<p>In your opinion, is there really an education crisis in this country? </p>
<p>Or do you think that it is mainly media hype and sensationalization? </p>
<p>Do you really believe that the education system today is worse than what it was 50 years ago?</p>
<p>That’s a pretty one dimensional question for a complex problem. What segment of the education system are you talking about?</p>
<p>I think the education system is fine.
I think the parenting system has changed significantly.</p>
<p>And I don’t think the schools can educate and parent. Someone has to teach the students to do their homework, pay attention in class, show up every day. In our area it’s fairly common to pull kids out of class for vacations, etc. I just think it teaches the kids that school isn’t important (not talking about sick kids staying home). If you teach them school isn’t important in grades k-8, what magic makes it important in 9-12? If EC’s are a priority, and homework is on the back burner k-8, how does it change in high school?</p>
<p>The education is fine. The dumb attitudes of entrenched townies who are unmotivated parents is the problem. As it always was and always will be.</p>
<p>Crisis is perspective, no?</p>
<p>The school district I attended now boasts ~23% grad rate for HS ninth graders in four years. Of these, ~10% attend a 4-year college. Of these 10% are getting a bachelors in 4-5 years. Roughly two out of 100 ninth graders right now will be holding a college diploma in 8 or 9 years.</p>
<p>An outrage? What if you were so desparately poor that you had no other choice? Because that’s reality, folks. </p>
<p>You wanna call the real estate agent and tour some of the neighborhoods? I can guarantee you that houses there are cheap. And it’s one of the largest cities in America.</p>
<p>More of a “Society Crisis” than educational. In my 27 years in education the demise of the nuclear family and explosion of disorders (ADD, ADHD, OCD, etc.) that affect “Executive Functioning” have strained the educational system like never before. In addition , be wary of "studies’ (such as the Mobil Exxon commercial citing us ranking 17th on a science test). Most foriegn contries “track” their students beginning in middle school & only send a certain percentage to college prep high schools. I suspect that these are the only students that are “tested” in these studies. If we only took our top 60%, our scores would look much different.</p>
<p>Poor is bad, but not having a lot of money won’t stop a motivated person in America.</p>
<p>From wiki:
“Sonia was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at age eight,[7][19] and began taking daily insulin injections.[23] Her father died of heart problems at age 42, when she was nine years old.[6][15] After this, she became fluent in English.[7] Sotomayor has said that she was first inspired by the strong-willed Nancy Drew book character, and then after her diabetes diagnosis led doctors to suggest a different career from detective, she was inspired to go into a legal career and become a judge by watching the Perry Mason television series.[7][21][23] She reflected in 1998: “I was going to college and I was going to become an attorney, and I knew that when I was ten. Ten. That’s no jest.”[21]”</p>
<p>PolarBear: your quick quips are fine. But there are a few more subtleties involved than people just not being “motivated”. Why don’t you sign up for a year as an Citycorps volunteer in Detroit. They’d love to have you.</p>
<p>Oh, the drama.</p>
<p>I think there is a crisis; the achievement gap. There is a giant achievement gap in our education system. The gap is created by parents and communities that don’t value education. The number one factor in how a student does in school is not the teacher or principal or school district, it is the parents of the student. Rich or poor, natural or foreign born the value parents and families place on education has a direct correlation on how the kids will do in school. </p>
<p>The countries that score better than the US on standardized tests value education to the extreme, that’s why they do so well on the tests; to do poorly would be a disgrace.</p>
<p>Thank you to all the above posters. As a career teacher in a family of teachers I am really tired of all the blaming of the schools and the teachers. Yes, it’s primarily the parents, or lack thereof. I also think we are starting to see that our diets (corn syrup hidden in almost everything) full of fast food/lacking in vegetables has contributed greatly to the the explosion of learning disorders. Add in the elimination of healthy physical education programs in schools, and we have our current situation.</p>
<p>Agree with post #6 (csdad) I know the Euopean model (of school) has 2 tracks one to prepare for college the other to prepare for work or vocational school. I tend to think the testing from those countries comes from the college track kids. I would compare our (the US) top 50% to that group any day.</p>
