Also seems relevant to note that NCLB requires standardized testing for all students. Right now, only 1% are exempt from the traditional testing. They're considering making it 2%. (this is an alternate, portfolio-based assessment)
Statistically though, 2.5% of students qualify as mentally retarded, and this doesn't account for the dozen other brackets of special needs such as cerebral palsy, severe emotional disturbances, autism, etc., so children who are mentally retarded are very frequently not exempt from taking standardized testing with the general population.
Anywhere from 10-20% of the average school's population consists of children with exceptional learning needs (not counting gifted and talented). I shouldn't have to tell you that significantly fewer of these children attend private schools and scores are reflected as thus.
I'll also use that point to reiterate that a primary function of schools is to screen children for disabilities and signs of abuse-- one of the main reasons I'm opposed to homeschooling in practice.
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Home SchoolingFollow
"Let's agree, at least, that private schools, dollar for dollar educates more efficiently than public schools, be that in terms of test scores, college bound freshmen percentages, or class size." --Me
I need to add to that graduation rates.
Other than that, look at the money spent per child in the public school system compared to private schools. I'll use my own kids as an example. Home schooling? There was the cost of the Abekka program which was in 1990 dollars about $50 per child. Once we placed our kids in the local church school in town I paid $250 a month, 12 months a year, or $3000 per child. The average public school? Ohhh, somewhere in the neighborhood of $6857 per child*. And does the preponderence of money go? Administration! Not to the actual teaching of the kids, but to the bureaucracy of running an inefficient school system-- which, incidentally, has an average test score in reading on standardized tests of around 35%**, class size of 20 students per teacher****, and a graduation rate of 93%***** (further study shows only half of every student who attends school at some point graduates from high school).
How does RCHS (the school we sent our kids to) rate? Test score averages of 96%, college bound freshmen: 92%, an average class size of 25 kids (more in the elementary grades), and a graduation rate of 98%.
Ok, this might be considered to be unreliable info to you guys based on our presumptions about the results, but this report claims that home schooling outperforms public schools by an average of 30-37%******.
Bleh. I hate cites, researching crap just to give you guys information you'll just say is biased or wrong anyway. My point is this: despite the attempt to turn a flaw into a virtue, private education and home schooling is markedly better than public education for one simple reason-- they don't have to teach to the lowest common denominator, ie Joe and Mary I'm-As-Dumb-As-Rock, sitting in the back of class passing notes and wishing they were smoking dope on the street corner. The home schoolers generally have parents who are doing this becasue they want their kids to have a better education than what is available publically, and the private schoolers can screen the quality and caliber of teachers to their own standards and match that with thresholds for the children applying for enrollment. It's that simple.
Totem
* http://www.cato.org/pubs/briefs/bp-025.html
** http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/22/AR2007022201781.html
***http://www.paloaltoonline.com/weekly/morgue/2005/2005_06_15.guest15kirst.shtml
**** http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/cs/mh/
***** http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/198304.html
****** http://www.hslda.org/docs/nche/000010/200410250.asp
I need to add to that graduation rates.
Other than that, look at the money spent per child in the public school system compared to private schools. I'll use my own kids as an example. Home schooling? There was the cost of the Abekka program which was in 1990 dollars about $50 per child. Once we placed our kids in the local church school in town I paid $250 a month, 12 months a year, or $3000 per child. The average public school? Ohhh, somewhere in the neighborhood of $6857 per child*. And does the preponderence of money go? Administration! Not to the actual teaching of the kids, but to the bureaucracy of running an inefficient school system-- which, incidentally, has an average test score in reading on standardized tests of around 35%**, class size of 20 students per teacher****, and a graduation rate of 93%***** (further study shows only half of every student who attends school at some point graduates from high school).
How does RCHS (the school we sent our kids to) rate? Test score averages of 96%, college bound freshmen: 92%, an average class size of 25 kids (more in the elementary grades), and a graduation rate of 98%.
Ok, this might be considered to be unreliable info to you guys based on our presumptions about the results, but this report claims that home schooling outperforms public schools by an average of 30-37%******.
