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Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#71

Post by schme »

skrebbel wrote: post #13

I can't wait for Finns to pop in here to tell us about the dark sides of this success. There must be some. For one, there's a tax rate that would make most Americans, and even most Europeans, choke on their latte. I'm not sure that's bad, but this article seems to neglect to mention that nothing comes for free. This isn't just "doing it smarter", it's also investing a massive chunk of money. Additionally, I honestly…

Top students get diminished returns for their abilities. Everything is based on your age, so students who learn faster just have it easier, but they can't advance any further than the slowest student in the class. As the teacher tells us, a lot of effort goes to helping the kids with more problems learning, keeping the lows as high as possible. Due to the "everyone needs to have equal education" setting, nothing is done to keep the brilliant brilliant.

This isn't a real _problem_ though, just something that could be better and I personally found annoying.

Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#72

Post by mpk »

Ironballs wrote: post #35

I do not know if it was mentioned in the article as I did not read it fully, I'm Finnish and am sort of tired of reading or hearing about this particular subject, but it is worth mentioning that all Finnish teachers are required to have a Master's degree to qualify as teachers (even kindergarten ones). Since higher education is free (there are no private universities in Finland), the threshold to study to become a te…

> [..] it is a sure way of getting employment especially if one is studying a field in which employment is scarce outside of academia, say, philosophy.

Just a random observation, but having philosophers with an educational background teaching kindergarten is probably not such a bad thing.

Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#73

Post by _delirium »

jonknee wrote: post #44
[deleted] wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

There are very few principals and administrators compared to teachers.

As far as I can tell, teachers don't take up the majority of spending, though. It varies a lot by school district, but typical figures are that ~40-45% of education spending is on classroom teachers' salaries, with a declining trend compared to a few decades ago (when it was more common to have 50-60%).

Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#74

Post by _delirium »

Duff wrote: post #52
thomaslangston wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Confirming this. The experience of a Americorps recruit is barely comparable to the average experience of a professional teacher. Americorps recruits are sent to the worse schools, partly because those schools cannot afford more professional teachers.

"Worse" translates to "urban" or "rural" schools. Think about what that means. (Hint: It's not a money issue)

I'm curious how you exclude the "money issue". Don't "rural" and "urban" districts correlate remarkably well with "poor" districts?

Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#75

Post by _delirium »

schme wrote: post #71
skrebbel wrote: post #13

I can't wait for Finns to pop in here to tell us about the dark sides of this success. There must be some. For one, there's a tax rate that would make most Americans, and even most Europeans, choke on their latte. I'm not sure that's bad, but this article seems to neglect to mention that nothing comes for free. This isn't just "doing it smarter", it's also investing a massive chunk of money. Additionally, I honestly…

Top students get diminished returns for their abilities. Everything is based on your age, so students who learn faster just have it easier, but they can't advance any further than the slowest student in the class. As the teacher tells us, a lot of effort goes to helping the kids with more problems learning, keeping the lows as high as possible. Due to the "everyone needs to have equal education" setting, nothing is d…

That's true to a significant extent in the U.S. as well, though districts vary on their policies towards "advanced" or "gifted" classes. I think that on average, even with "advanced" courses, the brilliant students progress further mostly through outside-of-school pursuits, whether it's the internet, independent reading, going to museums, an intellectual hobby, or something else along those lines.

Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#76

Post by mynameishere »

hugh3 wrote: post #60
billswift wrote: post #33

Because they are full of Finns. http://www.amren.com/mtnews/archives/2010/12/pisa_scores_sho...

Wow, if those numbers are true then it sure falls into the "uncomfortable truths" category: ''' * Asian Americans outscored every Asian country, and lost out only to the city of Shanghai, China’s financial capital. * White Americans students outperformed the national average in every one of the 37 historically white countries tested, except Finland (which is, perhaps not coincidentally, an immigration restrictionist…

If truth is uncomfortable, it's just grinding against some lies you're more comfortable with.

But there's no "wow" about it. If America has the pedigree amongst whites, asians, africans, and hispanics, it was simply due to the horrible trials associated with distant migration. Simple Darwinian stuff really.

Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#77

Post by jonknee »

_delirium wrote: post #73
jonknee wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are very few principals and administrators compared to teachers.

As far as I can tell, teachers don't take up the majority of spending, though. It varies a lot by school district, but typical figures are that ~40-45% of education spending is on classroom teachers' salaries, with a declining trend compared to a few decades ago (when it was more common to have 50-60%).

Facilities and materials aren't cheap. Admin is about 10% of my school system's budget and that counts total admin, not just the principals and the like (there are tons of low paid employees in administration).

Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#78

Post by Jtsummers »

tokenadult wrote: post #51
Jtsummers wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How old are your cousins? Americorps seems to recruit (only recruits?) twenty-something, recent college grads. The people I know who've gone to work for them were certainly in that age group. Other teachers I know (15+ years of teaching) seem to have a fair amount of freedom in their lesson plans and materials so I wonder if this is an issue with Americorps, younger teachers, or perhaps I've just known some fortunate…

What subjects do the teachers you know teach, and where are they teaching? After edit: The Americorps website is a mess, so I'm still looking around for information about where Americorps members might work as teachers.

The teachers I know (and remain in regular contact with) are mostly high school teachers and a couple of middle school teachers. I believe the Americorps teachers I know are both HS teachers, both are in Mississippi.

As to the other, more experienced teachers, they teach in various parts of Georgia. Rural districts in both north and middle GA, as well as the Atlanta area (in a variety of school types: a few in financially well off districts; others in financially poorer districts).

Subjects taught:

- Math by most of the Atlanta area teachers

- The rural teachers are a combination of foreign languages and english and a couple math/science teachers

Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#79

Post by forkandwait »

hugh3 wrote: post #58
Duff wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Worse" translates to "urban" or "rural" schools. Think about what that means. (Hint: It's not a money issue)

That black people and white people are stupid? I'm really not sure what forbidden truth you're supposed to be getting at here.

The forbidden truth is about poor people ("rural"=white and poor, "urban" = black and poor.)

Re: Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?

#80

Post by djb_hackernews »

Of course it's easier to teach a smaller homogenous group than a large diverse group.

Doesn't make sense to try to find a one size fits all solution for a problem with a multitude of unique aspects: culture, race, language, income, etc.

In Finland on the other hand it does, because they are all the same culturally, racially, economically and speak the same language.

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