NationStates Jolt Archive

Basic assumptions:
1) No system in perfect.
2) Every system can be improved.

(I don't thinkl anyone can rationally argue against either of those.)

Given those assumptions, how would you adjust, change, or modify the education system of your home country?

What are the problems and what do you think are the best solutions?

And just because too often I see soom poor nOOb replying ICly. no I mean your home country and not your NS country. Great FSM I shouldn't need to post that but I know the folks who post here...

1 - Under-funded
2 - Dumbed down too much

A better public system would be adequately funded so that the supplies would be decent, the books recent and the students in good facilities. There would be no need for portables and the necessary repairs could be done swiftly.

The other problem is that the system has been dumbed down over the years. They should allow students to be able to take advanced programs and push the slackers, and have a program for students who can't succeed in the regular or advance program.

"How would you change the education systems in you country?"

Re-legalize corporal punishment, both in schools and for parents to use.

You get anything less than an "A" and you get your lil ass beat! :D

Get rid of the system and make one that focuses not on conformity and creating drones and soldiers but intelligent freethinkers.

I'd get rid of grades in elementary school. They already don't have them until the 8th grade, meaning one only has grades for two of the nine school years, which makes the grades even more pointless than they would be, were they to be in place for all the years.

The grades in Gymnasiet may stand, as they serve a purpose, and the Universities should fight Bologna (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bologna_process) and ECTS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Credit_Transfer_and_Accumulation_System) tooth and nail!

more cowbell!

As an intellectually inclined grammarian, the following would be most agreable:

-the establishment of the grammar school procedure universally
- a schism of sorts between vocational subjects, wherein I also consider computing, and academic subjects
- a harsher marking system imposed to differentiate between efficient mediocrity and genuine ability.
- the transmogrification of the curriculum and marking scheme in order to reward "intellectual" students as opposed to students adept at exploiting the Labour created examination system.
- interdiction of "city academies"
-removal of EMA

from a funding standpoint, I would reorganize the school districts (talking locally not nationwide here) and fire some of the administration, we have 14 school districts in my county alone, with 14 superintendents making more than 100K a year each, then they have assistants who make 80K and so on, a lot of money going to people who don't do much (not that I am against money, but it's not worth anything if you aren't going to use it wisely) from a business standpoint it doesn't make sense.

from a curriculum standpoint, I would quit the high pressure testing that goes on, and start teaching the basics again, and not so that the kids can fill in bubbles and win more money for the school board, so that the kids will learn it, I am tired of helping my friend grade papers of illiterate 5th graders who only go to school to learn the "right answers" instead of the "right things"

school should be about teaching a child how to think, how to think critically, how to learn, not beating dates and other arbitrary facts into their heads so you can come out on top of the "funding game"

Dates are important, but they are meaningless unless you learn about the history associated with them.

in short though? I just don't use the public schools around here, so without being "in it" more than I was when I was in school I can't really pick out more to screw up. LOL

1) All year school end summer vacations.
2) Bring back "physical" education
3) Emphase fundamental skills in lower grades.
4) Forgein languages are MANDATORY
5) Remove all traces of political correctness.
6) Disband teachers unions
8) Nationally standard curriculums
9) Politcal indoctrination will not be toleranted (from left or right)
10) community service
More as I think of them



Basic assumptions:
1) No system in perfect.
2) Every system can be improved.

(I don't thinkl anyone can rationally argue against either of those.)

Given those assumptions, how would you adjust, change, or modify the education system of your home country?

What are the problems and what do you think are the best solutions?

And just because too often I see soom poor nOOb replying ICly. no I mean your home country and not your NS country. Great FSM I shouldn't need to post that but I know the folks who post here...

Give every kid a per-capita voucher, with extra money for special needs, but let rich people pay more if they want to for their kids' schooling. This voucher applies for private and public schools, so public schools will compete with each other for students and be able to have the available funds to use on the student. Then deregulate the hell out of public schools to make them have the same requirements as private schools and have plenty of wiggle room so that we don't get this crap of "one size fits all" and "we're going to mold you into what we want you to be and make you think like we want you to think." Also, have rural boarding schools for students in places where their environment reasonably demonstrates a great inhibition for the learning process. We can take them out of a culture of drugs and violence to a place where they can focus on studying peacefully.

