Two Million Minutes

[NutmegCT]

If you get a chance, check out this new documentary.

"Two Million Minutes" (not the band, the movie)

https://www.2mminutes.com/

Highlights some differences between high school education in the USA and in China (and in India).

Seems to show that the "two million minutes" (the time you live in four years) spent in high school is greatly wasted in the USA on athletic competition, social competition, and "buying new bling" competition.

In other words, it's spent in "having fun".

Might help account for why U.S. students scored lower on science literacy than their peers in 16 of 29 developed countries in a December 2007 report.

https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2008/2008016.pdf

We scored 16th out of 29? Folks, if we don't stop our slide downward ...

Tom

 

[DrEntropy]

Ain't gonna change for the better any time soon, Tom. Self-governance has been slipping into government's "cradle-to-grave" responsibility for the citizenry for years. The academic under-achievement is just the tip of a much larger iceberg.

 

[Basil]

just the tip of a much larger iceberg.

Not to worry, all the icebergs are melting /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/jester.gif

(I'm sorry, I couldn't resist, I tried but I just couldn't...I'M ONLY HUMAN FOLKS!!!)

 

[bugimike]

So long as the "we are the Best" mentality prevails, often as an empty boast, there will be no perceived need for improvement ("Why should I try to do better since we are already the best!")!!! We need to foster the Avis attitude among our youth (We may be #2 but we try harder!).

 

[DrEntropy]

just the tip of a much larger iceberg.

Not to worry, all the icebergs are melting /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/jester.gif

(I'm sorry, I couldn't resist, I tried but I just couldn't...I'M ONLY HUMAN FOLKS!!!)

/bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/lol.gif

Glad I saw this before I refilled the coffee cup.

 

[Basil]

I have very VERY <span style='font-size: 17pt'>VERY</span> stong opinions on this subject, but I'm going to refrain from posting them here lest I violate my own rules. Maybe I'm just being preemptively paranoid, but this thread is one of those seemingly innocent topics that "could" turn south.

 

[Mickey Richaud]

I have very VERY <span style='font-size: 17pt'>VERY</span> stong opinions on this subject, but I'm going to refrain from posting them here lest I violate my own rules. Maybe I'm just being preemptively paranoid, but this thread is one of those seemingly innocent topics that "could" turn south.

THIS crowd?

NAAAHH! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/angel.gif

 

[aeronca65t]

Not to worry, all the icebergs are melting /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/jester.gif

Finally!
We <u>agree</u> on something! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/jester.gif

As for the PISA/NCES stats:

Apples and Oranges.

They are very accurate in terms of randomization of student slection in the USA and *some* other countries.

But they do not reflect an accurate assessment of students in all counties.

That's because the selection process for student testing is left to the host country.

I occasionally teach Statistics. This is the sort of thing that I use to illustrate why you have to be careful quoting statistical data.

A friend of mine was doing educational work in Singapore when he observed standardized tests being given to high school students there. By his estimation, only the top 10% of students were allowed to participate. When national pride is at stake, some folks tend to cheat. Americans tend to "play fair" and give everyone these tests.

Even taking the US out of the equation, you can see anomolies in the result: Norway has a literate and scientifically oriented population, yet they scored fairly low. Again, like the US, they let *everyone* take the tests.

Through the process of scale, China and India literally have biliions of illiterate and undereducated people. That's really not their fault....it's just a result of the staggering number of people in their countries (many living agrarian lives of subsistence farming). If the results *truly* included a *real* cross-section of the population of some of these countries, the results would be quite different.

This is not to say we can't do better. We can and should. And there are simple ways to do it.

If any of you are really interested in seeing what great things kids can do in high school, please check out your local FIRST Robotics team or go to the closest FIRST Robotics Competiton;
https://www.usfirst.org/whatsgoingon.aspx

I have been a FIRST Robotics mentor and volunteer for over 10 years. On Sunday afternoon I spoke to over 200 people about our FIRST team and their planned efforts at our upcoming Regional event inTrenton, NJ (2/28 to 3/1).

Many teachers, parents and school administrators are hungry for more programs like this. Other good example are The Science Olympiad, The Siemens/Westinghouse Competition in Math, Science & Technology, the Intel Science Competition and others.

Virtually all of these programs are run by volunteers, while many schools spend enormous amounts of taxpayer money on student athletics programs. I don't hate school sports but any school that spends more money on sports than on science-oriented extra-curricular programs has it's priorites mixed up, in my opinion (and that includes my local school, where the local school board is well-familiar with my opinions).

 

[GregW]

Maybe I'm just being preemptively paranoid, but this thread is one of those seemingly innocent topics that "could" turn south.

I have yet to see one you spotted that didn't.

 

[drooartz]

I'll start my comments with a disclosure: I work for a school district as a DBA and web developer (5 years or so). Prior to that I worked for a couple of oil companies doing somewhat similar work. I believe strongly in public education, it's why I remain satisfied working here, even with the roughly 50% pay cut I took to come work here.

