Top 5 Changes You Would Make To American Education (1 Viewer)

[wikkidpissah]

K thru Doctorate, kids.

Mine:

1 - Break the teachers' unions. NEA & AFT's stranglehold makes all elementary/secondary changes moot, the way campaign financing makes good governance impossible.

2 - De-socialize it. Education is not about pleasing students or parents. It is about equipping children to be productive adults and good citizens. If you want the govt to educate your children, trust it as a monolithic aspect of childhood development & let it do its work

3 - Tear down the college system. My guess is that 75% of higher learning can be done digitally. Do it. Screw the college tie, sports, giving parents a way to get rid of their kids.

4 - Make higher education free in exchange for national service. This is part of a larger concept of mine where national service (military, community service, infrastructure training/work) is required to give all citizens eligibility to the American Miracle - reasonable tax rates, programs, higher education, etc

5 - Most importantly, by far - science. Educate by brain science. We understand now what & when students can learn best & most and almost none of it is utilized because of socialization and perceived harshness of certain phases. Yes, there are developmental points where children would optimally be boot-camped on learning. Far more harsh in the scheme of things is a human being not being properly trained to be the best it can be. nufced

 

[Max Power]

Bring teaching trade skills back to high schools.  Not everyone is going to college.

Teach more life skills courses.  Things that will be useful in your everyday adult life.

Bring back dodgeball because it was awesome and kids need more exercise.

Elementary schools need to do a better job at challenging children.  Push the advanced kids harder and pull the slower ones to the side. 

Get class sizes under control. A single teacher for a 25-30 student class is not effective. 

 

[joffer]

only one I have is pay teachers more.

 

[randall146]

increase teachers pay

smaller class sizes

de-emphasize college prep for all

increase vocational training/opportunities 

Require national year of service 

 

[MAC_32]

#1 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

#2 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

#3 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

#4 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

#5 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

 

[randall146]

Push the advanced kids harder and pull the slower ones to the side. 

This is a big one that I missed. Inclusive classrooms are great in theory but teachers end up teaching to the least common denominator and wasting time on discipline cases instead of nurturing talent. 

 

[dgreen]

#1 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

#2 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

#3 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

#4 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

#5 - stop grading school performance based on standardized tests

Should we grade school performance? If so, how?

 

[Maurile Tremblay]

Teaching methods should be designed to foster long-term retention of the material so that it is not forgotten a week after the test. (We know how to do this effectively — there is a science to it — but it is not done.)

 

[MAC_32]

Should we grade school performance? If so, how?

I don't think politically it would ever be feasible, at least across a wide net - but, no, I don't think we should. The unintended consequences from the current approach effect everyone. They effect one school differently than they do another, but I don't think any of it is positive. And, yes, I get that a 180 to no longer doing it at all would also come with its own. I think there's a balance in between that must be attained. And I think accomplishing that goal would solve several of the other issues already mentioned.

 

[randall146]

K thru Doctorate, kids.

Mine:

1 - Break the teachers' unions. NEA & AFT's stranglehold makes all elementary/secondary changes moot, the way campaign financing makes good governance impossible.

Can you elaborate on this? I agree with the rest of your suggestions but I’m always skeptical of demonizing unions. 

 

[Sinn Fein]

We don't need no education.

We don't need no thought control.

No dark sarcasm in the classroom.

Teachers leave them kids alone.

 

[Max Power]

This is a big one that I missed. Inclusive classrooms are great in theory but teachers end up teaching to the least common denominator and wasting time on discipline cases instead of nurturing talent. 

My oldest son is a pretty smart kid. He always brought home great grades.  When he was in second grade, one quarter his report card came home with a note that the teacher needed to have a parent teacher conference with my wife and I.

When we got there she tolds us how he is acting up in class and has become a distraction to other children.  He bothers other kids trying to do their work. We say we'll talk to him about it and then teacher proceeds to show us some of his work.  We noticed on the back of most of his assignments he is writing 1 to 200.  Every single number. 

We ask about it and come to find out he finishes his work before the other kids and that was the teachers way of keeping him busy until the other kids finish.  Needless to say I was pretty livid at this point. Not only was the teacher being lazy about developing the smarter kids, she had the gull to call me in and complain that he is being a distraction. 

