EPTI'm not trying to argue schools are over-funded, though.
US Politics Mega-thread - Page 3368
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micronesia
United States24768 Posts
I'm not trying to argue schools are over-funded, though. | ||
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Simberto
Germany11796 Posts
In the last year, a lot of teaching here was done distantly via the internet, due to covid. Now, obviously, one needs stuff like computers, and webcams, tablets, microphones and all sorts of other stuff for that. None of the teachers i know got any of that stuff from the schools. If a teacher had good supplies for distance teaching here, it is because they bought it, with their own money. We also had the option of going to school and trying to use the computers in the classrooms for this. But sadly the internet is not very trustworthy there. And an old laptop without a webcam or a good microphone, and with no surface to write on, isn't really good for distance teaching either. You could of course try to get those supplies through the official channels here. But that would probably take a year or two. And after that time, you get some laptop that is managed through some IT department that you can hardly ever reach, where you have no admin power to ever install the programs you need for teaching. So if your childrens teacher did some effective distance teaching during lockdown, it is almost certainly because they spent their own money onto supplies. | ||
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States45456 Posts
On November 12 2021 07:59 Simberto wrote: If we are talking about spending your own money on supplies for teaching, let me tell you something. In the last year, a lot of teaching here was done distantly via the internet, due to covid. Now, obviously, one needs stuff like computers, and webcams, tablets, microphones and all sorts of other stuff for that. None of the teachers i know got any of that stuff from the schools. If a teacher had good supplies for distance teaching here, it is because they bought it, with their own money. We also had the option of going to school and trying to use the computers in the classrooms for this. But sadly the internet is not very trustworthy there. And an old laptop without a webcam or a good microphone, and with no surface to write on, isn't really good for distance teaching either. You could of course try to get those supplies through the official channels here. But that would probably take a year or two. And after that time, you get some laptop that is managed through some IT department that you can hardly ever reach, where you have no admin power to ever install the programs you need for teaching. So if your childrens teacher did some effective distance teaching during lockdown, it is almost certainly because they spent their own money onto supplies. I spent over $1,500 of my own money last school year, just to make sure I could effectively teach remotely. | ||
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cLutZ
United States19574 Posts
On November 11 2021 22:18 micronesia wrote: This idea that paying teachers less wouldn't reduce the quality of teaching at schools is difficult to reconcile with the problem that the teaching profession has trouble drawing quality candidates. You get what you pay for, and when you aren't willing to pay even 100k to the most experienced/educated members of the profession in an expensive state, you are setting up the schools for failure. I can only conclude cLutZ's actual objective here hasn't been explicitly stated. I mean, I stated pretty much up front that I don't think "teacher quality" matters that much. I don't think "school quality" matters much. I havent hid anything. My POV has always pretty clearly been "we have an expensive and wasteful system and so we should try to make it cheaper." I also had the explanatory point about woke people seemingly believing what I do, which is that school's are incapable, even with reform, of meaningfully improving outcomes for low-performing students. Which is why, from my POV they prefer eliminating gifted programs, the SAT, etc to reforming them. They suspect, or at least act as if they suspect, that reforms will not achieve the goal of uplifting, so to equalize outcomes, their proposals must necessarily bring down the high performers. | ||
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micronesia
United States24768 Posts
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LegalLord
United States13779 Posts
On November 12 2021 09:58 micronesia wrote: There seems to be growing discontent with the entire concept of reform in the U.S. in recent years. It's actually a bit concerning to me that we are going in the direction of, "if something isn't working, don't fix it, just replace it entirely." There's a time and a place for that sure, but that's not always the right thing to do. Years of "incremental improvement" that ends in a state that looks worse than where we started will do that. Not much appetite for putting on a band-aid on a bullet wound any more. | ||
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micronesia
United States24768 Posts
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LegalLord
United States13779 Posts
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micronesia
United States24768 Posts
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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micronesia
United States24768 Posts
On November 12 2021 10:43 JimmiC wrote: But when has breaking a democracy to make it better worked? Has it not every single time, left or right, ended in a dictatorship that ends up pretty quickly muxh worse than what it was intended to fix. An example that comes to mind is the Articles of Confederation: "It was quickly agreed that changes would not work, and instead the entire Articles needed to be replaced. On March 4, 1789, the government under the Articles was replaced with the federal government under the Constitution." Although I wasn't specifically referring to replacing an entire democracy, even though some may want that even now. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States45456 Posts
On November 12 2021 09:52 cLutZ wrote: I mean, I stated pretty much up front that I don't think "teacher quality" matters that much. I don't think "school quality" matters much. I havent hid anything. My POV has always pretty clearly been "we have an expensive and wasteful system and so we should try to make it cheaper." I also had the explanatory point about woke people seemingly believing what I do, which is that school's are incapable, even with reform, of meaningfully improving outcomes for low-performing students. Which is why, from my POV they prefer eliminating gifted programs, the SAT, etc to reforming them. They suspect, or at least act as if they suspect, that reforms will not achieve the goal of uplifting, so to equalize outcomes, their proposals must necessarily bring down the high performers. 1. Can you please elaborate on what that means? 2. Do you believe that an experienced teacher generally provides a better education than a brand new one? 3. Do you believe that a teacher who has an in-depth understanding of content and pedagogy generally provides a better education than one who doesn't? 4. Would you ever say the same thing about other professions - that the quality of lawyer or doctor doesn't really matter that much? | ||
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micronesia
United States24768 Posts
