). Real estate does here, but not teaching.
From my experience, most workplaces don't give a damn about your professional development (unless they're receiving a subsidy of some kind for it), they just want the work done. And on the flipside of that, a lot of employees are equally uninterested in development... they just want to show up, do their job, collect their paycheque and go home.
Oh, I don't disagree with that.
Ran into it a lot with my archives Masters, as the faculty was obsessed with theory (and offered basically no practical skills), but I'd come into it from the workplace. So their insistence that employers wanted archivists who could babble about the latest theory from the professional journals and keep up with the latest 'global standards' rang a bit hollow. The archives I'd already worked for wanted people who could adapt to -their-system and get on with clearing the backlog already. The last thing they wanted was a theorist to come along and create an even larger backlog in transferring everything already done over to the 'current standard' (that would only last a couple years anyway).
On the employee side, it depends. I've spent a lot of time with the National Park Service, and development there gets you a lot of perks, including just being out of the office and away from your coworkers. But there are a lot of bonuses and additional pay opportunities involved.
It goes both ways, with "Blue Collar" workers tend to think that nothing beyond what they need to know is "extra" and other less savory words.
Mike Rowe gives a good idea of how people think that all you need to know is what it is go get the job done.
Which is adequate if ALL you plan to do with your life is work one job. Heaven help you if that job becomes obsolete, though. Doesn't matter if you're the greatest buggy-whip manufacturer if no one even owns a buggy, much less needs a whip to go with it. So knowing more than what is necessary to do ONE job helps you avoid becoming obsolete yourself.
If you plan to participate in politics, you need a LOT more information to vote intelligently... something often overlooked.
Vulcan wrote: Doesn't matter if you're the greatest buggy-whip manufacturer if no one even owns a buggy, much less needs a whip to go with it.
Is it sad that my first thought on reading this was an image of Dunebuggy pulling a cart of dry goods and getting whipped by some guy shouting 'mush'?
Anyway, I think this is going to be more and more important.
What exactly are all the truck drivers going to be doing in 10 years? We can all complain about the potential safety of self-driving vehicles, but it's fething happening and we all know it. There's too much money to be made in not having to pay people to do the job for it not to happen. Where are those tens of thousands of people going to work with a job skill that is utterly obsolete? Hang out at the watering hole with the horses? Maybe a 4-Year degree isn't the best answer to every problem, but we seriously need some kind of system for retraining workers or moving people from one market sector that doesn't need them to another. And people will bitch about that I know, but hey. They're the ones with a job complaining about how they don't have a job. You can either get a new one or bitch all day only one is likely to pay you... Although the internet is full of people getting paid to bitch.
In any case, I feel like we're rapidly approaching the point where we can either start dealing the unemployment like adults, or we can just make pithy comments about boots and straps and enjoy all the wonders of a large and permanent underclass that can't get work.
Vulcan wrote: Ultimately, the problem in American and English education systems is that politics is involved in the education systems beyond making sure there is adequate funding. Once funding levels are met politics and politicians need to STAY OUT OF IT and let professional teachers handle it. And that needs to be TEACHERS, not professional administrators saying 'no, you can't do that' who've never taught a class ever, not professional curriculum developers with a product to sell, TEACHERS in charge and running things.
Yeah... I don't really agree with that. I finished my undergrad at a what was effectively a state school that specialized in cranking out teachers (and a masters at another). They were woefully, woefully uneducated.
They'd have classes about crafts and holiday projects, but have a grand total of _4_ electives in their 'specialization' (history, math, etc). They basically knew nothing about the subjects they were teaching, just that they needed to teach to the standardized tests and not get caught drinking during their degree, else they'd be disqualified from the teacher's license. Most teachers (at the elementary and high school level) latch on to the minimum current state of knowledge in their field when they graduated and never get past that.
They don't have any business at all deciding what to teach.
Fair point. Before you can have teachers run teaching, you need teachers, not fools who think they are teachers because they passed a course.
Vulcan wrote: Doesn't matter if you're the greatest buggy-whip manufacturer if no one even owns a buggy, much less needs a whip to go with it.
Is it sad that my first thought on reading this was an image of Dunebuggy pulling a cart of dry goods and getting whipped by some guy shouting 'mush'?
Anyway, I think this is going to be more and more important.
What exactly are all the truck drivers going to be doing in 10 years? We can all complain about the potential safety of self-driving vehicles, but it's fething happening and we all know it. There's too much money to be made in not having to pay people to do the job for it not to happen. Where are those tens of thousands of people going to work with a job skill that is utterly obsolete? Hang out at the watering hole with the horses? Maybe a 4-Year degree isn't the best answer to every problem, but we seriously need some kind of system for retraining workers or moving people from one market sector that doesn't need them to another. And people will bitch about that I know, but hey. They're the ones with a job complaining about how they don't have a job. You can either get a new one or bitch all day only one is likely to pay you... Although the internet is full of people getting paid to bitch.
In any case, I feel like we're rapidly approaching the point where we can either start dealing the unemployment like adults, or we can just make pithy comments about boots and straps and enjoy all the wonders of a large and permanent underclass that can't get work.
If my truck driving cousin is any example, just go get another job. That is what he says whenever people complain about lack of work. Just go get another jobs
Vulcan wrote: Fair point. Before you can have teachers run teaching, you need teachers, not fools who think they are teachers because they passed a course.
I took IT evening classes while working full-time (to prove to myself I actually knew what I was going on about). When I graduated from them, the uni offered everyone a free teaching conversion short-course (to become a 'qualified' teacher in 4 - 6 months)...
Vulcan wrote: Doesn't matter if you're the greatest buggy-whip manufacturer if no one even owns a buggy, much less needs a whip to go with it.
Is it sad that my first thought on reading this was an image of Dunebuggy pulling a cart of dry goods and getting whipped by some guy shouting 'mush'?
Anyway, I think this is going to be more and more important.
What exactly are all the truck drivers going to be doing in 10 years? We can all complain about the potential safety of self-driving vehicles, but it's fething happening and we all know it. There's too much money to be made in not having to pay people to do the job for it not to happen. Where are those tens of thousands of people going to work with a job skill that is utterly obsolete? Hang out at the watering hole with the horses? Maybe a 4-Year degree isn't the best answer to every problem, but we seriously need some kind of system for retraining workers or moving people from one market sector that doesn't need them to another. And people will bitch about that I know, but hey. They're the ones with a job complaining about how they don't have a job. You can either get a new one or bitch all day only one is likely to pay you... Although the internet is full of people getting paid to bitch.
In any case, I feel like we're rapidly approaching the point where we can either start dealing the unemployment like adults, or we can just make pithy comments about boots and straps and enjoy all the wonders of a large and permanent underclass that can't get work.
If my truck driving cousin is any example, just go get another job. That is what he says whenever people complain about lack of work. Just go get another jobs
Yeah, that's the easy part. Saying 'Go find another job'.
In case you hadn't noticed, there are two types of jobs, Specialist jobs requiring lots of education... and McJobs that don't, but pay garbage.
So, apologies in advance if this comment gets too close to politics, however I will endeavor to keep it at "historic levels" of politics (ie, nothing current).
So, in many states across the US, especially in the post-WW2 era, you had a glut of new funding for schools. Tons of new jobs required new labor, and many of those jobs required semi-specialized skills (we're talking welding, machine shop stuff, carpentry, etc)
In comes the "Technical school". It's a novel idea: a school which focuses on educating students for a career in a labor field. While students would get some "language arts", history and other general education courses, the focus of the schools were on auto shop, metal shop, wood shop, etc.The academic premise being that students who do not show an aptitude for "college learning" would still be able to attain a decent life.
The problem though, and there were 2 major ones: first was bussing, second was bias. On the bussing front, school districts had a mandated system where they would go anywhere in the district to ensure students made it to and from school. Which isn't a problem. . . however, the way things happened in reality, was that students in poorer neighborhoods were bussed to the tech school, and POC's who lived in otherwise affluent neighborhoods were often bussed there as well. Which leads into problem 2 of bias. . . The courts eventually ruled that the technical school system, as practiced, was discriminatory against persons of color. They were actively suppressing social mobility and enforcing many of the social ills of the day.
Fast forward, and much of the funding mechanics that had previously held US schools to such high standards evaporated. Even State funded universities really aren't today, they are funded through alumni donations and particular major sports revenue.
The two biggest keys, in my mind to the success of any educational system is the acceptance of its value, and revenue.
Is it sad that my first thought on reading this was an image of Dunebuggy pulling a cart of dry goods and getting whipped by some guy shouting 'mush'?
Anyway, I think this is going to be more and more important.
What exactly are all the truck drivers going to be doing in 10 years? We can all complain about the potential safety of self-driving vehicles, but it's fething happening and we all know it. There's too much money to be made in not having to pay people to do the job for it not to happen. Where are those tens of thousands of people going to work with a job skill that is utterly obsolete? Hang out at the watering hole with the horses? Maybe a 4-Year degree isn't the best answer to every problem, but we seriously need some kind of system for retraining workers or moving people from one market sector that doesn't need them to another. And people will bitch about that I know, but hey. They're the ones with a job complaining about how they don't have a job. You can either get a new one or bitch all day only one is likely to pay you... Although the internet is full of people getting paid to bitch.
In any case, I feel like we're rapidly approaching the point where we can either start dealing the unemployment like adults, or we can just make pithy comments about boots and straps and enjoy all the wonders of a large and permanent underclass that can't get work.
1. . . that is a cool visual.
2. . . One of the things I noticed, while getting my MBA, was a very stark mindset difference within "business" in America and a country like, say, Germany. . . Part of my school's MBA program was a mandatory study abroad trip (typically 10-14 days, depending on which you took in a given year), and I happened to choose Germany. During said trip, we had many stops with discussions and "class" with various business leaders and by the end of the trip, my entire class came to largely the same conclusion about the mindset of business over there, compared to the US. And that is, as you allude to in your comment about truck drivers soon to be out of work. . . in the US, we have a system which prides itself on maximizing profits over all, which inherently means cutting wages at every opportunity, including cutting the number of employees. In Germany, by and large the business community looks at things with an eye to making their existing employees better at their job. This is done by increasing efficiency, or making certain tasks easier. It is done with an eye to improving the life conditions of the workforce. . . and if we look at things like productivity ratings, we see that in most comparable sectors, German workers, despite working a 32 or 26 hour week, is more productive than their american counterparts working 40+
I'd argue that mindset comes about in some part due to the state and view of the education system.
It seems we have crested the higher education wave where everyone and their pet hamster got a degree.
I had so many friends who graduated uni with me who ended up working in low paid jobs for years, some still do.
Unless you have something very specific in mind(who does at 18?) and the drive to do it it is a massive time and money sink. Which is what I keep telling younger family members. You are far better getting a a core trade/ IT skills, than doing any random degree. Or just take some time off after school, do any kind of work to see what the real world feels like before making decision and getting a drive to achieve.
University degree has been sold as a golden ticket to the last couple generation especially since the introduction of tuition fees. However this falls short for a lot of people and we get a bunch of "educated" young adults who have no idea how to do a job ending up in crap jobs with a feeling of entitlement and depression.