I voiced concern to the principle but that went nowhere. We ended up sending him to school with a 3rd grade workbook we purchased.  Luckily that was the last year at that school and things have been better since.  I was still blown away at what a poor job that school was doing.  

 

[dgreen]

I don't think politically it would ever be feasible, at least across a wide net - but, no, I don't think we should. The unintended consequences from the current approach effect everyone. They effect one school differently than they do another, but I don't think any of it is positive. And, yes, I get that a 180 to no longer doing it at all would also come with its own. I think there's a balance in between that must be attained. And I think accomplishing that goal would solve several of the other issues already mentioned.

Measuring school performance is a means to an end. The end, I assume, is providing a quality education to everyone. Assuming that's a goal of yours, how do you work towards that end without measuring performance?

In the private sector, performance is measured by profit and whether a company stays in business. There are consequences to not performing because consumers have choices. If public education were to no longer measure the performance of each school (with the goal of improving low-performing schools), there would need to be a way to allow consumers to move to a different school relatively easily.

I agree this isn't necessarily feasible, but still think it's interesting to brainstorm how something like that might work.

 

[randall146]

My oldest son is a pretty smart kid. He always brought home great grades.  When he was in second grade, one quarter his report card came home with a note that the teacher needed to have a parent teacher conference with my wife and I.

When we got there she tolds us how he is acting up in class and has become a distraction to other children.  He bothers other kids trying to do their work. We say we'll talk to him about it and then teacher proceeds to show us some of his work.  We noticed on the back of most of his assignments he is writing 1 to 200.  Every single number. 

We ask about it and come to find out he finishes his work before the other kids and that was the teachers way of keeping him busy until the other kids finish.  Needless to say I was pretty livid at this point. Not only was the teacher being lazy about developing the smarter kids, she had the gull to call me in and complain that he is being a distraction. 

I voiced concern to the principle but that went nowhere. We ended up sending him to school with a 3rd grade workbook we purchased.  Luckily that was the last year at that school and things have been better since.  I was still blown away at what a poor job that school was doing.  

This is happening at every public school in the country. It’s a disaster for gifted kids aka future gifted adults. 
It’s like if minor league teams spent 80% of their resources on the worst prospects.  

 

[Ramblin Wreck]

My oldest son is a pretty smart kid. He always brought home great grades.  When he was in second grade, one quarter his report card came home with a note that the teacher needed to have a parent teacher conference with my wife and I.

When we got there she tolds us how he is acting up in class and has become a distraction to other children.  He bothers other kids trying to do their work. We say we'll talk to him about it and then teacher proceeds to show us some of his work.  We noticed on the back of most of his assignments he is writing 1 to 200.  Every single number. 

We ask about it and come to find out he finishes his work before the other kids and that was the teachers way of keeping him busy until the other kids finish.  Needless to say I was pretty livid at this point. Not only was the teacher being lazy about developing the smarter kids, she had the gull to call me in and complain that he is being a distraction. 

I voiced concern to the principle but that went nowhere. We ended up sending him to school with a 3rd grade workbook we purchased.  Luckily that was the last year at that school and things have been better since.  I was still blown away at what a poor job that school was doing.  

We had that in 1st grade.  My child was disruptive because he was bored out of his mind.  The teacher called multiple times a week and I kept telling her to give him more work and keep him busy.  She told me she wasn't allowed to at one point and I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.  We've homeschooled since then and haven't thought twice about it since. 

 

[wikkidpissah]

Can you elaborate on this? I agree with the rest of your suggestions but I’m always skeptical of demonizing unions. 

I'm a union man - twice a shop steward and helped bring AFSCME to Albq health orgs in the 80s. But the performance of our unions is as much why we are no longer a union country as corporate tactics and none have been more obstructive & destructive in their bureaucracies than teachers. We are paying triple (in real dollars) what we did 50 years ago for half the benefit (this will likely bog me down in arguments with the Test Score Mafia as it has in the past, but anything to get @Henry Ford and @Ditkaless Wonders out of the Bootyjudge thread) and most of that is the cost of admin, parent service & Big Excuse (the psych/pharma industry). Since i was in school, 50 years of brain science has gone largely ignored in the name of more socialized classrooms and happier educators. Any further elaboration (feminization, especially) would engage me more with field partisans than i care to be, so i'll rein it in here, but i see no progressive change happening in education til NEA/AFT are neutered.

