The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021) • Hacker News Board

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#401

Post by tootie » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:05 PM UTC

jmyeet wrote: post #51

There are so many topics that are hard to talk about nowadays without getting into politics but politics and structural inequality are at the core of this. For the benefit of non-US readers, know that how the US funds public education (K-12) is rather unique. It's done through property taxes essentially. Depending on your state and city your property taxes can vary a lot with the same value property. But what this me…

This is closer to the core of the problem and honestly it goes even deeper. We very frequently look at poor outcomes when it comes to things like education and employment and then scream at schools or companies for not supporting equity. And not to let them all completely off the hook because they have absolutely been part of the problem, but the roots of this stuff go way deeper. Trying to find diverse candidates for knowledge jobs is made harder when there are fewer diverse candidates graduating from good colleges because fewer diverse students are getting into gifted programs because diverse children are raised in neighborhoods with fewer resources and on and on.

We still have so much culturally ingrained bias that we can't update policy to set the stage for even the next few generations to close these gaps. And it's compounded by the current generation being asked to pay an unreasonable price (ie disappearing gifted classes) to put a band-aid on this gunshot wound of a problem which breeds resentment which sets progress back even further.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#402

Post by bendbro » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:05 PM UTC

TimPC wrote: post #68

formerly_proven wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Equity != Equality. Equity is semantically closer to equality of outcome than equality (of conditions/opportunities).

But Equity also argues for treating people differently depending on their needs. Eliminating gifted programs so that all students are treated the same seems to me to be far closer to the equality bucket than any equity one.

Comrade I see you have formed some misinformations, please allow me to reeducate you. The pupil-with-non-intrinsically-greater-test-performance does not need increased schooling, as she already has too much. To increase equity and goodwill in our society, it is best for the student to receive less education.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#403

Post by ARandumGuy » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:05 PM UTC

whatshisface wrote: post #106

robonerd wrote: post #48

The gifted program helped me immensely in highschool, although the hour or two I actually spent in the gifted classroom was mostly wasted playing board games. However being in that program gave me the ability to switch classes/teachers whenever one wasn't working for me, usually because some teachers could maintain a civil classroom and other teachers let the students run wild and taught nothing. Because I was in the…

If you let students attend any classes they wanted, I bet they would sort themselves appropriately. The rowdy kids won't want to be in a classroom where everyone is quiet and the teacher is explaining the central limit theorem.

That's basically what my high school did. Students had a lot of flexibility to choose the classes they wanted to take, and had a lot of leeway if they wanted to choose the advanced or standard version of a class. Combine this with a lot of optional classes, and students at my high school could tailor their class schedule to their own needs and wants.

I recognize that my experience was no means the norm. My high school was large, well funded, and had a lot of resources at its disposal. And even then, there were absolutely students that weren't served well by the school. But its overall a system that seems to work pretty well, and I think its a model that more schools look at.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#404

Post by adam_arthur » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:05 PM UTC

jmyeet wrote: post #51

There are so many topics that are hard to talk about nowadays without getting into politics but politics and structural inequality are at the core of this. For the benefit of non-US readers, know that how the US funds public education (K-12) is rather unique. It's done through property taxes essentially. Depending on your state and city your property taxes can vary a lot with the same value property. But what this me…

Education funding has very little to do with outcomes. Your peers and culture of their family matters most, which will also correlate with wealth/income levels.

But it's correlation, not causation.

There was a complete test case of this in NJ a few years ago where a poorly funded school got a huge amount of extra funding as a result of a lawsuit, and it made 0 statistical difference to outcomes years down the line. They did a study on it. https://edlawcenter.org/litigation/abbott-v-burke/abbott-his...

If you're surrounded by people who care and aim to excel, you'll probably care. And vice versa.

In that sense, forced integration is an unethical but probably effective way of homogenizing educational results. I think Singapore actually forces some cultural integration like this with demographic requirements per neighborhood block/district.

New York somewhat achieves this incidentally via their "affordable housing" being attached to expensive unit buildings, but most wealthy new yorkers send to private, so doesn't fix the cultural balance in public system.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#405

Post by lazide » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:05 PM UTC

rootusrootus wrote: post #338

abirch wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is an oft repeated myth. In addition to property taxes, school funding is supplemented by state and federal budgets, in inverse proportion to property taxes, so that racial differences in per-pupil funding are negligible: This is not my experience. I chose a more expensive house with higher taxes because the schools are better. They are better funded than those in the surrounding areas. Sure the Federal Govern…

Having done a similar analysis myself, here is what I found. Schools in wealthier areas have better results primarily because the support system at home is much stronger. I.e. A wealthy family's kids do better in school no matter where they go. Another factor, mostly in elementary school, is that wealthier areas get noticeably more volunteer activity from parents. State & local funding is less important, by far.