I am glad more and more people view trades with respect and go down that route. I think its healthy to cultivate a an education centred around pragmatism, and being able to making things and build things.
One thing in my experiance that needs to be taught better, at least in North America, is civics. The horrifying ignorance in both Canada and the USA by their citizenry in how their government is supposed to work is just SCARY
1. Basic civics classes that will let people know how government works (at least in their country). I don't know how many people I've hired (17-25 years old) that don't know basic things like how the electoral college works, who the Vice President is, who makes laws, etc. I actually had to take an employee to the post office to register for selective service once before he violated federal law and messed up his chance for college.
2. Home Economics doing better with basic life skills in the home. Sure, making that 5th pastry in one semester is awesome, but I'd like to see a little more effort being made on how to plan meals, and how to afford them, on a working-person's budget.
3. Basic home/auto repairs.
4. Basic life skills. How to plan ahead. How to not get yourself killed if you get stuck somewhere in winter. basic first aid, etc.
5 Actually failing students. I've seen some people that graduated high school with their peers that really shouldn't have. They just get passed up the ranks of the school until it's not the school's problem any more.
2. Home Economics doing better with basic life skills in the home. Sure, making that 5th pastry in one semester is awesome, but I'd like to see a little more effort being made on how to plan meals, and how to afford them, on a working-person's budget.
3. Basic home/auto repairs.
4. Basic life skills. How to plan ahead. How to not get yourself killed if you get stuck somewhere in winter. basic first aid, etc.
On these items, I absolutely agree with one caveat: EVERY effort needs to be made to ensure that students know these classes are useful for everyone. Before home-ec was cut from my middle and HS (my graduating class was the last to have it throughout our entire school career. . . the middle school cut it after 04, and by 06/07 they had dropped it from HS as well), it was treated largely as a "girl's" class, or the class guys took if they wanted to hang out with their girl crush for a semester. Seriously. Most of the guys I knew who took those classes, passed, but didn't do a single thing in class, instead relying on the work of their female cohorts.
2. Home Economics doing better with basic life skills in the home. Sure, making that 5th pastry in one semester is awesome, but I'd like to see a little more effort being made on how to plan meals, and how to afford them, on a working-person's budget.
3. Basic home/auto repairs.
4. Basic life skills. How to plan ahead. How to not get yourself killed if you get stuck somewhere in winter. basic first aid, etc.
On these items, I absolutely agree with one caveat: EVERY effort needs to be made to ensure that students know these classes are useful for everyone. Before home-ec was cut from my middle and HS (my graduating class was the last to have it throughout our entire school career. . . the middle school cut it after 04, and by 06/07 they had dropped it from HS as well), it was treated largely as a "girl's" class, or the class guys took if they wanted to hang out with their girl crush for a semester. Seriously. Most of the guys I knew who took those classes, passed, but didn't do a single thing in class, instead relying on the work of their female cohorts.
You see, that's just a pity. My parents insisted I learn to do the following things with proficiency before I moved out: 1. Balance a Checkbook 2. do my own taxes 3. change a tire 4. change my car's oil 5. read a paper map 6. sew a queen-sized bedspread 7. cook a full meal, from scratch, using NOTHING instant 8. Save half of what I earn 9. Wash my own clothes.
My parents were old-school, but both insisted that I learn both the "man chores" and the "woman things". Being broke, smelly, and malnourished is no way to go through life.
Home economics - life skills - even sex education can be classes that most students and teachers tend to treat as a bit of a "lax" period.
You don't get graded at the end, there's no test there's no pass and there's no fail. So there's no real pressure at either end of the scale. Students also often feel that "they know it all anyway" in those types of class.
I think that whilst I'd not want them to shift into a full "this is test zone pass fail" I would think that there's likely an attitude change toward those classes which is needed. A core part might well be (esp in the case of life skills and sex ed) ensuring that teachers are better trained, educated and equipped for those lessons. Since often as not they appear to be given to any teacher with a time slot for the period to teach the students.
I also agree that the University degree has been sold as a golden ticket. The problem as I see it though is it was sold as a golden ticket to both employees and employers. So its raised a whole series of generations who think that they have to get a degree to progress AND a whole series of generations who think they need to have staff with a degree to get good staff (or to progress staff up the scale). It's an immensely effective system for boosting student numbers in university education (and student loans) even if people are both ends feel that the university teaching isn't actually giving the employee "real" skills for their job.
I'm not denying the value of seal learning and research methods, but at the end of the day most of what a uni course teaches is how to read multiple sources and write an essay. Skills that could be taught and gained through life or through a training course for those who have need of those specific skills. Just like if you're a land worker your employer will put you through specific tool/machine training if its required and will ensure that your training tickets for existing skills that are required, are kept up to date.
You see, that's just a pity. My parents insisted I learn to do the following things with proficiency before I moved out: 1. Balance a Checkbook 2. do my own taxes 3. change a tire 4. change my car's oil 5. read a paper map 6. sew a queen-sized bedspread 7. cook a full meal, from scratch, using NOTHING instant 8. Save half of what I earn 9. Wash my own clothes.
My parents were old-school, but both insisted that I learn both the "man chores" and the "woman things". Being broke, smelly, and malnourished is no way to go through life.
Another aspect I think we shouldn't forget is repetition.
Changing a care tyre is something that most people still call the service people out for. Not because they can't do it, but because they've only done it that one or two times in their life before. So whilst they can do it they can't remember how to do it. It's EVER so easy to do something daft like position the jack wrongly or to do the nuts up in a circle and not alternating.
Actually on that subject I think the highway code and basic theory of driving should be taught at schools. Highway code from a young age, basic driving theory once you're getting closer to being eligible to take a test. For something that is a key life skill for the vast majority of it it baffles me that, typically unless you're a farmer, you won't sit in a car to drive or train or really learn anything about it, until you're in your late teens or twenties. Even then the amount of hours many spend behind the wheel being trained is tiny - some even manage to "cram" in a few weeks with an intensive course and pass.
Roads and cars are a big part of modern life. We should be teaching students how to read roads, navigate roads and how to behave on the road from a young age. For any that might ride a bicycle its already providing a valuable amount of training in specifically how the road works and also how car drivers are thinking and assessing situations.
PS with all these essential skills we are adding for teaching - any of us got any idea how to fit all the extra into the school system? UK side state schools tend to finish at about 3-4pm whilst private tend to finish closer to 5pm. Of course this balances out with state spending more weeks at school so that both balance out the total number of hours. One could claw back those hours by simply increasing the term time for private and increasing the school day length for state. In fact when you consider how many parents have to both work now it baffles me that we keep state schools ending early and thus forcing one parent to have to leave work early or juggle their work hours to be away before the end of the work day. Of course I guess one reason for it is to try and reduce traffic congestion, but we only do it in the evening; come the morning everyone is heading to school/work at the same time.
Argive wrote: It seems we have crested the higher education wave where everyone and their pet hamster got a degree.
I had so many friends who graduated uni with me who ended up working in low paid jobs for years, some still do.
Unless you have something very specific in mind(who does at 18?) and the drive to do it it is a massive time and money sink. Which is what I keep telling younger family members. You are far better getting a a core trade/ IT skills, than doing any random degree. Or just take some time off after school, do any kind of work to see what the real world feels like before making decision and getting a drive to achieve.
University degree has been sold as a golden ticket to the last couple generation especially since the introduction of tuition fees. However this falls short for a lot of people and we get a bunch of "educated" young adults who have no idea how to do a job ending up in crap jobs with a feeling of entitlement and depression.
The issue is the bold rather than the italics - aside from educated in inverted commas, which is a very loaded and potentially patronising judgement.
[From a UK perspective, but largely applicable across Europe] Higher education, outside of a few vocational courses, simply isn't traditionally meant to get people jobs. Some unis, mostly ex-polytechnics, specifically downplay academia in favour of job skills/transferable skills/whatever the current marketing speak is but mostly they're also teaching courses that are more explicitly vocational in the first place. More academic research institutions like to talk about their ability to get people jobs, and their administrators like to demand that we frame course proposals around the transferable skills that students will gain, but they generally make more of a song and dance about research-led teaching - and not that many people are researching 'finding and holding a job'. We're mostly still dealing in very niche topics and the real skills that are being taught (encouraged, really, I think it's deceptive for most of us to be described as 'teaching') are research, analysis, and presentation of results. Even in my department, where we do a lot of practical stuff to prepare people who want to work in commercial archaeology, the bulk of our undergraduate courses concern pretty focussed regions and periods or theory. Not many practical applications outside of academia for the relational ontologies and 3rd millennium religious landscape experiences that I talk to students about... It makes no sense to criticise these types of degrees because they don't prepare people for jobs. That isn't their purpose.
Universities are for educating people - in whatever those people fancy. Governments (and schools) trying to convince people that they're a gateway to employment and affluence are the issue.
That reminds me that my geography course had 100 students in the first year. When it came to skills teaching them was a bit of a mess because you have SO many students. Even by 3rd year you can still have optional models with large numbers of students and only one or two staff. That makes it very hard to teach multiple practical skills and I'd argue most graduate only knowing the practical skill(s) that were required for their chosen research project for the year (gah the name if it escapes me now)
I recall staff frustrated on one field trip that we couldn't use the soil charts well on our own. Thing was we had never really used them nor had any repetition of their use. It wasn't highly complex, but it was simply that there was no training build up and no reinforcement of training.
By situation both schools and uni tend to end up with an ineffective "one and done" on a lot of hands on skills. OF course the cure is simple - more teachers/lecturers so that class sizes come down dramatically. The cornerstone that breaks it is affording those teaching staff.
Overread wrote: Home economics - life skills - even sex education can be classes that most students and teachers tend to treat as a bit of a "lax" period.
You don't get graded at the end, there's no test there's no pass and there's no fail. So there's no real pressure at either end of the scale. Students also often feel that "they know it all anyway" in those types of class.
I think that whilst I'd not want them to shift into a full "this is test zone pass fail" I would think that there's likely an attitude change toward those classes which is needed. A core part might well be (esp in the case of life skills and sex ed) ensuring that teachers are better trained, educated and equipped for those lessons. Since often as not they appear to be given to any teacher with a time slot for the period to teach the students.
I also agree that the University degree has been sold as a golden ticket. The problem as I see it though is it was sold as a golden ticket to both employees and employers. So its raised a whole series of generations who think that they have to get a degree to progress AND a whole series of generations who think they need to have staff with a degree to get good staff (or to progress staff up the scale). It's an immensely effective system for boosting student numbers in university education (and student loans) even if people are both ends feel that the university teaching isn't actually giving the employee "real" skills for their job.
I'm not denying the value of seal learning and research methods, but at the end of the day most of what a uni course teaches is how to read multiple sources and write an essay. Skills that could be taught and gained through life or through a training course for those who have need of those specific skills. Just like if you're a land worker your employer will put you through specific tool/machine training if its required and will ensure that your training tickets for existing skills that are required, are kept up to date.
You see, that's just a pity. My parents insisted I learn to do the following things with proficiency before I moved out: 1. Balance a Checkbook 2. do my own taxes 3. change a tire 4. change my car's oil 5. read a paper map 6. sew a queen-sized bedspread 7. cook a full meal, from scratch, using NOTHING instant 8. Save half of what I earn 9. Wash my own clothes.
