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Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

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Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#121

Post by shawndumas »

InfiniteLoopx64 wrote: post #73
shantanubala wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Neil Tyson does a beautiful job of explaining why basic education is important: There are people who say “I'll never need this math -- these trig identities from 10th grade or 11th grade.” Or maybe you never learned them. Here's the catch: whether or not you ever use the math that you learned in school, the act of having learned the math established a wiring in your brain that didn't exist before, and it's th…

Can I not learn "math" wiring from doing other activities that ACTUALLY benefit me, such as programming? The very act of owning a business and such is giving me the PRACTICAL knowledge while still building the wiring. It's win win.

More than that; your smart and get things done. if and when you needed to learn the math needed to solve a roadblock you'll use exactly the same skills you used to learn Linux administration/networking/programming

Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#122

Post by shawndumas »

elptacek wrote: post #116

A teacher approached my mother when I was 15 and strongly suggested that I be allowed to take the GED and move on to college. Later, an employer approached both of my parents and strongly suggested that I be allowed to take the GED and attend culinary school. Both adults were ignored. Outside of these two, there was no guidance available to me for seeking an education beyond high school. To this day, I believe that t…

without disagreeing with a thing you wrote, you're assuming that he even wants/needs to go to college

Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#123

Post by shawndumas »

mtrimpe wrote: post #97
InfiniteLoopx64 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My teachers (with exceptions) are stubborn and unwilling to make such deals. It's also not only the after school assignments that I'm upset about, but the fact that I spent 8+ hours of my day in school with no ability to get any work done.

Have you considered that you might not have the social skills yet to make them willing to make such deals with you? I was in a very similar position as you and looking back what got me those breaks were the teachers that liked me, that liked what they saw in me and who wanted to support me. Everything I got, I was granted. Just like in real life.

he convinced me to do what I could to try and convince his parents to let him get his GED and then dropout

Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#124

Post by shawndumas »

InfiniteLoopx64 wrote: post #115
danielweber wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots of schooling is built around making it easier to manage groups of kids. If this guy starts getting exceptions, the teacher is afraid that the next 10 kids in the class will also want exceptions, and pretty soon it's dogs sleeping with cats.

Yep. That about describes it. All the kids in my school are wildly crazy and immature and thus it's not in the picture. I may not have the "best" social skills, but I will say many of the teachers do like me.

worse than that; the very nature of the job of school administration attracts a certain kind person

they want him to conform to a system that was never designed for him

Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#125

Post by shawndumas »

quasque wrote: post #88
InfiniteLoopx64 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. I do not feel I am too smart for school, however, as you say, I feel that the system is flawed. And I don't want to waste my time on many things that I know will truly never help me in practical knowledge. However, there is still of course the connections and some vital information that school providers, but I don't think it's worth sitting out all the other useless information that wastes my time.

This is a curious assault on general knowledge that you display here - what precisely would you consider to be "useless information", and why? Schooling at the level you're at now is designed to be well-rounded, and I suspect you would be doing yourself a future disservice if you chose to completely reject it in favour of your current narrow interests.

the insipid inanity that they pass off as "knowledge" really is not worth his time.

he would be much better served reading broadly; historic fiction, science/nature periodicals, the classics etc

Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#126

Post by shawndumas »

MartinCron wrote: post #41
recuter wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe there's a point like this to be made about college but I don't understand how 3 more years of high school would benefit him - what's wrong with a GED? It just seems so much more time efficient.

For better or worse, a GED has a stigma as being an inferior option. Just something to be aware of.

I've conducted well over 200 interviews and I will tell you honestly it never would've crossed my mind to pass up on someone who is smart and got things done simply because they had a GED

and just to give that statements some context, I've been in a position to make the initial decision on hiring at three of the last four companies I've worked for

Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#127

Post by shawndumas »

jonsen wrote: post #7
shawndumas wrote: post #2

Hello Mr. [Principal], I've heard through sources that there have been various meetings conducted regarding my recent and overall academic performance at [private school]. I'd like to put some stuff on the table and get your thoughts on a few issues if you would take the time to read this. As background information I'd like you to know that I am the owner, CEO, and CTO of [hosting company], LLC a large Minecraft host…

Well, one thing he could gain from HS is the ability to write an argument. What does he actually want? I tend to agree with you.

His arguments, considering that he's not even quite sure what he wants, where enough to convinced me to try to convince his parents to let him get his GED and then dropout

Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#128

Post by shawndumas »

InfiniteLoopx64 wrote: post #71
Arelius wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the kid is this smart he can do way better than running some VPS hosting company in the long run. What's actually super interesting about the kid's comment is that while clearly written by a clever kid, he specifically never states that he is too smart for this, and that seems intentional. It seems very much that the kid recognizes that the system is flawed, and not that he is too extraordinary for the system, s…

Exactly. I do not feel I am too smart for school, however, as you say, I feel that the system is flawed. And I don't want to waste my time on many things that I know will truly never help me in practical knowledge. However, there is still of course the connections and some vital information that school providers, but I don't think it's worth sitting out all the other useless information that wastes my time.

Flawed doesn't even begin to describe the system, and that's not taking into consideration that the system was never designed for people like him

Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#129

Post by shawndumas »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #107
shawndumas wrote: post #2

Hello Mr. [Principal], I've heard through sources that there have been various meetings conducted regarding my recent and overall academic performance at [private school]. I'd like to put some stuff on the table and get your thoughts on a few issues if you would take the time to read this. As background information I'd like you to know that I am the owner, CEO, and CTO of [hosting company], LLC a large Minecraft host…

I'm reminded of the argument I heard from one kid that if eating junk food was "bad" it wouldn't satisfy their hunger and be so tasty. The core of that argument, like this one, is that the fundamental assumptions about what the activity is providing are incorrect, and that leads to poor reasoning about the problem. In my case the young man had made assumptions about signalling his body gave him with regard to being h…

He already knows how to develop knowledge when confronted with his own lack of it

you act like he hasn't already learned linux administration/networking/programming on his own

Re: Ask HN: Friend's 15 year old wants to drop out, I've been asked to intervene

#130

Post by shawndumas »

demosthenes wrote: post #39
shawndumas wrote: post #2

Hello Mr. [Principal], I've heard through sources that there have been various meetings conducted regarding my recent and overall academic performance at [private school]. I'd like to put some stuff on the table and get your thoughts on a few issues if you would take the time to read this. As background information I'd like you to know that I am the owner, CEO, and CTO of [hosting company], LLC a large Minecraft host…

He doesn't know what 'temporal' means and doesn't write that well. He would benefit from more English instruction. There are many problems with how kids are taught in school. However, it's arrogant to think that you won't benefit from further instruction at 15 - regardless of how well you think you're doing. I've known many smart autodidacts, but they're often unaware of their weaknesses. They tend to be less 'well r…

He writes better then a lot of the people that I've dealt with in my 23 years in the computer industry
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