Bleh. I hate cites, researching crap just to give you guys information you'll just say is biased or wrong anyway. My point is this: despite the attempt to turn a flaw into a virtue, private education and home schooling is markedly better than public education for one simple reason-- they don't have to teach to the lowest common denominator, ie Joe and Mary I'm-As-Dumb-As-Rock, sitting in the back of class passing notes and wishing they were smoking dope on the street corner. The home schoolers generally have parents who are doing this becasue they want their kids to have a better education than what is available publically, and the private schoolers can screen the quality and caliber of teachers to their own standards and match that with thresholds for the children applying for enrollment. It's that simple.
Totem
* http://www.cato.org/pubs/briefs/bp-025.html
** http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/22/AR2007022201781.html
***http://www.paloaltoonline.com/weekly/morgue/2005/2005_06_15.guest15kirst.shtml
**** http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/cs/mh/
***** http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/198304.html
****** http://www.hslda.org/docs/nche/000010/200410250.asp
Quote:
they don't have to teach to the lowest common denominator, ie Joe and Mary I'm-As-Dumb-As-Rock, sitting in the back of class passing notes and wishing they were smoking dope on the street corner.
What a favor we do our children if we seperate them from these dumb-as-a-rock students, these dregs of our society, and in doing so let them better master their trigonometry and analysis of Shakespeare.
I think your problem is a fundamental lack of depth in your philosophy of what it is that education is supposed to do.
Nevermind your failure to address the points I've already made.
Quote:
How does RCHS (the school we sent our kids to) rate? Test score averages of 96%, college bound freshmen: 92%, an average class size of 25 kids (more in the elementary grades), and a graduation rate of 98%.
And I'm sure that you, like most of the other parents of children in that school, just send them off on a bus, wish em the best of damn luck, and assume that when they come home they learned something. I bet you didn't spend much time with your kids, did you?
Edited, Mar 19th 2008 8:47am by Kachi
You are correct. we are doing our children a favor, even if they don't realize it at the time when they are receiving it. In our family-- going back three generations --schooling was paramount. If a local school wasn't up to the task of properly educating us, it was incumbent on the parent to find a school or take it upon themselves to teach the child in fashion that reflected the importance placed on intellect in our family.
I recognise that this sounds elitist, but this attitude is considered the norm for Dutch Reformed immigrants. Two of our colleges are considered to be among the best in the nation. Calvin College gets heads of state and dignitaries speaking there regularly as a matter of course.
There is no fundamental lack of depth, as you say, in my educational philosophy. There is just the recognition that education is the vehicle by which we attain our goals. As a former part-time teacher in both the home and formal educational system in several states,I believe I am well qualified to hold an opinion on this subject. And as such, I can unequivocally state that both home schooling and private schooling is far superior to public education on the whole.
Totem
I recognise that this sounds elitist, but this attitude is considered the norm for Dutch Reformed immigrants. Two of our colleges are considered to be among the best in the nation. Calvin College gets heads of state and dignitaries speaking there regularly as a matter of course.
There is no fundamental lack of depth, as you say, in my educational philosophy. There is just the recognition that education is the vehicle by which we attain our goals. As a former part-time teacher in both the home and formal educational system in several states,I believe I am well qualified to hold an opinion on this subject. And as such, I can unequivocally state that both home schooling and private schooling is far superior to public education on the whole.
Totem
"And I'm sure that you, like most of the other parents of children in that school, just send them off on a bus, wish em the best of damn luck, and assume that when they come home they learned something. I bet you didn't spend much time with your kids, did you?" --Kachi
You apparently did not read a thing I've written. If that is the conclusion you have drawn from my posts, then I have either failed to make myself clear or you have assigned different meanings to common, everyday words. I suspect it is the latter, considering I am quite eloquent with English.
Totem
You apparently did not read a thing I've written. If that is the conclusion you have drawn from my posts, then I have either failed to make myself clear or you have assigned different meanings to common, everyday words. I suspect it is the latter, considering I am quite eloquent with English.
Totem
I don't deny that public education funding is weighted down with special needs children or that their test scores can in some instances pull down a school's average, but ask anyone who has taught in a three types of school systems--
/raises his hand
--and they will tell you, on the whole, public schools are inferior to home schooling and private schools. Look, regardless what you're trying to spin here, this is not a great mystery or conundrum. Higher standards and expectations of education vs lowest common denominator. One trumps the other, hands down. Period. Simple.