My parents were old-school, but both insisted that I learn both the "man chores" and the "woman things". Being broke, smelly, and malnourished is no way to go through life.
Another aspect I think we shouldn't forget is repetition.
Changing a care tyre is something that most people still call the service people out for. Not because they can't do it, but because they've only done it that one or two times in their life before. So whilst they can do it they can't remember how to do it. It's EVER so easy to do something daft like position the jack wrongly or to do the nuts up in a circle and not alternating.
Actually on that subject I think the highway code and basic theory of driving should be taught at schools. Highway code from a young age, basic driving theory once you're getting closer to being eligible to take a test. For something that is a key life skill for the vast majority of it it baffles me that, typically unless you're a farmer, you won't sit in a car to drive or train or really learn anything about it, until you're in your late teens or twenties. Even then the amount of hours many spend behind the wheel being trained is tiny - some even manage to "cram" in a few weeks with an intensive course and pass.
Roads and cars are a big part of modern life. We should be teaching students how to read roads, navigate roads and how to behave on the road from a young age. For any that might ride a bicycle its already providing a valuable amount of training in specifically how the road works and also how car drivers are thinking and assessing situations.
PS with all these essential skills we are adding for teaching - any of us got any idea how to fit all the extra into the school system? UK side state schools tend to finish at about 3-4pm whilst private tend to finish closer to 5pm. Of course this balances out with state spending more weeks at school so that both balance out the total number of hours. One could claw back those hours by simply increasing the term time for private and increasing the school day length for state. In fact when you consider how many parents have to both work now it baffles me that we keep state schools ending early and thus forcing one parent to have to leave work early or juggle their work hours to be away before the end of the work day. Of course I guess one reason for it is to try and reduce traffic congestion, but we only do it in the evening; come the morning everyone is heading to school/work at the same time.
Government also had a vested interest in keeping people in education as long as possible, as people in education aren't counted as unemployed.
When I went through college it felt like a pipeline to funnel everyone into university. It was only my parents pointing out other options like the military to me that stopped me from being sucked into a uni hole. now I'm in a better life circumstances than a lot of my pals who did.
There's a change starting to happen though with the anti-university mentality that genuinely talented kids are no longer going to university as they view it negatively. They are then not challenged academically and in their own core values and critical thinking in the career/training path they then choose... Then the population again is less educated (not to say you cannot get educated via vocational routes, more lack of development of true higher order thinking)
Fundamentally, many students for the good of society need to be progressing onto university. The practice of universities must change though. Lots of degrees can be binned, as going to university is not worthless in itself, it is the degree, skills and subject knowledge you actually get that is what the value is going to be measured against.
A ridiculous example in sport is a a degree in 'golf management studies'. Totally, and utterly useless, because you really need a PGA apprenticeship qualification, that covers all the important aspects of the degree and more... That is one of probably thousands across multiple subject areas that can be binned off, then university degrees will be worth the money again.
Also, and in the UK specifically, let's face it, university for many students is for the experience, not necessarily for the degree....
I think that whilst I'd not want them to shift into a full "this is test zone pass fail" I would think that there's likely an attitude change toward those classes which is needed. A core part might well be (esp in the case of life skills and sex ed) ensuring that teachers are better trained, educated and equipped for those lessons. Since often as not they appear to be given to any teacher with a time slot for the period to teach the students.
Absolutely agree with that. Even at the reasonably prestigious UK private school I went to, some of the teachers were horrifically ill-equipped for this. Nearly 30 years ago now but I still remember in excruciating detail having to give a talk to the rest of my class (of 13-year-old boys) on the buying of condoms. I still escaped relatively unscathed compared to the chap who had to talk about, um, 'self-gratification'...
Fundamentally, many students for the good of society need to be progressing onto university. The practice of universities must change though. Lots of degrees can be binned, as going to university is not worthless in itself, it is the degree, skills and subject knowledge you actually get that is what the value is going to be measured against.
I'd content that outside of vocational courses, it's usually the skills alone, or sometimes the skills plus the level of award. The specific course and the subject knowledge is largely irrelevant in most contexts unless you want an academic career or fancy being a teacher. As such, in most circumstances, it really doesn't matter what you study. The specific degree will carry some weight where people with similar levels of achievement are compared, but even then where you studied is generally far more important than what.
Also, and in the UK specifically, let's face it, university for many students is for the experience, not necessarily for the degree....
Is that really a problem? Firstly, that's half of what uni is good for. Second, I've several colleagues who went to do History or English or whatever because they just wanted to get smashed and have fun for four years but took an archaeology course for a laugh and are now working academics.
You are arguing that any degree should carry weight, but if over saturation of degrees don't give any benefit to the masses, and combined with some degrees being actually functionally useless and/or not fulfilling a requirement to perform a specific job re: the golf management course I mentioned, then that perpetuates the mind set that a degree is useless, as you don't get any benefit out of them, and thus makes the mind set that university is useless.
I am arguing for people to go to university, but only if you are going for a direct reason and also not being ripped off/sold down the river by the university who are trying to make quick money with bogus degrees that have been made up to justify an increased intake of students.
I didn't say anything was wrong going to university for the social aspect, I just mentioned a large contingent do so, which means if that is their main reason then actually, a degree unlocking doors for you career wise isn't their main concern and shouldn't necessarily expect it to. There's many caveats to that conversation anyway, there are just as many students on the right degree, who party hard and achieve as those who party hard on a functionally useless degree. It's their choice and their money, they can do as they please, it just shouldn't be used as a beat stick by the 'university is a waste of time' crowd to justify their thoughts when their main reason for going to uni is not to learn effectively.
That seems a little confused, as I read it. You appear to be arguing both that people should be able to go ahead and study whatever they fancy, for whatever reasons they wish, but also that prospective students should have a 'direct reason' and that universities should not offer courses that are 'functionally useless'. Obviously defining 'direct reason' or 'functionally useless' is necessary here, and doing so presents additional issues. Could you clarify? I'm not sure how you'd identify 'Benefit to the masses' or 'bogus degrees' either. The golf example needs fleshed out a bit, I think,
For what it's worth I'm not arguing that any degree should carry weight - I don't think they need to. What I say above is how their relative weight tends to be measured in practice - and it isn't according to the subject matter or field.
nfe wrote: That seems a little confused, as I read it. You appear to be arguing both that people should be able to go ahead and study whatever they fancy, for whatever reasons they wish, but also that prospective students should have a 'direct reason' and that universities should not offer courses that are 'functionally useless'. Obviously defining 'direct reason' or 'functionally useless' is necessary here, and doing so presents additional issues. Could you clarify? I'm not sure how you'd identify 'Benefit to the masses' or 'bogus degrees' either. The golf example needs fleshed out a bit, I think,
For what it's worth I'm not arguing that any degree should carry weight - I don't think they need to. What I say above is how their relative weight tends to be measured in practice - and it isn't according to the subject matter or field.
The direct reason can be the social reasons. You just accept that you may not get any benefit out of it job market wise if you are doing it for that reason. In addition to that, if you are going for that reason, you can be accepted onto a none functionally useless course still...
It can still provide prospects and legit skills to people who do want to pursue that career etc... Basically, no joke degrees is my main argument, if you are going for the experience and not the end goal necessarily, then that's your choice, I'm not hear to stop you or talk you out of it.
Without going into extreme detail, you need a specific PGA qualification for most serious golf related jobs. You get that from the PGA in the form of an apprenticeship of sorts, not a degree in golf management. It's the same as doing a BA in football sports coaching to be a professional football manager... In the UK you need your UEFA pro license to do that, so you go through UEFA's education program, there is zero need or use in you going to university if that is your goal unless you wanted to, however because universities want good numbers, they will bend the truth and state that the degree will help them, when it won't really, it may give them skills, theory and practice, but they can attain that in the official UEFA route due to the time taken to attain a pro license it's a 5 year process as it is....
The same analogy would be going to university to do a BA in plumbing, and not being a qualified plumber at the end of the degree... Functionally useless.
* Not saying a BA in plumbing exists mind, and if it does, I'm fairly certain that you would be a qualified plumber at the end of it, or even to get onto it, that's just a comparable example I made up to emphasise my point.
I also think we need to be aware that not all degrees and universities are equal, for my degree I effectively was required to be a capable lab technician by year three otherwise I wouldn't be able to pass, let alone succeed in that year. Some degrees and some institutions do not emphasise such practical skills and marry them with theory... Some degrees you cannot do that as they don't require any practical skills, but some it could be easily embedded within but is not.
The course is taught in collaboration with the PGA, you can apply for the PGA membership whilst doing the degree.
Yes, this is why I know it fairly well, it's in my local area. You can apply for PGA membership without it though, and you need PGA membership for plenty of jobs within golf... It's a functionally useless degree in terms of getting to the end goal, it may help, but it won't get you there on its own.
The course is taught in collaboration with the PGA, you can apply for the PGA membership whilst doing the degree.
Yes, this is why I know it fairly well, it's in my local area. You can apply for PGA membership without it though, and you need PGA membership for plenty of jobs within golf... It's a functionally useless degree in terms of getting to the end goal, it may help, but it won't get you there on its own.
What you just said applies to any job which requires membership of a professional organisation.
If a theoretical job requires membership of the Institute of Physics then a 1st class physics degree helps but doesn't get you there on its own.
Or, to use a real life example, Chartered Accountancy. Doesn't matter how well you did in your Accountancy degree, if you are not a member of the professional organisation and have achieved the professional certification, you cannot get a job as a chartered accountant. But that Accountancy degree is going to be extremely useful in getting that certification.
Not quite, as there are specific practical skills that must be demonstrated as part of the PGA, that you learn from the PGA itself... Additionally, you do not need a formal qualification to enter the PGA program and attain membership, I assume that is almost always going to be the case with most other professional bodies, it is certainly the case for mine BASES.
By the way, the PGA membership accreditation is roughly 5 years.... That's another factor to consider, including internships. That's a hell of a lot to do along with completing and paying for a university course... When you don't have to pay for and complete the university degree alongside it...
In America many people are citing a school to prison pipeline system that seems designed to funnel many kids, especially minority ones, from school to privately ran for profit prisons.
Some will ask "Shouldn't this be in the conspiracy theory thread?"
Also the fact that kids have been deliberately put in for profit jails wrongfully solely to make money off them is a given in america. A young black girl was sentenced to such a facility by a judge for a unflattering social media post about a teacher, the judge was later convicted of taking kickbacks from the detention facility for sending as many kids as possible to it in exchange for bribes.
The entire design of the western education system is flawed. It intends to make "well rounded" individuals which is essentially useless beyond the basics.
Children should learn to read and write and do math and get a general history lesson about the world.
By the time they reach 6th grade they should be on a specialized path. With 50% of all schooling directed about something they have shown aptitude for and 50% of time directed down a path of their own interests and or something society has shown an explicit need for.
At the end of high schooling every single student should be leaving with an employable skill or 2. Secondary school should literally be on the job training/ apprenticeship for those that have shown aptitude.
Xenomancers wrote: The entire design of the western education system is flawed. It intends to make "well rounded" individuals which is essentially useless beyond the basics.