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<p>So it’s everything except the teachers?</p>
<p>The fact that for the last 40 years, we’ve been drawing our public school teachers largely from the bottom of college graduate barrel - that has nothing to do with it?</p>
<p>In spite of research that shows (a) the principal differentiator between kids who learn and those who don’t is the effectiveness of the teacher, and (b) the principal predictor of teaching effectiveness is the measured smarts of the teacher?</p>
<p>Inside school buildings great teaching is indeed the number one factor influencing student learning. </p>
<p>But a kid spends 70% of their time outside of school with; you guessed it their parents and family. They have by far the largest single influence on their kids. Kids have dozens of teachers with varying degrees of influence; they only have 1 or 2 parents. </p>
<p>An extremely motivated student will succeed with a great, good, mediocre or bad teacher. If a parent shows no respect or value for education they have a much higher chance of failure. </p>
<p>And let’s keep characterizing the people that teach our kids as the bottom of the barrel. That’ll definitely attract the best and brightest to the profession.</p>
<p>Newsweek named their “top 100 high schools” a couple of months back. Approximately 70% were private, charter, or magnet schools. The majority of the 30 or so true public schools were from high socio-economic areas, mainly suburbs of large cities. To me this says that the top 100 schools has more to do with who the students are than it does with who is teaching them. Almost every school is made up of “selected” students either by wealth or academic potential.</p>
<p>Depends on how you define crisis. </p>
<p>Is the system broken? Absolutely. But what can you expect when parents don’t care? When students don’t see the point? When bad teachers go to poor districts and burn out? When good teachers aren’t properly rewarded? When we can’t attract top talent to teaching since teaching is perceived as only for those who can’t “do” and isn’t prestigious? When we “teach to the test”? When we have students that go to school hungry and can barely meet their basic needs at home? I could go on and on. </p>
<p>Yeah, there’s definitely a huge problem and it’s going to bite us pretty soon- especially the significant achievement gap. How can we expect people to rise out of poverty, out of welfare, if we don’t provide them with a solid foundation?</p>
<p>A lot of the problem is administrative. Teachers teach what/how they’re told to - especially in elementary school - and the people who bring in all that “innovation” are highly paid administrators who need to justify their existence. New math, getting away from phonics, cutting activities deemed essential to the brain development in children (art, music, phys ed) to make room for new fads – these are changes often brought in against teachers’ advice/experience and cause damage for decades. School boards made up of politically-motivated non educators dumb down the curriculum, and discourage meaningful parental involvement especially if those parents are actually better educated than the administrators and teachers. </p>
<p>It’s not a pretty picture. But to point the entire blame on teachers - OR PARENTS – is simplistic.</p>
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<p>Certainly socio-economic class plays a large role in student success. But there are studies that show that among students from like socio-economic background, there is a huge difference in achievement between those taught by a highly effective teacher and those taught by a run-of-the-mill teacher. One study (I’m from memory here, I think it was in Tennessee in the 1980s) showed that after two or three years of consistently superior teaching, the disadvantage of socio-economic backgrounds was essentially eliminated. I do not know whether that result has been replicated.</p>
<p>I’d also point out that at least in most states, school districts in wealthy areas have more money to spend on teachers’ salaries, and thus can pick from the cream of the crop of newly minted certified teachers. Those in poorer areas get what’s left. I live in one of those poorer areas, and I can testify, there are some people in classrooms who have no business being there.</p>
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<p>New fads such as phonics?</p>
<p>Once again, point the finger everywhere except at the adults who spend six or seven hours a day in the classroom with the kids.</p>
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<p>But where’s the guarantee that if teachers made the curriculum themselves, it would be any better? Besides, even with a set curriculum, a lot of teachers choose to ignore it and spend class time talking about their personal lives.</p>