| Author |
Message |
    
Tom Reingold
Citizen
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 2106
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 2:27 pm: |     |
This is from http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/11/opinion/11KRIS.html?ex=1077527375&ei=1&en=9dd9 1df602d70d3d
Op-Ed Columnist: Watching the Jobs Go By
February 11, 2004
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
To be permitted to read the rest of this column, you must
first click here and answer the question correctly:
Go on, try it. After all, 83 percent of Japanese high
school seniors got it right (though only 30 percent of
American seniors). The correct answer is (c). If you
answered incorrectly, though, keep reading - think of it as
a social promotion.
The topic today is the growing furor over the outsourcing
of jobs to India - and, more broadly, educational lapses
here. One reason for the jobless recovery in the U.S. is
that it doesn't make much sense to have an American
radiologist, say, examine your X-ray when it can be done so
much more cheaply in New Delhi.
Indeed, why should computer software be written, taxes
prepared, pathology specimens examined, financial analysis
done or homework graded in the U.S., when all of that can
be done more cheaply in Bangalore? I.B.M. is moving
thousands of jobs to India and China, and Reuters says it
will have Indian reporters cover some U.S. companies from
there.
All this is unsettling. But to me the alarm seems
overwrought - and dangerous, for it is likely to fuel calls
for protectionism. A dozen years ago, there was a similar
panic about high-tech jobs going abroad, and people said
that Asia would be making computer chips while Americans
produced potato chips.
Instead, free trade worked. Some autoworkers lost their
jobs, but America emerged stronger than ever. Studies by
Catherine Mann of the Institute for International Economics
suggest that it is the same this time. Outsourcing raises
American productivity, gives our economy a boost, increases
foreign demand for U.S. products and leaves us better off.
Yet, as an Indian friend, Sunil Subbakrishna, pointed out
to me, there is one step we should take in response to this
wave of outsourcing: bolster our second-rate education
system.
Mr. Subbakrishna, a management consultant specializing in
technology, notes that in his native Bangalore, children
learn algebra in elementary school. All in all, he says,
the average upper-middle-class child in Bangalore finishes
elementary school with a better grounding in math and
science than the average kid in the U.S.
I saw the same thing when I lived in China and interviewed
college applicants there. The SAT wasn't offered in China,
so Chinese high school students took the Graduate Record
Examinations - intended for would-be graduate students -
and many still scored in the 99th percentile in math.
The latest international survey, called Trends in
International Mathematics and Science Study, found that the
best-performing eighth graders were, in order, from
Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, Belgium
and the Netherlands. The U.S. ranked 19th, just after
Latvia. (India and China weren't surveyed.)
"For too many graduates, the American high school diploma
signifies only a broken promise," declares a major new
study released yesterday by three education policy
organizations. Called the American Diploma Project, it
found that 60 percent of employers rated graduates' skills
as only "fair" or "poor."
The broader problem is not just in schools but society as a
whole: There's a tendency in U.S. intellectual circles to
value the humanities but not the sciences. Anyone who
doesn't nod sagely at the mention of Plato's cave is
dismissed as barely civilized, while it's no blemish to be
ignorant of statistics, probability and genetics. If we're
going to revere Plato, as we should, we should also
remember that his academy supposedly had a sign at the
entrance: "Let no one ignorant of geometry enter here."
In 1957, the Soviet launching of Sputnik frightened America
into substantially improving math and science education.
I'm hoping that the loss of jobs in medicine and computers
to India and elsewhere will again jolt us into bolstering
our own teaching of math and science.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/11/opinion/11KRIS.html?ex=1077527375&ei=1&en=9dd9 1df602d70d3d
Tom Reingold the prissy-pants
There is nothing
|
Cynicalgirl
Citizen
Username: Cynicalgirl
Post Number: 392
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 2:58 pm: | |
As a former kid whose Elementary Math class suddenly got a lot harder post Sputnik...well, I think he's right. I don't think it's all about money, but it may be about value. Many of the offshore folks I've worked with do not have 4 year degrees but are a lot sharper in terms of technical skills and communication. Educationally, they may equate to our high school or community college graduates; in terms of skills, they often outstrip.
And I'm as guilty of Liberal Arts love as the next person. I avoided math/science classes in college pretty successfully; graduated with one class in Botany, and one in a sort of Astronomy appreciation.
|
Tom Reingold
Citizen
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 2108
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 3:23 pm: | |
I almost posted this in the politics section instead of here. We're so busy disagreeing on how to improve the schools that we're not doing it. Or are we?
