4 ms·

A good place to start combatting inequality is the education system. It's a long-term bet, but improving our schools, the information they give students, and th

A good place to start combatting inequality is the education system. It's a long-term bet, but improving our schools, the information they give students, and the skills they prepare them with for life will vastly improve their chances of success. The "obedient worker" model of education is obsolete. Kids should be given more freedom to explore (a la the Montessori Method). They're inherently creative and we should nurture that, not stifle it. Curricula based on practical work that teaches high-level concepts like organization, perseverance, and patience would do wonders. Add in basic finance skills and boy howdy. Give a kid context and I'd bet they'd shine. "Okay kids, we're going to learn mathematics by learning how to design a space shuttle." That is easily a full semester/year long project that could touch on a TON of different topics. Kids wouldn't be left out because different jobs in designing the space shuttle could be assigned, each touching on core concepts (e.g., "hold a successful meeting with five other students to decide what happens if an engine fails").

frgtpsswrdlame 8y ago
A better way to start combatting inequality through the education system would be to outlaw private schools, end the funding of public schools through property (or any other local) tax, allow any kid to go to any public school anywhere, make public college free and make legacy admissions illegal. In order to fight inequality we must be willing to place ourselves in the same bucket as poor people. However policies like the ones I mentioned are hated exactly because they do that and so we look to other, more technocratic methods which only serve to triangulate us closer to 'separate but equal.' It's a sham and we should pull the band-aid off.
cal5k 8y ago
Here's the problem, though: what do you do about individuals with a low IQ? Not even crazy low, but low enough that STEM fields are out of their grasp? There's little evidence that IQ can be substantially increased through education... and I think those of us who pursued that path tend to incorrectly assume it's open to anyone if they just had a better school.
- umvi 8y ago
  I doubt low IQ is a significant problem in public education. I'd wager the #1 problem in our schools is bad parents. Schools are now expected not only to teach, but to parent students as well. A kid going to a crappy school who has good parents is still going to thrive. They will be motivated to complete homework, can receive help, etc. A kid going to a crappy school with crappy parents is going to crash and burn. Heck, a kid going to a good school with crappy parents is still probably to crash and burn. There may be more of an effort to help from school administration, but generally... crappy parents don't care if their kids don't do the homework, won't (or can't) help their kids when they get stuck, and blame the school system (or teacher) for their child's failure.
  - rglover 8y ago
    Bingo and we should anticipate this. Education programs (and the support systems around them) should be designed as though parents are _not_ going to participate. Simultaneously, though, there should be educational programs for how to parent. It's not "obvious" to everyone. The majority are in the "we had sex cause' it felt good and now we have a rugrat" bracket.
  - hoaw 8y ago
    Which is why every aspiring egalitarian society work hard to take the parents out of the equation. Day care in Sweden cost like €100, and you get that in cash benefit for having a kid, which means it is essentially free. Successful societies aren't in effect more sophisticated, they just make it easy for themselves from the beginning.
- rglover 8y ago
  1.) Understand the cohort. Group kids based on cognitive abilities and reevaluate on an interval (once per year, for example). 2.) Match the level of ability to the task. Practical work doesn't have to just be STEM. For example, "make sure the meeting room is clean, all attendees have a glass of water, and the lights are turned on." Simple checklist-style work that empowers the individual while being aligned with their abilities. It's important: keep reiterating to students that no one is "better" than anyone based on their jobs and that each is integral to the task at hand. It'd do wonders if we quit belittling people just because they lack a certain level of intelligence.
rexpop 8y ago
I wholeheartedly agree. I was lucky enough to chance into a "project-based learning" alternative program in Jr. High, where we had fewer, longer class periods and freewheeling, long-term multi-discipline assignments. Although I performed poorly in traditional academics, my belief in my creative capacity and industriousness—acquired during this period—has never left me, and forms the basis of the autodidactism that has facilitated my career.
dsr_ 8y ago
Education systems are highly local. The Zuckerberg kids aren't going to Cesar Chavez Elementary, or any of the other public schools, and will only know the children of other ridiculously rich people. You need to take steps to actively combat that kind of class separation. I'm not saying that rich kids shouldn't get a good education. I'm saying that every kid deserves a good education.