Totem
/raises his hand
--and they will tell you, on the whole, public schools are inferior to home schooling and private schools. Look, regardless what you're trying to spin here, this is not a great mystery or conundrum. Higher standards and expectations of education vs lowest common denominator. One trumps the other, hands down. Period. Simple.
Totem
Totem wrote:
private education and home schooling is markedly better than public education for one simple reason-- they don't have to teach to the lowest common denominator, ie Joe and Mary I'm-As-Dumb-As-Rock, sitting in the back of class passing notes and wishing they were smoking dope on the street corner.
In regards to cites, I won't berate yours. I had to do research on this topic for a pedagogy course I took and, in looking around, found a quote which summed up the studies issue fairly well:
American Journal of Education wrote:
In the case of educational vouchers, this problem is exacerbated by multiple goals and a lack of credible evidence, which neither supports nor refutes program effectiveness. Research has become a venue for competing ideologies and we conclude that the frenzied search for evidence on the impact of vouchers on student achievement is a charade that will not settle the debate.
Belkira wrote:
Wow. Regular ol' Joph fan club in here.
Ok, point granted, Jophiel. However, one area which none of you have acknowledged to be a true marker for the inherent better nature of home schooling/private education is the rate for kids from those institutions going into college. I dare say that on a ratio aspect more kids from the selective school systems have a far greater number going to higher education than public schools.
See it as a chicken or the egg argument, but you can't deny that it becomes a tool or cycle in which those more educated kids foment more education, most of whom will pass that on to their kids. The educational bar is raised and the next generation is likely to be expected to meet or exceed their parent's achievements. Take my sister for an anecdotal example. Our father has his masters from a time when a masters degree was probably the equivilent of today's doctorate in terms of how education was viewed. Yet my sister got her doctorate for many reasons, but chief among them is the sense that you work to surpass your parents.
The end result is that a higher level of education is reached. The whole basis for not wanting home schooling because people fear that a basic level of competance isn't being met is a sham. The very reason the vast majority people home school is to increase the quality of learning from the public school system.
This goes to the heart of why I began writing in this thread. Smash's contention that public schooling should be the foundation or measuring stick of our learning is a horrible idea. Why? Because it forces kids to learn at the lowest common denominator. We need more gifted/higher quality/college level classes taugh in schools, not less. Teaching to the level of the average student does just that: It makes for average students. Demand more of them and they produce more, achieve more, learn more.
What's not to like about that? And if private schools and home schooling reaches that goal or at the very least moves in that direction, why all the resistance to it?
Totem
See it as a chicken or the egg argument, but you can't deny that it becomes a tool or cycle in which those more educated kids foment more education, most of whom will pass that on to their kids. The educational bar is raised and the next generation is likely to be expected to meet or exceed their parent's achievements. Take my sister for an anecdotal example. Our father has his masters from a time when a masters degree was probably the equivilent of today's doctorate in terms of how education was viewed. Yet my sister got her doctorate for many reasons, but chief among them is the sense that you work to surpass your parents.
The end result is that a higher level of education is reached. The whole basis for not wanting home schooling because people fear that a basic level of competance isn't being met is a sham. The very reason the vast majority people home school is to increase the quality of learning from the public school system.
This goes to the heart of why I began writing in this thread. Smash's contention that public schooling should be the foundation or measuring stick of our learning is a horrible idea. Why? Because it forces kids to learn at the lowest common denominator. We need more gifted/higher quality/college level classes taugh in schools, not less. Teaching to the level of the average student does just that: It makes for average students. Demand more of them and they produce more, achieve more, learn more.
What's not to like about that? And if private schools and home schooling reaches that goal or at the very least moves in that direction, why all the resistance to it?
Totem
Quote:
You apparently did not read a thing I've written. If that is the conclusion you have drawn from my posts, then I have either failed to make myself clear or you have assigned different meanings to common, everyday words. I suspect it is the latter, considering I am quite eloquent with English.
You are apparently not as eloquent with sarcasm, so let me delineate my point a little more directly.
