student loan forgiveness

[narad]

That's why I'm saying top 10% *of* the top 1%

Yes, I'm quite aware there are plenty of rather incompetent instructors who gained their positions through birthright, connections, achievements in research, etc., but there are people who actually know how to teach too.

It doesn't really matter how x% of x% you get. Looking to ivies or any top ranked uni to get the best teachers is weird when they are not hired based on their in-the-classroom performance. You don't hire an indy driver when you want the best taxi, either.

 

[Adieu]

It doesn't really matter how x% of x% you get. Looking to ivies or any top ranked uni to get the best teachers is weird when they are not hired based on their in-the-classroom performance. You don't hire an indy driver when you want the best taxi, either.

Ok, whatever, use some other 1 in 10k metric.

You know exactly what I mean.

Keep the best one in 10,000, fire the other 9999

 

[p0ke]

haven't other countries figured it out by imposing sky high taxes?

Yeah, here in Finland taxes are sky high and education is basically free. Plus study loans are backed by the government and have 0% interest. I still have like ~4k€ left of my mine to pay back because I'm paying the minimum amount each month, no point in paying anything more since it's completely interest free. I could've survived without the loan too, but it just made life much easier at the time.

Also, people over here still complain that studying is not free, as the loans and other benefits apparently aren't enough to live on. Complete bullshit if you ask me, all you gotta do is study somewhere where living doesn't cost an arm and a leg (aka. you can't live in the center of Helsinki).

 

[StevenC]

Ok, whatever, use some other 1 in 10k metric.

You know exactly what I mean.

Keep the best one in 10,000, fire the other 9999

Firing 9999 teachers and getting 1 to make a video series means no one gets a good teacher.

 

[Adieu]

Firing 9999 teachers and getting 1 to make a video series means no one gets a good teacher.

So same thing as now, but 10k times cheaper?

Yeah that works too

Or any other process that involves complete lustration. Reforming something so rotten must involve banning all current employees from ever working in public education again, or at least a fire-and-rehire process with some major demerit like a points system that wipes out ALL seniority/experience points and then some for having previously been employed by a public school.

(YMMV)

PS it sounds harsh but it has worked wonders for institutional overhauls like police/security service reform in ex-authoritarian states.

 

[MaxOfMetal]

I can definitely see that @Adieu had some pretty awful teachers.

 

[StevenC]

So same thing as now, but 10k times cheaper?

Yeah that works too

Or any other process that involves complete lustration. Reforming something so rotten must involve banning all current employees from ever working in public education again, or at least a fire-and-rehire process with some major demerit like a points system that wipes out ALL seniority/experience points and then some for having previously been employed by a public school.

(YMMV)

I can't tell if you're an idiot, psychopath, or just hold a grudge.

 

[jaxadam]

I can't tell if you're an idiot, psychopath, or just hold a grudge.

 

[Adieu]

Look, I went to a super-rich public school district. Where a 4th grade teacher asked my 6th grade teacher "for one of your best students" (in an advanced placement classroom!).

TO HELP THE FOURTH GRADERS *READ* THEIR HISTORY TEST. Not write answers, not explain difficult questions... just read them.

It wasn't an ESL class. The illiterate kids weren't foreigners or even minorities.

They were just fucking illiterate upper-middle-class 11 yo rich WASP kids. And there were a lot of them.

I got called up to assist them. That was the fourth year since my first-ever encounter with the English language, btw.

 

[StevenC]

Look, I went to a super-rich public school district. Where a 4th grade teacher asked my 6th grade teacher "for one of your best students" (in an advanced placement classroom!).

TO HELP THE FOURTH GRADERS *READ* THEIR HISTORY TEST.

It wasn't an ESL class. The illiterate kids weren't foreigners or even minorities.

They were just fucking illiterate upper-middle-class 11 yo rich WASP kids. And there were a lot of them.

I got called up to assist them. That was the fourth year since my first-ever encounter with the English language, btw.