1) All year school end summer vacations.
2) Bring back "physical" education
3) Emphase fundamental skills in lower grades.
4) Forgein languages are MANDATORY
5) Remove all traces of political correctness.
6) Disband teachers unions
8) Nationally standard curriculums
9) Politcal indoctrination will not be toleranted (from left or right)
10) community service
More as I think of them

Hmm.....

Why on earth would community service be of benefit to children? Indeed, for that matter, assuming you do aspire to augment the overall standard of education and critical sentience, how do you justify the removal of holidays?

-Smaller class sizes (I had three classes this last year with more than 35 people in them. Kids were sitting on the air conditioner because we couldn't fit any more desks into my history class)

-More emphasis on reading ability. With reading, you can learn most anything else

-More music and arts. These are at least as important to intellectual development as anything else.

-Fewer grades and standardized tests, more one-on-one teacher involvement and student-directed education.

just

/condescension mode off and no offense.

sumimasen

- I'd start offering the level of diversity of classes available to students interested in science to students interested in the arts.

- I'd lower the number of students needed to run Advanced Placement, Honors, and IB and run more of them at the High School level, so that advanced placement students are less likely to not have a class purely because of when it runs.

- I'd demand higher quality work across the board.

- Pay teachers more.

- Provide students a chance to declare a High School major.

- Remove the option of dropping out before age 18. Students just allow themselves to fall into the classes intended for the learning impaired and then drop out, having made no effort. They need to be forced to make an effort.

1) All year school end summer vacations.
2) Bring back "physical" education
3) Emphase fundamental skills in lower grades.
4) Forgein languages are MANDATORY
5) Remove all traces of political correctness.
6) Disband teachers unions
8) Nationally standard curriculums
9) Politcal indoctrination will not be toleranted (from left or right)
10) community service
More as I think of them


Ew... We're trying to make our schools tollerable for learning, not hell for children. 9 already is true. 1 would be fine for High school, but just bad for elementry students. 2 is a waste of money, 6 hurts students and teachers alike, 5 is stupid, 10 is just moronic (and already required). 3 and 4 are true so far as I know.

You may want to work on your "fundamental skills" though, since I don't see a 7. :P

Holidays yes, all summer off no.

Community service helps cross social strata and helps you actually see beyond the narrow 4 walls of school.


Hmm.....

Why on earth would community service be of benefit to children? Indeed, for that matter, assuming you do aspire to augment the overall standard of education and critical sentience, how do you justify the removal of holidays?

make Pre K mandatory

start all children out learning a second language (as well as music and math) right away

all schools should be equally funded (public schools in rich areas wont get more money because the surrounding property value is higher than the poor neighborhood one city over)

teachers should have to be very good at what they do and be constantly tested for competence, but they will need to be paid more for this

get rid of a lot of the higher paid do-nothings in teh school boards and such

bring back physical education as well as drivers ed

As an intellectually inclined grammarian, the following would be most agreable:

-the establishment of the grammar school procedure universally
- a schism of sorts between vocational subjects, wherein I also consider computing, and academic subjects
- a harsher marking system imposed to differentiate between efficient mediocrity and genuine ability.
- the transmogrification of the curriculum and marking scheme in order to reward "intellectual" students as opposed to students adept at exploiting the Labour created examination system.
- interdiction of "city academies"
-removal of EMA

But I need that. How else wil I pay for my car and insurance? I agree with the rest though. I go to a grammar school and its challenging. Pushes your brain to the limit and if you can't push that far extra help is always avaliable. AAlso I hate when some people say the exams are too easy. Ask any one of the students and I guaranteee they'll tell you it was hard. The amount of detail that needs to be remembered is huge

See what happens on 3 hours of sleep and 100+ degree temps!!! You loose your 7.
Why would all year school be bad?

Why is Phys Ed a waste of money? There are too many fat kids who honestley don't know how to play without video games. The money invested in school would be recoupted from public health later.

6 is needed so you can shitcan bad teachers.

5 is hardly stupid...you don't have school age kids do you?

10 is the most important because it happens all the time you hear it from college professors to kindergarten teachers, Ive seen it 1st hand.

Ew... We're trying to make our schools tollerable for learning, not hell for children. 9 already is true. 1 would be fine for High school, but just bad for elementry students. 2 is a waste of money, 6 hurts students and teachers alike, 5 is stupid, 10 is just moronic (and already required). 3 and 4 are true so far as I know.

