What’s the point of hiring “better” people

Only to shove them into a failed system of pedagogy? The factory (classroom) model of education is nowhere more shown to be a failure than in teaching math and the hard sciences.

Why should any competent person with, say, an engineering degree want to enter a system set up to create failure in the students, provide low respect, burnout, and low pay to the instructor, and produce fewer scientists and engineers than would random chance?

We (America) is literally at the point where self-directed home-schoolers being “taught” by parents with no scientific background whatsoever are better prepared than are children who have suffered through the factory schools model for 12 years. That is damning evidence of a systematic failure in the whole method.

Schools themselves (and schools of education, naturally) are thoroughly dominated by non-scientists, people who have prospered in education for their verbal skills and despite their almost universal innumeracy and complete unfamiliarity with the actual application of the scientific method. As a result, schools neither value science nor practice it to evaluate their own efforts.

As with many failing companies, there is an unspoken assumption throughout all ed studies that the system is fine, it’s just that we need better people to run it. But where is the evidence that the system is worth preserving?

JMG, at 9:55 am EST on December 28, 2006

The homeschooling comment made me recall a Smithsonian program to which a friend told me she takes her homeschooled kid to on a regular basis... the child never ceases to amaze me at her interest in science. And, the kids gets a science field trip once a month, our local schoolkids are lucky to get such a trip once a year...

http://www.serc.si.edu/public_programs/home_school.jsp HOME SCHOOL PROGRAM: “MAPPING, WHERE AM I?” Home School Program Location: Reed Center Time: 9:00 AM Speaker: Outreach Coordinator We’ll be doing hands-on map making and drawing in this program designed to introduce students to maps, how to make them, and how to read them. Osprey (ages 3-5) 9:00-10:00 a.m. Herons (ages 6-12) 11:00- Noon p.m. Home schoolers are invited to join us for these exciting programs about science and nature. There are two programs each day, one for ages 3-5 (the Osprey) and one for ages 6-12 (the Herons). Topics are the same for each age group, unless otherwise stated, but content is modified to be age appropriate. Preregistration is required (443) 482-2300, classes are limited to 15 students. $4/student.Fees: adult — free child — $4

J.P., at 8:25 am EST on December 29, 2006

Mistake

The whole attempt is a mistake. This is not an education problem, but a social problem. Society stopped valuing education and knowledge. Look at who are valued the most. You will find people like Donald Trump, Paris Hilton, random celebrities from Hollywood, or the latest wondergirl from Big Brother. Compare them to the best contemporary engineers, scientists and biologists (do you even know who they are, or where to find them?). And I do not mean the CEO of Pfizer, but people who actually DO something. You will find a bunch of underpaid, disillusioned people, treated as slaves.

Now, ask a teenager what he/she wants to be. If you are lucky, you get an answer like stock broker, if you are not, it will be movie star. But it is very unlikely that you get anything like scientist or engineer.

This is what causes this ‘education problem’ and will ultimately cause the US to lose its leading role in science and technology.

les, at 9:25 pm EST on December 29, 2006

Science education

I don’t like to hear people knocking education when we have so many marvelous teachers, many great schools and an astounding gamut of educational opportunities from public and private schools to home schools and no schools and television with science and history channels. We have the best college/university system in the world. With adult ed and community colleges anyone can go to college. Heck, anyone in this country can walk into the library for free and get a personalized custom eduction! I am a dedicated educator with 15 years of classroom experience — all subjects and all grade levels. Though thoroughly credentialed I hesitate to call myself a “teacher” as that implies “teaching", something like imparting pre-digested knowledge. I see my chosen vocation as awakening in young minds life-long skills in learning. I “teach” curiosity — asking questions, observing, organizing, solving problems, trying new routes, reflecting, sharing and finding diverse means of expression. It is difficult to teach science, as it is not so much a collection of information as an atitude of exploration. My best friend graduated from Stanford with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Biology. Biology was not considered a science until 1960 or so, yet it is now the core of science curriculum. Science (and literature) is a matter of learning to listen to what the world has to teach. Parents and teachers are partners in this endeavor. Well, everybody is really. Is it really so bad that young people choose musicians and artists as their heros? We have an amazingly diverse musical culture in this country, a zillion bookstores well patronized and an ever-expanding inventiveness that makes my head spin. The highest salaries in this country don’t go to rappers or even sports stars. As I tell my students, the biggest earners are writers, especially screenwriters (think Stephen King or Larry McMurtry) and movie directors. We make millionaires of wonderful artists such as Bette Midler or Whoopi Goldberg. This is something worth celebrating. A last note on discipline. Pavarotti was asked about where he drew the discipline to be a truly great singer. He replied that it was not discipline, but devotion that motivated him and he wished more people understood the difference. So, find your devotion, love life and stay beautiful. And thank you for listening

Robin Rachael, at 4:35 am EST on January 2, 2007

ignorant posters

Please don’t listen to someone as ignorant as Robin Rachael. Biology most certainly was considered a science well before 1960. I am currently looking at J. Arthur Thomson’s “The Outline of Science” from 1922. Fully 1/2 of the book is biology from the previous century. The core science in the science curriculum is usually chemistry, not biology (although it should probably be physics).

Despite her rosy impression of the current state of education. I have not seen any evidence that my students have learned much of anything in high school. I think this is the point of the Early College High School. High School only beats down the best students with 4 years of learning nothing. If we get them from Junior High into college, they will be better learners. We already have all of the high school courses in our colleges now, anyway. We have to. The students need to learn this stuff somewhere, and they don’t learn it in high school anymore.

When I was in college (less than 20 years ago), the lowest level math course offered for credit was Calculus I. Calc I was the beginning of college-level math. Now, it is Algebra I. The same dumbing-down is true for the rest of the curriculum and I teach at a school where the main reason students give for leaving is that it is “too hard” and they are going to the state’s flagship institution because it is so much easier. At one of the community colleges in the area (a large, state community college whose credits transfer everywhere in the state) the physics professor gives the students copies of all of the tests, they go over the answers in class, THEN they take the tests. If they get less than a 60% on a test, they retake it. They can only retake it twice, though. Yes, quality education to be proud of.

Michael, at 10:20 am EST on January 5, 2007