On November 12 2021 11:05 JimmiC wrote: I dont know American history well, but from a quick look up it looks like incremental because they say compromise. I also think if everyone agrees you have a chance, but everyone agreeing to a total change sounds impossible. I don't understand the argument you are making. I recognize this isn't completely your wheelhouse, but the democracy under the AOC was replaced by democracy under the Constitution of 1787/1788. The fact that there was some horse trading regarding the content of the Constitution and it's amendments doesn't seem to me to have much to do with the fact that the leadership decided to throw out the AOC entirely instead of amend them to a form more similar to what we have today in the Constitution. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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cLutZ
United States19574 Posts
On November 12 2021 10:43 JimmiC wrote: But when has breaking a democracy to make it better worked? Has it not every single time, left or right, ended in a dictatorship that ends up pretty quickly muxh worse than what it was intended to fix. I woukd be shocked if schools were different. Why not just look at well functioning ones and do that? The "well functioning" schools are just schools with high IQ students that have involved parents. There is no public policy prescription for those problems inside the school system. There is one exception, which is expelling, suspending, and quarantining disruptive students. But that measure is largely seen as racist because of the demographics of who is punished. Outside the school system you could do things like eliminating lead paint and giving away prenatal vitamins, but that is all a very small effects AFAIK. Leaded gasoline really was a scourge, but other lead products aren't nearly as bio-available, so they cause very very tiny effects on population scale. On November 12 2021 11:08 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: 1. Can you please elaborate on what that means? 2. Do you believe that an experienced teacher generally provides a better education than a brand new one? 3. Do you believe that a teacher who has an in-depth understanding of content and pedagogy generally provides a better education than one who doesn't? 4. Would you ever say the same thing about other professions - that the quality of lawyer or doctor doesn't really matter that much? 1. I agree. I've never seen it properly defined in a rigorous way. 2. Neutral. I've not personally seen such an effect. And again, the studies around teacher quality are all bin-worthy. I will say there is a "brand new" teacher thing where on their first 1-3 years on the job they are a bit incompetent in some ways, but also more energetic in other ways. This is like most professions I think. Seniority is generally overrated in society. Most 5th year attorneys run circles around 25 year attorneys IMO. 3. Probably, but I don't think it matters much, if at all. The kids forget most/all of it. Our education system is nebulous about its outcomes intentionally. If I gave 100k six (6) year olds cognitive tests, and split them into two 50k populations of equal test scores, and then somehow managed to figure out teacher quality, and then gave one half really good teachers, and the other really mediocre teachers, I'd expect like a 1-3% difference on the SAT. 4. For quite a few I would agree. Sure, its probable that there are differences in skill level between doctor A and doctor B, or attorney A and attorney B. But, if 95% of doctor A's clients are smart, rich, and BMI 15 while, 95% of doctor B's clients are dumb, poor, and 40 BMI, how are we really going to compare them? Same with the attorneys. If I filed every application (like some hacks do to milk clients) that came through the door, my success rate would be like 10% on getting patents issued. Instead I do not, because we are supposed to be a niche firm that is "good" at getting patents issued. So what we are actually good at (mostly, obviously its a job lots of people are unable to do, like any job, I couldn't ever be a butcher because I'd have no fingers left after a month) is actually telling clients that they need to go back to the drawing board. | ||
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Gorsameth
Netherlands22206 Posts
https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/581198-appeals-court-temporarily-blocks-archives-from-handing-trump-records The desperate attempts to stall until the midterm elections continue. | ||
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Velr
Switzerland10873 Posts
On point 3: Do you have any actual data to support your claims or is this just what you made up in your mind to justify your own ideas? By this logic any kind of teaching/mentoring in just about any field is near totally useless. You don't think this is a ridiculous statement? | ||
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Dscexperts12
1 Post
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Liquid`Drone
Norway28784 Posts
But a highly educated teacher isn't necessarily the same as a good teacher, and average grade from examinations isn't the only criteria for a successful education. Also - I've read that while various steps taken to improve education tend to have a negligible effect on the overall outcome, the groups that tend to see improvement the quickest are the ones with parents whose education level is the lowest. Also, fewer students per teacher is one field where studies have confirmed a positive relation, sometimes very big. Boys benefit more from this than girls do, and the worst performing students benefit more than the best performing ones. Other studies indicate that the effect is rather small (still positive - but small) - but these studies (Hattie, for one) also explain this through teachers not changing their style of teaching to accommodate the possibilities from a smaller classroom. If you're just having a lecture, then 30 vs 15 students makes little difference, but if you are working with assignments that demand aid and supervision, the difference is big. (I think the differences are most notable in subjects like math and second/third languages - ones where many students need a lot of guidance.) Honestly, school, as much as it wants to reduce sociological differences, can't really ever expect to successfully counter the effects of good or bad parenting. As a teacher, I feel there's been an almost 100% correlation between 'I found out that this child has teacher parents' and 'this child performs way above average'. The thing is though - even though children from parents with more/better education (and statistically, also ones with higher iq) are going to perform better than children with lower iqs or parents with less education, there's still a marked effect from education policy. PISA tests would give much more uniform results otherwise - but there are certainly big differences on a country to country basis - indicating that yes, educational policy and resource investment matters. However, it's also a very complex issue, one that is frequently politicized, one where the research does not provide all that many uniform results, so to the degree where we know what works, there's not been all that much political will to implement it, many teachers are rather conservative in their methods, learning new approaches takes a lot of time and determination, and there's always a resource shortage. If every pupil had 1:1 tutoring, the differences in school performance in examination results would be absolutely massive (but perhaps the socialization and cooperation element would suffer). We can't expect perfection from an underfunded educational system aiming to reach all students, we can't expect short term gains because even if we develop approaches that are 'scientifically superior' then it still takes a long time to implement and they might not be superior to the old approaches if practiced by a pedagogue with 25 years experience doing what he or she has been doing in the past and 0 years experience doing what is suggested they should do in the future. (this is my source. It's in Norwegian, but it references multiple international studies. | ||
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