Many of the higher end schools in the area here (Bay Area) require volunteer fundraising, bake sales, volunteer time contribution, etc. precisely because property taxes aren’t enough and they get less than the other schools.

And the parents do it because they can (they have the ability to get the time off), and because they know it’s important in many ways.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#406

Post by raybb » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:05 PM UTC

car_analogy wrote: post #133

jmyeet wrote: post #51

There are so many topics that are hard to talk about nowadays without getting into politics but politics and structural inequality are at the core of this. For the benefit of non-US readers, know that how the US funds public education (K-12) is rather unique. It's done through property taxes essentially. Depending on your state and city your property taxes can vary a lot with the same value property. But what this me…

> how the US funds public education (K-12) is rather unique. It's done through property taxes essentially. Depending on your state and city your property taxes can vary a lot with the same value property. But what this means is the wealthier localities have more tax revenue and thus better schools. This is an oft repeated myth. In addition to property taxes, school funding is supplemented by state and federal budgets…

I don't have time to do it now. But it would be great to incorporate this info into the related wikipedia page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_school_funding_in_the_U...

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#407

Post by slothtrop » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:05 PM UTC

Joel_Mckay wrote: post #322

Animats wrote: post #155

The elephant in the room: In the US, average East Asian IQ is 105, average white IQ is 99, average black IQ is 85-95. Nobody in politics can afford to admit that.

The highest IQ in US history belonged to a man that spent his life as a plumber by choice. According to several studies, the greatest predictor of early academic advancement is the financial status of the parents. While scientific hubris and narcissism tend to quickly dominate competitive environments in colleges, the irrational pretense of a meritocracy quickly degenerates when you enter the faculty area. Note that…

> inflicting misery

Is that what you suppose gifted programs do?

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#408

Post by logifail » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:05 PM UTC

abirch wrote: post #371

logifail wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> my kids' books and chromebooks are always nice and new There's plenty of evidence that parental attitudes are a big factor: "Middle-class pupils do better because parents and schools put more effort into their education, according to a study [..] factors studied were the parents' interest in their children's education, measured by, for example, whether they read to their children or attended meetings with teachers"…

Check out Numberblocks from the BBC. My kindergartner found it while she was in Pre-K and learned multiplication and division on her own. Much of our intelligence is from our parents. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heritability_of_IQ I'm just stating that my kids' elementary school is nicer than those in our county and definitely from my hometown. They do receive a lot more money than what my hometown spent.

> Check out Numberblocks from the BBC

Heh, our daughter (who doesn't start school until September) knows all the Numberblocks and Alphablocks episodes...

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#409

Post by eli_gottlieb » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:06 PM UTC

chucksta wrote: post #87

whatshisface wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a bad analogy because the NBA is not the only accessible path to a stable middle class life while school, for many people, is.

So you have to be in gifted to have a successful life?

In our present economy? Yes.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#410

Post by dilatedmind » Wed, Jun 08, 2022, 6:06 PM UTC

derac wrote: post #11

Gifted programs are "unacceptably white". WTF does that mean? I had to pass essentially an IQ test to get placed into those classes. For me, it made a big difference in being engaged in schoolwork when every class consisted of reiterating content for days which I had mastered in minutes. Edit: I removed "I don't see what race has to do with it." I do see how race can affect this when the gatekeeper is a teacher with…

philly school district schools are 14% white. the school district i went to in the philly burbs is 79% white.

philly school district is in a bad place financially. https://www.inquirer.com/news/pa-school-funding-trial-philad.... A district with more money will have more resources for gifted programs.

I imagine this has it's roots in the demographic and population shift the city has seen starting in the 50s. Philly's population in 1990 was 75% of what it was in the 50s. I'm not an expert in this area, but I'm sure there was overhead in maintaining infrastructure, paying pensions, etc as the population shrunk.

At this point, maybe the federal government should just bail out city school districts in this situation. Why should an underfunded school district be paying a chunk of its budget on debts?