- rglover 8y ago
  Which is why this is a Department of Education level of implementation. I'm not talking about "daddy, they don't have juice boxes" type of schools, I'm talking middle of Iowa, watch out for that loose bail of hay on the road public schools. Designing those programs can be done in a way that teachers can be taught how to teach them. Not easy or quick, but doable. Ultimately it's a matter of admitting that the current education system doesn't work and start a national effort to recruit minds that can design a new one (and then actively start developing it and testing it).
  - dantheman 8y ago
    With public sector unions nothing will be able to change.
- sjg007 8y ago
  Charter schools are basically government subsidized private schools for "middle class" kids who live in resource poor public school districts. They are like magnet schools but they were opened up to private and for profit entities. Parents like them because they concentrate well motivated kids. Republicans like them because they will help bust unions. This will basically continue the current socioeconomic stratification we have. We would do a lot better investing in intensive early childhood education, providing after school care as well as subsidizing 3 meals a day to our kids.
d0mine 8y ago
I remember reading that it was proven that the more basic subject the more structured educational methods are beneficial (i.e., an ability to teach is more important than how well you know the subject at earlier stages) — you are not a special snowflake. I would heartily recommend "Learning how to learn" course (free) and the corresponding books.
victornomad 8y ago
While I totally agree with how obsolete is the current education system, as a person who has worked in several experimental education projects I still have my doubts that semester/year long projects work well. Kids and teens have very short attention span, when you say let's create a space shuttle they want to do it ASAP. After few days working on the same project they usually get very tired and the supercool subject becomes another "normal subject". Furthermore, not every kid wants to design a space shuttle, some wants just to dance, others draw graffiti, some others just sing or even reading a book might be more satisfying for some. What I want to say is that education is a quite complicated task. Parents and their contexts play gigantic roles that superfun and shinny activities at school cannot replace. I think inequality have to be fight from many angles, better jobs, universal health systems, investing in 3rd tier neighborhoods, less taxes for people who have less, helping people who have shi jobs and cannot afford to even search for new ones to have better ones, better integration of immigrants in the cities, etc, etc, etc Some examples of some of those projects http://victordiazbarrales.com/workshops/the-patching-zone---mediawerf/ http://victordiazbarrales.com/workshops/the-patching-zone---... http://victordiazbarrales.com/workshops/circolab/ http://victordiazbarrales.com/workshops/circolab/ edit: format
- rglover 8y ago
  > Kids and teens have very short attention span, when you say let's create a space shuttle they want to do it ASAP. So we teach them how to rein that in. > not every kid wants to design a space shuttle, some wants just to dance, others draw graffiti, some others just sing or even reading a book might be more satisfying for some. Dance: choreograph the ceremony before and after the launch. Graffiti: design the space shuttle's logo, branding, and marketing. Sing: see dance line above or other vocal needs like recording audio instructions for procedures or status updates on the mission. Reading: prepare a flight manual. --- The space shuttle is one example. My point is that adults need to apply creativity to generating multiple options, not just trying to make everything a one size fits all solution. Take some of the folks who write Hollywood scripts and have them create interesting projects for learning. Hell, we could even take movies and use those as our foundation (makes it fun for the kids and parents). If this is something you're interested in working on, shoot me an email: me@ryanglover.net.
peterlk 8y ago
Here's a structural thing we could do to improve our education system. Give teachers more money. And on top of that fix, change the career path incentives to keep the best teachers teaching. Right now, the best teachers are financially incentivized to stop teaching and become administrators. Pay teachers more, and pay administrators less: this decreases administration bloat, and increases the competition for being a teacher. The difficult thing to swallow is that we'll probably have to overpay poorly performing teachels for longer than one election cycle.
- zanny 8y ago
  Its an endemic problem in almost all industries that upward mobility means "management" despite it often being a completely divergent and esoteric skillset from the job you were hired on for, and often one that is less resource intensive to train for - learning good managerial skills can often be a weekend seminar, versus the years it takes to become competent in a companies codebase. But of course the boss sets the salaries so thats where the money ends up going.