Look, I went to a super well funded public school in a different country. We had more than 100 teachers and no one was illiterate.

Making kids watch a video lecture instead of engaging with a human isn't going to help them learn to read. It will do the opposite.

Teachers aren't the damn problem.

 

[narad]

So all teachers in the country are terrible because your school sucked? I'd say it was a poor leap of logic, but then again, with what I hear about your school...

 

[Adieu]

No, because according to the metrics, that was an EXCELLENT school.

I don't even want to know what a sucky school is like.

It'd be better to disband them all and start anew.

 

[narad]

I don't know how to reconcile that with my average school not having any such kids, apart from essentially a "slow" class. Unless that anecdote is merely that and wasn't representative of the school as a whole. I mean, you can't have competitive state test scores when a large chunk of students can't read the test.

 

[thraxil]

I don't know how to reconcile that with my average school not having any such kids, apart from essentially a "slow" class.

Yeah, I went to school in a low income mill town in rural Maine in the 80's and 90's. (if you've ever seen the show Trailer Park Boys, I swear they could've filmed that in my home town) Academic and art/music budgets were always being cut and the buildings were decrepit (but the football team had new equipment every year). We were not at the top of any state rankings (except maybe teen pregnancies). We had a lot of really average teachers and a couple spectacularly bad ones (the first time I ever got in trouble to the point where my parents got a letter home was when my fifth grade teacher was telling the class that Mexico was in South America and I was being "disrespectful" for arguing with her). Outside of the special ed class, there were some kids who weren't particularly fast readers or great at comprehension, but I'd be surprised if more than a couple percent were actually "illiterate."

 

[nightflameauto]

Leaving much of the curriculum to video would:

1) add transparency, opening it to parent and peer review
2) provide much more equality of opportunity
3) make it cheaper

BEHOLD! We have the prototype for the terrifying future of education, and it is youtube.

May the keepers of knowledge have mercy on our souls, for our education system will not.

 

[Adieu]

BEHOLD! We have the prototype for the terrifying future of education, and it is youtube.

May the keepers of knowledge have mercy on our souls, for our education system will not.

K-12 has nothing to do with capital K knowledge

Its job is to prepare proficient functional citizens. Literacy, math, basic skills, "civics" (= intro to law, government, history, and the rules of the land).

And even at that, it fails spectacularly. Kids graduate with honors and have no idea of their legal rights or obligations or how the tax system works.

Srsly? Wtf?

 

[Grindspine]

Firing 9999 teachers and getting 1 to make a video series means no one gets a good teacher.

That sounds like what every grocery and department store here has done; firing all the cashiers with one to run a kiosk for ten self-checkout stations. That does not make for better education; it just makes for me having to wait to get carded to buy a bottle of Jameson.

 

[wheresthefbomb]

(if you've ever seen the show Trailer Park Boys, I swear they could've filmed that in my home town)

I was just talking with my friend about this the other day, there seems to be a continuum of trailer Park boys viewing that ranges from "ha ha look at these trash people" to "way too fucking real" and leans more toward one or the other following class distinction in the audience

It is pretty apparent when you watch the show with people who did not grow up in the trailerpark or equivalent conditions. just part of why it's such a brilliant show.

 

[TedEH]

In today's comment, brought to you by Raid: Shadow Legends, we'll be asking where, Adieu, did the teacher touch you?
If you liked today's dumb comment, don't forget to smash that like button, and leave your replies below.
Next week, we'll be talking about the top 10 history factoids that traditional schools don't want you to know. Number 7 will shock you.

 

[Xaios]

In today's comment, brought to you by Raid: Shadow Legends, we'll be asking where, Adieu, did the teacher touch you?
If you liked today's dumb comment, don't forget to smash that like button, and leave your replies below.
Next week, we'll be talking about the top 10 history factoids that traditional schools don't want you to know. Number 7 will shock you.

I feel nothing.