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Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

palladiummag.com

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Re: Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

#41

Post by pierrec »

patel011393 wrote: post #30

I would like to point out for context that the author, Jordan Lasker, is a eugenist derided for shoddy science, falsely using university affiliations, and racist commentary. I do not write this to contradict particular claims in the article above, but @cremieux should be read cautiously. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jordan_Lasker

This definitely adds a grain of salt, but as far as I can tell, none of that shows in the article, especially in the final paragraphs explaining how the elitist system is overall bad for the country. But it does make me wonder about possible hidden flaws in the methodology (I'm still confused at some of the earlier statistics contradicting the claims made later)

Re: Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

#43

Post by scotty79 »

I think Poland is in very similar spot, often punching above its weight in software and math. My own amateur explanation is that Polish language is pretty complex and very particular about correct words and word forms. So Polish kids get a good training in keeping track of details of notations just by learning their native language.

Re: Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

#44

Post by avs733 »

pierrec wrote: post #41
patel011393 wrote: post #30

I would like to point out for context that the author, Jordan Lasker, is a eugenist derided for shoddy science, falsely using university affiliations, and racist commentary. I do not write this to contradict particular claims in the article above, but @cremieux should be read cautiously. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jordan_Lasker

This definitely adds a grain of salt, but as far as I can tell, none of that shows in the article, especially in the final paragraphs explaining how the elitist system is overall bad for the country. But it does make me wonder about possible hidden flaws in the methodology (I'm still confused at some of the earlier statistics contradicting the claims made later)

> Yet another possibility is that Romania has an undersampled ethnic group that overperforms, but whose schools aren’t tested very well. The only group this might be is Romanian Jews and using them as an explanation is problematic for two reasons. The first is that there are too few to realistically explain Romanian Olympiad performance. The second is that we know the identities of Olympiad participants from Romania, and they don’t seem to be Jewish.

This struck me as…odd…before I even saw the parent comment.

Re: Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

#45

Post by LarsDu88 »

Author aside I thought this was a very interesting answer to a question I didn't know I had.

I had been thinking that sending my children to a school with high achievers could leave her at a relative disadvantage but this data would seem to say otherwise.

I wonder if this conflicts with Malcolm Gladwell's observations on one's relative ranking when it comes to college matriculation (that its more important to be at a high percentile of your institution than your global rank)

Re: Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

#46

Post by LarsDu88 »

LarsDu88 wrote: post #45

Author aside I thought this was a very interesting answer to a question I didn't know I had. I had been thinking that sending my children to a school with high achievers could leave her at a relative disadvantage but this data would seem to say otherwise. I wonder if this conflicts with Malcolm Gladwell's observations on one's relative ranking when it comes to college matriculation (that its more important to be at a…

After looking into the author a bit. Ugh

Re: Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

#47

Post by koolba »

ecshafer wrote: post #38
koolba wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having seen what children are capable of, it’s neither overwhelming nor brutal. What’s truly brutal is acquiescing to children droning away their youth mindlessly clicking meaningless games or watching vacuous streaming content. We live in what could be a golden age of thought but for the average kid it’s anything but.

I have to agree with you. Children are adaptable and will rise to the challenge. The west too often prefers to think children are capable of nothing, and have them wallow in an intellectual void.

It’s not just intellectual challenge that parents are unwilling to entertain. It’s part of a wider problem of avoiding any and all confrontation. The moment a child shows any disinterest, the activity is shut down.

It’s why you have a generation of kids that only eat chicken fingers and french fries. The average parent is unwilling to even teach their children to eat and enjoy actual food. Why bother when you can just heat up some tendies?

Re: Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

#48

Post by credit_guy »

slt2021 wrote: post #42

Romania is wasting taxpayer money to groom bright students and then let them leave Romania for some higher GDP country

I would downvote you, but I won't, and instead I will leave a reply.

I was one of those students who left. Romania did not waste any more taxpayer money on me than on other students, and that money that it spent was really meager by any Western standards.

My kids now go to public school in NYC. The city spends north of $30k for each of them [1]. Yet, if they decide to leave the US nobody will complain that they were groomed with precious taxpayer money, and they betrayed the trust placed in them. It is understood that every person has the right pursue their own happiness the best way they can.

[1] https://www.schools.nyc.gov/about-us/funding/funding-our-sch...

Re: Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

#49

Post by kaladin-jasnah »

stefantalpalaru wrote: post #9

There are many factors - most of them economic and cultural - but it all starts with an intense maths syllabus in school, Soviet Union style. Here's the current one for 5th to 8th grade: https://www.scribd.com/document/184259748/The-Romanian-Maths... Most kids are overwhelmed by the complexity and volume (homework is brutal) but those few with an aptitude for it thrive and are picked up quickly by teachers looking to…

My grade school education in the US was similar to this (although you needed to qualify for "accelerated" math). There were maybe 90 people every year in this. Those who did well did not make it much past CML or AMC, maybe out of lack of interest. You had to be excellent to move on to Olympiad level maths.

Side note: I have many objections with the competition-ifaction of these things. Not everyone finds their best performance in a competition environment. In CS, maybe we would look at competitive programming and CTFs (arguably CP can be very mathematical). Nonetheless, we use competitions to measure performance, which in some way selects out people who are talented in a setting that isn't a competition, and glorifies people who do play the game.

Re: Why Romania excels in international Olympiads

#50

Post by _alternator_ »

avs733 wrote: post #44
pierrec wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This definitely adds a grain of salt, but as far as I can tell, none of that shows in the article, especially in the final paragraphs explaining how the elitist system is overall bad for the country. But it does make me wonder about possible hidden flaws in the methodology (I'm still confused at some of the earlier statistics contradicting the claims made later)

> Yet another possibility is that Romania has an undersampled ethnic group that overperforms, but whose schools aren’t tested very well. The only group this might be is Romanian Jews and using them as an explanation is problematic for two reasons. The first is that there are too few to realistically explain Romanian Olympiad performance. The second is that we know the identities of Olympiad participants from Romania,…

The general vibe of this magazine: support mainstreaming of eugenics ideas (and now eigenicists), the ubermensch / great man theory of history, and other ideas that we’ve largely shied away from for the last 75 years.
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