Children should learn to read and write and do math and get a general history lesson about the world.
By the time they reach 6th grade they should be on a specialized path. With 50% of all schooling directed about something they have shown aptitude for and 50% of time directed down a path of their own interests and or something society has shown an explicit need for.
NO!!! lets not let 11 year olds be forced into a path just on their interest. I love dinosaurs when i was a kid, if i was forced into a path to be a Paleontologist or biologist, i would be miserable RN because i hate the heat and other stuff.
As much as there are problems with our education. the best thing there is, is it allows us to choose our own path in life free of what other people say we need or what they want.
Those who are pressed into careers from a young age can find direction and achieve a high level of skill before their 20s. However they might lack the freedom of choice and might be pressed into something that they later dislike or which isn't as best suited to them.
Meanwhile with total open education until you're hitting your late teens/20s then you run the risk that you will take longer to develop skills and also that you can very easily find yourself without a key skill or focus.
I'd say this latter area is a bigger issue today because of the way the job market has evolved. Losing long-term employment style and focusing more on short term contracts and shifting between places of employment and even types of employment creates a less stable working situation for many which can leave people getting lost "adrift".
Xenomancers wrote: The entire design of the western education system is flawed. It intends to make "well rounded" individuals which is essentially useless beyond the basics. Children should learn to read and write and do math and get a general history lesson about the world. By the time they reach 6th grade they should be on a specialized path. With 50% of all schooling directed about something they have shown aptitude for and 50% of time directed down a path of their own interests and or something society has shown an explicit need for.
NO!!! lets not let 11 year olds be forced into a path just on their interest. I love dinosaurs when i was a kid, if i was forced into a path to be a Paleontologist or biologist, i would be miserable RN because i hate the heat and other stuff. As much as there are problems with our education. the best thing there is, is it allows us to choose our own path in life free of what other people say we need or what they want.
At 11 I wanted to be a surgeon because I loved M*A*S*H. At 28 I'm an astrophysicist.
Most people have no idea what they want to do until much later in life. A broad general education which allows kids to experience a wide variety of disciplines before they focus on what they enjoy and are interested in most is what we should be aiming for.
Education is not for the sole purpose of filling neat little boxes of drones in the economy.
Lol Malus, it was the same for me, But it was because i watched Scrubs.
Also, what happens when those things we trained those kids to be go obsolete. What if, we trained kids to be mechanics, then suddenly, cars change so much that only the people who built them, can fix them.....like it is right now for some cars.
Right now, at 28, I am a proffesional in my field of ABA soon to be starting a masters.
I would never have found this field i love and im passionate about, if I was told as a kid, go work on X, while all the other "Smart" students go on to do things you can do.
Im a firm believer that, barring intellectual disability, anyone can do anything they want and learn anything(This is ofcourse barring various barriers to power that are set up, but thats a different discussion)
Anyone can learn anything if they wish.
Matt Swain wrote: In America many people are citing a school to prison pipeline system that seems designed to funnel many kids, especially minority ones, from school to privately ran for profit prisons.
Some will ask "Shouldn't this be in the conspiracy theory thread?"
Also the fact that kids have been deliberately put in for profit jails wrongfully solely to make money off them is a given in america. A young black girl was sentenced to such a facility by a judge for a unflattering social media post about a teacher, the judge was later convicted of taking kickbacks from the detention facility for sending as many kids as possible to it in exchange for bribes.
So hey, you may think your education systems have issues, but can you top this?
An aspect of the prison pipeline that even my activist friend's don't like to acknowledge is the gender discrepancy. You think being Black is bad? Try being male. White men are more likely to be effected by the school to prison pipeline than AA Women
Matt Swain wrote: In America many people are citing a school to prison pipeline system that seems designed to funnel many kids, especially minority ones, from school to privately ran for profit prisons.
Some will ask "Shouldn't this be in the conspiracy theory thread?"
Also the fact that kids have been deliberately put in for profit jails wrongfully solely to make money off them is a given in america. A young black girl was sentenced to such a facility by a judge for a unflattering social media post about a teacher, the judge was later convicted of taking kickbacks from the detention facility for sending as many kids as possible to it in exchange for bribes.
So hey, you may think your education systems have issues, but can you top this?
An aspect of the prison pipeline that even my activist friend's don't like to acknowledge is the gender discrepancy. You think being Black is bad? Try being male. White men are more likely to be effected by the school to prison pipeline than AA Women
Well, so what? Does it matter if males are being targeted more than females? And remember the black girl who got 4 months for a mean post on social media. But so what? White males drastically outnumber black females, of course they're going to get hit more with this. But even if males are being targeted more, so what? The fact it's being done TO ANY KIDS AT ALL makes it a terrible thing that should be stamped out immediately and brutally.
To try and veer the topic back away from potential lock territory, some thoughts I've often had in terms of "reforming" the education system (at least in the US):
So, When my daughter was entering kindergarten, she was in the first class of kindergartners to go through my state's adoption of Common Core. As I was in school at the time, I used my school resources to figure out what the feth common core is, as by that point there was already a lot of negative press surrounding "new math".
Here's the long and short of it, from the academic perspective: People who were, in a university setting, training future teachers (ie, the doctors of education) were having reports from their STEM colleagues that far too many American students entering their classrooms with aspirations for advanced engineering degrees, or other STEM related degrees relying on very advanced math programs, were incredibly far behind, despite many of them having on record, taken Calculus and Trig in high school. . . How were they behind? Well, the US system, "old math", had taught them merely how to fill in the correct answer. They did not understand the mathematical principles and laws functioning behind something as simple as 2+2=4.
So, a group of them began researching things, and coming up with a new pedagogy, new way of teaching STEM subjects that would bring US born students back inline with certain European and asian peer countries students.
A new method was found, and was in a late testing phase when, unfortunately, the capitalists got ahold of it, and forcibly made money on it. Quite simply put, the "product" wasn't finished yet. Couple that with the way the entire thing was foisted onto K-12 educators meant you had thousands of teachers across the US who had no idea what to do with the information they were given, and the first couple years they really were winging it. Obviously, the Kindergarten and 1st grade teachers had it the easiest, but the point still remains that because of the way the whole system was rushed out left many parents feeling less than positive about the whole thing.
Anyhow. . . I say all of that to get into the further idea: Roll more practicality into as many subjects as we can. . . Everyone agrees we need math, why not use more cooking examples, or actually cook using the math in class? Imo, we should already be spending less time on nonsense like Shakespeare (seriously, no one but a college professor who wrote their thesis on the guy really gifts a rats arse about the subject, and reading shakespeare does NOT get anyone interested in reading classics), and spending more time on adult life preparation.
The problem with common core IME is that when it comes to people who do not know that mehod, are then expected to still teach or help(Aka, parents) the kids, So you have this pushback from parents who dont understand it, with the old joke "Math is Math"
When i saw common core it made sense to teach that way TBH
Also, To the Shakespeare thing, Classics are classics for a reason, because old white rich men said they are. Shakespeare is fine, and his stories shaped a few, but there is no reason to keep bringing him up anf forced to read him. I think forcing kids to read alot of this old stuff, rather than what they want, is a big reason quite a bit of adults dont like reading for leisure.
Hey, if i had my way schools would teach critical thinking and have mandatory courses on recognizing and resisting propaganda and advertising.
But george carlin explained why that can't happen unless I somehow acquire superhuman powers equal to superman's and literally conquer america by force.
endlesswaltz123 wrote: The direct reason can be the social reasons. You just accept that you may not get any benefit out of it job market wise if you are doing it for that reason. In addition to that, if you are going for that reason, you can be accepted onto a none functionally useless course still...
So essentially 'direct reason' is 'any reason whatsoever you like? I don't think I can be following you, because 'direct reason' seems like you mean something more tangible?
It can still provide prospects and legit skills to people who do want to pursue that career etc... Basically, no joke degrees is my main argument
Yeah, I get that this is your argument - but defining 'joke degree' is tricky. You're largely conflating it with 'functionally useless', right? How do we determine functions? Or useless?
You have the golf example but it remains a bit vague. Which specific jobs require PGA membership and how would John Doe's golf management degree demonstrably not help if he and another applicant for a given job both have said PGA qualification but only John has the degree?
I know very little about work in golf. I know a couple pro golfers and some greenkeepers (who did relevant degrees) but I've never spoken to them much about it. I know lots of sports coaches, though, and you specifically align it with doing a BA in football sports coaching to become a football manager. I don't think anyone does such a course because they think it'll get them a job as a football manager, because most people who'd do such a course know a little about football, but doing it certainly helps you get jobs that your coaching badges alone will not. I actually have a friend who is the head coach at a US school as a direct result of doing exactly this. I know a couple others with sports coaching degrees with good jobs in the SRU. These provide more linear routes to work than a history or English degree, for instance. Maybe you think these are also functionally useless? There are plenty people out there who think all humanities are irrelevant degrees, but my guess is you don't. Your other example is one you invented.
Given the above, I'm not sure we're much closer to putting a finger on what a 'functionally useless degree' is? Is learning for its own sake functionally useless? Is learning to conduct research and communicate results functionally useless? What benchmark does a degree need to reach?
There is certainly a problem with universities deliberately misrepresenting courses or exaggerating their 'marketplace value'. However, at legitimate established universities, academics proposing new courses have had to jump through many, many hoops to demonstrate to administrators that said course contributes to students skills across a whole range of categories. There is almost always a need to canvass opinion from students and academics that have/are studying or teaching similar examples. Often there is a need to engage with relevant professional bodies or employers. Increase this by a couple orders of magnitude for entirely new degree programmes. I think it's pretty hard to honestly and objectively describe almost any degree as functionally useless - even if you strictly define yhat as making you employable in a given field (which I think we agree is far too narrow a definition?). It might not do what you wanted it to do, but that's drastically different.
It's really really simple. Just like you need to be a qualified plumber, to be a plumber, for many many professional golfing jobs (or most likely to perform specific tasks as most are multi-role), you need accredited PGA membership, club fitting in a shop for example, or determining/verifying player handicaps.
It really is not that vague, that is a direct requirement. The University course does not give you that, it doesn't even fulfil within it's modules all of the requirements to achieve that accreditation, and it doesn't fulfil the time length of achieving that accreditation. It may help, but it's a waste of money, as you do not need to go to university to achieve that.
endlesswaltz123 wrote: It's really really simple. Just like you need to be a qualified plumber, to be a plumber, for many many professional golfing jobs (or most likely to perform specific tasks as most are multi-role), you need accredited PGA membership, club fitting in a shop for example, or determining/verifying player handicaps.
It really is not that vague, that is a direct requirement. The University course does not give you that, it doesn't even fulfil within it's modules all of the requirements to achieve that accreditation, and it doesn't fulfil the time length of achieving that accreditation. It may help, but it's a waste of money, as you do not need to go to university to achieve that.
No I understand what you are arguing on that front. I'm asking you to demonstrate why it is functionally useless. Can you show, firstly, that if only one of two candidates for Golf Job A has said degree, that all other things being equal this would not help them in any way, and secondly, that it provides no other skills of any kind that have any functional use?
What are the criteria for 'functionally useful' and if you assert that 'social reasons' alone are sufficient for study, why does functional usefulness matter in any case?
