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US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

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Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#721

Post by monkeyelite »

etempleton wrote: post #712
monkeyelite wrote: post #707

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In the US there are a few obvious things, but everyone acts as if we are powerless to solve them Yes but they aren’t the things you said: 1. Schools are filled with disruptive kids who use up time and resources and are not removed. 2. Teachers have no enforcement authority so they cannot do any of what you said, including removing phones. 3. Teachers and administrators are generally not smart or capable and continu…

Districts need to make district-wide policies and have clear action steps that happens if a student is caught with the phone out.

What are some examples of consequences they would enforce?

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#722

Post by themgt »

tomrod wrote: post #644
poemxo wrote: post #549

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't appreciate reading anecdata in response to cited findings. It cheapens the discussion. Now everyone is going to spend time writing knee-jerk responses to you. At least the parent commenter had the grace to reply with another source instead of falling for it.

I disagree. Were this an academic symposium I would agree. But this is the internet where folks who know how to establish causality and understand research methods and proper citing are uncommon. Fortunately, I do appreciate the author's thought and contribtions to observation data, and, tongue in cheek, as a utility monster my appreciation more than negates your lack of appreciation.

Were this an academic symposium on lung cancer I would agree. But this is the internet where folks who know how to establish causality and understand research methods and proper citing are uncommon. As a utility monster my appreciation reading about the author's grandma who lived 'til 90 smoking a pack a day more than negates your obsession with medical data.

The irony of this being every discussion of education on HN.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#723

Post by monkeyelite »

stonemetal12 wrote: post #720
monkeyelite wrote: post #707

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In the US there are a few obvious things, but everyone acts as if we are powerless to solve them Yes but they aren’t the things you said: 1. Schools are filled with disruptive kids who use up time and resources and are not removed. 2. Teachers have no enforcement authority so they cannot do any of what you said, including removing phones. 3. Teachers and administrators are generally not smart or capable and continu…

Is 1 even true? I can't say I have ever heard of a school that allows phones out in class. Taking them till the end of school, or making a parent come claim them is the standard punishment I have seen.

Taking them implies they have respect to give them to you or you are willing to use force to get them. Neither exist.

Sending them home implies there is a parent who cares and will come.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#725

Post by alphazard »

HankStallone wrote: post #705
alphazard wrote: post #692

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However,the United States, particularly in the last 50 years, seems to have fostered a culture averse to education. There's good reason for this. Not everyone enjoys learning for the sake of it. The pitch for forced education is that it will help you sustain yourself as an adult. If adults are finding their time in forced public education to be regretted, then they pass that information onto the younger generations…

That's all true, but this crowd also leans heavily progressive. Progressives have a great faith in processes and systems. Get the right top-down systems in place, and everything will be good. Naturally that includes the school system, especially government schools. It might be okay that I was self-taught, because I'm special; but we can't let regular people be doing that sort of thing.

> It might be okay that I was self-taught, because I'm special; but we can't let regular people be doing that sort of thing.

That's an interesting theory. It definitely explains a lot of what we see. I don't know if anyone self-describing as progressive would sign off on it as their own thinking.

Phrased the way you put it, it also seems like a kind of cognitive bias almost like the gambler's fallacy. Assuming that the concrete data you have is not representative, and instead the opposite is more likely to occur. The correct reasoning would be "this definitely worked for me, assume I'm not special and try to make the same path easier for others".

The reason I think it might be a strawman is that the ideology your talking about does want to help others, and that thinking would make them less effective at that goal.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#726

Post by dec0dedab0de »

Spivak wrote: post #718
jmpman wrote: post #693

My son is taking a woodworking class in high school. First week, he came home and I asked him what he was doing in his woodworking class… “Disassembling the library bookcases”. “Why???” “Because they’re getting rid of the library”. Apparently the school board decided to save money by cutting the librarian, and then decided to just move the books out of the school library and into the “nearby” public library. In reali…

> Yet the football team is fully funded, and the baseball diamond is kept up The football team makes money, why do people constantly ignore this. There's always money for ventures that have positive ROI. It has nothing to do with priorities. At schools with top theater programs they're also always fully funded because they bring in outside revenue.

I seriously doubt that most highschool football teams make a profit. I would be surprised if ticket sales even cover the cost of the staff working the game.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#727

Post by dec0dedab0de »

monkeyelite wrote: post #716
inetknght wrote: post #711

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> why would the school entangle students with a task to be performed by professional vendors. Why pay a vendor to do it when you can get the students to do it for free?

Because of legal problems if the job is performed improperly or someone is injured. This is basic administration. Also once again, this sounds like what someone would imagine they did in wood shop if they never took wood shop.

maybe they used the wood to make something else

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#728

Post by nancyminusone »

monkeyelite wrote: post #702
jmpman wrote: post #693

My son is taking a woodworking class in high school. First week, he came home and I asked him what he was doing in his woodworking class… “Disassembling the library bookcases”. “Why???” “Because they’re getting rid of the library”. Apparently the school board decided to save money by cutting the librarian, and then decided to just move the books out of the school library and into the “nearby” public library. In reali…

I went to a high school with lots of kids that read and nobody ever checked out a book from the school library. Their interests were specialized and they got their books online or from larger collections not offered at a school. It’s fine - libraries aren’t sacred. If nobody uses them we don’t need them. The joke about football is often made but they pay for it, because people use it. > “Disassembling the library boo…

>This is not the subject of wood working

Sure it is, it's free wood for the woodshop. Unless the library is very new, those are probably solid planks. No shop teacher is going to say no to free wood.

The real mystery is how the woodshop survived longer than the library did. Usually woodshops are the first thing to go.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#729

Post by stonemetal12 »

poemxo wrote: post #549
zdragnar wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Skin color isn't it, actually. I knew (second hand) a teacher in a rural area of a low population state. All white kids, she'd have kindergartners cussing her out. Very little hope for any academic future for the other grades as things didn't get better with the older kids. I knew a white kid who lived in a trailer park whose mom was upset he was getting tutoring after school for his dyslexia because she told him he'…

I don't appreciate reading anecdata in response to cited findings. It cheapens the discussion. Now everyone is going to spend time writing knee-jerk responses to you. At least the parent commenter had the grace to reply with another source instead of falling for it.

The cited findings, don't refute the culture argument though, and maybe even reenforces it. In US culture being illiterate is bad, being bad at math is not looked down up on. The stats show good at reading and bad at math.

While there are STEM (Science Tech Engineering and Math) initiatives, I have yet to see one that actually includes math. You see results in science but not math.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#730

Post by nevertoolate »

monkeyelite wrote: post #719
Rooster61 wrote: post #713

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The joke about football is often made but they pay for it, because people use it. This is not a joke. At all. There are a LOT of high schools that actively prioritize football facilities over education. I grew up in one. It's very frustrating, and that's coming from someone who DID play football.

At my school the kids asked for donations to fund their equipment and they brought in money on the games for their budget. But once again… students and community use football. They do not use high school libraries.

What is your point? One of education’s primary goals is / were to help learning to enjoy the “right” things. Football field or library are not “good” in themselves, people learn to enjoy reading books and playing football via guidance.
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