That said, here are a few of my observations from from my time here. I will do my best to keep my comments objective, since the boss is right that this can be a very charged discussion if care is not exercised.

1. When everyone is in charge, no one is in charge
When I worked in industry, I was used to top-down management. CEO/boss says, you do. In education we have Feds in the form of congress, president, department of ed; State governor, legislature, school board; local school board; local community/parents; district superintendent; school principals; teachers. Each of these groups often are given (or take) quite a bit of autonomy and don't like to be told what to do. How can you have a consistent direction with all these chiefs (and thus very few peons)?

2. Americans don't value education
This is a bit more controversial, so bear with me a bit. When I was in school (now more years ago than I'd like to admit) being smart was not seen as a plus. I used to try to hide my grades from friends (I was valedictorian) out of embarrassment. We admire the likable athlete or actor, but not so much the nerd or geek (yes, that was/is me /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smile.gif ). I never got beat up for it as some do, but then again I was always bigger than everyone else. If you judge a profession's value by it's compensation, the highly valued skills are doctor, lawyer, CEO -- not educator. Many of my education friends (myself included, with my music sideline) work a couple jobs to make ends meet.

Now I'll temper this by adding that this is the more mob-scale America I'm talking about. Individual Americans are a totally different thing.

It's not just Americans who suffer from this -- think of it this way: would the character of Harry Potter have been as popular if he were the genius instead of his sidekick friend?

3. Students succeed when they are supported, but not too much
I don't care what ethnicity/income level/race/etc -- if a child has support from parents and the community, they can learn. If not, the task gets exponentially harder. On the other hand, the current trend towards "helicopter parents" is not helping things. My wife (counseling secretary for a junior high school) sees this all the time. Kids don't learn to take care of themselves when mom and dad do it all for them. The new trend is that this extends to college, and even the workplace afterwards. Scary stuff that...

4. Education is afflicted with the Bright Shiny Thing mentality
For some reason, education folks seem to love silver bullets. The next great solution/program/method that will solve all the world's problems. Let's give every kid a laptop. Let's teach them only in Swahili. Let's buy this new software, and all our questions will be answered. If we only knew the questions. Or could understand the answers.

Keeping in mind that I'm a techie, I do wonder if the old blackboard was really all that bad. I seem to have done alright with it. Technology and new teaching methods must continue to move forwards, but there seems to be a real lack of consistent direction (see point #1 above) to really be able to make a measurable difference.

As you can see, this is an issue I feel very strongly about. My apologies if I've offended anyone, or made this thread too political. I do worry that we're not preparing our future generations to be the innovators that our parents were.

 

[drooartz]

Americans tend to "play fair" and give everyone these tests.

Well said, Nial. A previous superintendent once put it this way (when discussing comparisons between scores for public and private schools in the US):

"Think of a school as a factory making strawberry jam. A private school has some leeway into what berries are included. A public school has to use every berry, no exceptions."

Complicated issues all around.

 

[Tinster]

drooartz- you got my vote.

I was one of THOSE kids that got beat up alot by the
beloved high school athletes - it made me a survivor.

I was one of THOSE kids who washed filthy pots to pay
for my University education - it made me appreciate the
hard work ethic and acquire the drive to suceed. No hands
outs for me, thank you very much!

I was one of THOSE students that got beat up by the beloved
University athletes - to this day, I will not watch
football games on TV.

It's a national shame our education $$ dollar prioities are
so locked into winning at sports instead of mentoring
gifted minds.

Yup, I'm a Mensa and darned proud of it. A gift from my
Higher Power. I'll take brain over muscle or anytime.

My 2 cents worth!

Don't mean to insult any athlete members. Just my personal
experiences.

d /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/cheers.gif

 

[vagt6]

Since the first cave man walked out into the sunshine, it's been the PARENT's responsibility to ensure that her/his children receive a proper education. Also, schools should not be tasked with imparting moral values and discipline, that's the job of the parent!

Sure, schools decide the curriculum and hire the teachers, but too many parents (especially in the inner cities) are not involved in their kids' education. If children don't have input and guidance from their parents, the schools can't be expected to make up for it.

I have lots of professional educators in my family and I earned a teaching degree in college (but never taught). They are terribly saddend at the lack of parent participation in public schools. Recently the Washington Post printed an article about the lack of parent participation in PTOs: at some PTO meetings there weren't enough parents to continue the meetings! Unbelieveable.

School bashing has become a spectator sport in recent years, and it's not fair or logical. The majority of U.S. areas have decent school systems and competent teachers (again, inner cities remain a problem because of demographics): until <u>all</u> parents take a vested interest in their children's education, there's no school on the planet that can properly educate children who are not supported by their parents.

