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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

#731

Post by mynameisvlad »

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.

> students and community use football. They do not use high school libraries.

That's literally the problem being presented, the "joke" as you called it. This isn't something to be weirdly proud about. This is something to be extremely concerned about. Prioritizing football over education in a place dedicated to the latter is absurd. Like, Idiocracy-levels absurd.

How has it gone so far over your head?

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

#732

Post by Spivak »

dec0dedab0de wrote: post #726
Spivak wrote: post #718

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

Then you didn't go to a football school. We had a multi-million dollar stadium that could hold a thousand-ish fans and it was packed every game. Most of them were season ticket holders. We also raked in $$ from other schools who wanted to host their events using our stadium.

Also none of the people working the game are paid except for the ref (and the TV crew if you have one). It's all volunteers and students. Our principal was the announcer. The revenue from football paid for every other sport and then some.

Schools that weren't football schools had much more modest stadiums, usually just a field and a pre-fab bleacher.

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

#733

Post by marcusverus »

lucideng wrote: post #33

The majority of the public school system has devolved into day-care, not education. Most parents just watch TV, stare at their phones and don't want to be bothered by anything that requires effort. A major societal shift needs to happen for this to be reversed. It's many factors... the parents, the food system, various inequalities, social media, technology, healthcare... the solution is multi-pronged. But if I had t…

Public school is a joke. My 5 year old started kindergarten recently. They're currently learning shapes, which she (and every other child I've encountered) knew when she was two years old.

Meanwhile at home, she's already reading. She's at the hard part, when reading is so slow that it's painfully boring. It's still too slow for the entertainment value to justify the work, so she's not hooked yet. We spend 5-10 minutes a day on it, and I suspect she'll be over the hump in 3-6 months. Public school would have taken another two years to get her there, even though they get her for 7 hours per day.

The one-size-fits-all model of education is a blight on our civilization.

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

#734

Post by bwestergard »

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.

Anecdote: I have spoken to primary school teachers on the east coast of the United States who report that in recent years, there were not supported by parents and administrators when trying to separate kids from their phones ins school.

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

#735

Post by djeastm »

decimalenough wrote: post #307
dzink wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s culture led by phones and other screens. Most teens are addicted to the screens. The need them for school and for socialization with friends and they end up on TikTok or another network and zombie there for most of their best brain years. They lack the ability to focus necessary to learn because the brain is used to constant screen simulation. Letting your child be babysat by a screen is absolutely the worst thi…

I'm pretty sure the same argument was made for television, movies, radio and fiction books.

Yes and it was a fair argument then, too. It's likely only a matter of degree of distraction.

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

#736

Post by jbeam »

Spivak wrote: post #732
dec0dedab0de wrote: post #726

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Then you didn't go to a football school. We had a multi-million dollar stadium that could hold a thousand-ish fans and it was packed every game. Most of them were season ticket holders. We also raked in $$ from other schools who wanted to host their events using our stadium. Also none of the people working the game are paid except for the ref (and the TV crew if you have one). It's all volunteers and students. Our pr…

The vast majority of high school sports teams aren't coming anywhere close to a profit. Your experience is unusual, which answers your question:

> why do people constantly ignore this.

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

#737

Post by Spivak »

jbeam wrote: post #736
Spivak wrote: post #732

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then you didn't go to a football school. We had a multi-million dollar stadium that could hold a thousand-ish fans and it was packed every game. Most of them were season ticket holders. We also raked in $$ from other schools who wanted to host their events using our stadium. Also none of the people working the game are paid except for the ref (and the TV crew if you have one). It's all volunteers and students. Our pr…

The vast majority of high school sports teams aren't coming anywhere close to a profit. Your experience is unusual, which answers your question: > why do people constantly ignore this.

Because people who talk about "the football team always is fully funded" are from schools that are turning a profit. We played teams from schools that weren't. They had ancient gear and a field. The public HS across the street from us didn't even have a field, they used ours.

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

#738

Post by sdsd »

datadrivenangel wrote: post #359
sdsd wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an empirical claim and there's statistics already available. Almost every study of student performance dramatically favors homeschool over American public school. I'm not saying this in support of homeschool, but as an indictment of public school. It's wild that schools spend many millions of dollars on hundreds of professionals, materials, and centuries of institutional knowledge, and yet are trivially outco…

As a homeschooler raised ~20 years ago, the key insight is that outcomes are bimodally distributed based on an overlayed function of parental socioeconomic status and student talent.

The question is which causes which. Does homeschool follow or bolster student talent. Is high parental involvement a meaningless correlation of some other aspect of high SES which actually explains these results, or is it that high SES homes are more involved, and the money itself is the mere correlate?

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

#739

Post by monkeyelite »

mynameisvlad wrote: post #731
monkeyelite wrote: post #719

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

> students and community use football. They do not use high school libraries. That's literally the problem being presented, the "joke" as you called it. This isn't something to be weirdly proud about. This is something to be extremely concerned about. Prioritizing football over education in a place dedicated to the latter is absurd. Like, Idiocracy-levels absurd. How has it gone so far over your head?

So which is worse? - funding something people benefit from but is not part of your mission - funding something which is in your mission, but nobody uses?

The former is questionable. The latter is a just a waste.

Do you care about education outcomes? Or do you care about 90s symbols of education, like libraries.

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

#740

Post by monkeyelite »

nevertoolate wrote: post #730
monkeyelite wrote: post #719

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

My point is you don’t need to spend money on high school libraries if nobody uses them. You can even just buy students books.
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