If high school was better, would we need college? • Hacker News Board

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#21

Post by cheez » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 5:56 PM UTC

yummyfajitas wrote: post #11

chopsueyar wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strange that we say our public education system is in need of desperate help, yet our colleges and universities are the best in the world. [EDIT] To clarify, the sound bites I hear from politicians and university administrators are that our colleges and universities are the best in the world. Personally, I do not agree. I could have written that better.

People who say our k-12 education system is in need of desperate help are unaware of the facts. http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-abou... http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2011/01/how-well-do-above-... It's ridiculously overpriced, but the value added is very good.

Very interesting, thanks.

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#22

Post by warwick » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 6:05 PM UTC

moblivu wrote: post #3

cmpeck wrote: post #2

If high school were better. Perhaps we still need college?

Let's start by removing the CEGEP system here in Quebec...

Could you elaborate on what's wrong with the CEGEP system? If you're planning on going to University, it doesn't add any additional time to the end of your degree (since you don't do grade 12 and you only do a 3 year degree if you've done CEGEP), and it seems like it makes education more accessible.

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#23

Post by beaumartinez » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 6:39 PM UTC

citricsquid wrote: post #17

Why is nobody questioning the "need" for college. This is a huge problem too, the idea that college is needed .

You don't think college―further education―is useful?

Are you as good with code as you are in catering for thousands?

It's impossible to be an expert in multiple fields. Specialized further education is essential―otherwise, we'd all be have the same small, limited, "high school" set of skills.

When you develop a pill that can give every human all discovered knowledge, then there will be no need for further education.

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#24

Post by tokenadult » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 6:45 PM UTC

Tycho wrote: post #19

I think about 98% of the population are what I'd call statistically and economically illiterate. Basic economics should be a mandatory lesson at school, but unless you picked the class you can leave without even understanding the law of supply and demand. And then politicians, whose job is mainly to interfere with economic activity, blast these people with statistics (the significance of which they barely understand)…

Basic economics should be a mandatory lesson at school

But if it were, and voters and taxpayers actually entered adult life with a sound knowledge of economics, they would demand that the school system be radically restructured, which is why I don't think that this will happen.

"The education system is a formalised, bureaucratic organisational structure and, like any bureaucratic organisational structure, it strives for maximum autonomy from external pressures as its cardinal principle of survival. While ostensibly devoted to the education of children, teachers, school administrators and local education officers must nevertheless regard parents acting on behalf of children as a force to be kept at bay because parental pressures in effect threaten the autonomy of the educational system. . . . I would hold that the stupefying conservatism of the educational system and its utter disdain of non-professional opinion is such that nothing less than a radical shake-up of the financing mechanism will do much to promote parental power." -- Mark Blaug, "Education Vouchers--It All Depends on What You Mean," in Economics of Privatization, J. Le Grand & R. Robinson, ed. (1985)

After edit: Mark Blaug is quoted here in large part because years ago a public schoolteacher suggested that I read his writings on the economics of education. I discovered the quotation above back then. Blaug is one of the leading economists of education in the world, one of the founders of human capital theory, and an interesting example of an economist who has changed his ideological position over time as he gained more life experience and did more research.

http://clubtroppo.com.au/2009/05/07/the-remarkable-career-of...

http://www.neaydinonat.com/blog/?p=712

http://www.bookrags.com/tandf/blaug-mark-1927-tf/

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#25

Post by showsover » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 6:47 PM UTC

beaumartinez wrote: post #23

citricsquid wrote: post #17

Why is nobody questioning the "need" for college. This is a huge problem too, the idea that college is needed .

You don't think college―further education―is useful? Are you as good with code as you are in catering for thousands? It's impossible to be an expert in multiple fields. Specialized further education is essential―otherwise, we'd all be have the same small, limited, "high school" set of skills. When you develop a pill that can give every human all discovered knowledge, then there will be no need for further education.

There is a difference between needing something and finding something useful.

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#26

Post by tokenadult » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 6:47 PM UTC

yummyfajitas wrote: post #11

chopsueyar wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strange that we say our public education system is in need of desperate help, yet our colleges and universities are the best in the world. [EDIT] To clarify, the sound bites I hear from politicians and university administrators are that our colleges and universities are the best in the world. Personally, I do not agree. I could have written that better.

People who say our k-12 education system is in need of desperate help are unaware of the facts. http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-abou... http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2011/01/how-well-do-above-... It's ridiculously overpriced, but the value added is very good.

It's ridiculously overpriced, but the value added is very good.

The first phrase makes the second less likely to be true.

On the basis of international comparisons, including comparisons with a country outside the United States I have lived in for two three-year stays, I don't think K-12 schooling in the United States offers good value added or good value for the price paid by taxpayers.

http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/45/48/37864432.pdf

http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/54/12/46643496.pdf

After edit:

http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG10-19_Hanushe...

Many of the comparisons of United States population subgroups to populations of other countries ignore the serious issue of underperformance of United States schools in serving students from the most advantaged subgroups. The least advantaged subgroups of United States students can't be used as an excuse for lousy performance of the whole national non-system when that non-system also underperforms for the children of college graduates and for children of "white" families and children in the wealthiest neighborhoods.

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#27

Post by joshfinnie » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 6:50 PM UTC

InclinedPlane wrote: post #14

The recent increase in reliance on college as a prerequisite for many office and knowledge worker jobs is more of an indication of the failure of the public K-12 education system than of the beneficial qualities of college. It's no longer feasible to assume that the holder of a high school diploma possesses a basic level of proficiency with the English language (written and verbal), mathematics, reasoning skills, and…

I agree 100% with your comment. I think it was incredibly frustrating going through college in classes where people were there just since it is a requirement for basic jobs today. University should not be forced upon these people who want a four year party away from their parents... let it be for people who want to do something more focused than a general education.

The mandatory college experience has to be stopped or I fear the race to the bottom of higher education much like what has happened in the K-12 education.

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#28

Post by splat » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 7:03 PM UTC

burgerbrain wrote: post #13

Perhaps you could cram a liberal arts or business education into a highschool format, but there is no way in hell that you're ever going to be churning out physics or mathematics PhDs from anything that can be realisticly called a "high school".

That's true, but you also can't, in general, churn out physics or mathematics PhDs from anything that can realistically be called a four-year undergraduate program.

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#29

Post by fecklessyouth » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 7:09 PM UTC

Tycho wrote: post #19

I think about 98% of the population are what I'd call statistically and economically illiterate. Basic economics should be a mandatory lesson at school, but unless you picked the class you can leave without even understanding the law of supply and demand. And then politicians, whose job is mainly to interfere with economic activity, blast these people with statistics (the significance of which they barely understand)…

>The productivity of virtually every job in the country depends in part on the employee's ability to use a computer.

Don't you think that's somewhat of an overstatement?

Re: If high school was better, would we need college?

#30

Post by fanboy123 » Sun, Apr 10, 2011, 7:09 PM UTC

chopsueyar wrote: post #7

chopsueyar wrote: post #5

Exactly.

Strange that we say our public education system is in need of desperate help, yet our colleges and universities are the best in the world. [EDIT] To clarify, the sound bites I hear from politicians and university administrators are that our colleges and universities are the best in the world. Personally, I do not agree. I could have written that better.

There are over two thousand four year colleges in the US. Saying we have (random number) 80 of the top 200 colleges in the world doesn't mean the system as a whole is producing adequate results.

Performance metrics should always be stated/calculated to reflect efficiency.