Public Education in the US

I don't know what your point is.

Most agree that U.S. schools in affluent districts perform well and poor districts do not. Nobody is bashing public schools in general. The Shanghai kids are 100% wealthy upper class. Poor Chinese are illiterate. We do a better job overall for the whole population, but not good enough. The Chinese do not teach creativity nor innovation. We are better in that area.

The best part of the article was the last paragraph "What we face is not an engineering problem; it's overcoming the legacy of history and culture. The outcome may affect our economic competitiveness less than our success at creating a just society." R.S. should elaborate on that. The problem stems from social, cultural, and historical forces against education.

Notakicker wrote:

I don't know what your point is.

Most agree that U.S. schools in affluent districts perform well and poor districts do not. Nobody is bashing public schools in general. The Shanghai kids are 100% wealthy upper class. Poor Chinese are illiterate. We do a better job overall for the whole population, but not good enough. The Chinese do not teach creativity nor innovation. We are better in that area.

The best part of the article was the last paragraph "What we face is not an engineering problem; it's overcoming the legacy of history and culture. The outcome may affect our economic competitiveness less than our success at creating a just society." R.S. should elaborate on that. The problem stems from social, cultural, and historical forces against education.

My point is this. Many, many people in the general public take aim at public education as a failing institution, unworthy of further taxpayer support. They cite data that compares our students' test scores to other nations, as a way to prove our system is broken.

Haven't you heard these things: Watch out! The Japanese attend school 224 days out of the year! They're better in math in 5th grade! We need to raise standards! Cut non-academic offerings like choir and art! Cut sports for the love of god! Public schools are socialistic constructs! Vouchers! Superman! Choice!

Cripes. What Samuelson is saying is that our schools ARE on par with Finland, Shanghai, etc, when you only look at homogenous groups. You can compare aggregate scores all you want; the fact is, the US public education system educates students as well as anyone else in the world.

So the next time someone says to you, "Our students are not as smart as those in Japan," you say, "Yes. Our Asian students are." When someone says, "Why can't our kids achieve like those in Finland?"... you say, "They do. Our Caucasain ones, anyway."

It just burns me when people attempt to tear down public schools - to achieve whatever agenda they have going - by comparing us to other countries. This article shows that such statements do not paint a complete picture, and "solutions" many craft to address such "problems" are based on false premises.

Many of the people who complain about public education have no real interest in education at all. Seriously, they don't. They're even suspicious of educated people.

The United States in the most racist nation in the recorded history of the human race.

MLK was assassinated before he could remedy apartheid in housing, secondary education, fire and police departments.

No person has taken the place of MLK and continued the civilizing the savage White racists in America.

Japan began educating peasants in the 1600s in castle towns to improve farm output and military armaments. By 1900, 100% functional literacy throughout the nation had been achieved. Japan remains the sole nation to have achieved this amazing feat.

hmmmm. So you are saying that our Asians and our Caucasians do as well as other Asians and Caucasians around the world? It's a genetic thing then is it?

So if it's not the Asians... and not the Caucasians...you must be about to blame blacks then right?

So your argument is "well our blacks are just as well educated as the rest of the world's blacks and they're just killing the US average". The US education system isn't a failure, it's the blacks!

You sir are a racist, and US education sucks. Stop blaming everything on race like typical liberal hacks.

1619 wrote:

Japan began educating peasants in the 1600s in castle towns to improve farm output and military armaments. By 1900, 100% functional literacy throughout the nation had been achieved. Japan remains the sole nation to have achieved this amazing feat.

Actually there are plenty of countries with higher literacy rates. Different reports have different top counties, but some of the different literacy reports have put Georgia, Iceland, Finland and Andorra as having the highest literacy rates in the world.

Not functional literacy. Sure, people in Georgia, Iceland, Finland and Andorra can read 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 today. Keep in mind those countries weren't civilized until the Renasissance. Until the Renaissance, 95% of the people in Europe were primitives and aboriginals living in caves, forests and mudhuts. Europe was one of the last areas civilized by Central Asian and Middle Eastern conquerors.

checkyourfactsplz wrote:

hmmmm. So you are saying that our Asians and our Caucasians do as well as other Asians and Caucasians around the world? It's a genetic thing then is it?

So if it's not the Asians... and not the Caucasians...you must be about to blame blacks then right?

So your argument is "well our blacks are just as well educated as the rest of the world's blacks and they're just killing the US average". The US education system isn't a failure, it's the blacks!

You sir are a racist, and US education sucks. Stop blaming everything on race like typical liberal hacks.

Not sure you read the article. It's not "blame." Blame suggests there was an incident, a problem, which requires a source.

There is no problem.

If you think there is, read the PISA report statistics - again, or in your case, for the first time.

checkyourfactsplz wrote:

hmmmm. So you are saying that our Asians and our Caucasians do as well as other Asians and Caucasians around the world? It's a genetic thing then is it?

So if it's not the Asians... and not the Caucasians...you must be about to blame blacks then right?

So your argument is "well our blacks are just as well educated as the rest of the world's blacks and they're just killing the US average". The US education system isn't a failure, it's the blacks!

You sir are a racist, and US education sucks. Stop blaming everything on race like typical liberal hacks.

AND.. I'm not saying it. Researchers are. PISA report.

It seems to me this study confirms what everyone should already know: inner-city public schools (which tend to have higher percentages of black and hispanic students) are struggling, but most other public schools are fine.

How are there still illiterate people in America? Do the people who can read a different language count as illiterate because they cannot read English? If this is the case, then yes, it is the fault of the latinos and other immigrants. I do not know a single illiterate white caucasian. I know of several hispanic people who are not able to read English, however...

We already know wrote:

The United States in the most racist nation in the recorded history of the human race.

Its because we are the only nation that has intermingled each race across the landscape and not secluded one from the other dipshit.

a lot of people do in fact bash public education in general, yet it does significantly better than charter schools and better than private schools, controlling for wealth, etc.

checkyourfactsplz wrote:

hmmmm. So you are saying that our Asians and our Caucasians do as well as other Asians and Caucasians around the world? It's a genetic thing then is it?

So if it's not the Asians... and not the Caucasians...you must be about to blame blacks then right?

So your argument is "well our blacks are just as well educated as the rest of the world's blacks and they're just killing the US average". The US education system isn't a failure, it's the blacks!

You sir are a racist, and US education sucks. Stop blaming everything on race like typical liberal hacks.

The author blames social factors, not genetic ones:

"To the contrary, these persistent achievement gaps demonstrate the limits of schools to compensate for problems outside the classroom - broken homes, street violence, indifference to education - that discourage learning and inhibit teaching. As child-psychologist Jerome Kagan points out, a strong predictor of children's school success is the educational attainment of their parents. The higher it is, the more parents read to them, inform and encourage them."