You may want to work on your "fundamental skills" though, since I don't see a 7. :P

:eek: oh crap we agree on somthing

make Pre K mandatory

start all children out learning a second language (as well as music and math) right away

all schools should be equally funded (public schools in rich areas wont get more money because the surrounding property value is higher than the poor neighborhood one city over)

teachers should have to be very good at what they do and be constantly tested for competence, but they will need to be paid more for this

get rid of a lot of the higher paid do-nothings in teh school boards and such

bring back physical education as well as drivers ed

7) A basic life skills class (basic cooking repair finance etiquite(sp) )

Theres your 7 :p

all schools should be equally funded (public schools in rich areas wont get more money because the surrounding property value is higher than the poor neighborhood one city over)

Do you mean a flat rate for every school, or a sum per pupil (possibly with extra for special needs students)?


And personally, I think that schools could be improved a lot just by cutting out a lot of the the bureaucracy and using the money saved to increase teachers wages. We really need to attract dedicated, passionate university graduates, because they will have the expertise and the drive to be good teachers, but things like making enough money to buy food get in the way, so they get the good private sector six-figure-salary jobs, while those who can't, teach. It really drags the education system down.

That said, if we want better teachers we also have to cut out a lot of the disciplinary crap. My idea? Criminal proceedings. Beating people up in the corridors? Jail. Threatening the teachers? Jail. False accusations of child molestation to get your least favourite teacher fired? Jail. In secondary school at least, people are old enough to be responsible for their own actions, so use it. No more messing around with warnings, and no more having to watch them skip detention because you can't legally hold the bastards against their will. Community service, fines, and in the most extreme cases, jail. Of course, we'd have to extend the courts too...

:eek: oh crap we agree on somthing

I thought I saw fire raining down from the sky

Do you mean a flat rate for every school, or a sum per pupil (possibly with extra for special needs students)?


And personally, I think that schools could be improved a lot just by cutting out a lot of the the bureaucracy and using the money saved to increase teachers wages. We really need to attract dedicated, passionate university graduates, because they will have the expertise and the drive to be good teachers, but things like making enough money to buy food get in the way, so they get the good private sector six-figure-salary jobs, while those who can't, teach. It really drags the education system down.

That said, if we want better teachers we also have to cut out a lot of the disciplinary crap. My idea? Criminal proceedings. Beating people up in the corridors? Jail. Threatening the teachers? Jail. False accusations of child molestation to get your least favourite teacher fired? Jail. In secondary school at least, people are old enough to be responsible for their own actions, so use it. No more messing around with warnings, and no more having to watch them skip detention because you can't legally hold the bastards against their will. Community service, fines, and in the most extreme cases, jail. Of course, we'd have to extend the courts too...


sum per pupil

flat rate wouldnt be good me thinks

Get rid of "No Child Left Behind", for starters.

Get rid of those pointless short homework assignments at the begining of the year you talk about yourself. At the end of the year we are always so pushed for time and then we spent three weeks writing about our hobbies. I mean, English: alright so the teacher can get a general idea of who you are (you're writing style, grammar etc.) but no more than one class spent on that. French as a second language/extended: fair enough but Socail Studies and French immersion: no. We actually didn't get around to the last unit in Socail Studies there were 4 or 5. The last one was the one when the taugh us about our current rights. We had a unit (1-2 weeks) on Canadian patriotism (Unit Summary: Canada is awesome: :rolleyes: because we'll ever use that) and a week on "Pretend you are a country" What would be your main in fluences, who would have the most to least control on your decisons. And then you listed your hobbies and what not. Then we had a loooong unit on WWI, WWII and the Cold War. Fair enough but for most of that time we were colouring maps. (We also had a unit on the UN and politics but that was worthwhile). Teach us or don't but don't waste my time. And yes, then we get to the unit that actually effects us and we don't get taugh anything on the subject.

As so get rid of short homework assignments. That bring incompetant peoples mark up and competant peoples marks down. More emphisis on big projects and tests.

Oh and in English I had one written test the whole year and that was half of the exam everything else was multiple choice. No.

Funding the building structures come to mind. School have been evacuated for the rest of the year because of underfunding. One school closed in January that just decided to funding fixing it and it'll take forever before they get around to doing that. I mean arguing over whether or not we need to invest more in books is one thing but when schools are about to collapse....

In Gym have certain amounts of time that must be spent on each Unit (with some flexibility obviously but still have minimal amounts of time for games like soccer, basketball, track). We spent over 10 classes play dodge ball 6 playing ping-pong and we spent 8 classes in archery (I mean, I love archery but) and then we had no soccer unit because my teacher didn't consider it a real sport.