 

[Ditkaless Wonders]

I'm a union man - twice a shop steward and helped bring AFSCME to Albq health orgs in the 80s. But the performance of our unions is as much why we are no longer a union country as corporate tactics and none have been more obstructive & destructive in their bureaucracies than teachers. We are paying triple (in real dollars) what we did 50 years ago for half the benefit (this will likely bog me down in arguments with the Test Score Mafia as it has in the past, but anything to get @Henry Ford and @Ditkaless Wonders out of the Bootyjudge thread) and most of that is the cost of admin, parent service & Big Excuse (the psych/pharma industry). Since i was in school, 50 years of brain science has gone largely ignored in the name of happier classrooms and educators. Any further elaboration (feminization, especially) would engage me more with field partisans than i care to be, so i'll rein it in here, but i see no progressive change happening in education til NEA/AFT are neutered.

Fair enough.  I will cease and desist.

 

[Endowed]

Breaking Unions is bad.

All a union does is negotiate.

A normal employee should not be negotiating against professional teams of negotiators.

 

[MAC_32]

Measuring school performance is a means to an end. The end, I assume, is providing a quality education to everyone. Assuming that's a goal of yours, how do you work towards that end without measuring performance?

In the private sector, performance is measured by profit and whether a company stays in business. There are consequences to not performing because consumers have choices. If public education were to no longer measure the performance of each school (with the goal of improving low-performing schools), there would need to be a way to allow consumers to move to a different school relatively easily.

I agree this isn't necessarily feasible, but still think it's interesting to brainstorm how something like that might work.

First, remove comparisons to the private sector from the thought process. It being there is a major contributor to how we ended up in teach-to-the-test culture in the first place.

To your overall question, this is where MAP testing has taken education to a level many of us didn't get to experience. Everyone has their own developmental curve. Their performance does not necessarily need directly tied to that aggregate, but it serves as the basis. This way you're not evaluating a school with a larger pool of students that started in the 90th+ percentile vs. a school with a larger pool of students that started in the 10th. In the latter's case in the current system they will be a failing school system. There is likely nothing the school can do to change their fate - between the lines anyway. You could have a school full of great teachers and it wouldn't matter; the ceiling is capped with such a low starting point. But you won't have a school full of great teachers because they will try to stay away those because they're considered failing - and there is a strong correlation between failing school districts and those low on the teacher pay scale.

There is no way to completely eliminate teach-to-the test culture, but the MAP test step would be one towards minimizing its negative influence. But it's just that - a step. I think it is the first step and until it's done we can't concern ourselves about whatever the next one may be. Teacher compensation could be addressed in conjunction with it (and needs to) though. I don't have anywhere near sufficient info to throw anything of substance out there to get the ball rolling. I think the goal would be to incentivize teachers to not avoid failing districts under the current (flawed) model. The major hurdle there that would not necessarily be prevalent with performance eval is I don't think it's feasible to accomplish at the federal level. Good luck getting alignment at the state and local levels. So while both of them would be long game's I think the compensation one would be much longer.

 

[supermike80]

Make hot female teachers that "educate" their male students about the ways of love a legal practice.  

 

[IvanKaramazov]

Statistics, not pre-calculus, for the large majority of students.

 

[joffer]

Statistics, not pre-calculus, for the large majority of students.

that's an interesting one.  as an engineer, i initially thought no, but i need to think about it a little more.  you mean let the student choose?

 

[IvanKaramazov]

that's an interesting one.  as an engineer, i initially thought no, but i need to think about it a little more.  you mean let the student choose?

Yes.  A tiny percentage of students -- specifically people who plan to go into engineering and or handful of other disciplines -- need calculus.  It is a complete waste of time for everyone else, especially considering the value of a good course in probability and statistics.

