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Escaping High School

skunkledger.substack.com

101–110 of 276 posts

Re: Escaping High School

#101

"Maybe you go to a school in a poor area, or with a lot of violence ... I don’t know enough to say what the best tactics are for these cases, but I have a few theories." This pretty much says it all right here. The author comes from an incredibly privileged background and clearly believes they are smarter than people who have spent their lives studying education. How we educate children isn't a perfect system, but ed…

Yes, don't we all hate it when people come into our job and tell us how to do it? Parents love to think that because they have had one child (or maybe a couple), they know how to educate children writ large. Compounding that, most people went through the education system as students, so they believe they have insider knowledge as to how the system works. Usually their advice on how to fix the system is geared toward…

>Parents love to think that because they have had one child (or maybe a couple), they know how to educate children writ large.

They don't care about how to educate children writ large. They care to the extent that they think you are failing their child, specifically. You would do well to remember that as an educator, you have a responsibility to the public. If you really find parents concerns to be beneath your dignity, perhaps you shouldn't be a teacher.

Re: Escaping High School

#102

This is an interesting article, but I think it is heavily skewed toward the author’s goals in life and who they innately are. A guide for a more introverted person, or sports-oriented person, or highly social person would be vastly different. In particular, I think the author makes the mistake of believing everyone must be a creator. The reality is most people aren’t good at it, don’t like it and don’t pursue it. And…

I don't think they realize how lost teenagers can be either. Some kids have a driven vision, but a lot don't. They are still going to hang around the same parking lots and it's not because school is getting in the way.

Re: Escaping High School

#103
post #9

Personally, I’ve always felt that schooling is a waste of time, money, and resources. The default model of civilization is that children are absent from life. This means that kids are missing out on seeing adults interact, so they mature more slowly, and it also means that their life experiences are limited to what happens in a building. Importantly, after 18 years, people in the USA leave school in debt and are no b…

> The default model of civilization is that children are absent from life.

There's nothing "default" about Civilization, which entailed intentional centralization and creation of bureaucracy.

We don't live in a society where 80% of people farm shitty land to survive, and no one of sound mind wants to turn back that dial. We're not bringing our kids to roam sheepishly around oil rigs, mines, labs, sales floors, whatever.

I think everyone has an opinion on how education could improve, but there's no superior (or viable) substitute for it at scale.

Notwithstanding, this isn't zero sum in the first place: parents can teach their kid at leisure, and they do. They expose them to their interests and their work, to some extent.

And lastly, there's no such thing as "absent from life". Even if this is only meant to convey the idea that schooling shelters kids away from any and all interesting things in society, this is untrue (and by extension, it would suggest that you're "absent from life" if your shit job doesn't meet some arbitrary criteria, or otherwise that your shit job is "full of life" but school isn't).

Re: Escaping High School

#104

Something that bugs me today is the way music education was handled at my school, and probably other schools. I got to a pretty good technical competence with my trumpet but at the end of the day I could only play what was on the sheets. Maybe some of that is my bad, but I switched to keys after highschool and when I show up to jam, most wind players seem like musical cripples without a lead sheet, and my fakesheets…

> I got to a pretty good technical competence with my trumpet but at the end of the day I could only play what was on the sheets. This is pretty much how music is taught to all students learning 'classical' and was my experience as well. Most never really learn anything about music at a fundamental level, and can even have an entire career in the classical world not really knowing anything about what's going on in th…

As far as I am concerned, classical music in conservatoire includes music theory and instrument trainings. To play in an orchestra, especially semi famous one, most likely you would need to follow an university/similar degree.

Any exam is done without a music sheet, music theory always include composition. Chord progressions comes surely later in music theory but harmony is key from classic repertoire,and counterpoint from baroque era repertoire.

Re: Escaping High School

#105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Dont put effort just for the sake of grades, they are worthless. They aren't worthless. Grades make it easier and cheaper for you to go to college. Good grades in college make it far, far easier to get jobs and can get you in the door to significantly better and higher paying jobs or grad school. So not worthless, just not the be all and end all.

It is almost certainly not worth your time to try to be in the top 10 in your class. Nearly everyone is much better off doing other things with their time than studying to try to get an elite college for a good deal. There's little evidence that where you go to school matters. If you take Albert Einstein and you put him in a community college, he's still going to be Albert Einstein, and you're still going to just be…

> It is almost certainly not worth your time to try to be in the top 10 in your class.

In Louisiana, it literally gets you a free public college education.

Re: Escaping High School

#106
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, don't we all hate it when people come into our job and tell us how to do it? Parents love to think that because they have had one child (or maybe a couple), they know how to educate children writ large. Compounding that, most people went through the education system as students, so they believe they have insider knowledge as to how the system works. Usually their advice on how to fix the system is geared toward…

> Yes, don't we all hate it when people come into our job and tell us how to do it? I read this and was expecting /s but apparently not. Please address something concrete! In the US, there are significant problems with the educational system. It's ok to write a theoretical piece thinking about ways to do things differently. The author has some good ideas that do not deserve to be dismissed lightly. They can even be a…

Well, there are a couple things going on here. First is the blog post, which I can't really make sense of. It's 12,000 words on how to navigate high school without a single reference or citation. No evidence is presented whatsoever to support any of the assertions made. It purports to be a guide for 14 year olds but is written in a manner and published in a medium that is not accessible for 14 year olds; not many 14 year olds are reading 36 pages worth of blogs on substack. The author doesn't seem to teach 14 year olds or teach at all. He does not seem to have done any research for the post -- he hasn't spoken to any 14 year olds, or anyone else who has spoken to or teaches them for that matter. Paul Graham gets a quote though.

