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On September 24 2011 01:48 giuocob wrote: .... America has been the site of many, many scientific and academic discoveries in its history, far more than any other country. ...
well your country is by far not old enough to say this and its just not true ^^ well it is not even NEARLY true only the last 100 years america is good in this before ... well sry man but not even top5
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On September 24 2011 04:58 Craze wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2011 04:53 jmbnm wrote:On September 24 2011 02:49 YeahScience wrote: I've been in the American public school system my entire life, went to a community college for 2 years before transferring to a state school. I graduated with a science degree and I'm looking to apply to a graduate school this fall. I'd have to say that in general, American colleges are less impressive than foreign ones at the undergraduate level. The students from foreign colleges seem more prepared for tests and have the best knowledge of the subject they're studying. That's because you went to bad schools in the US. Community college to a state school (and I'm betting it's not Berkeley or UVA)? Sorry to break it to you, but at least there's still a chance for you to get into a good graduate school. The only universities that can compete with the top US ones (HYPSM. No, not UPenn or Columbia, they are quite good but not HYPSM level.) are Oxford and Cambridge. No, not UCL or LSE. We're talking overall prestige. Next tier is 5-20, and drawing from US News, ARWU, THE, and QS, it's schools like the rest of the Ivys, UChicago, Duke, Johns Hopkins, CalTech, Berkeley, UCLA, etc. The fact that you went from CC to state school and have still set yourself up to succeed shows that our college system works fine as long as the student works hard enough. But like YeahScience wrote you probably didn't attend a school that is highly ranked, where the University does more to help you. When I was at private college (Linfield) there was a lot more 1 on 1 time with professors, they got to know you, required you to be in class and cared about your future, or at least cared about how it reflected on them. I enjoy the University of Washington more, mostly because it's $25,000 less per year but that faculty support isn't as prevalent. They just have too many kids.
You mixed yourself up a little bit. I'm quoting YeahScience.
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The higher cost of these universities creates the illusion that they are better imo.
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On September 24 2011 01:48 giuocob wrote: Universities are private. America has been the site of many, many scientific and academic discoveries in its history, far more than any other country. These people drive universities and make them exceptional.
Most high schools and below are public. It is well known that most anything the American government touches turns to shit, and public schooling is no exception.
Almost all educational institutions, including universities, are partially subsidized by the government.
America also has the most prohibitively expensive schools in the world.
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On September 24 2011 06:53 CoR wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2011 01:48 giuocob wrote: .... America has been the site of many, many scientific and academic discoveries in its history, far more than any other country. ... well your country is by far not old enough to say this and its just not true ^^ well it is not even NEARLY true only the last 100 years america is good in this before ... well sry man but not even top5
Lol America is far too young to ever make that claim for all of history but he said "its history" and in the history of the US existing it has done quite well for itself. Though its defiantly has slipped and I don't think any one country will dominate the way countries/regions have in the past because so many countries are really up there now a days as America/Asia/Europe are all producing good research. The main problem is regions embracing and looking to other regions and not snubbing them because they came from researchers from across the world. It would do a lot of good for collaboration instead of competition (country wise there should still be competition within the scientific community).
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On September 24 2011 06:45 AudionovA wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2011 01:54 meadbert wrote: American Universities are really International Universities located in America. There are a ton of students from other countries.
My hall Freshman year had 9 kids including kids from Peru, Taiwan, Thailand and Pakistan.
In grad school the diversity only increases. Statistic source please?
Anecdotely, in the sciences this was definitely true. Overall I would expect it to be a much lower percentage, which is what the only stats I could find support:
http://chronicle.com/article/Admissions-Offers-to-Foreign/128700/
~15% of graduate students are international, I assume it would be higher for undergrad, but maybe not.
Edit: The article is confusing talking about foreign offers and the year-year change in percentage, in the graphs, but I'm pretty sure I'm reading it correctly.
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On September 24 2011 06:53 CoR wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2011 01:48 giuocob wrote: .... America has been the site of many, many scientific and academic discoveries in its history, far more than any other country. ... well your country is by far not old enough to say this and its just not true ^^ well it is not even NEARLY true only the last 100 years america is good in this before ... well sry man but not even top5 Well seeing as the world as a whole has made more scientific and industrial progress in the past 100 years than the entire history of humans, I'd say the claim is arguable.