You are essentially comparing the performance of schools-- as a whole-- where nearly all of the parents care about their child's education and play an active role in their development, to schools with parents who are relatively uninvolved in their children's lives and only hope that they will stay out of their hair until they are given the boot when they turn 18.
And that would be fine if you didn't mean to say that because one group had a higher -average- than the other, that the education provided to every individual child was suffering. The ones that are suffering are the ones that are neglected by their parents.
Quote:
I don't deny that public education funding is weighted down with special needs children or that their test scores can in some instances pull down a school's average,
Not in some instances. I challenge you to find one that isn't. All instances, unequivocally.
Quote:
--and they will tell you, on the whole, public schools are inferior to home schooling and private schools.
Really? All of them? You're not letting your personal experiences bias your perception then? Well I'm sorry to tell you that you're wrong. Many teachers will complain that classroom management is more difficult in public schools due to parental involvement, but that's as far as it goes. And religion-based private schools as opposed to magnet-type/general private schools are generally percieved as lower-performing. Which in your region is the prevailing type of private school, I guess would influence your perception.
And every teacher who I've discussed this with agrees that parental involvement and SES are the primary factors-- not the schools or teachers themselves.
Quote:
Higher standards and expectations of education vs lowest common denominator.
Since you're a teacher, you surely know then that higher expectations yield higher results, as research has consistently shown and been forced down the throats of every teacher in every school system? It doesn't matter who the lowest common denominator is, because you teach to the upper end of the class, not the middle.
The only way these "dumb" kids are dragging down your child's education is when they interrupt class with misbehavior.
Quote:
There is no fundamental lack of depth, as you say, in my educational philosophy.
The more you speak, the more I disagree. What do you think the purpose of the school is? Could you be a little less vague?
Quote:
I am well qualified to hold an opinion on this subject.
Everyone is well qualified to hold an opinion on education in the sense that everyone is well qualified to be a parent. That you've been a part time teacher says nothing to me. I know people that have worked under alternative contracts who were vastly underqualified and uneducated. Sometimes they possess an elective or vocational skill that gets them a "teaching" job. Then they can come in with virtually no knowledge of child/developmental psychology, instructional design, styles of learning, validity of assessment, classroom management, etc... but hey, they have "experience" now so it's ok.
But I guess you luck out. I won't ask for your credentials because I have no intention of giving mine.
Quote:
However, one area which none of you have acknowledged to be a true marker for the inherent better nature of home schooling/private education is the rate for kids from those institutions going into college. I dare say that on a ratio aspect more kids from the selective school systems have a far greater number going to higher education than public schools.
I don't know how else to say it.
You want your kid to go to college and give them the means to do so, short some mental trauma or birth defect, you will make sure they do it. Private school, public school, home school. Doesn't matter. You're misidentifying the independent variable here. It's not the school. It's the parent. The schools have a significant correlation with parental involvement. They do not have a significant causation on student performance or success.
Granted there are exceptions to every rule, but I'm speaking in general. Obviously there will be a difference between a public school in a high crime community and a private school in an affluent one.
"Not in some instances. I challenge you to find one that isn't. All instances, unequivocally." --Kachi
Without having the means to discover said school, I suspect in the vastness that is our educational system there is at least one school out there that does not, at this moment, have a special needs student. It might be a one room schoolhouse in Utah with 10 kids in it, but there's one out there somewhere. Just sayin'.
Totem
Without having the means to discover said school, I suspect in the vastness that is our educational system there is at least one school out there that does not, at this moment, have a special needs student. It might be a one room schoolhouse in Utah with 10 kids in it, but there's one out there somewhere. Just sayin'.
Totem
The purpose of a school is to educate. Why do you ask? Because your vision of a teacher's role in the school system is to bore in like a tick and armor yourself with the Teachers Union CBA?
Totem
Totem
Wow. Nice generalization there, Kachi. Let me summarize your positions:
Public school educated kid's parents = less involved and less caring
Private school educated kid's parents = wealthy and actively involved
Home school educated kid's parents = incestual and non-standardized hillbillys
Got it.
Totem
Public school educated kid's parents = less involved and less caring
Private school educated kid's parents = wealthy and actively involved
Home school educated kid's parents = incestual and non-standardized hillbillys
Got it.
