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I grew up in Cali, moved to Poland after uni and have been living here ever since, no regrets. One of the really negative things I remember when growing up was

I grew up in Cali, moved to Poland after uni and have been living here ever since, no regrets. One of the really negative things I remember when growing up was the little cliques that formed at school, you had the popular kids, the nerds, the outcasts, etc. I think a lot of resentment was built up in kids this way, the movie "Mean Girls" portrays the issue well in my opinion. I spent my summers in Poland and saw there was no such divide, you could be a nerd but no one cast you out of some group because of it. Furthermore I never understood why at school during every period I would have different people in my class, and from one year to the next my classmates in single subject would change too, this made it impossible to form strong bonds with classmates. How is that good for anyone? In my opinion it is a terrible system. Thankfully I skateboarded after school, that helped me form strong connections with people over the years that I maintain in touch with to this day. Fix the school system and I think you will fix a lot of social issues as well.

Aromasin 7y ago
I think changing students in classes is fine, provided there is ample opportunity to socialise outside of that. In the UK, schools are largely given free reign on how they organise their day but I was lucky enough to go to a school that provisioned for two 30 minute breaks, morning and afternoon, and one 90 minute one for lunch. This definitely isn't the case everywhere mind. Our school also confiscated smart-phones at the beginning of the school day, so all we could do was play sports and card games. Most of my friends now are still those I went to school with, which wasn't strange for me until I went to university and found out that most of my friends there don't talk to any of their friends from school anymore. Out of the 150 people in my year, I still regularly see maybe 40 of them. Within that group everyone has been wildly successful and I put that almost entirely down to the time we got every day to build our social skills. Time spent playing football or rugby on the fields, running around the woods behind our school playing catch and bulldog, trying to find places to wrestle and fight in secret, sitting in classrooms playing card games, or messing around in the music rooms with instruments we couldn't play. They're probably my fondest memories and it baffles me that not only is more time not given to it, but time is spent trying to take that away! It did nothing to stunt our learning, and I'd argue it enhanced it. Most of my friends are in postgraduate education, went to Oxbridge or another Russel group university, and were straight-A children at school. A kid shouldn't be expected to effectively work a 9-5 job (let's not even get started on the ridiculous start times some have to go through, fighting their biological circadian rhythm), with an hour off to rush through lunch before getting thrown back in to classroom. It's no wonder teachers often describe teaching as riot control. A school shouldn't just be a place to learn academics. That puts way too much onus on parents to provide socialisation themselves; meaning children with bad parents, or those that can't afford to send their kids to extra-curricular clubs and sports teams, get left behind and form cracks in a working society.
- JacKTrocinskI 7y ago
  That sounds like an amazing experience, I wish my school had been more like that. My high school had a student body of 3000+, we had police stationed at the school, and there were actual riots. I went to one of the better public high school in California by the way, I can not imagine what happens in L.A. or the valley.
  - Aromasin 7y ago
    It was great in hindsight. Sadly the school is a vastly different place than it was 10 years ago when I went. The new headmaster has traded play time for school time, but it's had the opposite effect he's intended by decimating their grades. We used to come in the top 20 state schools in the country for overall achievement, but now they're barely reaching the top 100. He of course blames too many video games at home for that, and not his changes to the schedule... Sadly the US way is certainly the way UK schools seem to be going. As much as I hate saying it, I can't imagine sending my child to a state school anymore. I won't be surprised if the class divide widens even more as wealthy parents start sending their children to private schools or home schooling them.
    - Angostura 7y ago
      All is not lost, my daughters go to a bog standard Comprehensive in East London (not an Academy or anything) and they are having a great time. Luchtimes are rushed, but you get the impression that the teachers actually like the kids and are interested in them - the atmosphere is really great. Pretty good grades, and an emphasis on educating the whole child.
- rezeroed 7y ago
  You're giving no credit to the teaching aspect. I went to a school that sounds a lot like yours, but the teachers were terrible, and I'm not aware of anyone becoming wildly successful. Some fairly successful. Glad you enjoyed it, but I think you're giving it too much credit.
  - 7y ago
alexpotato 7y ago
My mother is Italian and I used to live in England which means I spent many summers in Italy as a teenager. I also noticed that American teenagers seem to be very focused on the "let's make a group to exclude other folks" model. In Italy, however, the idea always seemed to be "let's include as many people as we can in the group!" Case in point: one summer in Italy, there was a girl that no one really liked but she was always included in any groups activities. It was unthinkable that you would exclude someone just because you didn't like them. I chalk this up to American "individualism" vs an older European model of "your town is basically an extension of your family". In the American model, what identifies you is what's different between you and someone else whereas in Italy, the group is how you identify yourself. There are certainly pros and cons to both. E.g. "Going along with the group" can certainly lead to problems. On the flip side, rugged individualism can lead to the type of loneliness described in the article.
- dagw 7y ago
  Let's be careful with the whole 'Europe' vs 'American' thing. The difference between say Italy and Sweden or Russia is probably larger than the difference between Italy and some US states.