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America has the "best" universities in the sense that we act as a magnet for the smart folks of other nations. We have a high standard of living, lots of space and a great reputation of incredible thinkers, so of course it would be highly sought after to come to the United States to raise kids or attend college as an abroad/out of country transfer student.
It's the approach to education and the idea that all the problems of teaching come from low test scores that is causing the problem with the educational system today. It's not really a paradox, just two closely related topics.
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Not all American public schools are bad.
Some public schools in very rich neighborhoods or suburbs pay their teachers twice or more what other public schools pay. Whether or not this is fair is another question.
Also, there are a number of private American schools at which, of course, teachers get paid more as well.
In these private schools and rich schools, there is plenty of access to technology, facilities, and the teachers are generally happier and more educated.
Also, rich schools and private schools are often willing to fire teachers, because they get lots of applicants for the teaching positions there.
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in China i know that they let only the top portion of students into high school. so obviously they will get better test scores.
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On September 24 2011 06:17 Wuster wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2011 05:31 cz wrote:On September 24 2011 05:29 Surrealz wrote:On September 24 2011 01:48 giuocob wrote: Universities are private. America has been the site of many, many scientific and academic discoveries in its history, far more than any other country. These people drive universities and make them exceptional.
Most high schools and below are public. It is well known that most anything the American government touches turns to shit, and public schooling is no exception. this comment was both concise and true. I also consider the tests at which we are gauging our academic knowledge are increasingly subjective and outdated, and really don't do the average American student justice. Don't private universities still receive the majority of their funding from the government though? The two posters above you are just about as incorrect as you can get. Any American University/College that starts with University of "State name" - "City name" is a public school which gets state tax money as a major part of its funding. Residents of that state pay much lower tuition (I was paying about 1/5 of what the out of state students paid). That includes some of the top universities here: Berkeley (University of California - Berkeley), University of Virginia (ok no city name in this one), Michigan (University of Michigan - Ann Arbor), ect.
Except University of Chicago.
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One thing I've heard was that a lot of better teachers went to teach elsewhere because they're paid very low wages in America.
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The difference between public school and universities is about $50k a year per person.
edit: Also, my high school was very high quality with great teachers. It depends more on the area (better areas get more money for better test scores).
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On September 24 2011 07:14 OrangeApples wrote: One thing I've heard was that a lot of better teachers went to teach elsewhere because they're paid very low wages in America.
Grade and High School teachers are underpaid in both Canada and the US, considering the difficulty of their job.
Public school basically either burns teachers out or turns them into worse teachers, to put it simply. I know it's hard to appreciate if you've never taught before, but trust me.
I taught ONE continuing-ed class at a local college for a couple years. It was only 3 hours with 15 adult students, and I was surprised by how exhausting it was, not including the extra six to seven hours extra I was doing; preparing material, marking projects, and just trying to be a good teacher.
I can't imagine teaching kids 6 to 8 hours a day with a class of 30 students. It would be like doing stand-up comedy 6 hours a day to the same 30 people (none of which really want to be there) for 5 days a week, for 9 months. On top of that, you would have to mark 60 to 80 assignments a week in your spare time, which is like answering really bad, shitty mail.
Public schools suck because the system forces teachers to be shitty. If you ever meet a good teacher that constantly inspires you and keeps you engaged, give them the props they deserve.
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dont the US only truely dominate the university charts made by US companies? there seems to be a lot of variability, with about 50% US in some versions, going up to 100% us top 16 made by others.
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On September 24 2011 07:34 Holykitty wrote: dont the US only truely dominate the university charts made by US companies? there seems to be a lot of variability, with about 50% US in some versions, going up to 100% us top 16 made by others.
Probably because of Bias. I would say the prime difference is money and opportunities due to perceived prestige. You have to remember in academics there is a lot of elitism. In actually being able to teach and put out good students most of the top universities are similar but in research dollars there probably isn't many schools that can compare to the top US ones outside of a few.