The erosion of the family and working moms don't make it easier for some households, I admit. But at some point, even single, working parents must make some kind of commitment the the child's education!

Do-nothing parents are pretty low on my list, as you can see! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/wall.gif

 

[sparkydave]

I too can say I was a geek in school, and got labeled as a nerd. I can relate to Drew and Tinster because I got roughed up by the jocks on the football team too. Who knows? Maybe those jocks are now making more than I'll ever make, but I'd rather have my brains.

As far as the quality of education, I'll have to admit that even colleges seem to fall short. When I was studying electrical engineering, it was kind of sad that many fellow EE students may have been getting straight A grades, had their names on the dean's list, and graduated something cum laude, but if you asked them to wire up a simple circuit or pick out a 4.7K resistor, they'd be hopeless. I'd been playing with electric circuits and test equipment as a boy, so I was right at home when I got to the labs and we actually had to build things. Most of my classmates were having to ask "which end is which on the diode?", and they were blowing fuses in the multimeters constantly because they didn't know how to measure current correctly. Heck, in another lab, they had us working with large electric motors and generators, and I was one of the very few who already knew that wiring up the 40 amp, 240 volt DC motor with 28 gauge wire was a bad idea.

 

[DrEntropy]

I was one of the very few who already knew that wiring up the 40 amp, 240 volt DC motor with 28 gauge wire was a bad idea.

/bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/lol.gif Great "minds-eye" image there, Dave! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/thumbsup.gif

 

[Dave Richards]

I was somewhere in the middle of the athlete/scholar thing. I played sports and then washed dishes and replaced car parts to pay for college.

Of the hundreds of kids I played sports with, not a one is, or ever was, paying any bills as an athlete. Some kids have dead-beat parents and some have cajoling parents and others have them everywhere in between. Kids learn if they want too, on a blackboard, or on a computer.

There's some benefit to high school sports, I guess, but besides tradition, I can't think of much...

We have a referendum coming up in March for the public high school here. It's being portrayed as the Library Improvement and Stadium Referendum.

It's for just under two million dollars. I looked at the budget breakdown, and I'm not making this up...the library portion was for $50,000, the rest was for an artificial turf football field!!! The pamphlet was obviously professionally prepared (at my expense, I'm sure.) How's that for priorities?

I gave up on the public school after they failed some of my older kids, I put the rest in private school and have never looked back, except in dismay.

 

[AweMan]

I was a nobody in school, I didn`t do well grade wise, I wasn`t exactly a nerd so to speak but worse yet a redneck! I liked country music when country wasn`t cool. Wore western clothes and cowboy boots. {Not cool with the "In Crowd"}
My wife on the other hand was On the deans list 3.0 grade average. She is smart at what she does for a living But thats about it! I, on the other hand {So she claims} am smart at most anything that intrests me. {and that a bunch of stuff} Gameshows on TV, I normaly answer a big percentage of the questions correctly. My wife asks me "How do you know all of this stuff?" My answer ...... I don`t know, I just do.
I had NO intrest in school, it bored me to tears. I must have retained something from my school years. {More than most people according to my wife.} Both of my sons are like her, good at what they do but not much else. {I call it NO common sense}.
But then I find not many so called smart people have common sense.
Maybe, just Maybe thats the problem ....... we have so called smart people deciding what should and should not be taught in our schools these days.
For instance, it is ok to have FAITH that the HUGE gaps surrounding the missing fossil evidence in the darwinism theory exists somewhere. So we need to be taught about darwins theory of evolution.
BUT DON`T YOU DARE have FAITH in creationism!
Creationisn has to be bunk because there is NO evidence.
Well ......... Maybe THEY evolved from some Monkey, But ...... I have faith that I didn`t!

I Hope this didn`t get too far into the political realm.
If it did ...... My humble apoligies!

 

[Guest]

Can we keep the religion out of this? Otherwise I'll be forced to make smart alec responses about creationism that'll get me into trouble...

Oh and I did well at school and played sports. I also worked full time while at university. At least I didn't have any student loans when I graduated, and now I have a job where I get paid better for doing less.

That said, I've seen what they are teaching them in the high schools here. I despair of what my kid is going to 'learn' when it is time for him to go to school.

 

[NutmegCT]

One thing that keeps me positive, is that there's still some interest in what's going on in the schools, and what might make it better for the kids.

There are some real downers, that's for sure. But as long as people keep asking questions about what's going on there - and not just telling stories of "back in my day it was different" - things might change.

Shrugging the shoulders and pointing fingers doesn't change a thing. Asking questions and demanding responsibility does.

Tom

 

[SilentUnicorn]

I was one of the very few who already knew that wiring up the 40 amp, 240 volt DC motor with 28 gauge wire was a bad idea.

/bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/lol.gif Great "minds-eye" image there, Dave! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/thumbsup.gif

lol all i see is smoke..