11–20 of 97 posts
The fundamental problem of education in public schools and its ineffectiveness is not being addressed. It's great that many of these extracurricular clubs and institutes exist to impart advanced education to interested students. But it does not solve the underlying problem.
"The No Child Left Behind Act, which shaped education for nearly 15 years, further contributed to the neglect of these programs. Ignoring kids who may have had aptitude or interest in accelerated learning, it demanded that states turn their attention to getting struggling learners to perform adequately..." teaching to population averages will prove disastrous to our long-term growth. thank goodness we have private in…
I'm glad private institutions exist too. But remember you can only get the education you can afford. Since brilliance is not necessarily related to parents' income, private education is a poor substitute for efficient, timely public education.
I am continually surprised by how many emails I get from teenage students thanking me for writing my math blog. On top of that, I try to occasionally make it out to high schools to give guest lectures. I posted an example experience from one of these online [1] and I am usually looking for other opportunities to do this sort of thing. I think that if every math graduate student who is a reasonably good teacher took a…
TLDR : American public schools suck but there is an increasing number of extracurricular math programs that help talented kids learn advanced problem solving skills. Mostly only well-educated and well-off parents get their kids into these programs. That kind of sucks, and there are marginal efforts to reach out to poorer students. But the real story right now is, if you have kids in public school, their math educatio…
The difference between "good schools" and "bad schools" is much more about the kids that go there than anything about the school itself. You're seeing this starkly in D.C. where gentrification in certain neighborhoods is shifting the student demographics from 90% low-income to 20% low-income over just 4-5 years. Test scores are shooting up, but it's not like they fired all the teachers and hired new staff at twice th…
Why are you assuming that the schools are responsible for the higher test scores? In my immigrant, upper-middle class community, there's nearly universal use of after-school test prep and tutoring from companies like Kumon. I'd argue that's the reason you're seeing test scores "shoot up" once only few low-income families are left in a neighborhood.
TLDR : American public schools suck but there is an increasing number of extracurricular math programs that help talented kids learn advanced problem solving skills. Mostly only well-educated and well-off parents get their kids into these programs. That kind of sucks, and there are marginal efforts to reach out to poorer students. But the real story right now is, if you have kids in public school, their math educatio…
The difference between "good schools" and "bad schools" is much more about the kids that go there than anything about the school itself. You're seeing this starkly in D.C. where gentrification in certain neighborhoods is shifting the student demographics from 90% low-income to 20% low-income over just 4-5 years. Test scores are shooting up, but it's not like they fired all the teachers and hired new staff at twice th…
I think a lot of well-educated (or self-educated) tech folks think that if only we could fix our education system, poverty and income inequality would disappear under a massive rise in productivity and innovation. I know that I am guilty of thinking this way.
But you're right: family and socioeconomic status are highly predictive of education outcomes. So we need to directly address both schools and poverty at the same time in order to create a virtuous cycle of social improvement.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The difference between "good schools" and "bad schools" is much more about the kids that go there than anything about the school itself. You're seeing this starkly in D.C. where gentrification in certain neighborhoods is shifting the student demographics from 90% low-income to 20% low-income over just 4-5 years. Test scores are shooting up, but it's not like they fired all the teachers and hired new staff at twice th…
> Test scores are shooting up, but it's not like they fired all the teachers and hired new staff at twice the salary. Why are you assuming that the schools are responsible for the higher test scores? In my immigrant, upper-middle class community, there's nearly universal use of after-school test prep and tutoring from companies like Kumon. I'd argue that's the reason you're seeing test scores "shoot up" once only few…
"The No Child Left Behind Act, which shaped education for nearly 15 years, further contributed to the neglect of these programs. Ignoring kids who may have had aptitude or interest in accelerated learning, it demanded that states turn their attention to getting struggling learners to perform adequately..." teaching to population averages will prove disastrous to our long-term growth. thank goodness we have private in…
I'm glad private institutions exist too. But remember you can only get the education you can afford. Since brilliance is not necessarily related to parents' income, private education is a poor substitute for efficient, timely public education.
TLDR : American public schools suck but there is an increasing number of extracurricular math programs that help talented kids learn advanced problem solving skills. Mostly only well-educated and well-off parents get their kids into these programs. That kind of sucks, and there are marginal efforts to reach out to poorer students. But the real story right now is, if you have kids in public school, their math educatio…
The difference between "good schools" and "bad schools" is much more about the kids that go there than anything about the school itself. You're seeing this starkly in D.C. where gentrification in certain neighborhoods is shifting the student demographics from 90% low-income to 20% low-income over just 4-5 years. Test scores are shooting up, but it's not like they fired all the teachers and hired new staff at twice th…
Also well off parents could help school in other ways.
TLDR : American public schools suck but there is an increasing number of extracurricular math programs that help talented kids learn advanced problem solving skills. Mostly only well-educated and well-off parents get their kids into these programs. That kind of sucks, and there are marginal efforts to reach out to poorer students. But the real story right now is, if you have kids in public school, their math educatio…
The difference between "good schools" and "bad schools" is much more about the kids that go there than anything about the school itself. You're seeing this starkly in D.C. where gentrification in certain neighborhoods is shifting the student demographics from 90% low-income to 20% low-income over just 4-5 years. Test scores are shooting up, but it's not like they fired all the teachers and hired new staff at twice th…
You can try to work with the school, the teacher, the principal, but you can't really work with the other parents. I can't even imagine how you'd begin that conversation. "Hey, little Johnny acts like a complete asshole and disrupts the class to the point that they are spending their heads down on their desk for half an hour a day. Can you step up and do something about his behavior?" Obviously I'm never going to be a politician, but how can that ever be phrased in a neutral way?!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The difference between "good schools" and "bad schools" is much more about the kids that go there than anything about the school itself. You're seeing this starkly in D.C. where gentrification in certain neighborhoods is shifting the student demographics from 90% low-income to 20% low-income over just 4-5 years. Test scores are shooting up, but it's not like they fired all the teachers and hired new staff at twice th…
Aren't schools financed by local property taxes in US. And the rich parents pay more in taxes and there is more resources in the system. Also well off parents could help school in other ways.