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Escaping High School

skunkledger.substack.com

261–270 of 276 posts

Re: Escaping High School

#261
post #120

> And by the time you’re in your mid-teens, you’re probably as smart as you’re going to be – not as worldly or wise as you will be later, but the raw brainpower is mostly there. I strongly disagree with this. I don't know if it is genuinely true in a biological sense, but in my life experience it is not even close to true. There are lots of things I do that are so far beyond my abilities as a teenager. It could be du…

Author is just another grifter peddling pop-psychology/bro-science nonsense like thousands and thousands of others, since it generates like, views and even conversation (like at HN).

None of it is worth paying attention to.

Re: Escaping High School

#262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Evidence of what? That doing arithmetic by hand like in 19th century (as opposed to arithmetic understanding/intuition/modeling) has zero applications in professional and personal life? Isn't that obvious? When was the last time you did long division by hand? Or that mathematical modeling does have applications in both personal and professional life? Isn't it trivial to come up with numerous examples? Or that mathema…

> Evidence of what? ... Isn't that obvious? I'm loving how everyone is proving such good examples of the things I'm talking about in my root post. First, to be clear I'm not engaging with your proposal. But the point is that you seem to have a very strong opinion. Strong enough at least to muster yourself to type a fairly substantial reply (now two) to me using very strong language like "instanity" and "propagainda".…

I am all for evidence-based decisions, but you are asking for evidence that sky is indeed blue. Like seriously, you want me to prove that math is actually used somewhere? How about it being used in the evidence you are asking for? And when was the last time you used long division? I am sure there are nuances that average student or parent cannot see, but the thing with schools is that they are so rotten that a long list of serious flaws is visible to the public along with corresponding solutions.

Your demands for evidence for the obvious are just a form of red tape intended to protect the status quo. This sort of behavior is the definition of bureaucracy: no action can be taken until approved by the bureaucrat (via curriculum, law, funding, or management decision). In the end, everyone in education just wants to be protected from the stress of change and the challenges of technology.

Re: Escaping High School

#263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Evidence of what? ... Isn't that obvious? I'm loving how everyone is proving such good examples of the things I'm talking about in my root post. First, to be clear I'm not engaging with your proposal. But the point is that you seem to have a very strong opinion. Strong enough at least to muster yourself to type a fairly substantial reply (now two) to me using very strong language like "instanity" and "propagainda".…

I am all for evidence-based decisions, but you are asking for evidence that sky is indeed blue. Like seriously, you want me to prove that math is actually used somewhere? How about it being used in the evidence you are asking for? And when was the last time you used long division? I am sure there are nuances that average student or parent cannot see, but the thing with schools is that they are so rotten that a long l…

All I am asking for is for you to do even one single solitary ounce of effort in validating your assertions. Just like, the minimal, basest, most barebones effort beyond consulting your feelings. The barest of effort is not red tape. If anything, your argument style is doing great to reinforce the status quo, because it will convince exactly 0 people to change their ways.

I provided to you just the kind of evidence that would be necessary to convince people, and I have used to convince many people of exactly what you're trying to push here. Published work by experts in the field who have thought deeply about the subject, published works on the subject, and even designed and tested new curricula in a scientific manner. That is what you need to show people, not just glib statements about how what you're saying is "obvious" and how the people who are doing differently are "insane".

But I didn't go about it calling people "insane" in their actions, because that's the fastest way to get an immediate stonewall. These people are not insane, they are in fact as sane as you think you are, and a huge chunk of them (could even be a majority, certainly every teacher in my department) actually agree with you. But your whole approach of disparaging the very people trying to make a difference, trying to implement the change you want to see. You are calling this system rotten and you literally have no understanding of it, as you've shown here in your posts to me.

I'm open to being convinced that you know what you're talking about, but you keep telling me that you don't want to convince me, so I'll take you at your word that you know nothing about this topic you feel so passionately about. Definitely worthy of a bookmark for the best example of "Big Important Feelings" I've found in the wild so far. Cheers.

Re: Escaping High School

#264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I don't presume to know your children. But I am more qualified than you to compare them to other children, because that's part of my job (unless it's your job too, I dunno). Based on what you've told me, and that's all I have to go off of, your kids are above average. It's kind of wild to me that you're on here arguing with me that they're not. Kids who get A's, B's (even some C's); and do sports or music are wel…

You need a reality check, dude. The fact that you think you can judge people’s children better than their parents based on a few sentences on HN lays bare your poor assumptions.

I said I can judge your kids better relative to other kids because I have extensive experience doing it. If you think you can do that better without any experience actually evaluating kids, then I think it's you who needs the reality check. It's such hubris to think you can do the job of an experienced professional better without any experience or training whatsoever, and that's the whole problem with busybody parents.

The few sentences you provided are highly correlated with very successful students. Learning Latin in 5th grade is not something 90% of children do. Immediately your kid stands apart for having done that. Same with sports and music. Combine that with good grades, and that's the profile of a top student. What more do you want? Again, what's your conception of a top student, and how do your kids not qualify? Is it because they're not getting straight A's?

Still so wild to me that you, as a father, are arguing post after post to me, a dog on the internet, that your kids are below average. I mean, regardless of what reality I live in, what's up with that? Who are you really trying to convince here?

