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The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

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Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#101

Post by username90 »

pfortuny wrote: post #94
username90 wrote: post #85

KTH tests engineering students math abilities by giving new students the same test every year. There is nothing gained or lost from this test so nobody studied for it. Anyway, this gives us a reasonable trend in how well students know the basics, and it shows that students are getting better and not worse right now. The worst class was the one starting 2007. https://www.kth.se/aktuellt/nyheter/trenden-har-vant-mattek…

So they have already been accepted... Not a truly random sample. “Nobody studies for it” is surely an overstatement. Do not underestimate the fear of tests.

Nobody studies for it since nobody knows they will take the test. It is marked as a blank spot on their calendar and people gets surprised when a test gets handed out. Then they quickly forget they ever took a test since so much happens in the first days of new students.

Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#102

Post by sobriquet9 »

bjeds wrote: post #95
JorgeGT wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note that KTH is an elite institution so there is a selection bias. It's like saying education in America must be going well because new MIT students are getting better.

Now you are exaggerating. KTH is of course a good school for Swedish standards but calling it elite is weird. In what way would you say that KTH is elite, because I genuinely do not understand how the word "elite" applies to this school? I'm a bit out of touch, but of all schools in Sweden, the only I'd call elite - by the common meaning of the word - is Operahögskolan (I think it's called, the Opera school) and poss…

> who wanted to go to KTH

Here's your selection bias. Self-selection is also selection.

Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#103

Post by joshuaissac »

SiempreViernes wrote: post #52
joshuaissac wrote: post #26

> The business model is simple: you buy smaller independent schools and incorporate them into the growing groups and then make a profit by targeting marketing to easy-to-teach, independent students [...] With a sold-out, simpler student base, the corporation schools can reduce salaries, teacher density, resource staff > When the profitable students have been absorbed by the independent school, the municipal school is…

Uh, are you suggesting the municipalities should just deny education to the unprofitable students? Not sure how concentrating easy students would help if you still have to teach the complex ones too, and since the municipalities must provide education to eveyone they can't avoid them like the profit schools do.

> Uh, are you suggesting the municipalities should just deny education to the unprofitable students?

I did not suggest anything like that anywhere in my comment. Municipalities have to teach hard/expensive students in either scenario. Based on the article, they are leaving easy/cheap students on the table for the private sector, who can profit from scale and from the students being cheaper to teach.

There will be independent schools that only accept easy students whether the municipalities like it or not. The choice municipalities have is whether to run their own schools attracting such students and socialise some of the profits instead of letting it all go to the private sector.

Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#104

Post by Gwypaas »

pfortuny wrote: post #94
username90 wrote: post #85

KTH tests engineering students math abilities by giving new students the same test every year. There is nothing gained or lost from this test so nobody studied for it. Anyway, this gives us a reasonable trend in how well students know the basics, and it shows that students are getting better and not worse right now. The worst class was the one starting 2007. https://www.kth.se/aktuellt/nyheter/trenden-har-vant-mattek…

So they have already been accepted... Not a truly random sample. “Nobody studies for it” is surely an overstatement. Do not underestimate the fear of tests.

The only acceptance criteria is grades, or a local SAT/ACT like test but without essays or other harder to grade parts. It's language, logic and math. See more here [0]. You don't get in because you're good at sports, it's not even a consideration.

I've taken a similar test at another university in Sweden and truly nobody studies for it, in the introduction week it was simply done at one point as part of the introduction curriculum, without even being mentioned beforehand.

So, it's a fairly consistent sample of people aiming for a STEM education.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_Scholastic_Aptitude_Te...

Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#105

Post by bjeds »

sobriquet9 wrote: post #102
bjeds wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now you are exaggerating. KTH is of course a good school for Swedish standards but calling it elite is weird. In what way would you say that KTH is elite, because I genuinely do not understand how the word "elite" applies to this school? I'm a bit out of touch, but of all schools in Sweden, the only I'd call elite - by the common meaning of the word - is Operahögskolan (I think it's called, the Opera school) and poss…

> who wanted to go to KTH Here's your selection bias. Self-selection is also selection.

I'm not sure what you are claiming here. Are you saying that I'm wrong in questioning calling KTH "elite" because I used one anecdote in a larger argument?

You can look up the admission statistics yourself: it's very easy to get in to KTH. Maybe there are some programs that are more competitive than others.

When I finished high school, the admission criteria for example Electrical Engineering was roughly "you need a non-failing grade in all high school courses". How is that "elite"? Compare with medical school where it used to be "you need the best grade in every single course otherwise you're not getting in". Or the Opera school where there's an admission test in front of an audience.

I can guarantee that MIT is more difficult to get into than KTH.

Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#106

Post by hogFeast »

logicchains wrote: post #40
bjeds wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sort of agree with what you are saying (I'm also Swedish) but I think the incentives are different, and due to the American dominance of Hacker News readers it's worth to clear up: Swedish middle class parents do not choose "good schools" because they want a "great education" for their kids as a competitive advantage... in the sense of a well-off American parent want their kids to go to Harvard or MIT or similar. S…

The same is true in Australia: parents choose "not-bad" schools to minimize the chance of their kids being knifed or beaten up by other kids. But it's not due to immigration, instead just to "white trash" for lack of a better word raising violent, substance-abusing children.

The same is true in the UK. One of the highest rates of bullying in Europe (the other big one is Finland). Somehow, one of the highest rates of sexual violence against girls in schools too (this is globally, so including developing countries).

Obviously, this problem is multi-faceted, the best solution is everyone just going to a nice school. But part of the problem in the UK was that comprehensive education is very ideological, and the belief was: comp schools are so bad because all the good students go to grammar schools. This did not turn out to be accurate.

But London (which is currently in the midst of a knife-crime epidemic) was one of the worst places, and got significantly better due to more investment, and more exclusions/discipline. For example, some schools will get teachers to walk at-risk students directly to their homes from schools. And ofc, the exclusions have caused outcry (funnily enough, there is a split on this between unions, who hate it, and teachers, who quite like it). Incidentally, Glasgow also used to have a serious knife crime problem, and they got over this with enhanced stop-and-search...unf, this is politically impossible in London. There are solutions to all these problems though.

I grew up in the UK, and knew lots of smart kids now working deadend jobs who got chewed up and spit out by schools (almost always the issue was bullying, and schools not removing people who were behaving, in a non-school context, criminally). It is a seriously bad situation imo.

Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#107

Post by ihsw »

captain_price7 wrote: post #44
corty wrote: post #7

While I agree with the article about the problems of profit-driven schools, the whole situation (and the article in parts) points to a imho bigger problem in most education systems: Profit-driven schools cater to the more able, easier to educate and more intelligent pupils. Why can they do that? Because public schools almost everywhere insist on coeducation of the most and least gifted. This is severely holding back…

Assuming it's possible to find out "intelligent" vs not primary/middle schools kids. We all here agree that finding talented developers is hard- meaning 22+ yr old adults. Isn't the job like 10 times harder for say 8 yr old kids?

A good start is taking a harder look at students that go to school to raise hell, and there are many. They have an uncanny ability to destroy the teaching ability of teachers and the learning ability of students.

A good start is taking those troublesome students out of the classrooms of public schools/district schools without regard to the inevitable protestations of "concerned citizens."

Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#108

Post by aerique »

bjeds wrote: post #69
vanderZwan wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would that explain why my bachelor students were so unbelievable inept at emotionally dealing with and resolving conflicts when I taught at university there?

Haha I don't know where you're from but Swedish people are often stereotypically bad at both dealing with emotions and resolving conflicts. "Van der" = Gonna guess you are Dutch? Well Swedish people are, as you know well yourself, the opposite of the Dutch in how to handle things. Source: My partner is Dutch.

Haha, could you elaborate on that? That sounds like a fun read.

disclaimer: I'm Dutch.

Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#109

Post by Aerroon »

fabbari wrote: post #57
corty wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course higher intelligence is a privilege, as is higher sportive ability and other attributes given to you from birth. This includes your own personal attributes as well as the privilege that comes from your family's wealth and status. But actually, the word "privilege" muddles the waters, because those are two very different things. I agree that schools should not differentiate based on families' status and wealt…

Schools do not treat stupid and intelligent children the same, teachers - with few exceptions - do. Not because they are evil, but because to be able to cater to the different levels of intelligence and the variation in interests that you will naturally find in a random sample of children they require the time and opportunities to do so. As long as we treat teachers as the least important workers, without acknowledgi…

How much of a difference do teachers make in the public school system? I don't mean teacher vs no teacher, but good teacher vs average teacher. The topics in the public school system are not set by the teachers themselves - they have to teach what has been decided elsewhere. A good teacher can engage students better, but how much of that is the teacher's ability as opposed to the teacher and students happening to get along? How much of it is good students self-selecting themselves into academically better schools, therefore having better peers?

Asked in a different way: if we paid (all) teachers 3x as we do right now, would we observe significant long-term improvements in students?

Re: The Shame of Swedish Education: J’Accuse

#110

Post by corty »

lou1306 wrote: post #70
corty wrote: post #7

While I agree with the article about the problems of profit-driven schools, the whole situation (and the article in parts) points to a imho bigger problem in most education systems: Profit-driven schools cater to the more able, easier to educate and more intelligent pupils. Why can they do that? Because public schools almost everywhere insist on coeducation of the most and least gifted. This is severely holding back…

School should also teach kids that they live in a complex society, where people have different backgrounds and, yes, different skill sets. I'm afraid that relegating "more gifted" kids (whatever this means) into a world of their own is not only harmful to those who are left out, but to them as well.

Getting beaten up by the differently-gifted jocks is beneficial?
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