If you need PGA membership and accreditation to get the job, and there is no requirement to have a degree, then the degree is not useful to a person trying to get that specific job.
Just to be clear, getting accredited by the PGA is not CHEAP. It usually requires 2 years at least of free full time internship. You usually have to demonstrate a serious background and dedication to golf prior to starting the process.
It is functionally useless as it absolutely is not required. If you are going to argue that spending £27k+ on top of achieving the above is a good investment just for the extra line on the CV that the degree will provide, then I really do not have anything more to say... The person will be more educated, but they won't be more capable to perform the job.
Just to add, one of the partial reasons I know about this is because I had a student that was investigating doing this degree who played golf at a fairly high level, but knew he wasn't going to get a career as a player. Travelling around the world playing, he asked the question a lot, all course managers said the degree wouldn't help they just want PGA accreditation... Anecdotal I admit, but it makes sense. It's a very practical job and learning process that is akin to an apprenticeship.
I'd argue personally if you were still intent on going to Uni as you wanted a degree on top, branch out into a related but different field, general sport science, sport therapy etc. Compliment your apprenticeship with additional learning, the golf management course just picks and chooses specific elements from the PGA accreditation that you will be taught through the apprenticeship anyway.
endlesswaltz123 wrote: If you need PGA membership and accreditation to get the job, and there is no requirement to have a degree, then the degree is not useful to a person trying to get that specific job.
Just to be clear, getting accredited by the PGA is not CHEAP. It usually requires 2 years at least of free full time internship. You usually have to demonstrate a serious background and dedication to golf prior to starting the process.
It is functionally useless as it absolutely is not required. If you are going to argue that spending £27k+ on top of achieving the above is a good investment just for the extra line on the CV that the degree will provide, then I really do not have anything more to say... The person will be more educated, but they won't be more capable to perform the job.
Just to add, one of the partial reasons I know about this is because I had a student that was investigating doing this degree who played golf at a fairly high level, but knew he wasn't going to get a career as a player. Travelling around the world playing, he asked the question a lot, all course managers said the degree wouldn't help they just want PGA accreditation... Anecdotal I admit, but it makes sense. It's a very practical job and learning process that is akin to an apprenticeship.
I'd argue personally if you were still intent on going to Uni as you wanted a degree on top, branch out into a related but different field, general sport science, sport therapy etc. Compliment your apprenticeship with additional learning, the gold management course just picks and chooses specific elements from the PGA accreditation that you will be taught through the apprenticeship anyway.
Not required is absolutely not synonymous with functionally useless. I feel you're getting really locked on this singular example and missing the main issue, however, so probably best to stop repeating a question about it.
Can we just get into what defines 'functionally useless'? If it's simply 'not a requirement for a given job' then that's the overwhelming majority of degrees. It may be your position that almost all degrees are functionally useless, but your posts don't feel like it.
If 'not required' isn't a sufficient definition of 'functionally useless' then what is? 'Not good value for money' seems similarly simplistic. 'Does not meet criteria it promises' might be closer but you're still going to learn things and I think you accept learning for it's own sake as valid? If we're to discourage students from pursuing useless and 'joke' degrees, how are we to identify them? You could make a case for a given degree being functionally useless to a particular person with specific goals, but that surely doesn't invalidate it for everyone, and we're in any case still left with the worthiness of all learning.
Not Online!!! wrote: I am advocating for mandatory classes in philosophy, not the deep stuff, but just logic.
Agreed. Schools need 10000% more Aristotle and Ayn Rand, and -100000% Plato and Kant.
We'd be colonizing Pluto in 10 years from now if we did this tomorrow.
Whats wrong with kant?
No my point of is really the baseline logical structures .
Morale Philosophy and other sub directions should be talked after that is secured , not before.
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Matt Swain wrote: Hey, if i had my way schools would teach critical thinking and have mandatory courses on recognizing and resisting propaganda and advertising.
But george carlin explained why that can't happen unless I somehow acquire superhuman powers equal to superman's and literally conquer america by force.
endlesswaltz123 wrote: If you need PGA membership and accreditation to get the job, and there is no requirement to have a degree, then the degree is not useful to a person trying to get that specific job.
Just to be clear, getting accredited by the PGA is not CHEAP. It usually requires 2 years at least of free full time internship. You usually have to demonstrate a serious background and dedication to golf prior to starting the process.
It is functionally useless as it absolutely is not required. If you are going to argue that spending £27k+ on top of achieving the above is a good investment just for the extra line on the CV that the degree will provide, then I really do not have anything more to say... The person will be more educated, but they won't be more capable to perform the job.
Just to add, one of the partial reasons I know about this is because I had a student that was investigating doing this degree who played golf at a fairly high level, but knew he wasn't going to get a career as a player. Travelling around the world playing, he asked the question a lot, all course managers said the degree wouldn't help they just want PGA accreditation... Anecdotal I admit, but it makes sense. It's a very practical job and learning process that is akin to an apprenticeship.
I'd argue personally if you were still intent on going to Uni as you wanted a degree on top, branch out into a related but different field, general sport science, sport therapy etc. Compliment your apprenticeship with additional learning, the gold management course just picks and chooses specific elements from the PGA accreditation that you will be taught through the apprenticeship anyway.
Not required is absolutely not synonymous with functionally useless. I feel you're getting really locked on this singular example and missing the main issue, however, so probably best to stop repeating a question about it.
Can we just get into what defines 'functionally useless'? If it's simply 'not a requirement for a given job' then that's the overwhelming majority of degrees. It may be your position that almost all degrees are functionally useless, but your posts don't feel like it.
If 'not required' isn't a sufficient definition of 'functionally useless' then what is? 'Not good value for money' seems similarly simplistic. 'Does not meet criteria it promises' might be closer but you're still going to learn things and I think you accept learning for it's own sake as valid? If we're to discourage students from pursuing useless and 'joke' degrees, how are we to identify them? You could make a case for a given degree being functionally useless to a particular person with specific goals, but that surely doesn't invalidate it for everyone, and we're in any case still left with the worthiness of all learning.
Okay, I will change my functionally useless statement, to inefficient (I'd argue 100% inefficient but I assume you will get hung up on me stating that also). I am in favour of education, I work in education. I am not an advocate of universities/education taking advantage of and exploiting students for the sole purpose of chasing funding, which they do by creating joke degrees.
This then perpetuates a line of thinking that universities and degrees are useless, because many students walk out of university and discover they actually didn't need a degree to fall into the job they end up getting, or finding out that saturation of degrees undervalue them as a whole. As I stated on the previous page right at the top of one of my comments. I have students that absolutely should be going to university as they are very capable students that can excel at university, scared because they don't want to get into debt for something that doesn't help them, I try to convince them that is not the case if you choose the correct course.
Just as bad are now training providers taking advantage of this fear culture, and selling them down the river, stating they do not need a degree to do certain jobs, they can learn in an apprenticeship format with them and be able to earn just as much as someone with a degree, however they are then locked out of the higher pay scales as they are not 'qualified' and are locked within the 'unqualified' pay scale... Maybe it's because I'm involved in sport so am very aware of the dodgy practices that go on and it is an issue fairly singular to sport, I would guess it is not just an issue in sport though... I also know of loopholes where learners can become primary school teachers without their GCSE's in Maths and/or English also but that is another conversation entirely... Well it isn't, it's a loop hole certain universities have created to help them inflate student numbers on certain teacher training courses.
Education must have integrity, I argue it does not in the UK currently.
Further thoughts on education - and a word that might instil fear in most of our regular membership - SPORTS. Or rather P.E. Physical Education.
I suspect its no shock that I was never a sporty person at school, in fact I'd wager its a more dominant theme in wargamer groups and online groups. Thing is looking back I realise now where the issues were in the system.
1) Rather like art, sports relies on "natural talent" and "personal interest" mixed with a touch of "making sure we have enough for the team".
2) Sports teachers don't get grades, they get trophies. Basically a sports teacher (or head of sports) "Value" is only in what their students can WIN for them. Throw out the ideas of good sportsmanship; they really only want as many wins as they can secure. Because at the end that's the only metric that sports classes collect. It's the only means by which the students are measured and, as a result, the staff as well.
This creates the wrong atmosphere. Students who excel "naturally" are pushed toward the teams to help win awards. As part of that they are often pressed into extra training to improve their sporting skills.
Meanwhile students who underperform are typically only given the official classes, are still trained in the basic sporting skills, but by and large are left out. They lack the natural talent/interest and its not abnormal to get staff drafted in from other departments who are not primarily sports teachers.
See the thing is, looking back, I realise now that this is a daft system that promotes unhealthy competitive spirit and also doesn't really "teach" students anything about their physical self. In fact its typically a torment for those who are not more inclined to activity outside of sports classes.
Changes I'd make:
1) I'd introduce the concept of personal improvement at the student level using multiple metrics. This means tracking a students personal performance at a more basic level. How long it takes them to run 100mm; 400; 800; the marathon. How much weight they can lift and with what muscles; etc... Alongside that basic hand-eye such as catching, passing, etc...
Basically a series of metrics that can be measured and assessed at the individual level. This allows a teacher and student to track a students physical development irrespective of if they are in a winning team or even a team at all.
2) I would put students against themselves not each other. Competing against each other will happen, if your'e all running someone is coming first and someone is coming last. However those who are always coming last if their only metric is competition against each other then there's little to enthuse them to progress. Instead I'd have students comparing their personal scores against themselves. Sure they'd compare against each other, but the teaching focus would be on personal comparison. It won't matter if you're always last, the core focus will be that between the start and end of the year, your personal position improves or at least maintains.
3) Underperforming students should get extra. If you're not all that fast or strong chances are you are in more need of exercise on more days of the week. Thus I'd say this group should be the focus of extra (eg afterschool) exercise. Again this is focusing on personal improvement.
4) Include sitdown lessons or combine with exercise periods. Basically teach students about their body. At present in the UK this doesn't really happen until you get to the optional GCSE/A-level selection to do "sports". Instead I think that sports teachers could easily adopt teaching like a good driving instructor and, alongside exercise (the activity) can impart understanding about basic details of the human body.
Teach students what muscles they are exercising; teach them good diet; teach them the fundamentals. Basically improve the students own ability to understand themselves.
5) Broader motivation toward other activities. Sports tends to focus on competing events - football, hockey etc.... I don't think you'll ever remove that, but at the same time I think you can work toward broadening student horizons as to what good physical health can unlock for them in life. This is about inspiring students more than anything. If you couple it to the multiple metric and personal improvement angles then it creates an atmosphere where even very out of shape and unfit students can see gradual improvement in themselves and can then see potential new things opening up for them in the future. Perhaps not jobs, but at least hobbies, interests etc...
I think "sports" has the wrong focus. It's far too keyed into the idea that a good head of sports will produce high performing sporting students keen for the competition. Instead I think it needs to instead stop looking at its top end and look at its bottom end. Especially when many 1st world nations are tackling obesity issues in adults and children.
If sports takes a much more active and inspirational role at the bottom end it will feed through to the top end naturally. I think shifting the focus for heads of sport off trophies and into student metrics you at least create options for schools that might not compete well, but which at least can show continual student personal improvement - which is basically what every other teacher has. No other class relies almost solely on award winning students to promote their department - sure its great to have, but its not the same as it is for the sports department.
