"a teacher who basically tortured us through adolescence"This "torture" idea came up in my mind just reading the title. Having a professor that is being harsh only objectively may be good in a limited sense, but in my experience this is just rare (and I had "the joy" of being educated by a good lot of harsh teachers). Being harsh objectively is the only kind that is supposedly beneficial, and it is "supposedly" because its efficiency is just very dependent on the subject's susceptibility. This is rare because it requires a lot of discipline on the teacher's part. Most often than not, around an harsh attitude the reason is pushed aside to make room for ever-dominating emotive behavior. On the teacher's side this leads to an unconstrained way of pulling the strings, and on the pupil's side - to cede and degenerate into fear, close-mindedness, and self disrespect, among many others. Don't get me wrong, the primary results will be there. The teaching's goal will be reached, if we're to ignore the costs (and we often do). I just guess the difficulty of summing it all up or realistically considering the entire thing on its true value as a parent or policy-maker if one hasn't been subjected to it and its effects.
"My old teacher Mr. K seldom praised us. His highest compliment was «not bad.» It turns out he was onto something." "the belief, the faith really, in students' ability to do better."
That of course is valid only if the amount of disparage in pupil's overall social interaction is minor, otherwise there wouldn't be enough confidence to build up in the first place. The writer praises her teacher for his results and concludes that the means must have been justified. I don't. What I see is the most rudimentary automatic negative-reaction based system. Any deviation from the expected parameters causes a literally negative reaction from the ruler that enforces the entire process. A most rudimentary form of teaching. It doesn't need any calibration to student's profile, it doesn't require much refinement of pedagogics as the task of getting back (somehow) in the normal parameters falls mostly on the student, and it definitely relieves the teacher of any kind of stress for the locus of control that is the pupil performance not being in his direct reach. (Actually, a harsh teacher gets rid of his stress in the lessons.) As a researched material this article presents itself, I'm disappointed of the conclusion. I expected efficiency without getting back to the old and brute ways.
The state of the education may not be rosy, but getting into "harsh" seems a bit extreme to me. Instead of "harsh" I would call for "serious". You only need teachers to show you the way and the limits. It's you and only you that should be harsh on yourself, no one else.