Tom Reingold the prissy-pants
There is nothing
|
las
Citizen
Username: Las
Post Number: 16
Registered: 10-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 4:03 pm: | |
"...we're not doing it" ????
Speak for yourself.
As always, Tom, that sounds great. |
Tom Reingold
Citizen
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 2109
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 4:23 pm: | |
You're right, I spoke too hastily and painted with too broad a brush. Schools are improving in many ways, but Kristof's point stands. We suck at math, and there's no excuse. The talking Barbie doll said, "Math is hard" and it sounds so defeatist to me.
If, however, you just want to bait me or ridicule everything I say, I'm not playing.
Tom Reingold the prissy-pants
There is nothing
|
nan
Citizen
Username: Nan
Post Number: 1152
Registered: 2-2001
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 7:18 pm: | |
Well, I did not even bother to check out the test question because to me the real question here is WHO IS THE AMERICAN DIPLOMA PROJECT and WHY are they saying these horrible things about our education system?
And the non-surprising answer to the WHO is question: Achieve, Inc., The Education Trust,The Thomas B. Fordham Foundation and The National Alliance of Business.
In other words, all the people who support sending jobs oversees, overreliance on testing, NCLB and VOUCHERS. We (some of the same posters) were just discussing this in a Soapbox thread titled, "What It's Really Like to get Laid off: http://www.southorangevillage.com/cgi-bin/show.cgi?tpc=3127&post=191526#POST1915 26
And WHY are they doing this? Well, it sure lets them off the hook if everyone in America thinks we have such a lousy school system (and lousy attitudes) that it's OUR fault that all the jobs are going away. Even those friends and associates who did GREAT in school but can't seem to find jobs these days. And such reports also help the arguments for vouchers and for-profit educational enterprises.
Some people also think this is the beginning of the dialogue to form a national curriculum--as they get some states to agree to shared benchmarks then push others to join.
Time to wake up and smell the coffee--and the rat. |
Cynicalgirl
Citizen
Username: Cynicalgirl
Post Number: 393
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 6:40 am: | |
I'm sure I'll get hammered for this, but I've never understood what's so bad about a core, shared national curriculum. Seems like it would help parents do the comparisons they seek, and insure basic competencies. Maybe reduce the edu-babble that can make it tough to tell what's going on.
And, theoretically, I don't understand what's so bad about vouchers. I know that in practice, vouchers can end up just a smoke and mirrors exercise -- if you want to send you kid to a particular school and he/she is qualified, and there's no room, well then it's not working. On a state/district level, I have seen district-based "choice" programs and parents seem to like them (where the choice is among themed or magnet schools). I used to be very much against vouchers if the pool included private and parochial schools, chiefly due to the potential for funding religion-based education. Now, as I look at parochial schools not for the religon but for more traditional curriculum and discipline seemingly unavailable in the public schools, I'm not so sure.
For me, these thoughts are not tied to a political party. I don't know what I am anymore, except ready for a sort of Boston Tea Party educationally. |
J. Crohn
Citizen
Username: Jcrohn
Post Number: 904
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 10:16 am: | |
"I'm sure I'll get hammered for this, but I've never understood what's so bad about a core, shared national curriculum."
I believe England has one. Probably also France and Germany. Taiwan.
Most democracies are smaller than ours though, and that might matter for some reason. (The claim that other countries are much less "diverse" than the US is no longer true; and I don't think it ever was a reasonable argument anyway.)
The up-side of a national core curriculum is obvious (to you and me, anyway). But the down-side is that if the core curriculum is mediocre or bad, then every state in a large country such as ours is affected.
We're seeing an analogy to this question play out in the MA gay marriage debate, which has sparked a conservative (Congressional?) proposal to legislate against gay marriage across the entire country.
Now, I would enthusiastically support a constitutional ammendment permitting gay marriage. But I would be horrified by one explicitly banning gay marriage and forbidding individual states to recognize it.
Thus, as soon as the country as a whole becomes socially liberal enough to permit the kind of ammendment I prefer, I will become an ardent supporter of national legislation. Until then, I cravenly defer to state's rights. |
Cynicalgirl
Citizen
Username: Cynicalgirl
Post Number: 396
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 1:02 pm: | |
I'm not looking for the entirety of what is taught to be dictated nationally, but I sure would like state to state agreement on which subject/what grade/what competencies. From there, embroider away on state history, diversity topics particularly relevant to a locale, etc.
I don't view this as identical to the gay marriage issue. I view it as more like national driver's licenses.... |
kathy
Citizen
Username: Kathy
Post Number: 745
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 4:21 pm: | |
So 83% of Japanese high school seniors have studied calculus, but only 30% of U.S. seniors. In this country calculus has traditionally been considered a college-level subject and only advanced math students study it in high school.
