3 ms·

> Are you saying you can't figure out how to acquire all those skills you mentioned for less than 600k and 4 years spent? Honestly 4 years felt rushed when I w

> Are you saying you can't figure out how to acquire all those skills you mentioned for less than 600k and 4 years spent? Honestly 4 years felt rushed when I was in college, there was a lot more I wish I could have learned. That aside, yes, I would reform the educational system. I'd put in place actual expectations in high school, finish it up at age 16, and have an education with the same expectations of college started where 11th grade is started now. The AP program is kind of like this, but taught in current institutions. (Also I have heard that it is watered down now days, not sure how true that is.) The Running Start program that Washington State has is a good model to build on, high school students can choose to go to a community college starting in 11th grade. Good students can finish up both HS and pre-major requirements by age 18. At that point their university diploma is just 2 years. The problem is that community colleges are not prevalent throughout all of the nation, making this scheme hard to implement nation wide. I doubt the opportunity cost is at 600k, especially for the first 2 years. If you compare learning a 2 year trade and then going to work, there is certainly some cost there. A few bad policy decisions from ill-informed voters and all that becomes moot.

RosanaAnaDana 9y ago
I think if starting pay for a highschool teacher was 85k a year, but came with the expectation that your students are utterly prepared for life after highschool, we could fully resolve issues with k-12. While I agree with the sentiment behind your proposals, I think the real world variance of this throws things of. As an example, I had a very hard time in HS due to social issues, and basically flunked out of math my first year. Went to community college to make up the course; did fine, got a B, and ended up continuing to take CC courses and graduated a year early (did very well in CC compared with HS at the time). Coming from a pretty low income family however, I was still utterly unprepared for higher education, in the sense that 1) my family had 0 experience on navigating the system; or 2) even having expectations of higher education. It never even occurred to me that I was almost 2 years ahead of my piers in accumulated college credits. I ended up going into the military to get the money to go to university, since my family had effectively none. It all worked out in the end, but with some decent mentorship, or even one decent teacher in HS, I could have finished an undergrad degree at 19-20.

RosanaAnaDana 9y ago

I think if starting pay for a highschool teacher was 85k a year, but came with the expectation that your students are utterly prepared for life after highschool, we could fully resolve issues with k-12. While I agree with the sentiment behind your proposals, I think the real world variance of this throws things of. As an example, I had a very hard time in HS due to social issues, and basically flunked out of math my first year. Went to community college to make up the course; did fine, got a B, and ended up continuing to take CC courses and graduated a year early (did very well in CC compared with HS at the time). Coming from a pretty low income family however, I was still utterly unprepared for higher education, in the sense that 1) my family had 0 experience on navigating the system; or 2) even having expectations of higher education. It never even occurred to me that I was almost 2 years ahead of my piers in accumulated college credits. I ended up going into the military to get the money to go to university, since my family had effectively none. It all worked out in the end, but with some decent mentorship, or even one decent teacher in HS, I could have finished an undergrad degree at 19-20.