Totem
Quote:
This goes to the heart of why I began writing in this thread. Smash's contention that public schooling should be the foundation or measuring stick of our learning is a horrible idea. Why? Because it forces kids to learn at the lowest common denominator. We need more gifted/higher quality/college level classes taugh in schools, not less. Teaching to the level of the average student does just that: It makes for average students. Demand more of them and they produce more, achieve more, learn more.
Maybe. There is some evidence that mixing kid of different abilities in a classroom results in everyone doing better, especially if the work given is challenging. But the school, as said, by in large have to pay thousands of dollars for kids who cannot function, for one reason or another, in the conventional school system. They are legally obligated to find some accommodation and even when they do a half-assed job, they are often out tens of thousands of dollars for one student, then being blamed when the school district is out of money. People point at administration. It's not just administration. It is the cost of out of district placements and specialized education.
I'm all fine with Totem's desire to educate his own kids. I have an issue with where he blithely condemns the public school system--a system without the right to refuse difficult kids, the system that has to serve everyone and the one that is most accessible to the most difficult students. The public schools are an easy scapegoat for the right because it's not perfect. I'm not convinced at all that school choice is the answer either. I would like to see some evidence that it is helpful. Did they do it in Minnesota or something? Because you can't offer an alternative that actually has never been tested and the existence of private schools and their self-selected population isn't really proof that it would be effective policy.
Edited, Mar 19th 2008 1:38pm by Annabella
Turin wrote:
Seriously, what the f*ck nature?
Totem wrote:
Ok, point granted, Jophiel. However, one area which none of you have acknowledged to be a true marker for the inherent better nature of home schooling/private education is the rate for kids from those institutions going into college. I dare say that on a ratio aspect more kids from the selective school systems have a far greater number going to higher education than public schools.
What you're failing to show is that the level of education at the school was responsible. In other words, it's probable that the private school student would go to college even with a public school diploma however it's not assumable that your typical public high school grad would go to college if only they'd attended the private school. Once again, we're limited in examples, but Cleveland's voucher program, in which any parents could move their students to other schools, failed to show an increase in how well the kids were being educated.
I don't have an issue with the existance of private schools. I do have an issue with people who use flawed data, such as non-representative sets of students, to push an agenda against public schooling. Private schools need to prove that, as a whole, they're better at teaching any student before there's a reason to grant them any favors such as government assistance in the form of voucher programs. The data supporting that simply doesn't exist yet.
Belkira wrote:
Wow. Regular ol' Joph fan club in here.
But you see, there's the rub, Anna. The public school system is organizationally set up to teach to the lowest common denominator-- a standard which is determined by a committee that decides what is the absolute minimum that needs to be taught to our children. And what happens? The teachers do exactly that-- they teach the test, because school funding/ratings depends on those kids reaching those arbitrary goals. Factor in disciplinary issues, school cirriculum, Title 9 in sports, textbook choice, teacher's tenure, and bussing, you have an entire structure that is too bulky to meet the needs of the kids who should really be the target audience of our educational system: the gifted and genius.
A triple faceted school system should be in place. One type for developmentally disabled kids, one for average kids, and one for exceptional kids. And the vast majority of funding should go to the gifted programs.
But what do we have? An educational system that caters to just getting by rather than promoting excellence. Egalitarian vs elitist. Hey, that's great for some things, but to encourage our nation's brain trust to flourish, the preponderence of attention should paid to the gifted. Instead what we have is pedestrian, plodding, and underperforming.
By comparison, the Japanese system has a competitive system in place for children as young as kindergarteners. You earn the priviledge of going to better schools by working for your marks. College is the prize, not just some place kids go to get drunk and enjoy a four year long vacation. Our system is all very democratic and all, but it underperforms. Instead, take the best of both societies and create something exceptional.
Totem
A triple faceted school system should be in place. One type for developmentally disabled kids, one for average kids, and one for exceptional kids. And the vast majority of funding should go to the gifted programs.
But what do we have? An educational system that caters to just getting by rather than promoting excellence. Egalitarian vs elitist. Hey, that's great for some things, but to encourage our nation's brain trust to flourish, the preponderence of attention should paid to the gifted. Instead what we have is pedestrian, plodding, and underperforming.
