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If this works, can it be used as an example for better public schools? Even if it's more expensive, one can argue that the increased productivity of well educat

by andreyf 11y ago

If this works, can it be used as an example for better public schools? Even if it's more expensive, one can argue that the increased productivity of well educated kids outweighs the cost of their education.

vezzy-fnord 11y ago
Better models have been around for a long time, with traditional compulsory schooling being criticized by authors and educators such as John Taylor Gatto, John Holt, Ivan Illich, Charlotte Iserbyt, A.S. Neill and others. There is no interest in them. Zuck's approach appears to be only marginally better and almost entirely devoid of influence from alternative schooling.
andreasklinger 11y ago
same argument could be made for healthcare and higher education as well
dogma1138 11y ago
Well if a single primary school needs 1 bln or anything close to it to operate that won't be scale able. The question now would be how much improvement would there be due to actual new methods in delivering the education vs just pouring money onto the problem and cherry picking your students. They did seem to open the school in a place that could benefit from it as far as the silicon valley area goes, EPO didn't receive as much benefit from the valley as some other areas, Belle Haven is a mixed bag with it being quite popular with silicon valley folks that are looking to find a big enough house for a family but can't afford more sought after locations. The only grief I really have with this program is that they did not publish their acceptance policy online which doesn't bode well for transparency in that aspect, so cherry picking and gating might be a problem here as well. Their management team and staff has more accreditations than some school districts combine probably, they have a huge capital investment, so the school should do rather well, but I'm really not sure how much impact it can have in the long term.
- lacksconfidence 11y ago
  Well if a single primary school needs 1 bln or anything close to it to operate that won't be scale able. Just to clarify, Zuckerburg has spent over a billion on education related grants and other gifts since 2010, but no one knows what he has spent on this one school. I can't see how he could have spent anywhere close to a billion dollars. Unfortunately the writing is fairly poor so I'm not even sure how many students this school will serve from which to guesstimate a cost. FTA: Chan did not tell the Mercury News how much she and her husband are contributing to The Primary School, but when it is fully built, it will serve 50 students in 14 grades (pre-K through 12) plus the families of their 700 students.
gaelenh 11y ago
Their new school seems to follow the community school model. Community schools provide classes for parents, wrap around services, dental, medical, social workers, etc. They are fairly popular in urban school districts, though their efficacy hasn't really been proven (though nothing truly ever is in K-12 edu).

by andreyf 11y ago

vezzy-fnord 11y ago

Better models have been around for a long time, with traditional compulsory schooling being criticized by authors and educators such as John Taylor Gatto, John Holt, Ivan Illich, Charlotte Iserbyt, A.S. Neill and others. There is no interest in them. Zuck's approach appears to be only marginally better and almost entirely devoid of influence from alternative schooling.

andreasklinger 11y ago

same argument could be made for healthcare and higher education as well

dogma1138 11y ago

Well if a single primary school needs 1 bln or anything close to it to operate that won't be scale able. The question now would be how much improvement would there be due to actual new methods in delivering the education vs just pouring money onto the problem and cherry picking your students. They did seem to open the school in a place that could benefit from it as far as the silicon valley area goes, EPO didn't receive as much benefit from the valley as some other areas, Belle Haven is a mixed bag with it being quite popular with silicon valley folks that are looking to find a big enough house for a family but can't afford more sought after locations. The only grief I really have with this program is that they did not publish their acceptance policy online which doesn't bode well for transparency in that aspect, so cherry picking and gating might be a problem here as well. Their management team and staff has more accreditations than some school districts combine probably, they have a huge capital investment, so the school should do rather well, but I'm really not sure how much impact it can have in the long term.

lacksconfidence 11y ago
Well if a single primary school needs 1 bln or anything close to it to operate that won't be scale able. Just to clarify, Zuckerburg has spent over a billion on education related grants and other gifts since 2010, but no one knows what he has spent on this one school. I can't see how he could have spent anywhere close to a billion dollars. Unfortunately the writing is fairly poor so I'm not even sure how many students this school will serve from which to guesstimate a cost. FTA: Chan did not tell the Mercury News how much she and her husband are contributing to The Primary School, but when it is fully built, it will serve 50 students in 14 grades (pre-K through 12) plus the families of their 700 students.

gaelenh 11y ago

Their new school seems to follow the community school model. Community schools provide classes for parents, wrap around services, dental, medical, social workers, etc. They are fairly popular in urban school districts, though their efficacy hasn't really been proven (though nothing truly ever is in K-12 edu).