 

[dgreen]

Yes.  A tiny percentage of students -- specifically people who plan to go into engineering and or handful of other disciplines -- need calculus.  It is a complete waste of time for everyone else, especially considering the value of a good course in probability and statistics.

This can be broadened to so many things. Overall, I think we should move students away from general ed course work earlier. I think it's ridiculous that people have to spend the money to complete 120 credit hours for a bachelor's degree when probably half of that is meaningless to them. General ed should be to give everyone the basics and to help people find what interests them so they can pursue those things more deeply.

 

[toshiba]

School funding should not be based on the wealth of the community in which the school resides.

 

[dgreen]

I think we should also look into less class time. If schools are going to give out so much homework, then let the kids have enough time to do it by sending them home. Basically, can we have "teleworking" days for students?

 

[Joe Bryant]

Make hot female teachers that "educate" their male students about the ways of love a legal practice.  

Don't. Be more cool if you come back.

 

[Cjw_55106]

Breaking Unions is bad.

All a union does is negotiate.

A normal employee should not be negotiating against professional teams of negotiators.

I suppose at its core this is true. Within those negotiations are the rights to protect teachers that are terrible at their jobs. 
As far as your last sentence, you do realize that at least 90% of the country is able to do this without union representation?

 

[Endowed]

They do it terribly. Its damaging to the working citizenry.

The companies use negotiators. So should the employees.

In fact because the companies bring in pros to do it, tells you how hugely important it is.

 

[Endowed]

 Within those negotiations are the rights to protect teachers that are terrible at their jobs. 

And protect hundreds of millions of workers from what the companies did for the first 150 years to the working men and women of the USA. Including children when you let them.

 

[Cjw_55106]

And protect hundreds of millions of workers from what the companies did for the first 150 years to the working men and women of the USA. Including children when you let them.

I’m not denying that unions once had their place. They were needed and did a good job. Like most things that get too big, Corruption and nonsense start to set in. For the record, I’m not necessarily against unions. Sadly, like most things, unions do not allow for common sense.

 

[Endowed]

Corruption is still in company's too.  We dont eliminate them.

Unions negotiate for the workers.

The answer is... NEGOTIATE BETTER. Dont try to bad mouth unions and hurt the American worker by trying to remove their ability to negotiate on even ground.

 

[Cjw_55106]

Corruption is still in company's too.  We dont eliminate them.

Unions negotiate for the workers.

The answer is... NEGOTIATE BETTER. Dont try to bad mouth unions and hurt the American worker by trying to remove their ability to negotiate on even ground.

Like I said, 90% of Americans do it just fine.
But carry-on.

 

[Endowed]

No they dont. They get routinely taken advantage of because that is NOT what they do. Meanwhile the companies hire pros to do it for them.  

 

[Maurile Tremblay]

The companies use negotiators. So should the employees.

And protect hundreds of millions of workers from what the companies did for the first 150 years to the working men and women of the USA.

Corruption is still in company's too.  We dont eliminate them.

No they dont. They get routinely taken advantage of because that is NOT what they do. Meanwhile the companies hire pros to do it for them.  

I wouldn’t describe schools as companies.

 

[Endowed]

They have professionals running their education department and school board. They dont send the office clerk or janitor to negotiate wages.

And never should "breaking unions" be the answer, it only damages the every day worker.

 

[Scoresman]

Bring the square pizza slice back to public school cafeterias

 

[IC FBGCav]

Teach kids about how to handle money responsibility.  It will cut college enrollment in half.

 

[wikkidpissah]

I’m not denying that unions once had their place. They were needed and did a good job. Like most things that get too big, Corruption and nonsense start to set in. For the record, I’m not necessarily against unions. Sadly, like most things, unions do not allow for common sense.

Au contraire, mon frere. There should be unions for everything. If there was a fan's union, you could still take the fam to a Red's game or the wife to Paul McCartney for under $100. The Consumer's Union should be more than product testers. If there was a Citizens' Union, there would never have been Citizen's United. There is no end to what unions - people cooperating in the name of good to protect society from bad - can do, but we are near to the end of what unions will do.