By comparison, the Japanese system has a competitive system in place for children as young as kindergarteners. You earn the priviledge of going to better schools by working for your marks. College is the prize, not just some place kids go to get drunk and enjoy a four year long vacation. Our system is all very democratic and all, but it underperforms. Instead, take the best of both societies and create something exceptional.
Totem
I think you make a good point about the problems of our school systems, especially compared to Japan, I am just not sure if school vouchers is the answer or whether we are expecting our schools to have a major paradigm shift without really figuring out if your plan is actually effective. We want the schools to do too much with difficult kids without thinking about strengthening families and communities. I'd worry about a really underfunded alternative/ special education school for troubled kids--it seems as if we'll just end up with more kids dropping out. However, we'd do ourselves alot of good to have more vocational training in the US.
Turin wrote:
Seriously, what the f*ck nature?
Totem wrote:
But what do we have? An educational system that caters to just getting by rather than promoting excellence. Egalitarian vs elitist. Hey, that's great for some things, but to encourage our nation's brain trust to flourish, the preponderence of attention should paid to the gifted. Instead what we have is pedestrian, plodding, and underperforming.
By comparison, the Japanese system has a competitive system in place for children as young as kindergarteners. You earn the priviledge of going to better schools by working for your marks. College is the prize, not just some place kids go to get drunk and enjoy a four year long vacation. Our system is all very democratic and all, but it underperforms. Instead, take the best of both societies and create something exceptional.
Totem
I guess, but you'll still find that most people with doctoral degrees in this country went to public school, haha, so they must be doing ok. And there's still a reward system for hardwork and dedication: time and money.
I think we can safely say we've somewhat moved away from the homeschooling debate, yes? Private schools and home schooling are different issues.
Nexa
“It has always been the prerogative of children and half-wits to point out that the emperor has no clothes. But a half-wit remains a half-wit, and the emperor remains an emperor.â€
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones
/bangs his head against the wall
Ok, it's clear I'm not making myself understood. Yes, private schools have the ability to screen students, but on the whole if you have the cash and your kid isn't a criminal you can get in one. That does not equate to a better student initially, nor does it imply higher intelligence. All it does is place the new student in a system that demands more from the child and is backed up by a schoool board that has its salary paid for by parents that expect them to get their kids properly educated.
Beyond a possibly more advantaged stock of potential families, your average private school accepts your typical kid. Pimply, angsty, hormonal, etc. What the school can do is-- nay, is likely to do due to the parents placing them there in the first place --encourage/enforce more learning due to a lack of constraints placed on their lowly brethren, the public school.
The emphasis on learning encourages further learning, which in turn leads to college, which ostensibly leads to greater deeds, wealth, blah blah blah.
This is not to say that in public schools you cannot succeed wildly. However, the teachers aren't going to be there actively working with you to do that outside of some AP courses, because they are dealing with the other kids-- the dumb ones, the ones that have to be there, the ones requiring much attention because of misbehavior.
There are distinct advantages to not being beholden to public school strictures. And these advantages don't necessarily stem from wealth either. It's just a completely different mindset towards learning. And this is even more pronounced with home schoolers.
Totem
Ok, it's clear I'm not making myself understood. Yes, private schools have the ability to screen students, but on the whole if you have the cash and your kid isn't a criminal you can get in one. That does not equate to a better student initially, nor does it imply higher intelligence. All it does is place the new student in a system that demands more from the child and is backed up by a schoool board that has its salary paid for by parents that expect them to get their kids properly educated.
Beyond a possibly more advantaged stock of potential families, your average private school accepts your typical kid. Pimply, angsty, hormonal, etc. What the school can do is-- nay, is likely to do due to the parents placing them there in the first place --encourage/enforce more learning due to a lack of constraints placed on their lowly brethren, the public school.
The emphasis on learning encourages further learning, which in turn leads to college, which ostensibly leads to greater deeds, wealth, blah blah blah.
This is not to say that in public schools you cannot succeed wildly. However, the teachers aren't going to be there actively working with you to do that outside of some AP courses, because they are dealing with the other kids-- the dumb ones, the ones that have to be there, the ones requiring much attention because of misbehavior.
