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Scandal at America's top science fair

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Re: Scandal at America's top science fair

#131

Post by teekert »

fransje26 wrote: post #126
teekert wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, in my country (the Netherlands) this whole attitude changed within 1 generation. My parents left met largely alone with my school stuff. Now I hear all my friends complaining that their kid's school "is so much work" for them. Crazy right? When I ask them: Why help them at all (my kids are younger btw), they tell me that "sure we can just not help them, they won't make it into university (but something "low…

Unless something drastically changed in the education system the last ten years, I wonder where all that perceived workload is coming from. Because 10 years back, the homework load, as expressed by the post high-school students I was hanging around with, was significantly lower than in some other European countries.

Dutch youth is spending an average (!) of 5 hours and 45 minutes per day on digital media. That's some serious amount of time, putting pressure on everything else.

I was always told: 8 hours of work, 8 hours of sleep, 8 hours of leisure. Sure, you have eating and commuting etc. But people nowadays have to take those 5+ hours attention they're giving away from somewhere.

Re: Scandal at America's top science fair

#132

Post by thriftwy »

distances wrote: post #111
thriftwy wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The child is nothing to be blamed for, it is a 100% problem of the organizers. For a 17 years old, even throwing together such work is already an worthwhile result. Teens is a golden age of compilation and remixing.

17 year olds are of course fully responsible for their own academic claims and creations. You would get expelled from many high schools for much smaller cases of plagiarism.

Do you really get expelled from high school in the USA? Isn't that basically mandatory education? And for plagiarism?

I'd see some evidence.

Re: Scandal at America's top science fair

#133

Post by throwawaysleep »

teekert wrote: post #115
uneekname wrote: post #10

I was a finalist at the 2017 ISEF and it was quite an experience. A lot of super smart kids there and we all had fun living it up in Los Angeles. There was a stark contrast between those of us who had designed our projects completely ourselves, and those who had significant mentors/lab affiliations. No hate to high schoolers getting valuable STEM experience at local universities, but Regeneron should do more to diffe…

Honestly, in my country (the Netherlands) this whole attitude changed within 1 generation. My parents left met largely alone with my school stuff. Now I hear all my friends complaining that their kid's school "is so much work" for them. Crazy right? When I ask them: Why help them at all (my kids are younger btw), they tell me that "sure we can just not help them, they won't make it into university (but something "low…

> It's a super bad trend because the parent won't be around after school (during their adult life I mean)

At least in North America, this has massively changed within a generation. By a lot. Virtually all of my social circle got help at a young age to buy big houses from their parents. Parents support kids for much longer. Kids live with their parents much longer.

So yeah, the parents are now always there for people my age (mid 20s).

Re: Scandal at America's top science fair

#134

Post by miningape »

throwawaysleep wrote: post #14
blackeyeblitzar wrote: post #9

Science fairs always have hints of fraud around them. Many of the children putting out incredibly advanced research, beyond their capacity, are benefiting from their parents’ expertise, or friends of family, or access to labs, and such. It’s not talked about much but has been an issue for decades. As a side note, the criticism around this incident seems to have some racial tones. It’s weird to see tweets referring to…

Definitely racial tones. Asian countries are frequently accused of copying, cheating, and stealing intellectual property from others, so it matches what people assume about members of those races.

I think this comes down to "face culture" where its "better" to lie and be caught than be forthright from the beginning.

The people used to / raised in face cultures think this is normal and acceptable behavior (because: hey everyone else is doing this I should too - If I don't I will fall behind), whereas those from more "honest" cultures tend to despise the behaviour as it makes work less trustworthy and tends to give an unfair advantage. Notice how the reason for and against doing this is the same: unfairness.

Face cultures tend to embrace systemic unfairness as "fair" whereas non face cultures tend to call it as it is. What's interesting is that countries "with a face culture" tend to have higher levels of corruption and unfair business practices but also much higher levels of societal cohesion and trust. In other words, the more likely you are to save face the less likely you are to live in a democracy. And the less likely you are to trust institutions/organisations the more likely that they are trustworthy.

Re: Scandal at America's top science fair

#136

Post by dagw »

thriftwy wrote: post #132
distances wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

17 year olds are of course fully responsible for their own academic claims and creations. You would get expelled from many high schools for much smaller cases of plagiarism.

Do you really get expelled from high school in the USA? Isn't that basically mandatory education? And for plagiarism ? I'd see some evidence.

Big difference between public and private schools. Getting expelled from a public school is pretty hard, you basically have to do something seriously illegal involving guns and/or drugs. Getting expelled from a private school is an entirely different thing. They can expel you for a lot of things, and basically anything that makes the school look bad in the eyes of prospective future 'customers' is high on that list. Especially among more prestigious schools.

Re: Scandal at America's top science fair

#137

Post by fransje26 »

teekert wrote: post #131
fransje26 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless something drastically changed in the education system the last ten years, I wonder where all that perceived workload is coming from. Because 10 years back, the homework load, as expressed by the post high-school students I was hanging around with, was significantly lower than in some other European countries.

Dutch youth is spending an average (!) of 5 hours and 45 minutes per day on digital media. That's some serious amount of time, putting pressure on everything else. I was always told: 8 hours of work, 8 hours of sleep, 8 hours of leisure. Sure, you have eating and commuting etc. But people nowadays have to take those 5+ hours attention they're giving away from somewhere.

> Dutch youth is spending an average (!) of 5 hours and 45 minutes per day on digital media.

I was wondering if something like that was at play. Well, here are some hard statistics. Thank you for that.

> That's some serious amount of time

It's a worrying and disturbing amount of time.

Now, the question is: is more time wasted on digital media than was wasted on TV in the past?

And secondly: does the current TV time come on top of that, or has TV simply been displaced to other media, and is therefore fully included in the 5 hours and 45 minutes?

Re: Scandal at America's top science fair

#138

Post by mike_hearn »

liendolucas wrote: post #135

Isn't this equally embarrassing for the people that decided to award him? I mean just looking at those images or even imagining the sort of research and equipment that would take to achieve something like this, shouldn't have raised red flags easily?

Sure, but it happens all the time with "professional" science too. This guy did nothing that isn't seen every day in the literature.

The reason these people didn't check the claims is because they have an extremely strong culture of never checking any claims. If they did they might discover the claims were false, and then they might feel obliged to attack a colleague who realistically will be protected by their institution, and who might be a peer reviewer or even colleague in future. So, ignorance is bliss.

Re: Scandal at America's top science fair

#140

Post by dagw »

saberience wrote: post #120
watwut wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paying tutors is not gaming the system. It is trying to learn effectively. I get that one wants to avoid creating a system where students are forced to spend too much time to learn purely for competition sake with no real practical need, but still. The core issue is the pyramid shaped system where not being at one of these super places means that you are out of the competition for best work in general.

Having to pay for tutors to have a chance of getting into the best colleges biases the whole system in favour of the wealthy. Do you want only rich kids going to college?

If you are genuinely smart you will do well enough on qualify for top schools just by studying at school and on your own and relying on your own ability. And even the best and most expensive tutors cannot do that much to improve your scores if you just don't have the aptitude and discipline.

The system now is far more geared towards sending only rich kids to college than any national testing and admissions system would be.

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