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On September 24 2011 07:10 KimJongChill wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2011 06:17 Wuster wrote:On September 24 2011 05:31 cz wrote:On September 24 2011 05:29 Surrealz wrote:On September 24 2011 01:48 giuocob wrote: Universities are private. America has been the site of many, many scientific and academic discoveries in its history, far more than any other country. These people drive universities and make them exceptional.
Most high schools and below are public. It is well known that most anything the American government touches turns to shit, and public schooling is no exception. this comment was both concise and true. I also consider the tests at which we are gauging our academic knowledge are increasingly subjective and outdated, and really don't do the average American student justice. Don't private universities still receive the majority of their funding from the government though? The two posters above you are just about as incorrect as you can get. Any American University/College that starts with University of "State name" - "City name" is a public school which gets state tax money as a major part of its funding. Residents of that state pay much lower tuition (I was paying about 1/5 of what the out of state students paid). That includes some of the top universities here: Berkeley (University of California - Berkeley), University of Virginia (ok no city name in this one), Michigan (University of Michigan - Ann Arbor), ect. Except University of Chicago.
I don't see Illinois in that name ;-).
It is a rule of thumb, but I haven't seen any exceptions yet.
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United States24741 Posts
On September 24 2011 02:08 Kinetik_Inferno wrote: I don't think anybody can deny that the American school system is shit, particularly not after seeing Waiting for Superman. That movie's just depressing. I can. I'm not going to try to make the public ed system to be some paragon of awesome, but Waiting for Superman did a terrible job of making a case that the system is in bad shape. Most people just don't realize this.
On September 24 2011 07:30 Defacer wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2011 07:14 OrangeApples wrote: One thing I've heard was that a lot of better teachers went to teach elsewhere because they're paid very low wages in America. Grade and High School teachers are underpaid in both Canada and the US, considering the difficulty of their job. Public school basically either burns teachers out or turns them into worse teachers, to put it simply. I know it's hard to appreciate if you've never taught before, but trust me. I taught ONE continuing-ed class at a local college for a couple years. It was only 3 hours with 15 adult students, and I was surprised by how exhausting it was, not including the extra six to seven hours extra I was doing; preparing material, marking projects, and just trying to be a good teacher. I can't imagine teaching kids 6 to 8 hours a day with a class of 30 students. It would be like doing stand-up comedy 6 hours a day to the same 30 people (none of which really want to be there) for 5 days a week, for 9 months. On top of that, you would have to mark 60 to 80 assignments a week in your spare time, which is like answering really bad, shitty mail. Public schools suck because the system forces teachers to be shitty. If you ever meet a good teacher that constantly inspires you and keeps you engaged, give them the props they deserve. Surprisingly accurate. I'm contractually obligated to work a little over 7 hours a school day. This year I'm working almost double that. Much of my work is for students who don't give a shit no matter what I try. There are few people in this world who can keep it up for a whole career... I'm just lucky this isn't my typical year as a teacher.
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It's funny how in my country we consider the american schools very good, but it is because when we say our school sucks it means we have no teachers, no chairs, no books, no school.
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There is no paradox. The private schools for primary education /grade school and private colleges are all excellent. The paradox is in s the public school system and the institutions of higher learning. This paradox your seeing is just one of many that is occuring when the middle class of the United States is vanishing like fog in the afternoon sun. The paradigm is shifting from a large well educated middle class to a two tier system where you have either afluence wealth education or a crumbling system. I dont' know enough to assign blame but as far as I know there are alot of reasons why the public system is failing hard. Education is not as important as money. Educators/Teachers are not the best and brightest students (or was this way) and the family structure is failing where 40% of children today have one parent. ( not to say one parent is fail but when that one parent has to work that leaves very little quality time to improve the quality of your children). There is more than enough reasons why the paradox exists today. However I would say the main fall off historically began to occur when (hate to say this) ERA occured and women no longer where focus'd on bringing up awesome kids but wanted to have an awesome career as well. This isn't assigning blame but just pointing out that one parent who is only there intermittantly giving nurturing and assisted learning does not produce alot of quality students.
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