There are distinct advantages to not being beholden to public school strictures. And these advantages don't necessarily stem from wealth either. It's just a completely different mindset towards learning. And this is even more pronounced with home schoolers.
Totem
Wow Totem, that's a great bunch of opinions you gots thar!
Nexa
Nexa
“It has always been the prerogative of children and half-wits to point out that the emperor has no clothes. But a half-wit remains a half-wit, and the emperor remains an emperor.â€
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones
Sure, Nexa, there are more doctorates from public schools on a numbers basis alone, but I suspect that when viewed from a ratio-based study, private schooled and home schooled children would do remarkably better.
Sadly, I have no means by which to prove such suspicions beyond my own anecdotal experience with my own family and those people who were like-minded in their search for a better education for their kids.
Totem
Sadly, I have no means by which to prove such suspicions beyond my own anecdotal experience with my own family and those people who were like-minded in their search for a better education for their kids.
Totem
The community were on lives has more to do with how well students will preform on standardize test when taken as a whole, then individuality. The home prices, will be higher in areas which have good schools. Thus it costs more to live in Howard and Montgomery Co, MD then in Baltimore City and Prince George's Co. In Howard county home prices are higher in areas zone around Public high schools that are known to have higher test scores then others.
Having a special needs student in the classroom, depends on how the teacher and school system handle the situation. When such students are tutor by their better preforming peers, both set of students do better then in those in a classroom were often the teachers just repeat their lessons at different levels of the students in their class.
While out of favor right now, a public school that places students in tracks will show better results also. I was lucky to be placed in the higher track class base on my test scores and not on my grades, in a time when there was little help for non traditional learners. While I did poorly on assign class work, I learn as well or better, then my peers did in most subjects. Only way the school gave me extra help was speech therapy, up to the six grade. If they had been require to give it in higher grades, I would have gotten speech therapy until I went to a private Art College. The high schools I went to in Howard Co, were better then all but the most exclusive private schools in Maryland.
Having a special needs student in the classroom, depends on how the teacher and school system handle the situation. When such students are tutor by their better preforming peers, both set of students do better then in those in a classroom were often the teachers just repeat their lessons at different levels of the students in their class.
While out of favor right now, a public school that places students in tracks will show better results also. I was lucky to be placed in the higher track class base on my test scores and not on my grades, in a time when there was little help for non traditional learners. While I did poorly on assign class work, I learn as well or better, then my peers did in most subjects. Only way the school gave me extra help was speech therapy, up to the six grade. If they had been require to give it in higher grades, I would have gotten speech therapy until I went to a private Art College. The high schools I went to in Howard Co, were better then all but the most exclusive private schools in Maryland.
In the place of a Dark Lord you would have a Queen! Not dark but beautiful and terrible as the Morn! Treacherous as the Seas! Stronger than the foundations of the Earth! All shall love me and despair! -ElneClare
This Post is written in Elnese, If it was an actual Post, it would make sense.
This Post is written in Elnese, If it was an actual Post, it would make sense.
Alright, I can see where having average students teach other less astute students the subject matter reinforces the lessons already taught. Absolutely. It becomes a matter of conceptuality put into practice. Yet, for the gifted-- and I'm not talking about just smart kids, but the really smart kids, the geniuses --our school system is not set up to cater to that segment of the educational stratum. And that's a sad and bad thing, because while Joe Average can do important things just by the sweat of his brow, it's the extraordinary student that makes the breakthroughs and discoveries as a rule.
Smash used the example of Thomas Edison (I think. I didn't read through the first 3 pages of this thread, beyond the opening 5 or 6 posts.) His genius--and dyslexia --were not understood by the school system, nor did they meet his needs. But it was his genius that propelled our world into the second half of every day, allowing us to do tasks in the light we couldn't have done in the past.
The lesson we need to learn from him is not that like Edison we don't need decent formal schooling, but rather the school system is not geared to take someone of such exceptional talents and potential and maximize them. That's the core issue of our educational system.
Our public school system is presently set up to allow students to mark time until they are either old enough to get out or get just enough learning to be considered functionally literate.
And, in my opinion, that isn't good enough.