Almost no one reading this would be sons & daughter's of the middle class without unions. Women wouldn't have found the engine by which to begin their liberation without the Temperance Union. But the only way labor unions could reach level ground with industry was with outside muscle & sway. Organized crime and the biggest union of them all, the Soviet Union, provided those, so unions made deals with devils. It was that important and i'd do it again. I hope that, once democratic capitalism crashes us and joins communism on the ash heap of history, that our next try will value unions in the way they were meant to be valued.

 

[Ketamine Dreams]

1.  Include a personal finance class for all students prior to graduation 

2.  Decrease the power of teacher unions - they rarely do what they intend. 

3. Focus on all possible career choices for students and not only on college 

4. Ditch the idea that more money spent = a better education

5. Realize that personal and family involvement is important for students to succeed  

 

[Mario Kart]

I wouldn’t describe schools as companies.

I will recuse myself from this discussion but way too many people, typically on one side of the aisle, want schools to act like companies and produce like companies and want to grade schools in a similar way to how companies are "graded." If you can get this side of the aisle, and the public to stop comparing public schools to private companies... you'll have my vote. The inching through the years of schools "are like" companies is... disturbing.

 

[JohnnyU]

1). Make teachers teach the material instead of indoctrinating our kids with their opinions.

 

[Mister CIA]

We don't need no education.

We don't need no thought control.

No dark sarcasm in the classroom.

Teachers leave them kids alone.

5.  More School of Rock like classes.

 

[MAC_32]

This is happening at every public school in the country. It’s a disaster for gifted kids aka future gifted adults. 
It’s like if minor league teams spent 80% of their resources on the worst prospects.  

No, it's not.

 

[Sinn Fein]

I wouldn’t describe schools as companies.

I think it would be fair to describe school districts as companies.  Individual schools are divisions within that company.

 

[Sinn Fein]

This is happening at every public school in the country. It’s a disaster for gifted kids aka future gifted adults. 
It’s like if minor league teams spent 80% of their resources on the worst prospects.  

I can't speak to every public school in the country, but I can tell you my experience was nothing like that.

 

[Maurile Tremblay]

I think it would be fair to describe school districts as companies.  Individual schools are divisions within that company.

I wouldn't describe them that way. They don't have a board of directors that appoints officers to negotiate on behalf of shareholders in order to maximize profits.

I view corporations and unions as flip sides of the same general phenomenon. Corporations have many shareholders looking to invest capital, in part by hiring laborers. Each shareholder could negotiate with laborers independently, but it's a lot more efficient for the shareholders to get together as a group and have agents negotiate on their behalf as a single bargaining unit. It's not only more efficient, but it gives them greater negotiating strength as well (since the individual shareholders no longer have to compete against each other to hire laborers). In the same fashion, each worker could negotiate with capitalists independently, but it's more advantageous for them to band together as a group and negotiate collectively through their appointed representatives.

It often makes sense for workers to unionize whether they are negotiating with a private company or with a government entity such as a school district. My argument isn't that teachers shouldn't form unions. (I don't have a strong opinion about that.) My argument is only that school districts don't really operate like for-profit corporations, and I therefore wouldn't refer to them as companies.

 

[Sinn Fein]

I wouldn't describe them that way. They don't have a board of directors that appoints officers to negotiate on behalf of shareholders in order to maximize profits.

Not all companies are for profit.  My wife works for a Non-Profit.

School Districts - at least in my experience have a CEO - Superintendent - who does answer to a board - in this case the Elected School Board.  The School Board does have a budget, and while they may not be trying to maximize profits - they are incentivized to lower costs to fit within a budget.  Increasing teacher salaries is at odds with shrinking budgets.  Teachers are very much at a bargaining disadvantage individually, and benefit from having a union in most cases.

 

[Dickies]

increase teachers pay

smaller class sizes

de-emphasize college prep for all

increase vocational training/opportunities 

Require national year of service 

"Free" public vocational and university education.

 

[JB Breakfast Club]

No classes should assign homework until 7th grade.

7th through 12th grade include an open "homework" period during school hours for students to complete course work and seek assistance in subjects where they need help. 

Limit core subject classroom size to 20 students (yes, this requires a significant infrastructure investment to build more schools).

Secondary trade school, community college, and state universities should be tuition-free.