So really, I'm left to assume that this is just a letter from the author to his past self. That's how this reads to me.

As for the concrete advice you list, this is exactly what I'm talking about. Saying something like "get a computer" or "make a thing" will play great here on HN. But this is not advice 14 year olds want or need. Kids are creating things all the time. You do not have to tell them to create things. In fact, telling a 14 year old that they need to get a computer to before they can produce shows a distinct lack of understanding of how 14 year old express themselves creatively. Most of the advice in that section is focused on how to find a cheap computer, not how to create anything.

If you actually listen to the problems kids have today, it's not that they have a lack of creative outlets. The problems they are facing revolve around managing mental health issues, and there's not a single word about that in all the 12,000+ written.

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The other thing going on is the generic HN discussion on education the blog post has catalyzed. The blog post doesn't really touch on the discussion happening here, so it's kind of separate, but still related. Here on HN, the discussion often revolves around the Big Important Feelings posters have about the education system. You're right, there are problems, but they are rarely identified here. The solutions offered therefore often aim to solve the wrong problems.

For example, a lot of HN posters have a problem with the number of administrators employed at universities, and they even like to cite a ratio of admin to students or admin to faculty. Then they say "They ratio is too high! Fire the administrators!"

This is a classic example of Chesterton's Fence. Firing the administrators and hiring more faculty seems like a great idea from the perspective of the student, who interacts with faculty and not administrators. But from my perspective as a member of the faculty, I would not want this at all and it would make my work and the work of my students harder (for many reasons I have articulated in previous comments if you're interested in those).

For the HN crowd, this is like saying "The computer is running too many processes. It looks like a lot of those are daemons and system processes, so let's get rid of the operating system to free up resources. That way we can run more programs, because after all, that's the point of the computer." The average HN poster will immediately see 100 reasons why that's a bad idea in a computer system, but then go to advocate for something very similar in principle when it comes to the education system.

Re: Escaping High School

#107
post #2

Decades ago, an old friend of mine had a go-getter son, who started a lawn care business when he was ~15. Son was talented, and his business grew very fast. (This was in a well-to-do suburb, before there were so many lawn care businesses. Plenty of good HS students available to hire, and the trucks were leased.) For getting into top-ranked colleges, "the summer business I started in HS is already paying me more than…

This seems to be another strong argument for social class being a huge player in determining your success - as you say it was a well-to-do suburb. Good on them for taking advantage of the opportunity, but just as vitally the opportunity was there to take.

Re: Escaping High School

#108

Something that bugs me today is the way music education was handled at my school, and probably other schools. I got to a pretty good technical competence with my trumpet but at the end of the day I could only play what was on the sheets. Maybe some of that is my bad, but I switched to keys after highschool and when I show up to jam, most wind players seem like musical cripples without a lead sheet, and my fakesheets…

Couldn't agree more. I think the issue is that school budgets are limited and music programs are perennially on the chopping block because they are among the most expensive and are seen as the least critical to education. The band directors fall into a cycle of needing to justify the investment by getting the kids to play the most impressive piece that they are capable of playing, even if the kids learn absolutely nothing along the way.

And have you ever tried to get 50 kids to do the same thing for five minutes? Even if that thing is sitting still, it's virtually impossible. If it's playing a song at the limit of their musical ability? You'd have a better time swallowing a shovel.

Re: Escaping High School

#109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, don't we all hate it when people come into our job and tell us how to do it? Parents love to think that because they have had one child (or maybe a couple), they know how to educate children writ large. Compounding that, most people went through the education system as students, so they believe they have insider knowledge as to how the system works. Usually their advice on how to fix the system is geared toward…

>Parents love to think that because they have had one child (or maybe a couple), they know how to educate children writ large. They don't care about how to educate children writ large. They care to the extent that they think you are failing their child, specifically. You would do well to remember that as an educator, you have a responsibility to the public. If you really find parents concerns to be beneath your digni…

Personally I teach adults, so in my capacity as a teacher, parental concerns are not my concerns.

In my capacity as a citizen of this country and as a taxpayer, I also don't care about busybody "concerned parents" who feel the system is failing them personally. My concern in this capacity comes down to how the system is building a better community for everyone. Individual parental concerns shouldn't turn into culture wars.

Re: Escaping High School

#110
post #39

> As a bare minimum, high school is supposed to give kids somewhere to go while their parents are at work and keep them from ending up pregnant, in jail, or dead Perhaps we should start with putting some trust in the people who are close to the age of majority. High school is not daycare in any shape or form. Highschoolers can largely fend for themselves. Of course they get ideas, but you consistently see less of tha…

I’m going to disagree with you here. For most kids in high school regulars courses it is absolutely day care. And that’s the majority of students. Honors, AP, IB are not daycare.

This is the sort of approach that's utterly foreign to me.

When people in my class started turning 18 teachers reminded us that compulsory education doesn't apply to them any more, so they're free to leave at any time - with appropriate consequences regarding their chances of passing, but nothing else.

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