See what happens on 3 hours of sleep and 100+ degree temps!!! You loose your 7.
Why would all year school be bad?

Why is Phys Ed a waste of money? There are too many fat kids who honestley don't know how to play without video games. The money invested in school would be recoupted from public health later.

6 is needed so you can shitcan bad teachers.

5 is hardly stupid...you don't have school age kids do you?

10 is the most important because it happens all the time you hear it from college professors to kindergarten teachers, Ive seen it 1st hand.
At the moment I don't have enough room in my schedule for all the academic classes I want to take, much less to waste my time playing dodge-ball for an hour.

I doubt my system would even come close to perfect but ohwell, it's what I want, so screw those who don't agree.:sniper:

#1; Privatize schools, COMPLETELY. Clearly despite what the goverment is spending on schools it's not working as American education is mediocre at best. Instead of pointing blames at the teachers (who for such an important job get paid so minimaly..) and the state, just privatize the damn schools.

#2; School should not be compulsery. Smart kids will want to go to school, stupid kids won't. Let natural selection takes it's course.

1) Institute merit pay for teachers. Of course, this requires an objective set of performance criteria, which has its own issues. While this may not be easy, it is the best way to address the fact that good teachers are paid just as little as poor teachers, many teachers are not incented to perform better, and the fact that people who might have become teachers chose other careers where their efforts would be recognized financially.

2) Institute school choice.

3) along with number 2, end 'districting' as we know it.

4) along with 2 and 3, stop funding schools based on property taxes. Let the money follow the children, and all children are alloted the same amount (excepting those with 'special' needs).

5) mandate that at least 65% of all education funds (for primary and secondary schools) must be spent in the classroom. This includes teachers' salaries, desks, books, computers, etc. Administration, bureaucracy, and non-classroom physical plant has to get by on the remainder.

6) Since schools will have to compete for students now to stay open, create an independent board to be responsible for maintaining and publishing the academic claims of schools' performance as they market themselves and their specialties to the community. As this new system takes hold, this function can be privatised later - think Morningstar or Zagat of education.


Of course, I'd like to see more privitization of education, but short of that, I think the above will go along way to improving things. I don't claim that this list is exhaustive or would make a perfect system, just vastly improved.

you would have plenty of time if you went 8-4:30 12 months a year.



At the moment I don't have enough room in my schedule for all the academic classes I want to take, much less to waste my time playing dodge-ball for an hour.

you would have plenty of time if you went 8-4:30 12 months a year.
And have no time for extracurriculars or any kind of a life. Even so, I could easily fill that up without needing to take a class in how to throw a stupid ball.

1) get rid of NCLB and other high-stakes testing
2) Higher pay for teachers
3) get rid of teacher unions
4) get rid of tenure
5) increase allocation of funding to the areas that need it rather than administrative fees
6) provide incentive to teach inner city schools
7) require math, science, English, music, physical education (including health), technology/computers, history and language from early years.
8) stop using students as a way to get more funding

Give every kid a per-capita voucher, with extra money for special needs, but let rich people pay more if they want to for their kids' schooling. This voucher applies for private and public schools, so public schools will compete with each other for students and be able to have the available funds to use on the student. Then deregulate the hell out of public schools to make them have the same requirements as private schools and have plenty of wiggle room so that we don't get this crap of "one size fits all" and "we're going to mold you into what we want you to be and make you think like we want you to think." Also, have rural boarding schools for students in places where their environment reasonably demonstrates a great inhibition for the learning process. We can take them out of a culture of drugs and violence to a place where they can focus on studying peacefully.
vouchers don't work. It is impossible to compare private schools to public schools at this point, and the voucher program would create huge problems with educating the entire population, particularly in rural areas. The ultimate result would be that private schools would rapidly be flooded with students and unable to maintaint their standards while public schools would shut down. Private schools would then collapse under their own weight.
In order to have the type of competition vouchers would need to work, you would need to see immediate results. The soonest time table results are available are up to a full year later, and much longer for anything of meaning and importance (ie, seeing where the students go to college and such)

Basic assumptions:
1) No system in perfect.
2) Every system can be improved.

It's vastly underfunded. Teachers need a pay raise.

WE NEED TO RAISE THE REVENUES. :(

Did I mention I hate Republicans! Go Jon Tester!