Totem
Smash used the example of Thomas Edison (I think. I didn't read through the first 3 pages of this thread, beyond the opening 5 or 6 posts.) His genius--and dyslexia --were not understood by the school system, nor did they meet his needs. But it was his genius that propelled our world into the second half of every day, allowing us to do tasks in the light we couldn't have done in the past.
The lesson we need to learn from him is not that like Edison we don't need decent formal schooling, but rather the school system is not geared to take someone of such exceptional talents and potential and maximize them. That's the core issue of our educational system.
Our public school system is presently set up to allow students to mark time until they are either old enough to get out or get just enough learning to be considered functionally literate.
And, in my opinion, that isn't good enough.
Totem
Totem wrote:
Sure, Nexa, there are more doctorates from public schools on a numbers basis alone, but I suspect that when viewed from a ratio-based study, private schooled and home schooled children would do remarkably better.
Sadly, I have no means by which to prove such suspicions beyond my own anecdotal experience with my own family and those people who were like-minded in their search for a better education for their kids.
Totem
Sadly, I have no means by which to prove such suspicions beyond my own anecdotal experience with my own family and those people who were like-minded in their search for a better education for their kids.
Totem
haha, I'm sure you do suspect that, and it's clear you have no evidence but anecdotal.
I assure you that parents who send their kids to public schools are not just a bunch of slackers who don't give a ****. I want my kid to have a wide variety of experiences, I want her to meet a wide variety of people, I want her to deal with cliques and ****** snotty teenagers and realize that not everyone in the world is nice. I want her to learn to stand up for herself while always knowing her mom has her back if things get rough. I want to do her homework with her, read books with her and discuss them, sit on the PTA and push for better standards, ***** at the library for not carrying the books I think should be there and then get them for her myself and explain why they are important. I want her to hear different perspectives, and find out that the people she respects and looks to for information don't always agree and that if she wants to learn the truth, she might need more than one source. I want to take her to work at a soup kitchen on Thanksgiving morning. I want to suppliment her education while allowing her to meet children with down's syndrom, cerebral palsy, and learning disabilities and understand that not everyone can process things as quickly as she can and that yes they do need help and that yes, she can help them too. There are many things to be proud of one's children for, including their sensitivity to the needs of others, their patience, their generosity, AND their intelligence, perceverance and dedication to hard work.
Sure, if you want to start out with a kid with cash and an already above average intelligence and a desire to go on to college and the dedication to do the work required and the support of helpful parents and put them into private school and then oooh and ahhhh over how successful they've become and how proud you are basking in the glory of elitism, go for it. Just realize there's more than one way to get where you want to.
I guess the point of this whole conversation has come down to "there's no research that shows one is better than the other" and "I'm happy to hear about your anecdotal but largely unrepresentative evidence".
Nexa
“It has always been the prerogative of children and half-wits to point out that the emperor has no clothes. But a half-wit remains a half-wit, and the emperor remains an emperor.â€
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones
Totem previously wrote:
private education and home schooling is markedly better than public education for one simple reason-- they don't have to teach to the lowest common denominator, ie Joe and Mary I'm-As-Dumb-As-Rock, sitting in the back of class passing notes and wishing they were smoking dope on the street corner.
Totem later wrote:
Yes, private schools have the ability to screen students, but on the whole if you have the cash and your kid isn't a criminal you can get in one. That does not equate to a better student initially, nor does it imply higher intelligence. All it does is place the new student in a system that demands more from the child and is backed up by a schoool board that has its salary paid for by parents that expect them to get their kids properly educated.
So are you saying that Joe & Mary IADAR would be doing better in private school if only their parents sent them? Because you said earlier that the IADAR siblings were the "one simple reason" public schools were being out-performed.
A superior school, if it is indeed superior based on its educational merits and not simply the set of students it receives, should be able to outperform public schools even if the back rows of St. Mary's are filled with kids from the IADAR clan. The few times this has been tried, it hasn't been shown to be the case.
Edit: The other major experiment in allowing lower-income students to attend private schools via vouchers (Milwaukee) had the same results as Cleveland -- no appreciable increase in testing scores for the students given vouchers
Edited, Mar 19th 2008 1:45pm by Jophiel
Belkira wrote:
Wow. Regular ol' Joph fan club in here.
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