frgtpsswrdlame 8y ago

A better way to start combatting inequality through the education system would be to outlaw private schools, end the funding of public schools through property (or any other local) tax, allow any kid to go to any public school anywhere, make public college free and make legacy admissions illegal. In order to fight inequality we must be willing to place ourselves in the same bucket as poor people. However policies like the ones I mentioned are hated exactly because they do that and so we look to other, more technocratic methods which only serve to triangulate us closer to 'separate but equal.' It's a sham and we should pull the band-aid off.

cal5k 8y ago

Here's the problem, though: what do you do about individuals with a low IQ? Not even crazy low, but low enough that STEM fields are out of their grasp? There's little evidence that IQ can be substantially increased through education... and I think those of us who pursued that path tend to incorrectly assume it's open to anyone if they just had a better school.

umvi 8y ago
I doubt low IQ is a significant problem in public education. I'd wager the #1 problem in our schools is bad parents. Schools are now expected not only to teach, but to parent students as well. A kid going to a crappy school who has good parents is still going to thrive. They will be motivated to complete homework, can receive help, etc. A kid going to a crappy school with crappy parents is going to crash and burn. Heck, a kid going to a good school with crappy parents is still probably to crash and burn. There may be more of an effort to help from school administration, but generally... crappy parents don't care if their kids don't do the homework, won't (or can't) help their kids when they get stuck, and blame the school system (or teacher) for their child's failure.
- rglover 8y ago
  Bingo and we should anticipate this. Education programs (and the support systems around them) should be designed as though parents are _not_ going to participate. Simultaneously, though, there should be educational programs for how to parent. It's not "obvious" to everyone. The majority are in the "we had sex cause' it felt good and now we have a rugrat" bracket.
- hoaw 8y ago
  Which is why every aspiring egalitarian society work hard to take the parents out of the equation. Day care in Sweden cost like €100, and you get that in cash benefit for having a kid, which means it is essentially free. Successful societies aren't in effect more sophisticated, they just make it easy for themselves from the beginning.
rglover 8y ago
1.) Understand the cohort. Group kids based on cognitive abilities and reevaluate on an interval (once per year, for example). 2.) Match the level of ability to the task. Practical work doesn't have to just be STEM. For example, "make sure the meeting room is clean, all attendees have a glass of water, and the lights are turned on." Simple checklist-style work that empowers the individual while being aligned with their abilities. It's important: keep reiterating to students that no one is "better" than anyone based on their jobs and that each is integral to the task at hand. It'd do wonders if we quit belittling people just because they lack a certain level of intelligence.

rexpop 8y ago

I wholeheartedly agree. I was lucky enough to chance into a "project-based learning" alternative program in Jr. High, where we had fewer, longer class periods and freewheeling, long-term multi-discipline assignments. Although I performed poorly in traditional academics, my belief in my creative capacity and industriousness—acquired during this period—has never left me, and forms the basis of the autodidactism that has facilitated my career.

dsr_ 8y ago

Education systems are highly local. The Zuckerberg kids aren't going to Cesar Chavez Elementary, or any of the other public schools, and will only know the children of other ridiculously rich people. You need to take steps to actively combat that kind of class separation. I'm not saying that rich kids shouldn't get a good education. I'm saying that every kid deserves a good education.

