Cheetos, potato chips and a white bread sandwich?

Posted on February 2, 2008 — by glingglo29

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I have a few friends who teach English in South Korea, which is ranked number one in Education. The children there spend the vast majority of their lives in school - I believe that its like 10 hours a day including private schools in addition to public - then they go home to do homework! The children are taught to fiercely compete with their classmates by kindergarten. They don't have a chance to be children, have an imagination and play.

I don't know if its worth trading our children's imagination for higher math scores. But I know that the US could do better for all the cash we throw at the school system.

Posted on February 3, 2008 — by cheyroze

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I completely agree that school lunches are not helping. These are the worst in 'nutritional value' if you can even put that label near a school lunch!
I work in a school so I am there everyday and see a lot of things firsthand.
I was going over a learning program with my son today (on technology) and wondering why our schools do not use more programs such as these. My son was picking up so very much from it. I think schools need to overhaul the system completely. Ditch a lot of the useless curriculum and stop lecturing the kids about where they are going to someday NEED this useless information.

Posted on February 3, 2008 — by Nae

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"But sir, I have a master's degree in applied science... Do I really need to sweep..."

Boss - "Oh, I'm sorry, here I'll show you how..."

Frankly there's been too much focus on education in the worst aspect of it; Quantity over quality. The "No Child Left Behind" scam, using hoops to jump through as an excuse to deny federal funding, forcing schools back on the path of being "Route Memorization" factories to hurt the real intellectual and emotional development.

It ends up with just a gauntlet they only put up with, because at the end of it there's supposedly a "College Degree" that will get them a "Good Job". One they'll hate and be bored to tears in, but will "Pay the bills"...

Except, those jobs are going out the door, replaced by "McJobs" that are low paying dead end jobs and even worse than the high paying pointless ones they replaced.

Not that education does not need to be reformed. Most notably in teaching how to think, how to learn, not what to learn and what to think. My parents, despite being "Hippies" read me a lot of ancient Greek stuff, not just the myths but the dramas, the discourses. Simply put, the ancient greek "Acadamy" model, the "Classical Education" is the basis of our western civilization. I'm almost outraged how little most other people seem to know about even the most basic principles of logic and debate.

Posted on February 4, 2008 — by Greengestalt

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Is it really a wonder why our schools are "failing" when we live in a country that doesn't value education? I am a teacher in an urban public school. We have students that match the best in the world, and some that shouldn't be in school at all. There are two major problems in the United States that most of the world does not face. First: compulsory education. Many western education systems do not require all students to track in an academic setting for twelve years in order to earn a diploma. Instead, they allow the non-academic student to study a trade or begin work. Imagine if our students had that option...graduation rates would skyrocket! Wouldn't you be happier learning something if you enjoyed it? Besides, that is how the rest of the world does it...let's compare apples to apples!

Secondly, the US is the largest cultural melting-pot in the world. In South Korea and Japan for instance, there is very little cultural diversity and education has a high value to the family unit. That is not so in the US. The children who drop out in the US generally come from families of low SES background. These kids have to work! In other countries these kids would no longer be in school and wouldn't count towards graduation totals.

Yes, Diversity is a double edged sword. It is our biggest strength and our largest weakness. If we had the parental and cultural involvement of a Japan coupled with the diversity we currently have, the US would be unstoppable.

Posted on February 5, 2008 — by mrdeely

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Does anyone know what the criterion was for ranking?

Posted on February 10, 2008 — by gshook

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