3 ms·

I don't agree with her, well, sure a little. The fact is, like capitalism, the schooling system is the worst system, except for all the others. And for the maj

I don't agree with her, well, sure a little. The fact is, like capitalism, the schooling system is the worst system, except for all the others. And for the majority, it is great for them. I think this is one of the areas where it is so easy to criticize, because of course there are problems, unless someone actually recommends a good alternative system, I just ignore them.

WingForward 16y ago
You're misquoting Churchill and objectively inaccurate. The USA version's of capitalism and schooling are not ideal for our culture or the world as a whole. There are plenty of alternatives.
- brp22 16y ago
  ...go on
loewenskind 16y ago
Total nonsense. Lots of other countries have vastly better grade schools (pg mentions this in one of his essays). Do you think all the people in those countries just have a lot more potential than most Americans? The worst thing about this ridiculous "America is the best!" attitude is that you can't fix anything if you think you've already got the best that can be done.
- chopsueyar 16y ago
  "Do you think all the people in those countries just have a lot more potential than most Americans?" Yes, for the above reasons you mentioned.
  - loewenskind 16y ago
    I meant potential as in "do you think no manner of teaching could ever make them more intelligent".
- megablast 16y ago
  I am not actually American, I am from Australia, which supposedly has a comparatively good schooling system. We have the same complaints here.
aik 16y ago
I agree, she didn't offer any alternatives. There are some very basic concepts that regular schools completely skip that would make all the difference. In my opinion we need classes (for example): - dedicated to learning how one specifically learns, - dealing with relating to people/relationships (it's really the main thing a lot of young people think/worry about), - helping people find passions/things they care about, - giving people choices and learning through real-world scenarios. We all agree that a majority of schooling is focused on memorizing random stuff. It's a fact that people learn more effectively by doing, not sitting in a classroom memorizing and theorizing. It only makes sense that most information needs to be placed into contexts for it to be any useful whatsoever (or stick in the first place), and school eliminates any context in most cases. Math is the perfect example of this. Other than for the reason that you may appear ignorant in random social settings with mindless/pointless conversation, why do we have to learn all the math that we do, history, literature, chemistry, biology, etc.?

WingForward 16y ago

You're misquoting Churchill and objectively inaccurate. The USA version's of capitalism and schooling are not ideal for our culture or the world as a whole. There are plenty of alternatives.

brp22 16y ago
...go on

loewenskind 16y ago

Total nonsense. Lots of other countries have vastly better grade schools (pg mentions this in one of his essays). Do you think all the people in those countries just have a lot more potential than most Americans? The worst thing about this ridiculous "America is the best!" attitude is that you can't fix anything if you think you've already got the best that can be done.

chopsueyar 16y ago
"Do you think all the people in those countries just have a lot more potential than most Americans?" Yes, for the above reasons you mentioned.
- loewenskind 16y ago
  I meant potential as in "do you think no manner of teaching could ever make them more intelligent".
megablast 16y ago
I am not actually American, I am from Australia, which supposedly has a comparatively good schooling system. We have the same complaints here.

aik 16y ago

I agree, she didn't offer any alternatives. There are some very basic concepts that regular schools completely skip that would make all the difference. In my opinion we need classes (for example): - dedicated to learning how one specifically learns, - dealing with relating to people/relationships (it's really the main thing a lot of young people think/worry about), - helping people find passions/things they care about, - giving people choices and learning through real-world scenarios. We all agree that a majority of schooling is focused on memorizing random stuff. It's a fact that people learn more effectively by doing, not sitting in a classroom memorizing and theorizing. It only makes sense that most information needs to be placed into contexts for it to be any useful whatsoever (or stick in the first place), and school eliminates any context in most cases. Math is the perfect example of this. Other than for the reason that you may appear ignorant in random social settings with mindless/pointless conversation, why do we have to learn all the math that we do, history, literature, chemistry, biology, etc.?