Overread wrote: Further thoughts on education - and a word that might instil fear in most of our regular membership - SPORTS. Or rather P.E. Physical Education.
I suspect its no shock that I was never a sporty person at school, in fact I'd wager its a more dominant theme in wargamer groups and online groups. Thing is looking back I realise now where the issues were in the system.
1) Rather like art, sports relies on "natural talent" and "personal interest" mixed with a touch of "making sure we have enough for the team".
2) Sports teachers don't get grades, they get trophies. Basically a sports teacher (or head of sports) "Value" is only in what their students can WIN for them. Throw out the ideas of good sportsmanship; they really only want as many wins as they can secure. Because at the end that's the only metric that sports classes collect. It's the only means by which the students are measured and, as a result, the staff as well.
This creates the wrong atmosphere. Students who excel "naturally" are pushed toward the teams to help win awards. As part of that they are often pressed into extra training to improve their sporting skills.
Meanwhile students who underperform are typically only given the official classes, are still trained in the basic sporting skills, but by and large are left out. They lack the natural talent/interest and its not abnormal to get staff drafted in from other departments who are not primarily sports teachers.
See the thing is, looking back, I realise now that this is a daft system that promotes unhealthy competitive spirit and also doesn't really "teach" students anything about their physical self. In fact its typically a torment for those who are not more inclined to activity outside of sports classes.
Changes I'd make:
1) I'd introduce the concept of personal improvement at the student level using multiple metrics. This means tracking a students personal performance at a more basic level. How long it takes them to run 100mm; 400; 800; the marathon. How much weight they can lift and with what muscles; etc... Alongside that basic hand-eye such as catching, passing, etc...
Basically a series of metrics that can be measured and assessed at the individual level. This allows a teacher and student to track a students physical development irrespective of if they are in a winning team or even a team at all.
2) I would put students against themselves not each other. Competing against each other will happen, if your'e all running someone is coming first and someone is coming last. However those who are always coming last if their only metric is competition against each other then there's little to enthuse them to progress. Instead I'd have students comparing their personal scores against themselves. Sure they'd compare against each other, but the teaching focus would be on personal comparison. It won't matter if you're always last, the core focus will be that between the start and end of the year, your personal position improves or at least maintains.
3) Underperforming students should get extra. If you're not all that fast or strong chances are you are in more need of exercise on more days of the week. Thus I'd say this group should be the focus of extra (eg afterschool) exercise. Again this is focusing on personal improvement.
4) Include sitdown lessons or combine with exercise periods. Basically teach students about their body. At present in the UK this doesn't really happen until you get to the optional GCSE/A-level selection to do "sports". Instead I think that sports teachers could easily adopt teaching like a good driving instructor and, alongside exercise (the activity) can impart understanding about basic details of the human body.
Teach students what muscles they are exercising; teach them good diet; teach them the fundamentals. Basically improve the students own ability to understand themselves.
5) Broader motivation toward other activities. Sports tends to focus on competing events - football, hockey etc.... I don't think you'll ever remove that, but at the same time I think you can work toward broadening student horizons as to what good physical health can unlock for them in life. This is about inspiring students more than anything. If you couple it to the multiple metric and personal improvement angles then it creates an atmosphere where even very out of shape and unfit students can see gradual improvement in themselves and can then see potential new things opening up for them in the future. Perhaps not jobs, but at least hobbies, interests etc...
I think "sports" has the wrong focus. It's far too keyed into the idea that a good head of sports will produce high performing sporting students keen for the competition. Instead I think it needs to instead stop looking at its top end and look at its bottom end. Especially when many 1st world nations are tackling obesity issues in adults and children.
If sports takes a much more active and inspirational role at the bottom end it will feed through to the top end naturally. I think shifting the focus for heads of sport off trophies and into student metrics you at least create options for schools that might not compete well, but which at least can show continual student personal improvement - which is basically what every other teacher has. No other class relies almost solely on award winning students to promote their department - sure its great to have, but its not the same as it is for the sports department.
Pretty much all your recommendations now happen. PE is a very different beast to even 10 years ago, let alone 20 when I was at school. Just like any lessons they are diversified now also, and you are grouped on ability. No point the teachers coaching a kid that can already bowl a ball, to bowl a ball when many cannot, so the ones that need the coaching are placed in coaching groups whilst already competent kids go into game situations, in very large schools/departments the kids are in different locations so as to not impact on confidence and motivation by seeing some already achieving whilst they are struggling. There is also more diversity in lessons now, all students are taught dance for example (something I personally don't agree with, but I appreciate the logic behind it). However, PE has been pillaged, on a whole students get far less hours than they did historically. Which means, they have to do all of the above changes, but in less time. That does not work.
There are also other issues, where none olympic sports were removed from the PE A level and GCSE practical assessment. Meaning if you had a child that happened to be outstanding at a non olympic sport, squash for example, they no longer can be assessed completing skills in that sport (there's workarounds, but rules as written, it cannot happen). The logic being, how are teachers meant to be able to assess all sports and thus a persons competency within it. However, that is the case with most olympic sports, you won't find many PE teachers that can accurately assess competency in archery, or shooting, or equestrian for example...
Ahh that's a mix of good and bad to hear. I agree its been (counts) at least 20odd years since I was in education so yeah I'm not surprised to hear that there has been change. Though I agree it sounds daft to make such positive steps in one area, but then cut the hours. You can improve the teaching and focus, but the body needs time to develop muscles and improve itself - you can't get that without the hours.
Dance actually makes sense to me in being included. Most sports are crude in how your body moves and works; if you can throw the ball you can throw the ball. Dance is all about precision of motion and balance. Heck if you look at a fair few martial arts a good chunk of training is body motions done almost exactly like a dance.
My specific issue with dance is mainly because it is doubling up on gymnastics at the latter key stages which is also mandatory, and I'd argue gymnastics is more valuable due to the strength development mainly as well. This is from a pure development of physical skills point of view mind. I'm aware there's other factors like rhythm etc which are also developed in dance, but I'd then argue, kids should be learning that in music and performing arts anyway, there's no reason to clog up PE further.
Dance is just embedding basic functional movement patterns anyway from a pure PE standpoint (discounting the development of rhythm, timing etc), which is what you spend the majority of key stage 1 and most of key stage 2 learning to do anyway. Realistically, it is not required and takes up time that can be spent on other areas at key stage 3, yet is mandatory (EDIT: I said earlier it was also mandatory at stage 4, but it is not)... Then as stated above, gymnastics is mandatory at all key stages anyway so really it's not actually going to give much further benefit. If it was an option for students I'd be fine with it, but like I said, it is mandatory.
PE politics anyway, there's always disagreement about it's mandatory inclusion past KS 1 and 2.
In regards to the hours cut... It's frustrating, but it's what has happened to many areas, it's not as grim as what has happened to the subjects revolving around the arts at least anyway.
Matt Swain wrote: In America many people are citing a school to prison pipeline system that seems designed to funnel many kids, especially minority ones, from school to privately ran for profit prisons.
Some will ask "Shouldn't this be in the conspiracy theory thread?"
Also the fact that kids have been deliberately put in for profit jails wrongfully solely to make money off them is a given in america. A young black girl was sentenced to such a facility by a judge for a unflattering social media post about a teacher, the judge was later convicted of taking kickbacks from the detention facility for sending as many kids as possible to it in exchange for bribes.
So hey, you may think your education systems have issues, but can you top this?
An aspect of the prison pipeline that even my activist friend's don't like to acknowledge is the gender discrepancy. You think being Black is bad? Try being male. White men are more likely to be effected by the school to prison pipeline than AA Women
Well, so what? Does it matter if males are being targeted more than females? And remember the black girl who got 4 months for a mean post on social media. But so what? White males drastically outnumber black females, of course they're going to get hit more with this. But even if males are being targeted more, so what? The fact it's being done TO ANY KIDS AT ALL makes it a terrible thing that should be stamped out immediately and brutally.
It's rate, not overall numbers. People tend to point out that the rate for AA individuals is higher, therefore it must be systemic discrimination. However, when it comes to systemic discrimination against men they tend to turn a blind eye.
1) Rather like art, sports relies on "natural talent" and "personal interest" mixed with a touch of "making sure we have enough for the team".
2) Sports teachers don't get grades, they get trophies. Basically a sports teacher (or head of sports) "Value" is only in what their students can WIN for them. Throw out the ideas of good sportsmanship; they really only want as many wins as they can secure. Because at the end that's the only metric that sports classes collect. It's the only means by which the students are measured and, as a result, the staff as well.
This creates the wrong atmosphere. Students who excel "naturally" are pushed toward the teams to help win awards. As part of that they are often pressed into extra training to improve their sporting skills.
Meanwhile students who underperform are typically only given the official classes, are still trained in the basic sporting skills, but by and large are left out. They lack the natural talent/interest and its not abnormal to get staff drafted in from other departments who are not primarily sports teachers.
Pretty much all your recommendations now happen. PE is a very different beast to even 10 years ago, let alone 20 when I was at school. Just like any lessons they are diversified now also, and you are grouped on ability. No point the teachers coaching a kid that can already bowl a ball, to bowl a ball when many cannot, so the ones that need the coaching are placed in coaching groups whilst already competent kids go into game situations, in very large schools/departments the kids are in different locations so as to not impact on confidence and motivation by seeing some already achieving whilst they are struggling. There is also more diversity in lessons now, all students are taught dance for example (something I personally don't agree with, but I appreciate the logic behind it). However, PE has been pillaged, on a whole students get far less hours than they did historically. Which means, they have to do all of the above changes, but in less time. That does not work.
There are also other issues, where none olympic sports were removed from the PE A level and GCSE practical assessment. Meaning if you had a child that happened to be outstanding at a non olympic sport, squash for example, they no longer can be assessed completing skills in that sport (there's workarounds, but rules as written, it cannot happen). The logic being, how are teachers meant to be able to assess all sports and thus a persons competency within it. However, that is the case with most olympic sports, you won't find many PE teachers that can accurately assess competency in archery, or shooting, or equestrian for example...
Here in America-land things are a bit different.
PE has still been pillaged heavily, with reduced instruction time. Even by the time I left school (not college/uni) 15 years ago, the youngest grade levels were being taught by a part-time teacher (seriously, they'd have a teacher for a half day, or only 2 or 3 days a week. . . what resulted was that there are now fewer PE teachers because the few that are left have gamed the system where, in order to be FT, they work 2 schools). . And then, the obesity problem is such that we've now devolved "PE" to the point where WALKING is an entire fething class on its own. Seriously, people are so inactive that something as miniscule as walking is considered a physical education subject.
On the sports front you tend to have a bit of antagonistic dichotomy going on. Basically, school administrators who have a football (american style) team, or basketball or soccer or whatever team, want to win, but at the same time, they want to hire the next John Wooden. . . the "best" coaches are the ones who sell themselves as ones who coach character, and greater character (sportsmanship, life skills, etc) has the happy coincidental affect of producing wins.
