How to Overhaul US education system • Hacker News Board

Re: How to Overhaul US education system

#21

Post by niels_olson » Sun, Nov 07, 2010, 11:53 PM UTC

MichaelSalib wrote: post #16

niels_olson wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your physician was identified for medical school, residency, and fellowship based in large part on standardized test scores. And the schools and residency programs are tyrannized by their students and residents scores. I gotta say, it doesn't take long to identify the docs who did well on those tests: they're generally the best docs. They're the most articulate, ask the most insightful questions during their patient…

I gotta say, it doesn't take long to identify the docs who did well on those tests: they're generally the best docs. Do you have any evidence to support this notion at all? Or is thus just some religious notion that we're supposed to take on faith?

Yes, I'm a doctor. I work with other doctors.

Re: How to Overhaul US education system

#22

Post by niels_olson » Mon, Nov 08, 2010, 12:07 AM UTC

andrewce wrote: post #6

niels_olson wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your physician was identified for medical school, residency, and fellowship based in large part on standardized test scores. And the schools and residency programs are tyrannized by their students and residents scores. I gotta say, it doesn't take long to identify the docs who did well on those tests: they're generally the best docs. They're the most articulate, ask the most insightful questions during their patient…

Except that the MCAT measures at least some of the core competencies necessary for being a doctor, and includes a lot of vital information which, if you don't have, make it pretty tough to be a physician. Even then, there are plenty of people whose MCAT scores were high enough to get them into medical school who ended up being terrible doctors, just as there are plenty of people who barely got into med school who end…

>MCAT arguement

The USMLE exams (Step I: basic science, Step IICK: clinical knowledge, Step IICS: clinical skills, and Step III: clinical problem solving) are more like the bar exams.

> this is a specious comparison because the exams you cite are professional vocational exams which correspond to a specific career path/domain.

Well, you're throwing in the MCAT, which is an aptitude test based on Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, more like the GRE than the USMLE or bar exams.

> there are so many different ways that things like literacy and numeracy manifest

Literacy and numeracy can't be measured? You sure you want to hang your hat on that?

Look, to quote Allah, I mean, pg, himself, (http://www.paulgraham.com/wealth.html)

> To get rich you need to get yourself in a situation with two things, measurement and leverage. You need to be in a position where your performance can be measured, or there is no way to get paid more by doing more. And you have to have leverage, in the sense that the decisions you make have a big effect.

We can easily modify this paragraph to most if not all domains and industries. I leave as an exercise to the reader to modify it for "improving education".

Re: How to Overhaul US education system

#23

Post by MichaelSalib » Mon, Nov 08, 2010, 1:28 AM UTC

niels_olson wrote: post #21

MichaelSalib wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I gotta say, it doesn't take long to identify the docs who did well on those tests: they're generally the best docs. Do you have any evidence to support this notion at all? Or is thus just some religious notion that we're supposed to take on faith?

Yes, I'm a doctor. I work with other doctors.

Wait, you mean you have anecdotes? Why didn't you say that? I mean, now that I know you've got some anecdotes, I'm totally convinced.