One thing that I would want to know is, what percentage of 17/18-year-old students in Japan are high school seniors, as opposed to having been diverted into a less-academic education at an earlier point? I know that in some European countries a major division is made pre-high school between those getting a more vocational education and those going into the academic, pre-college type of high school program that we prescribe for virtually everybody.
I would also like to note that one of the CHS teachers spoke to the Home and School Association last year after she returned from Japan. One of the things she said was that Japan is moving toward a more American style of education because they are finding that although their students are technically savvy, they don't have the critical thinking skills that American students do. (Most of which, of course, don't show up on the kinds of tests that are used to make comparisons.) |
nan
Citizen
Username: Nan
Post Number: 1154
Registered: 2-2001
| | Posted on Friday, February 13, 2004 - 6:01 am: | |
I think that the influx of diversity has been an issue in formerly homogenous populations with national curriculums. We just don't hear much about that over here. We only hear about how lousy our system is supposed to be compared with everyone else. I bet few people know how well we actually do in international comparisons--especially in reading.
It is doubtful that a curriculum picked for everyone would suit anyone. I'm guessing we would end up with something similar to what happens in the UK,that is a "two-tier system" with a narrow curriculums focused on high test scores in a few key subjects and little else. Some think states would be pitted against each other to continue to "raise the bar" until almost no one would be able to pass a High School exit exam. Meanwhile there will still be lots of affluent kids successfully attending private schools with holistic, child-centered, creative rich offerings--the kind of practices that the government now tells us are "proven failures."
I suppose for those who are enamored of the idea of parochial schools with the uniforms, teacher-directed drills, and stern "no excuses" discipline policies there is cause for hope. The Bush Administration does favor behaviorist educational models. But for the rest of us it's probably just going to seem difficult, dull, dreary, joyless and no way to educate all children. |
Cynicalgirl
Citizen
Username: Cynicalgirl
Post Number: 404
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Friday, February 13, 2004 - 6:34 am: | |
Surely there's some possibility in the middle, with some kind of core (60%?) of shared curriculum goals across the states. I don't keep track of NCLB and all of this. I'm just speaking as someone trying to understand whether 5th grade math has the same goals here as it does elsewhere as far as what kids should achieve (minimally) goes. I don't think all private schools are child-centered, etc. nor do I think that everything in my kid's public classroom is dull, dreary and joyless.
I'm less interested in other country comparisons than other state/district comparisons. Which, I find hard to do given the variation in curriculum and talk about it. I see, right now, vocabulary work that is wholly unrelated to what is being read, with words that tie to nothing much (most recent example, "fetlock"; book being read in class, Pinballs, a socially conscious little book taught, I think, because of character development and alleged relevance.) In a previous school, in a previous state, I understood a little more clearly what was going on, and how the subjects were interconnected. Here I don't. So, for me, as a parent, it's hard to see why 5th grade learning goals vary so from district to district, state to state. I have seen my child's interest in her subjects, and her performance, deteriorate in part (I think) because all of this stuff doesn't hang together in quite the way one might hope. Yes, I'm trying to talk to the teacher, but based on some of what I'm hearing, I fear she'll say "it's the district curriculum and I have to teach it..." |
Tom Reingold
Citizen
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 2134
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Friday, February 13, 2004 - 5:16 pm: | |
I shouldn't say this because I might get jumped on, but...
I think the quality of the teacher can make more of a difference than the curriculum. And I have no clue whatsoever to monitor, measure, or affect the quality of teachers.
That said, cynicalgirl, your daughter may do just fine next year. It sounds like her teacher this year is uninspired or uninspiring (or both, of course). Or she just may not be a match for your daughter.
My younger daughter is having an absolute blast in sixth grade at MMS. It is very stimulating, compared with elementary school, and I say that even though her elementary school experience (in Edison, NJ, where we just moved from) was actually pretty good.
Tom Reingold the prissy-pants
There is nothing
|
nan
Citizen
Username: Nan
Post Number: 1161
Registered: 2-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, February 15, 2004 - 2:47 pm: | |
Actually Tom, there is research to support the notion that it is the teacher that makes the most difference. Here is an excerpt on the curriculum vs teacher debate between two reading researchers, Richard L. Allington and Anne McGill-Franzen. Their conversation is on the topic of reading instruction--but it could probably be applied to other subjects as well.
The entire piece is located here: http://cela.albany.edu/reports/looking/index.html, and provides a good history and overview of many of the prominant classroom conflicts featured daily on MOL.