Re: Escaping High School

#265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, author of the post here - thanks for chiming in! Was hoping to hear from someone who had worked in or gone to a school like this. This part of the essay was admittedly the most guesswork-heavy; I included it because that seemed better than the alternative of not mentioning economic disparities at all, or of telling kids at poor schools they're resigned to doom. I'm guessing you're a teacher? If so, I'd be curious…

Notwithstanding my asshole-ishness in my original comment, I actually appreciate you asking these questions. I don't have all the answers. I can gesture at some of them, which I will do later tomorrow (today? Hi, it's 2:00 am). I started to write out an answer and just got sad thinking about it, but I didn't want you to think I was just going to ignore you.

Appreciate this a lot! No rush.

Re: Escaping High School

#266

> Maybe you go to a school in a poor area, or with a lot of violence, or far too many students for the teachers to pay any individual attention to; or, relatedly, maybe you’re required to spend a lot of time caring for siblings or parents, working a low-skill job, or holding your family together or preserving your safety in some way. The disadvantages of this case are obvious, but there are a few advantages too; the…

> really coming face-to-face with the profound systemic and otherwise deep long-term issues kids in this environment have to confront Are there any good books on this topic that you would recommend? I don't expect you to write a point-by-point rebuttal to every blog post like this that comes along, but I'd sure love to do some of that work myself and well-regarded popular books on the subject are a good place to star…

"From Systems Thinking to Systemic Action: 48 Key Questions to Guide the Journey" by Lee Jenkins.

Re: Escaping High School

#267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe that's the definition of hubris. But the tone of the above comment was too abrasive. > genuinely awed by the hubris it requires to just plow ahead that tone sounded more like hubris plus other expletives.

Perhaps it was too abrasive. Hubris? No, I don't have any amount of confidence to drive me to offer big, system-wide solutions. Because schooling and its issues are incredibly complicated and bring into play much, much more than just what happens inside the walls of a school building. One trivial example: students in Title I schools (read: poverty) have much higher rates of chronic health conditions. That's not reall…

I have already given credit to your know-how in this domain in another comment. You would be 99th percentile in knowledge, passion and experience compared to others around here. But maybe there are few ideas from the article we wished implemented in all schools. The author comes from a place of good intention.

Sustained initiative from people like yourself, backed by policy and support from the government can do wonders. And I and most people in this thread are grateful for what you do on the ground level already.

Re: Escaping High School

#268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quitting school wouldn’t have helped me. It would’ve locked my into that life for myself. The chaos I had was mostly at home. School was my calm place.

This is something I hear startlingly often. It's not the majority of kids, by any means, but I've had a number of students who fail classes so they have to go to summer school, just to escape from home.

It wasn’t that intense for me or even a conscious choice. For me it was neglect and a chaotic environment. (Think growing up as a “roommate” of a depressed nonfunctional alcoholic)

Similarly, I had enough positive attention that I wanted to continue and make it to college.

Edit: bad-> intense. I need to stop minimizing what I went through.

Re: Escaping High School

#269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i think parent prefers to simply be angry than contribute to the conversation

The parents in these situation often don’t have the emotional or social skills to do more or even realize that there are options other than be angry. The parents are dysfunctional people churning out the next generation of dysfunctional people. It’s an intergenerational cycle that is nearly impossible to break.

I’m not blaming these people, but if you grow up in a dysfunctional functional environment it is on the level of a miracle to break the cycle.

You don’t know what’s wrong or where to look for help and in my case I was even proud of my parentification for making me “strong and resilient” while minimizing the bad things as a coping mechanism.

Re: Escaping High School

#270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am all for evidence-based decisions, but you are asking for evidence that sky is indeed blue. Like seriously, you want me to prove that math is actually used somewhere? How about it being used in the evidence you are asking for? And when was the last time you used long division? I am sure there are nuances that average student or parent cannot see, but the thing with schools is that they are so rotten that a long l…

All I am asking for is for you to do even one single solitary ounce of effort in validating your assertions. Just like, the minimal, basest, most barebones effort beyond consulting your feelings. The barest of effort is not red tape. If anything, your argument style is doing great to reinforce the status quo, because it will convince exactly 0 people to change their ways. I provided to you just the kind of evidence t…

> Published work by experts in the field who have thought deeply about the subject, published works on the subject, and even designed and tested new curricula in a scientific manner.

This is called "paralysis by analysis", a special case of "penny wise, pound stupid". There's a lot of low-hanging fruit in education that does not need much thinking. You are free to optimize the solutions as much as you want, but don't use that as an excuse to delay change. Also, some changes (computers in particular) only bring benefits when implemented at scale. Small incremental tests will always show negative results, because they will be dominated by costs of the change.

> All I am asking for is for you to do even one single solitary ounce of effort in validating your assertions.

Homeschooling parents validate tons of possible changes all the time. I did it too. One thing you learn when homeschooling is that major changes can be implemented quickly, easily, and cheaply by single person. You can iterate so quickly you end up being limited by the compulsory curriculum rather than by opportunities for improvement. You then look at the glacially slow pace of change (or even regression) in "professional" education and cannot help thinking it's insane. Something must be very wrong with the system.

> But your whole approach of disparaging the very people trying to make a difference

Are they really trying to make a difference? My impression is that teachers just want to do the minimum work they have to do and then go home. I have never seen a teacher care the way parents care. There are exceptions, rare innovators, but exceptional teachers, if they avoid traps of educational fads and try to implement real change, quickly run into resistance. They are locked in the inertia of the large organization. Their hands are tied, they get frustrated and they eventually give up.

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