Post by xdeadlyxmirage on May 19, 2014 3:26:12 GMT -5
Does anyone actually believe that education in America is ummmmmm... near adequate? Let us not just ask in effectiveness but content as well.
You can look at the numbers, the test scores compared to the rest of the world, and in all honesty, I do not give a shit. I do not think that ANY quantitative measurement is of any substantive value when it comes to education.
For a quick thought experiment, imagine a high school graduate, you can even imagine if you want, several years of art classes, choir, band, or things of the like. There is a fairly solid chance that their favorite "musician" will be Katy Perry, One Direction, Drake, or something on the same level. Am I the only one who thinks there is something fucking wrong with that? Educated through 18, and very likely near zero exposure to any of the great art or artists that has been preserved for 2000 years. Almost certainly if any has occurred, it would either be self directed or not be intellectual in any way. How many students even hear an argument for the importance of art that is not "it is entertainment," nor "it helps students do better in reading and math" but instead giving art any sort of intellectual value in its own essence? Our schools pretend up until college that STEM fields are the only intellectual subjects, while our intelligent students who either do not see the value within science or simply do not find it enjoyable are shown a world in which only it celebrates and satisfies any intelligence. Does no one else see anything wrong with the idea that we teach generations of people that good art has nothing to do with smarts but is simply about being fun in the shallowest way possible (this being true whether it is music, fine arts, film, photography, or creative writing)? For school no one is given assignments to listen to music, look at an art collection, or watch a film. In non-narrative English, history (social studies), and business, no one is given any sort of theory to read. Its is about memorizing what it is considered important concepts, events and not their meanings, grammar but not the time and place to break it, schools of thought but not the reasons for following it. How many opinion books are assigned and read in 13 years of schooling? I recall being given one, substantially less than in one semester (or month) of college.
The two answers I hear the most to the the problem of education in America in general (outside of the libertarian teaching students to be submissive good workers which I will not argue against or for inside of this post, maybe later) are either that we do not encourage enough STEM and we do not ask enough out of our students. I'm personally fine with more STEM if and only if the student expresses strong interest in the STEM fields. However, I am not sure that the problems people proclaim within the STEM fields at all arise out of being complacent on teaching STEM. It is much more demonstrable that we lack in fields outside of the STEM fields much more than we do within them. Think for a second not in comparison to other countries but in comparison to where we should be as a country. Think of how deeply lacking we are in arts and social awareness in a time in which the world has the population growth that lead to the biggest explosion within STEM and the amount of progress STEM fields have made within an absurdly small amount of time. However, any social or artistic understanding has dropped off or at least missed out on the same explosion. STEM fields are doing fine, even if America is managing an B+ while many other countries are doing better, what about the D in the other fields (even if other countries are about the same)? When it comes to asking more out of our students, I find too often that what people mean is double the worksheets, longer school days, less recess, stricter discipline, and more extracurricular activities. None of these are the solution though. Instead, we ignore that our problems lie in separate cases of not asking enough. Once children move past children's books they move onto teen and adolescent books (which no one actually thinks are good) where many stay until or past high school, without being as much as encouraged to move beyond. If one is in an intro economics class why would they not read Smith, Friedman, and Krugman? Frequently we ignore issues in the social sciences, the entirety of philosophy, and forcing children to debate or share their own ideas due to expecting our schools to protect our children from thing that may offend them. Any child who grows without being offended by another's ideas has not grown up. No one expects, asks, or even imagines that a student would ever think about intellectual or academic ideas outside of school. If a student were reading a non-fiction academic book/essay or a peer reviewed study it would be weird to everyone, fellow students and teachers alike. It should be expected that every child do so without being told. It should be weird not to do that.
Thank you for reading today's rant. Please feel free to comment, disagree, debate with or without me, think about to yourself, or of course agree with anything I have said.
You can look at the numbers, the test scores compared to the rest of the world, and in all honesty, I do not give a shit. I do not think that ANY quantitative measurement is of any substantive value when it comes to education.
For a quick thought experiment, imagine a high school graduate, you can even imagine if you want, several years of art classes, choir, band, or things of the like. There is a fairly solid chance that their favorite "musician" will be Katy Perry, One Direction, Drake, or something on the same level. Am I the only one who thinks there is something fucking wrong with that? Educated through 18, and very likely near zero exposure to any of the great art or artists that has been preserved for 2000 years. Almost certainly if any has occurred, it would either be self directed or not be intellectual in any way. How many students even hear an argument for the importance of art that is not "it is entertainment," nor "it helps students do better in reading and math" but instead giving art any sort of intellectual value in its own essence? Our schools pretend up until college that STEM fields are the only intellectual subjects, while our intelligent students who either do not see the value within science or simply do not find it enjoyable are shown a world in which only it celebrates and satisfies any intelligence. Does no one else see anything wrong with the idea that we teach generations of people that good art has nothing to do with smarts but is simply about being fun in the shallowest way possible (this being true whether it is music, fine arts, film, photography, or creative writing)? For school no one is given assignments to listen to music, look at an art collection, or watch a film. In non-narrative English, history (social studies), and business, no one is given any sort of theory to read. Its is about memorizing what it is considered important concepts, events and not their meanings, grammar but not the time and place to break it, schools of thought but not the reasons for following it. How many opinion books are assigned and read in 13 years of schooling? I recall being given one, substantially less than in one semester (or month) of college.
The two answers I hear the most to the the problem of education in America in general (outside of the libertarian teaching students to be submissive good workers which I will not argue against or for inside of this post, maybe later) are either that we do not encourage enough STEM and we do not ask enough out of our students. I'm personally fine with more STEM if and only if the student expresses strong interest in the STEM fields. However, I am not sure that the problems people proclaim within the STEM fields at all arise out of being complacent on teaching STEM. It is much more demonstrable that we lack in fields outside of the STEM fields much more than we do within them. Think for a second not in comparison to other countries but in comparison to where we should be as a country. Think of how deeply lacking we are in arts and social awareness in a time in which the world has the population growth that lead to the biggest explosion within STEM and the amount of progress STEM fields have made within an absurdly small amount of time. However, any social or artistic understanding has dropped off or at least missed out on the same explosion. STEM fields are doing fine, even if America is managing an B+ while many other countries are doing better, what about the D in the other fields (even if other countries are about the same)? When it comes to asking more out of our students, I find too often that what people mean is double the worksheets, longer school days, less recess, stricter discipline, and more extracurricular activities. None of these are the solution though. Instead, we ignore that our problems lie in separate cases of not asking enough. Once children move past children's books they move onto teen and adolescent books (which no one actually thinks are good) where many stay until or past high school, without being as much as encouraged to move beyond. If one is in an intro economics class why would they not read Smith, Friedman, and Krugman? Frequently we ignore issues in the social sciences, the entirety of philosophy, and forcing children to debate or share their own ideas due to expecting our schools to protect our children from thing that may offend them. Any child who grows without being offended by another's ideas has not grown up. No one expects, asks, or even imagines that a student would ever think about intellectual or academic ideas outside of school. If a student were reading a non-fiction academic book/essay or a peer reviewed study it would be weird to everyone, fellow students and teachers alike. It should be expected that every child do so without being told. It should be weird not to do that.
Thank you for reading today's rant. Please feel free to comment, disagree, debate with or without me, think about to yourself, or of course agree with anything I have said.