RLA: . . .Not surprisingly, the new NAEP proficiency levels were at some variance with actual student performance and, thus, the NAEP results became evidence that American schools were failing to educate children sufficiently well. Never mind that the reading achievement of American nine-year-olds on the NAEP kept creeping upward. Never mind that American nine-year-olds outperformed nine-year-olds in 29 of the 32 industrialized nations in the most recent international literacy comparisons (Elley, 1992). Failure to achieve the new NAEP proficiency benchmarks has been used as evidence of the need for fundamental changes to the structure and governance of American education (Bennett, Fair, Finn, Flake, Hirsch, Marshall, & Ravitch, 1998) and for changes in reading instructional methods (e.g., Sweet, 1997).
AMF: But Dick, reading methods have changed, and changed again, over the past few decades. . . .
RLA: But even though the nature of the reading curriculum has shifted over time, American elementary school children's reading achievement has remained quite stable over the past 30 years.
AMF: Are you saying that curriculum materials have nothing to do with achievement?
RLA: Basically, yes. I think this was, in fact, the most important message of the First Grade Studies (Bond & Dykstra, 1967):
Future research might well center on teacher and learning situation rather than method and materials. The tremendous range among classrooms within any method points out the importance of elements in the learning situation over and above the methods employed.
. . . Children learn to read by a variety of materials and methods. (p. 67)
The most important variable in teaching reading, I believe, is the quality of classroom reading instruction and that seems largely independent of the nature of the curriculum materials. It amazes me that it is only recently that we have begun to attempt to estimate the impact of access to high-quality teaching. What has amazed me more is the incredible impact of access to good classroom teachers. In their study, Bembry and her colleagues (1998) reported enormous differences (e.g., 35+ percentile ranks) in reading achievement for children who spent three years with more effective teachers (upper 40% in achievement gains) compared to children who spent three years with less effective teachers (bottom 40%). Sanders (1998) reports similar differences in patterns of achievement among children whose teachers varied in their instructional effectiveness. In our recent study of exemplary first-grade teachers (Pressley, et al., 1999), there were large effects for exemplary teachers on the achievement of the lowest-achieving children.
What is interesting is that the teachers Bembry and her colleagues studied were from a single school district with a common curriculum plan, while the exemplary teachers we studied were located in a dozen school districts in five states – the epitome, perhaps, of curriculum materials variation. I cannot think of better demonstrations of the impotence of curriculum materials.
That said, let me make one more comment. I do think easy access to a rich array of well-designed curriculum materials can make good teaching more likely. Our exemplary teachers routinely used multiple curriculum materials. But I think that was because they viewed their job primarily as teaching children and not as teaching a curriculum material. If we take this idea of the importance of children's access to high-quality teachers seriously, I think it suggests a quite different approach to better meeting the needs of children who find learning to read more difficult. That is, we would concentrate more on improving classroom instruction and worry less about special programs and curriculum materials.
|
Mummite
Citizen
Username: Mummite
Post Number: 53
Registered: 6-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 17, 2004 - 8:00 pm: | |
For info:
My friend just went to the UK and her daughter has had to go down a year in school to catch up on what she doesn't know.
She's not yet 5 and is already behind. |
nan
Citizen
Username: Nan
Post Number: 1166
Registered: 2-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 17, 2004 - 8:09 pm: | |
Do you think we should have an education system that would label a 5 year olds as a failure? |
Diversity Man
Citizen
Username: Deadwhitemale
Post Number: 640
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 17, 2004 - 8:42 pm: | |
how about one which educates the child in the first place?
and doesn't hide failure behind edubabble.
DWM |
Redsox
Citizen
Username: Redsox
Post Number: 417
Registered: 6-2002
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 18, 2004 - 8:53 am: | |
nan, nan, nan
yes i do
i also think scores should be kept for childs sporting events, and that popular & attractive kids should be shown favor....... |
nan
Citizen
Username: Nan
Post Number: 1168
Registered: 2-2001
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 18, 2004 - 9:21 am: | |
Redsox,
As one of the only Redsox fans that thinks the Curse of the Bambino is a GOOD thing, I have to disagree.  |
Redsox
Citizen
Username: Redsox
Post Number: 418
Registered: 6-2002
| | Posted on Saturday, February 21, 2004 - 11:52 am: | |
nan,
next year is NOW....this is the time.....
let's go sox.....
|
nan
Citizen
Username: Nan
Post Number: 1171
Registered: 2-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, February 21, 2004 - 6:08 pm: | |
My husband, the Mets fan, says "GO, Red Sox!" I just want them all to go. |
|
Closed: New threads not accepted on this page