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The problem with your intuitionist approach is that you are myopically focusing on some issues without proposing any real solutions. You are not proposing a pat

The problem with your intuitionist approach is that you are myopically focusing on some issues without proposing any real solutions. You are not proposing a path from here to there. Fire bad teachers: good idea, but you need to train and attract good teachers at the same time. How do you do that? Teaching is a badly overeducated, underpaid, and under-respected profession in the U.S. Doing more to stop student truancy: This is cultural. Put armed guards to stop the students from leaving, and they don't show up in the first place. We need to foster a culture such that school isn't simply a prison students are coerced into going to for 9 hours a day. The path from here to there is difficult and there isn't currently any money in improving education, so there isn't any political will either. It's a lot more difficult problem than your simplistic world view admits.

hugh3 17y ago
there isn't currently any money in improving education, so there isn't any political will either That was my point, these are two examples of ways in which education which can be solved with political will alone rather than requiring complicated new research. Teacher salaries aren't as low as often assumed, by the way; the average teacher's salary in the US in 2006 was a surprisingly respectable $51,009 (with all sorts of perks) which, while no path to riches is certainly a ticket to a good middle-class lifestyle, especially in a two-income household. I personally wonder if part of the low attractiveness of teaching as a profession can be attributed to the fact that teachers' unions spend so much time whining about how low teachers' salaries are. You don't need to put armed guards to stop 'em leaving, you just need to make sure they're punished when they don't show up. I never once played truant from my school; not because it was such a fabulous caring-sharing environment that I never wanted to leave (this is impractical, children will get bored at school) but because I knew if I might get caught and if I got caught I'd be punished. Now for me personally, the threat of detention and having my parents find out was a scary enough punishment, but I realise that this won't work on every kid... which is why I strongly believe that every school needs a form of punishment which every kid is afraid of; and if suspension won't do it for some kids then we need to bring back the cane.
tokenadult 17y ago
Fire bad teachers: good idea, but you need to train and attract good teachers at the same time. I have read that the number of American adults of working age who have teaching credentials is something like double the number of currently working teachers. But studies of teacher incompetence http://www.ericdigests.org/pre-921/incompetent.htm http://www.ericdigests.org/pre-921/incompetent.htm show that the least capable teachers stay in the occupation the longest, and sometimes their very presence drives out the most competent teachers. I agree that making schools less like prisons would be better both for teachers and for learners.

hugh3 17y ago

there isn't currently any money in improving education, so there isn't any political will either That was my point, these are two examples of ways in which education which can be solved with political will alone rather than requiring complicated new research. Teacher salaries aren't as low as often assumed, by the way; the average teacher's salary in the US in 2006 was a surprisingly respectable $51,009 (with all sorts of perks) which, while no path to riches is certainly a ticket to a good middle-class lifestyle, especially in a two-income household. I personally wonder if part of the low attractiveness of teaching as a profession can be attributed to the fact that teachers' unions spend so much time whining about how low teachers' salaries are. You don't need to put armed guards to stop 'em leaving, you just need to make sure they're punished when they don't show up. I never once played truant from my school; not because it was such a fabulous caring-sharing environment that I never wanted to leave (this is impractical, children will get bored at school) but because I knew if I might get caught and if I got caught I'd be punished. Now for me personally, the threat of detention and having my parents find out was a scary enough punishment, but I realise that this won't work on every kid... which is why I strongly believe that every school needs a form of punishment which every kid is afraid of; and if suspension won't do it for some kids then we need to bring back the cane.

tokenadult 17y ago

Fire bad teachers: good idea, but you need to train and attract good teachers at the same time. I have read that the number of American adults of working age who have teaching credentials is something like double the number of currently working teachers. But studies of teacher incompetence http://www.ericdigests.org/pre-921/incompetent.htm http://www.ericdigests.org/pre-921/incompetent.htm show that the least capable teachers stay in the occupation the longest, and sometimes their very presence drives out the most competent teachers. I agree that making schools less like prisons would be better both for teachers and for learners.