But, on the flip side, some schools will tie a portion of a team's budget to their previous records. Oftentimes, this budget comes at the expense of (IMHO) more important educational facets. Fun story, in college, I was taking a political science course which required us to participate in some civic action. Mine was to attend a school board budget meeting which was open to public (I think I was one of maybe 5 people in the audience. It was pathetic), which I almost got thrown out of because all of us in the audience had access to the same budgetary paperwork as the board, and I was grilling them on why the library had received no new materials in 4 years, while the football team had resurfaced their astroturf field twice in the last 6 years, and why the football team got new helmets, new uniforms, new everything every year, while the part of the school which produces more college bound scholars was languishing with outdated and worn out material.
Most PE courses in public schools only cover track and field, and "american" sports (basketball, baseball, football, rarely soccer). . . You'll find that pretty much all of the other olympic sports, like equestrian, fencing, gymnastics, etc. are all consigned to private clubs, and some of those clubs are very much economically bound to certain tiers of society.
Yeah, baring in mind I am from the UK so I don't fully understand all the synergetic factors in the US PE system, but the collegiate recruitment process surely is the main factor for the athletic kids being the focus. Most of the teachers/coaches will ideally be looking to move up the system order/developmental pyramid, meaning team/athlete results is super important for their career, at the detriment of the other kids. For schools that do not have great progression rates, potentially due to socio-economic reasons, those sporty kids are a prime route in progressing kids onto further education also (via scholarships), meaning the school is invested in the sport teams doing well also as every kid who goes to college etc counts.
There's a hell of a lot I seriously admire about the sport pyramid in the US, including how effectively sport academies/development programs are embedded right within the education program, whereas in the UK it's professional teams that partner with education programs which causes strain, as it is effectively a money accruing exercise rather than an actual development program (I'm not talking about high calibre football clubs here btw, I'm talking 5th, 6th tier team development programs). However, as detailed above, the US program comes with its own issues as it is results orientated.
Funding seems to be a common issue, surprise surprise...
TBF, funding, and the impact on schooling is a massive issue, as seen where funding for Schooling programms has been cut, especially in regions with weak structures and that directly lead to an increase in people that are not even able to read.
It's also an oxymoron, imo, because whilest you "saved "cost by cutting funding , you basically created more cost now through external effects like crime and internal effects by having these regions becoming massive issues for wellfare overall for a society.
Changing the topic slightly, for those of you who have kids at school in the UK, specifically teenage kids at secondary school and higher, prepare yourselves for this year... Winter is coming.
It's going to be a rough one, even more so that with the faff of exam results we have just had. I'm hoping most rules in regards to covid are relaxed come January as there will be enough time to negate the negative effects of the potential (almost guaranteed) faff that will be the first school term. If schools are not fully reopened at full capacity or at least for students who are taking important exams (GCSE's, and A levels... SAT's shouldn't get the same priority) by January then I do not think exams will be able to be conducted the in May/June in good faith. There will not be enough time to effectively prepare the students.
Okay, I will change my functionally useless statement, to inefficient (I'd argue 100% inefficient but I assume you will get hung up on me stating that also).
I think this rather implies I was being pedantic about your specific phrasing. I was trying to get you to define an expression regarding your view of some degrees upon which your entire argument lay. Inefficient makes sense. I understand what you mean, now.
I am in favour of education, I work in education. I am not an advocate of universities/education taking advantage of and exploiting students for the sole purpose of chasing funding, which they do by creating joke degrees.
Universities sure do love to exploit people, including students, but by and large that's staff and grad students. Anyone working in a university will tell you that we are pushed, often aggressively, by administrators and policy makers to bend over backwards to ensure undergraduates wildest dreams are fulfilled wherever possible. And frequently where it's impossible.. Student experience and satisfaction are, by a huge distance, the main drivers in virtually all aspects of university practices and policies.
As such, beyond the notorious types of online institutions I mention above, and some false advertising to (usually foreign) students conducted by places like Anglia Ruskin (where adverts tend to be framed as 'Anglia Ruskin UNIVERSITY in CAMBRIDGE), I'm not sure how many examples of universities exploiting undergraduates in terms of money for little in return there really are, at least in the contrived way you suggest? You haven't demonstrated the golf one and your other example I know to be incorrect in at least some instances. There are certainly examples of universities misrepresenting the opportunities their courses provide (see Anglia Ruskin paying out £61k for being sued on this basis last year) but primarily, I believe (though happy to have clear examples presented to me), this is restricted to odd examples, mostly in business schools, and predatory online 'universities'.Definitely a problem, but not, for me, the main thing leading to...
This then perpetuates a line of thinking that universities and degrees are useless, because many students walk out of university and discover they actually didn't need a degree to fall into the job they end up getting, or finding out that saturation of degrees undervalue them as a whole.
I don't think either perceptions of degrees as useless or the oversaturation of degrees in the employment market are the fault of universities. Assuming we still mean inefficient when we say useless (and I think the vast majority of people who think any degree is truly useless have bought the well-trodden 'Mickey Mouse Degree' sneering that is directed at some courses, generally because they've fundamentally misunderstood what they are, then this really lies at the feet of government. Few degrees have severe cost/benefit mismatches until you're paying tuition fees.
Similarly, though oversaturation is unquestionably an issue of you want a degree purely as a market tool, but, again, is less the fault of universities and more the fault of the now longstanding 50% target. In and of itself this was a reasonable goal, but it is preposterous if married to the belief that a degree of a ticket to prosperity.
Education must have integrity, I argue it does not in the UK currently.
Potentially another semantic quagmire here I think this is very true in some areas, albeit I believeIt has more to with staff relations and and league tabling than with how education is delivered to learners.
I work in FE. I literally have to drag students through, giving them extensive 1 to 1 coaching on assessments towards the end of the year to ensure they pass, which lacks integrity, as they don't deserve to pass, I in some cases dictate to them what to write... I'm instructed to do this by my line manager, who is instructed to ensure the kids at least pass by their senior and it goes up the chain...
I thought universities didn't have the same delight as the above as funding was guaranteed whether a student passed or failed (though, it doesn't look great in the data for students to fail), I may be mistaken though with that, I'd like to know though.
The main issue at FE is, if the student fails, we don't get the funding for those students.... That can have a huge impact on the institution finances when each student is worth £4.5k per year, and evidently at such an amount, it's a problem the exponentially escalates the more that fail. Whole departments have disappeared over the summer when if their area (or worse, other areas) have had poor years...
endlesswaltz123 wrote: I work in FE. I literally have to drag students through, giving them extensive 1 to 1 coaching on assessments towards the end of the year to ensure they pass, which lacks integrity, as they don't deserve to pass, I in some cases dictate to them what to write... I'm instructed to do this by my line manager, who is instructed to ensure the kids at least pass by their senior and it goes up the chain...
I thought universities didn't have the same delight as the above as funding was guaranteed whether a student passed or failed (though, it doesn't look great in the data for students to fail), I may be mistaken though with that, I'd like to know though.
The main issue at FE is, if the student fails, we don't get the funding for those students.... That can have a huge impact on the institution finances when each student is worth £4.5k per year, and evidently at such an amount, it's a problem the exponentially escalates the more that fail. Whole departments have disappeared over the summer when if their area (or worse, other areas) have had poor years...
I'm a fairly brutal marker but marking schemes make it very difficult to fail a student. If you submit most coursework but put zero effort in, you can pretty much guarantee you'll come out with a 3rd even if you've next to no aptitude for the degree. This does not only apply to ex-polytechnics or institutions that people might have condescending ideas about. I teach at a Russel Group, my partner teaches at another one, she used to teach at Cambridge, and has just spent three years as an external examiner for an Oxford department maligning the grades awarded to mediocre submissions.
Some unis are hard for undergrads to get in to, but that uni will break its back* to make sure they stay and get out the other end as easily as possible and feel they've had their money's worth.
*in terms of participating in the strictly educational side, often the pastoral care and policies on diversity and equal opportunity can be dreadful.
Put simply, when it comes to Education, one size does not fit all. And not should it.
Frankly, we can’t spend enough on education, because it’s young peeps very first part of life.
You want a healthy, stable economy and flexible workforce? Got to invest in it properly, and that starts with teaching kids useful stuff, in a way that suits them as much as possible.
Not Online!!! wrote: I am advocating for mandatory classes in philosophy, not the deep stuff, but just logic.
Agreed. Schools need 10000% more Aristotle and Ayn Rand, and -100000% Plato and Kant.
We'd be colonizing Pluto in 10 years from now if we did this tomorrow.
Ayn Rand has done immeasurable damage to your education system through the policies that those who espouse her beliefs have enacted.
No school needs Ayn Rand. She was a mediocre author and a terrible human being who tried to justify her terribleness by claiming that greed is justified.
Not Online!!! wrote: I am advocating for mandatory classes in philosophy, not the deep stuff, but just logic.
Agreed. Schools need 10000% more Aristotle and Ayn Rand, and -100000% Plato and Kant.
We'd be colonizing Pluto in 10 years from now if we did this tomorrow.
Ayn Rand has done immeasurable damage to your education system through the policies that those who espouse her beliefs have enacted.
No school needs Ayn Rand. She was a mediocre author and a terrible human being who tried to justify her terribleness by claiming that greed is justified.
I believe it isn't as black and white, but like with any radical ideology, (and libertarianism is radical) it attempts to reach an utopia, which is just another dystopia.
As for prefering her over kant... no, just no, not to mention plato,,,
Objectivism does have some positive aspects, but like any flawed philosophy, it takes them to the extreme without considering and compensating for human nature and reality.
Also, you can't really espouse Aristotle without Plato. The former being a student of the latter.
Not Online!!! wrote: I am advocating for mandatory classes in philosophy, not the deep stuff, but just logic.
Agreed. Schools need 10000% more Aristotle and Ayn Rand, and -100000% Plato and Kant.
We'd be colonizing Pluto in 10 years from now if we did this tomorrow.
Ayn Rand has done immeasurable damage to your education system through the policies that those who espouse her beliefs have enacted.
No school needs Ayn Rand. She was a mediocre author and a terrible human being who tried to justify her terribleness by claiming that greed is justified.
Also: Her stuff's nowhere close to philosophy or of pedagogical worth.
Not Online!!! wrote: I am advocating for mandatory classes in philosophy, not the deep stuff, but just logic.
Agreed. Schools need 10000% more Aristotle and Ayn Rand, and -100000% Plato and Kant.
We'd be colonizing Pluto in 10 years from now if we did this tomorrow.
Ayn Rand has done immeasurable damage to your education system through the policies that those who espouse her beliefs have enacted.
No school needs Ayn Rand. She was a mediocre author and a terrible human being who tried to justify her terribleness by claiming that greed is justified.
“There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs." -John Rogers.
nfe wrote: Few degrees have severe cost/benefit mismatches until you're paying tuition fees.
And here is where your misconception arises. Here in America you will be paying tuition for college education barring a full-ride scholarship - which is quite rare. It's quite likely you'll be paying multiple years of future income in tuition even IF you get a decent job.
EDIT: Reading all this makes me very glad I opted out of having kids. But now I'm quite worried about some of my younger friends.
nfe wrote: Few degrees have severe cost/benefit mismatches until you're paying tuition fees.
