Why is this site becoming more and more infested with politics? It's going to end up suffocating anything actually worthwhile
The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
461–470 of 922 posts
Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
#462Gifted 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…
> Gifted programs are "unacceptably white" Curious if they're also "unacceptably asian" - the author doesn't seem to think so, or at least didn't feel the need to say so.
Asians are white when it's unhelpful to the narrative for them to be a minority. See also "underrepresented minority", which translates to: non-Asian minority.
Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
#463Alright, I don't imagine this will be a common take here but here goes. I am a product of the New York City public school system. I have spent the majority of my life as a student in it. The New York city public school system is both the largest public school system in the country and the most segregated. The argument about removing gifted programs are built on the faulty assumptions that the students in those progra…
I guess the problem is how the gifted programs are being executed rather than their existence then.
When I read "gifted programs" I certainly would think that race or social background has zero influence on acceptance (even though they do influence kids access to education before getting there).
Reading what you said it seems logical that removing these programs is overall a good thing. But the way I see it the discussion about supporting kids that are truly gifted shouldn't be dismissed.
Maybe the solution would be to actually replace that program with something that's not perpetuating this segregation.
Disclaimer: I don't live in the US, so take it with a big grain of salt :)
Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
#464Earlier quoted context omitted.
The lower performing schools also tend to be older and require more maintenance and repairs than newer schools in wealthier areas. Not all of that additional per-pupil funding makes it to the classroom.
> The lower performing schools also tend to be older and require more maintenance and repairs than newer schools in wealthier areas. Sure, that's a factor too, but I'd still call it a social service issue since it ultimately results from the historical disinvestment in the communities that today have low performing schools. There are reasons that the roofs didn't get repaired and the lead pipes didn't get replaced in…
A difference in maintenance costs is not necessarily a consequence of disinvestment... it could simply be that lower performing schools are more likely to be urban, and in urban areas everything related to the construction and maintenance of buildings, whether old or new, is more expensive (not to mention admin salaries, etc.). Or it could be that plus what you say for a double wammy at some schools. I'm just brainstorming reasonable seeming hypotheses that you could imagine trying to rule out with the right dataset.
Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
#465There 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…
There is a darker Truth.
Intelligence as tested by IQ by several govts and organizations is mostly genetic[1].
It means that the "nurture" part is not so much important as people think.
Heck you can even see with brothers / cousins the differences.
When we say "gifted" it means we are selecting and optimizing for IQ. Thus the "inequality". You will always see more Asians.
To make more equal we need to remove/disqualify asians.
If a profession/skill is very related to a characteristic/feature as IQ then I want the best there.
Not everyone is equal and not everyone has the same skills. If you check [1] you will see they studied TWINS adopted in families. There is no better "social intervention" than adopting someone, provide the same food/structure that all on family have.
Then you can see here the confirmation in a soft way [2] and [3].
"and we consistently find that considering performance on the SAT/ACT, particularly the math section, substantially improves the predictive validity of our decisions with respect to subsequent student success at the Institute."
I am not gifted but I do benefit from gifted people work.
[1] - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S016028962...
[2] - https://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/we-are-suspending-our-...
[3] - https://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/we-are-reinstating-our...
Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
#466Gifted 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…
> I had to pass essentially an IQ test to get placed into those classes. I don't see why race has anything to do with it. Simply put, we don't know how to make objective IQ tests yet. The questions in IQ tests tend to bake in a bunch of cultural assumptions, often in ways you don't expect. So the test measures a combination of IQ, and affinity with a specific cultural background. First, let me be clear about this: Th…
The Cattell Culture Fair III (CFIT-III) is really good.
If we are talking IQ scores within the same western country, we know now to make culture fair fluid intelligence test (it's not the same as future achievement score)
Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
#467Earlier quoted context omitted.
To make a compelling case that funding matters to outcome you really need to detail how a lack of funding hurts the learning process. Are the teachers bad teachers, and more pay will recruit better teachers? I'm not sure how many teachers enter the profession for the money to be honest. I'm sure they would like pay, but I'm not really of the mind that the curre nt crop of teachers are on average bad. Do kids not have…
The only resources needed are books and chalkboards, pencil and paper. These are cheap. My public high school installed a competition diving pool. Did that improve education there? Not a whit. It was nice for the diving team, though, which was 6 girls.
I wouldn't overlook people as resources. In addition to teachers, it's really valuable to have more adults around to help out. Otherwise keeping a room of 25 kids corralled is enough work on its own that it meaningfully reduces the time left to teach.
Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
#468There 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…
>But what this means is the wealthier localities have more tax revenue and thus better schools. This can be a vicious cycle of improving property values by having better schools and thus generating more tax revenue and so on.
No. This is a complete red-herring. Every school in the US is good enough to provide quality education. Every school in the US is staffed by good, well-trained teachers. Every child gets free textbooks, notebooks, pens, pencils, paper, etc (which isn't as common in the world as you'd think). Sometimes free breakfast or lunch is provided as well.
That some school district provides high-end iPads and another doesn't makes no material difference to a quality education. That some parents want to optimize their child's education by sending them to another district, makes no material difference to a quality education. Put another way, we're dealing with kids graduating being functionally illiterate - and that problem does not stem from school or teacher quality. That's a parent problem (as in, what kind of a parent allows their child to not be able to read by the time they are ready to graduate).
Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
#469Earlier quoted context omitted.
In my city, the worst schools tend to pay a good 20% better than the best ones, for teachers. They get lots of federal and state aid. People still usually prefer not to work at them, if they have options, because the work environment is terrible.
You have to pay more to hire people to do harder jobs.
Absolutely—my point is that these schools aren't behind the "good" ones, funding-wise, and even pay better.
Past a certain not-that-high point, giving schools more money doesn't help them much.
There's probably some astronomically-high level of funding that would help, past some tipping point, by enabling things like single-digit class sizes, tons of social workers and counselors, extensive home-outreach programs, et c., to the point that the staff-to-student ratio is 1:5 or better, but AFAIK no-one's tried that in public schools (that's not too far off from how lots of elite private schools, operate, though, except that they don't need the army of social workers or home-outreach or any of that)
Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)
#470Intelligent kids are one of the most picked on and abused demographics in existence. Gifted programs for many is the only part of school that is positive for them.