rglover 8y ago
Which is why this is a Department of Education level of implementation. I'm not talking about "daddy, they don't have juice boxes" type of schools, I'm talking middle of Iowa, watch out for that loose bail of hay on the road public schools. Designing those programs can be done in a way that teachers can be taught how to teach them. Not easy or quick, but doable. Ultimately it's a matter of admitting that the current education system doesn't work and start a national effort to recruit minds that can design a new one (and then actively start developing it and testing it).
- dantheman 8y ago
  With public sector unions nothing will be able to change.
sjg007 8y ago
Charter schools are basically government subsidized private schools for "middle class" kids who live in resource poor public school districts. They are like magnet schools but they were opened up to private and for profit entities. Parents like them because they concentrate well motivated kids. Republicans like them because they will help bust unions. This will basically continue the current socioeconomic stratification we have. We would do a lot better investing in intensive early childhood education, providing after school care as well as subsidizing 3 meals a day to our kids.

d0mine 8y ago

I remember reading that it was proven that the more basic subject the more structured educational methods are beneficial (i.e., an ability to teach is more important than how well you know the subject at earlier stages) — you are not a special snowflake. I would heartily recommend "Learning how to learn" course (free) and the corresponding books.

victornomad 8y ago

While I totally agree with how obsolete is the current education system, as a person who has worked in several experimental education projects I still have my doubts that semester/year long projects work well. Kids and teens have very short attention span, when you say let's create a space shuttle they want to do it ASAP. After few days working on the same project they usually get very tired and the supercool subject becomes another "normal subject". Furthermore, not every kid wants to design a space shuttle, some wants just to dance, others draw graffiti, some others just sing or even reading a book might be more satisfying for some. What I want to say is that education is a quite complicated task. Parents and their contexts play gigantic roles that superfun and shinny activities at school cannot replace. I think inequality have to be fight from many angles, better jobs, universal health systems, investing in 3rd tier neighborhoods, less taxes for people who have less, helping people who have shi jobs and cannot afford to even search for new ones to have better ones, better integration of immigrants in the cities, etc, etc, etc Some examples of some of those projects http://victordiazbarrales.com/workshops/the-patching-zone---mediawerf/ http://victordiazbarrales.com/workshops/the-patching-zone---... http://victordiazbarrales.com/workshops/circolab/ http://victordiazbarrales.com/workshops/circolab/ edit: format

rglover 8y ago
> Kids and teens have very short attention span, when you say let's create a space shuttle they want to do it ASAP. So we teach them how to rein that in. > not every kid wants to design a space shuttle, some wants just to dance, others draw graffiti, some others just sing or even reading a book might be more satisfying for some. Dance: choreograph the ceremony before and after the launch. Graffiti: design the space shuttle's logo, branding, and marketing. Sing: see dance line above or other vocal needs like recording audio instructions for procedures or status updates on the mission. Reading: prepare a flight manual. --- The space shuttle is one example. My point is that adults need to apply creativity to generating multiple options, not just trying to make everything a one size fits all solution. Take some of the folks who write Hollywood scripts and have them create interesting projects for learning. Hell, we could even take movies and use those as our foundation (makes it fun for the kids and parents). If this is something you're interested in working on, shoot me an email: me@ryanglover.net.

peterlk 8y ago

Here's a structural thing we could do to improve our education system. Give teachers more money. And on top of that fix, change the career path incentives to keep the best teachers teaching. Right now, the best teachers are financially incentivized to stop teaching and become administrators. Pay teachers more, and pay administrators less: this decreases administration bloat, and increases the competition for being a teacher. The difficult thing to swallow is that we'll probably have to overpay poorly performing teachels for longer than one election cycle.

zanny 8y ago
Its an endemic problem in almost all industries that upward mobility means "management" despite it often being a completely divergent and esoteric skillset from the job you were hired on for, and often one that is less resource intensive to train for - learning good managerial skills can often be a weekend seminar, versus the years it takes to become competent in a companies codebase. But of course the boss sets the salaries so thats where the money ends up going.