And here is where your misconception arises. Here in America you will be paying tuition for college education barring a full-ride scholarship - which is quite rare. It's quite likely you'll be paying multiple years of future income in tuition even IF you get a decent job.
nfe wrote: Few degrees have severe cost/benefit mismatches until you're paying tuition fees.
And here is where your misconception arises. Here in America you will be paying tuition for college education barring a full-ride scholarship - which is quite rare. It's quite likely you'll be paying multiple years of future income in tuition even IF you get a decent job.
Sorry, not following. Which misconception?
Basically, the tuition fees, make it so, that even if you find immediate job on top of beeing in a high earning bracket, still leaves you heavily indebted, makes it so, that even the best case scenario results in economic damage done to you.
or atleast that is how i interpret his point.
But considering the ammount of student debt accumulated in the US, and the marked increase between 2005-2012 not to mention the further snowballing, it will be a whole generation basically working debt away instead of actually contributing productively academically speaking.
nfe wrote: Few degrees have severe cost/benefit mismatches until you're paying tuition fees.
And here is where your misconception arises. Here in America you will be paying tuition for college education barring a full-ride scholarship - which is quite rare. It's quite likely you'll be paying multiple years of future income in tuition even IF you get a decent job.
Sorry, not following. Which misconception?
Basically, the tuition fees, make it so, that even if you find immediate job on top of beeing in a high earning bracket, still leaves you heavily indebted, makes it so, that even the best case scenario results in economic damage done to you.
or atleast that is how i interpret his point.
Sure but we were talking about where the blame lies for UK perceptions of university as being inefficient and I was saying that it's largely the fault of government introducing tuition fees (in 1997). Where there are no or negligible tuition fees (e.g. the UK before the late 90s, Scotland today, lots of Europe) the coat/benefit equation is much more favourable.
But considering the ammount of student debt accumulated in the US, and the marked increase between 2005-2012 not to mention the further snowballing, it will be a whole generation basically working debt away instead of actually contributing productively academically speaking.
'Academically speaking' has confused me here. What do you mean?
Diversion.
Basically you won't work aswell when you have to fear that you can't pay rent at the end of the month.
As for the UK one, i guess that has to do with the whole Anglo-saxon sphere beeing thrown into one pot.
Fret not happens all the time with everybody else.
nfe wrote: Few degrees have severe cost/benefit mismatches until you're paying tuition fees.
And here is where your misconception arises. Here in America you will be paying tuition for college education barring a full-ride scholarship - which is quite rare. It's quite likely you'll be paying multiple years of future income in tuition even IF you get a decent job.
Sorry, not following. Which misconception?
Basically, the tuition fees, make it so, that even if you find immediate job on top of beeing in a high earning bracket, still leaves you heavily indebted, makes it so, that even the best case scenario results in economic damage done to you.
or atleast that is how i interpret his point.
That may be true in the US, but for UK students studying in the UK, your student loan is probably the best loan you'll ever get in your life. It's not repayable until you're earning above a certain threshold, your repayments come out of your salary before tax, those repayments are worked out as a percentage of your earnings above that threshold and it doesn't actually get taken into account as debt when you apply for any other loans, such as a mortgage.
I agree the US system seems to have much higher potential to become an economic burden rather than bonus, depending on your degree and how much it actually helps you in your career. The commodification of education is a problem everywhere it occurs but it does seem the US has taken that to an extreme, at least from my relatively vague understanding of their system.
Not Online!!! wrote: Diversion.
Basically you won't work aswell when you have to fear that you can't pay rent at the end of the month.
Ok, gotcha. Yes for sure the impending debt burden is hardly conducive to peak performance.
As for the UK one, i guess that has to do with the whole Anglo-saxon sphere beeing thrown into one pot.
Fret not happens all the time with everybody else.
In the UK, the first and biggest benefit of our student loan system is that they do not impact on credit rating, and secondly you pay back 9% of your wages once you earn over a specific earning threshold (£1615 a month pre tax and deductions).
Whilst it does become quite a large payment when you are earning signification money, £175 per month on a salary of £50k for example (pre tax deduction though, so it's not all that bad), it isn't the most horrendous amount either. The other factor is, that it is written off after 30 years if you have not repaid it. Meaning if your degree does not provide you with any significant financial benefit through your life time, you haven't paid for it in full.
Whilst this sounds nice. The interest rates were hiked on the loan and they are now at anything from 2.6% to 5.6% APR depending on an array of circumstance (linked to RPI, as well as whether you are actively studying). Meaning you can see Thousands added to your balance each year if you are not currently repaying them.
They also removed many of the grants etc that use to be in place for poorer students also.
It's not an ideal system but it is nowhere near as bad as some countries have it.
I'm not actually opposed to tuition fees in some sense, they certainly have played a part in the growing places at university as they are arguably receiving more funding (contentious for some when your perform a thorough analysis), I do have a bitter taste in my mouth that policy makers who decided students should pay most certainly received their education completely free though...
Basically, you get lumped in with the US because you both speak english and english dominates a whole discurs on it's own. Regardless of local differences.
It's the same thing that happens to swiss academic discurse, in general often just lumped in with the "germans" ignoring the sizeable italian and french groups and systems in place. And other peculiarities.
I'm not actually opposed to tuition fees in some sense, they certainly have played a part in the growing places at university as they are arguably receiving more funding (contentious for some when your perform a thorough analysis), I do have a bitter taste in my mouth that policy makers who decided students should pay most certainly received their education completely free though...
seems indeed asinine, but is quite en vogue i guess.
Not Online!!! wrote: Basically, you get lumped in with the US because you both speak english and english dominates a whole discurs on it's own. Regardless of local differences.
It's the same thing that happens to swiss academic discurse, in general often just lumped in with the "germans" ignoring the sizeable italian and french groups and systems in place. And other peculiarities.
I see. Anglo-Saxon doesn't get used very often to mean Anglophone. Well, outside white supremacist circles.
I think Vulcan just hasn't read all the posts and didn't realise we were talking about the UK, rather than assumed homogeneity.
Not Online!!! wrote: Diversion.
Basically you won't work aswell when you have to fear that you can't pay rent at the end of the month.
It may be true that one does not perform as well when having a massive debt over your head, however I disagree that academians in the US aren't producing. I'd dare say its one of the few things they are doing.
Most schools in the US require its professorship to be actively pursuing something in their field. The school wants its professorship to be current and active in their respective fields and publishing, or working on publishing of academic works. My undergrad advisor was working on a historical article on baptismal rituals while I was in his program. After I entered business school, and he'd received the chair of a sort of hybrid position (an alum who made some serious money, endowed a chair which bridged the history and business departments) and has just released a book on the historical impact of the democratization of programming and its effect on society.
If I take to google, I can find reviews, or announcements of some book or article written and published within the past 2-3 years. . . Unfortunately in the US, this is largely the "only" way that professors will make any decent money, and that's through constant research and writing articles.
Not Online!!! wrote: Diversion. Basically you won't work aswell when you have to fear that you can't pay rent at the end of the month.
It may be true that one does not perform as well when having a massive debt over your head, however I disagree that academians in the US aren't producing. I'd dare say its one of the few things they are doing.
Most schools in the US require its professorship to be actively pursuing something in their field. The school wants its professorship to be current and active in their respective fields and publishing, or working on publishing of academic works. My undergrad advisor was working on a historical article on baptismal rituals while I was in his program. After I entered business school, and he'd received the chair of a sort of hybrid position (an alum who made some serious money, endowed a chair which bridged the history and business departments) and has just released a book on the historical impact of the democratization of programming and its effect on society.
If I take to google, I can find reviews, or announcements of some book or article written and published within the past 2-3 years. . . Unfortunately in the US, this is largely the "only" way that professors will make any decent money, and that's through constant research and writing articles.
I assumed Not Online was talking anout the academic output of students rather than faculty, so I think most of this is moot. That bolded bit though, oh boy!
Other than in very odd and extremely rare circumstances, academics are not paid for articles, chapters, or contributions to proceedings, nor for peer review or editing journals or books, and single author books make very, very low revenue. If you haven't written a standard textbook for a discipline with huge reach, say biology, then you wont notice your royalties.
Edit: I would say we are not paid for any of these things directly. If you have a research contract then you're expected to be using x% of your time to conduct and disseminate research. So you are paid to produce knowledge, but not for specific publications, and not by publishers. If you're on a teaching contract, then all that stuff is totally free. What's more, whilst lots of people may have 50/50 contracts, their actual teaching loads will take up significantly more time than they're meant to, so most of their research happens on their own time - and they ain't getting overtime.
Academic publishing really is a racket.
Edit 2: in case anyone wonders, we don't get paid for conferences, either. We usually pay for them. Sometimes if you're lucky your research budget will cover your flight. Probably not the hotel too unless you're a tenured professor at an Ivy. If you're a big name and a keynote speaker, or in a few fields with bags of money to throw around, the conference might cover costs, but you still won't be getting a fee. Oh, and your university definitely expects you to attend multiple a year to keep up with outreach obligations, even if you lose a lot of money.
nfe wrote: Few degrees have severe cost/benefit mismatches until you're paying tuition fees.
And here is where your misconception arises. Here in America you will be paying tuition for college education barring a full-ride scholarship - which is quite rare. It's quite likely you'll be paying multiple years of future income in tuition even IF you get a decent job.
Sorry, not following. Which misconception?
You imply that there's only a mismatch in the benefit of a college degree if you have to pay tuition. It may be normal to NOT pay tuition where you are, but here in America you WILL pay tuition unless you get a really good (and rarely issued) full scholarship.
Not Online!!! wrote: Basically, you get lumped in with the US because you both speak english and english dominates a whole discurs on it's own. Regardless of local differences.
It's the same thing that happens to swiss academic discurse, in general often just lumped in with the "germans" ignoring the sizeable italian and french groups and systems in place. And other peculiarities.
I see. Anglo-Saxon doesn't get used very often to mean Anglophone. Well, outside white supremacist circles.
I think Vulcan just hasn't read all the posts and didn't realise we were talking about the UK, rather than assumed homogeneity.
More like this discussion covers education in general, and not just in the U.K alone.
nfe wrote: Few degrees have severe cost/benefit mismatches until you're paying tuition fees.
And here is where your misconception arises. Here in America you will be paying tuition for college education barring a full-ride scholarship - which is quite rare. It's quite likely you'll be paying multiple years of future income in tuition even IF you get a decent job.
Sorry, not following. Which misconception?
You imply that there's only a mismatch in the benefit of a college degree if you have to pay tuition. It may be normal to NOT pay tuition where you are, but here in America you WILL pay tuition unless you get a really good (and rarely issued) full scholarship.
Sure but that conversation was explicitly talking about how higher education is perceived in the UK and where those perceptions come from - and a large part is the recent introduction, and even more recent increase, in fees. In any case that's hardly a misconception, it's just a problem that has arisen at different times in different places.
Of course the topic is a global one, but that hardly means you can't have localised discussions - especially given the variability off access to higher education, and the US is very much an outlier. (Relatively) low fees is the norm across most of the world.
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I think this is very true in some areas, albeit I believeIt has more to with staff relations and and league tabling than with how education is delivered to learners.