<p>Certainly! What applies to individuals within a given system surely also applies to the various systems that comprise the global economy. Von Mises and whatnot.</p>
<p>I agree with most of the stances taken in the article and think it is essential that we lengthen our school day and school year to compete in a global economy. The concern is will we restructure our system based on current American lifestyle needs or continue to follow the traditional instructional arrangement. It would benefit students in this country to start school between 8:30 and 9:00 and allow an hour for lunch so that students can engage in tutorials or ec’s. Ending the school day between 4 and 5 would also benefit students as would reducing the summer vacation to the months of July and August. Of course, this is my opinion only.</p>
<p>Does more time in school equate to better performance? I have yet to see a conclusive link. (unless I missed it…anyone?)</p>
<p>There is some evidence increased time does result in better performance:</p>
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<p>[Productive</a> Curriculum Time](<a href=“http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst?docId=95242986]Productive”>http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst?docId=95242986)</p>
<p>Other evidence (cited in an earlier post) suggests that much of the typical school day is wasted time. Accordingly, an increase in productive time can likly be achieved without extending the school day, lengthening the school year, etc.</p>
<p>I just know that one of the best teachers I ever met taught AP Government and interestingly, virtually all of her students received 5’s and there were a few 4’s. But her students had to REALLY do a lot of work. The hell she went through from parents who were upset about the amount of work their children had to do was insane! As a teacher, believe me, I see a major shift in responsibility - it is ALL the teacher’s fault, and less and less the responsibility of the student to do the work required. The major topic of discussion (and we are on the list of great schools nationwide) this last year at departmental and school meetings was how to get kids to do homework. They simply aren’t doing it. And parents are making excuses, and expect us to ignore it or give Johnny 3 or 4 months or longer to make up the work. This is not feasible, as everyone should know. And please don’t tell me that the kids trying for elite schools aren’t like that. They aren’t - you are right. But they are as small, tiny minority. The attitude now is if a teacher could just download the info into the kids’ brains via a chip, all would be well, because Johnny shouldn’t have to work so hard. And cars that kids have to work for have been a downfall, as well. Paying for the car, gas and insurance has taken precedence over study time. God forbid the kid not get a car!</p>
<p>I think you have to be willing to spend a LOT more on education (smaller classes, more and better teachers, better academic resources). And you have to be willing to exclude students from school for disruptive and disobedient behavior.</p>
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<p>Exactly why some parents look to private schools who have the ability to do this, unlike public schools who take all comers. </p>
<p>At our local public schools, there is a sorting that occurs–AP classes are filled with kids who for the most part are not discipline problems in class.</p>
<p>erj1, my experience (HS, college, grad schools, professorship, two kids in HS) supports your observations. </p>
<p>First, the best teachers are typically very demanding but do so with a combination of charisma and discipline that causes the students to want to do the work. </p>
<p>Second, America has reached a point at which many people want the symbols of success without having to do the hard work of getting them. So, many parents want good grades (and maybe learning) for their kids but do not place enough responsibility on the kids (and themselves) for making that happen. But this is just a symptom of a bigger societal problem. We have lived for a couple of decades with Americans spending more than they were earning, especially on pure consumption (nice leased cars, clothes, etc.). Our national health care debate is similar: the insured people want continued, full access to the best health care but we as a country cannot afford to pay for it. The connection between desires and constructive effort needed to realize those desires seems, in many people’s minds, to have been severed and the problems this disconnection causes will come crashing down upon them (see the housing market and stock market, but others will arise as well). </p>
<p>Not all parents and students are like the ones you described, and the CC faithful are less likely to match your description, but teachers in public schools (and perhaps some private ones) still have to cope with the majority of parents whose priorities seem, at least to me, dramatically skewed.</p>
<p>The main problem, in my eyes:</p>
<p>From a March Newsweek article</p>
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<p>I attended a magnet school of sorts. Some of the local politicians wanted to get rid of it, because it was “unfair” to the other kids that the smartest were being taken away. This is the kind of thinking that is ruining our education system. It turns into some notion of fairness and regression to the mean. We need to encourage and nurture the brightest among us. It might seem like social Darwinism, but in the end who is going to contribute more to society?</p>
<p>There is a good argument for an external assessment system. When I went to school, no grade given to me in class by any teacher, ever, had the slightest impact on admission to university - no school-given grades were even reported to universities. </p>
<p>With external (e.g. national level) subject exams the teachers are judged on how well the students do, and the students know the teacher is focussed on their interest too. An easy ‘A’ from the teacher has no use at all, and parent complaints about workload are easy to answer. </p>
