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Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

noahpinion.blog

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Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, then I hate to tell you how bad public education is then. It is estimated that about 10% of public school students will receive sexual abuse from a teacher or authority at some point in their education. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2012/02/is-sexual-abuse-... This was also backed by the US Department of Education in 2004. Since then they've been very hesitant to revisit the issue. https://files.eric.ed.g…

You're going to really hate when you look up how much sexual abuse there is in private schools then.

Provide examples.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a good case for vouchers. Instead, kids with engaged parents will flee to better schools. The other parents will either follow, growing the new school and model, or the other school will adapt in order to retain students. Engaged parents are your early adopters. Without vouchers, most people can’t even afford to enter the market.

One of the purposes of public education is also assimilating children into the shared values of society. In the US this has been forgotten despite guys like Jefferson talking about this exact thing. The free market can be good at optimizing for certain outcomes, but I don't think you're going to get a lot of buy in with the current political climate being what it is, and a lack of consensus around what kind of outcom…

To schools that have motivation to actually educate children?

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#153
post #59
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's the theory that, by forcing the kids with the most engaged parents to go to schools with the kids of less engaged parents, the engaged parents will drive school districts to implement good educational policies. In reality, though, that doesn't seem to have worked. School board elections have very low turnout usually, and the people elected to them are disproportionately ideologues who treat engaged parents wi…

I strongly suspect that in practice, those engaged parents handle it by moving to the next polity over that's not trying to use them to improve policies.

They often don't have a choice. They can stay, but as just one vote they cannot reform the system. They can fight for thier kids, but they may have limited results. (My mom faught hard in ~1965 to be able to take shop, but it was a boys only class and she didn't win)

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a good case for vouchers. Instead, kids with engaged parents will flee to better schools. The other parents will either follow, growing the new school and model, or the other school will adapt in order to retain students. Engaged parents are your early adopters. Without vouchers, most people can’t even afford to enter the market.

One of the purposes of public education is also assimilating children into the shared values of society. In the US this has been forgotten despite guys like Jefferson talking about this exact thing. The free market can be good at optimizing for certain outcomes, but I don't think you're going to get a lot of buy in with the current political climate being what it is, and a lack of consensus around what kind of outcom…

> purposes of public education is also assimilating children into the shared values of society

Regulate voucher schools. Content requirements. Restrictions on religion. Maybe even standardized testing, or requirements that voucher students not be subject to extra fees.

The public is paying, after all. It can attach strings to its money.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#155

I don’t know why this author needs to use this issue as a political cudgel against “progressivism” - I don’t see anything particularly progressive about this policy vs the Dallas one he also mentions - the goals are exactly the same, to bring more equity to disadvantaged and minority students. Here is what Jo Boaler has to say on the issue: https://patch.com/california/across-ca/lets-move-past-acrimo... she claims th…

Public education is political. It is run by directly elected boards, with funding provided by the legislature, and under the laws of the legidlature. Education policy is difficult, and every political movement that has worked on it has had at least 1 stupid and counterproductive idea. The particular stupid idea under discussion here happens to be one done by the movement that identifies itself as progressive, and in…

What evidence do you have that this policy is influenced by any kind of "movement," and what are the differences of this "movement" compared to the Dallas policy mentioned in the article?

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Private schooling is already on average cheaper than public schools in primary education at the dollars spent per child level. The reason education costs are screaming out of control in secondary education is because the government isn't responsible for student loans but students are and they have no opportunity to discharge to bankruptcy and there are no normal consumer debt protections for them. It's guaranteed fre…

Private schools are mostly quite bad and worse than typical public schools. A few outliers distort the general picture.

Multiple decades of studies produced by the NAEP directly refute your argument.

I would reference the confirming NAIS studies as well but they've got some self-interest in those results.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#157
post #67
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's the theory that, by forcing the kids with the most engaged parents to go to schools with the kids of less engaged parents, the engaged parents will drive school districts to implement good educational policies. In reality, though, that doesn't seem to have worked. School board elections have very low turnout usually, and the people elected to them are disproportionately ideologues who treat engaged parents wi…

> School board elections have very low turnout usually, and the people elected to them are disproportionately ideologues who treat engaged parents with contempt for being "privileged." Not only the School Board but the Teachers Unions and the United States Government are anti parents attending School Board meetings to support their children. Red or Blue, 6 or 600, it doesn’t matter when the USG decides to make parent…

> “We are coming after you,” a letter mailed to an Ohio school board member said, according to the group. “You are forcing them to wear mask — for no reason in this world other than control. And for that you will pay dearly.” It called the member “a filthy traitor.”

Ah yes, this is clearly a 'both sides' issue where parents are the victims.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#158
post #124

> It is difficult to find words to describe how bad this idea is without descending into abject rudeness. I think it's worth it in this case. You have to be an absolute moron or someone with a sinister agenda to think that decreasing the standard helps the community in any way. Especially idiotic to call this "progressive".

(Not trying to start a flame war). There's a strain of left-wing thought (of course not ALL left-wing thinking) that accepts economic prosperity as unconnected to competence.

Something that's just there in larger or smaller amounts, like the weather.

To these people, standards is just another word for gatekeeping. In this frame of mind, something like communism actually makes sense - the prosperity is there by default, and those at the top get most of it, so why not put everyone on the same rung of society.

There's another school of thought a step closer to the centre which holds that competence exists, but has no innate component and is purely environmental. This leads to the conclusion that if you put everyone in the same environment, you'll get the same outcomes.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#159
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> School board elections have very low turnout usually, and the people elected to them are disproportionately ideologues who treat engaged parents with contempt for being "privileged." Not only the School Board but the Teachers Unions and the United States Government are anti parents attending School Board meetings to support their children. Red or Blue, 6 or 600, it doesn’t matter when the USG decides to make parent…

[flagged]

The article cites a parent physically attacking a school board member and your response is shock that authorities were involved?
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