<p>Personally, I think that given a set of SAT and AP scores, colleges should not even bother to take a high school transcript.</p>
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<p>It would be interesting to know if any colleges tacitly implement that policy.</p>
<p>tokenadult, pretty unlikely that they will. SAT scores are an indicator of some kind of logical or analytical capability that helps in academic courses (and likely some kinds of work as well). AP/Subject test scores combine substantive knowledge/reasoning with this kind of test-taking skill. Grades are (should be) a reflection of how hard the kid is willing to work as well as knowledge/reasoning. Without the grades, you don’t get much of an indicator of willingness to work. </p>
<p>Success in the afterlife (after formal education) probably also is correlated with a) social skills/emotional intelligence; and b) who you know. Interviews, recommendations and ECs may provide some limited information about a) although I suspect the information that schools get is really noisy and frequently not that useful in this score; legacy, celebrity kid and development admits may go toward b).</p>
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<p>Actually, university admission systems that are totally indifferent to how hard you work (except as reflected in final scores) are common around the world. In fact, I can’t think of any country other than the US that depends on grades given by the high school.</p>
<p>The Australian system, Chinese, British and various commonwealth ‘A’ levels, are all based on standardized tests of actual achievement.</p>
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<p>But many colleges do look at the hs transcript for what it says about the applicant–especially the applicant who has high test scores but comparatively low grades.</p>
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<p>sorghum, I don’t disagree. These systems may be missing a piece of information that is not captured by standardized tests, which, if I understand them correctly, conflate knowledge, intelligence and effort.</p>
<p>I do think that grades without standardized tests or other knowledge of the schools do not provide reliable information. My daughter’s private HS has a forced curve with a B- median, so a B+ is a pretty good grade. At my son’s public HS, a B+ was not nearly as good a grade.</p>
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<p>Why especially that?</p>
<p>^^ because they expect the student to be performing close to ability. If he or she is not doing so (in a compulsory environment), this is not a promising sign for the non-compulsory and independent environment of college.</p>
<p>I’m no expert in education, but I question the notion that high test scores and low grades indicate that the student is an underperformer. In my limited experience with family members and my kids’ friends, it more often indicates that the student is intellectually capable but unchallenged, and therefore bored and unmotivated to peform. I hope colleges are considering this as well.</p>
<p>They sometimes do consider both, but note that work ethic counts for something in higher education admissions. We all must do things that are boring and that we hate – for example, certain repetitive or routine functions in our jobs, in parenting even (some aspects, perhaps sometimes), in everyday chores. Aristocracy has the luxury of pleading boredom: they get the servants to do the boring stuff for them.</p>
<p>Further, not everyone can legitimately claim boredom, and some who are bored have additionally not been doing the work for, say, 4 years, so the fact is that it is actually <em>harder</em>, more time-consuming for them (despite being boring), because they have lost the practice (if they ever had it), will ensure that these mundane but necessary skills are ones they will not bring with them to college.</p>
<p>If it is so “unchallenging,” they should actually be able to whip through it and get the drudgery over with, so that they can do more challenging things with their day & evening, like reading, creating, whatever. Rarely has one of my students who has not performed for 2-4 years not suffered a learning decline because of consistent nonperformance, and conversely been able to execute an immediate turnaround when challenged.</p>
<p>(I see this syndrome every week. And yes, sometimes a new challenge re-motivates them, but let me tell you that it takes work & time for them to be able to meet that challenge when they are in the habit of slacking. Skills need to stay fresh. IQ and ability ain’t everything.)</p>
<p>Playing catch-up with time management skills is painful indeed. The evolution of my son’s study habits has been something like this:</p>
<p>Early elementary school: Brilliant in class, no homework.</p>
<p>Middle elementary school: Brilliant in class, got homework done in class.</p>
<p>Later elementary school: Brilliant in class, homework had to be done at home, first signs of not keeping up.</p>
<p>Middle school: Brilliant in class, seriously falling behind in homework, grades starting to suffer.</p>
<p>Early high school: Good in class but leveling off, falling behind because of incomplete assignments, grades definitely suffering.</p>
<p>Late high school (now): More even with classmates than ever, finally learning to work hard outside of class, still learning time-management skills that other kids seem to have learned several years ago.</p>
<p>He now attends a math-and-science magnet school, and I’m struck by how many (but by no means all) of his schoolmates have similar issues. I think a certain kind of intellect just comes naturally with poor coping skills. I think most of these kids will come into their own in college, when they can study more of what interests them and are trusted (or forced) to manage their own affairs completely.</p>