Aromasin 7y ago

I think changing students in classes is fine, provided there is ample opportunity to socialise outside of that. In the UK, schools are largely given free reign on how they organise their day but I was lucky enough to go to a school that provisioned for two 30 minute breaks, morning and afternoon, and one 90 minute one for lunch. This definitely isn't the case everywhere mind. Our school also confiscated smart-phones at the beginning of the school day, so all we could do was play sports and card games. Most of my friends now are still those I went to school with, which wasn't strange for me until I went to university and found out that most of my friends there don't talk to any of their friends from school anymore. Out of the 150 people in my year, I still regularly see maybe 40 of them. Within that group everyone has been wildly successful and I put that almost entirely down to the time we got every day to build our social skills. Time spent playing football or rugby on the fields, running around the woods behind our school playing catch and bulldog, trying to find places to wrestle and fight in secret, sitting in classrooms playing card games, or messing around in the music rooms with instruments we couldn't play. They're probably my fondest memories and it baffles me that not only is more time not given to it, but time is spent trying to take that away! It did nothing to stunt our learning, and I'd argue it enhanced it. Most of my friends are in postgraduate education, went to Oxbridge or another Russel group university, and were straight-A children at school. A kid shouldn't be expected to effectively work a 9-5 job (let's not even get started on the ridiculous start times some have to go through, fighting their biological circadian rhythm), with an hour off to rush through lunch before getting thrown back in to classroom. It's no wonder teachers often describe teaching as riot control. A school shouldn't just be a place to learn academics. That puts way too much onus on parents to provide socialisation themselves; meaning children with bad parents, or those that can't afford to send their kids to extra-curricular clubs and sports teams, get left behind and form cracks in a working society.

JacKTrocinskI 7y ago
That sounds like an amazing experience, I wish my school had been more like that. My high school had a student body of 3000+, we had police stationed at the school, and there were actual riots. I went to one of the better public high school in California by the way, I can not imagine what happens in L.A. or the valley.
- Aromasin 7y ago
  It was great in hindsight. Sadly the school is a vastly different place than it was 10 years ago when I went. The new headmaster has traded play time for school time, but it's had the opposite effect he's intended by decimating their grades. We used to come in the top 20 state schools in the country for overall achievement, but now they're barely reaching the top 100. He of course blames too many video games at home for that, and not his changes to the schedule... Sadly the US way is certainly the way UK schools seem to be going. As much as I hate saying it, I can't imagine sending my child to a state school anymore. I won't be surprised if the class divide widens even more as wealthy parents start sending their children to private schools or home schooling them.
  - Angostura 7y ago
    All is not lost, my daughters go to a bog standard Comprehensive in East London (not an Academy or anything) and they are having a great time. Luchtimes are rushed, but you get the impression that the teachers actually like the kids and are interested in them - the atmosphere is really great. Pretty good grades, and an emphasis on educating the whole child.
rezeroed 7y ago
You're giving no credit to the teaching aspect. I went to a school that sounds a lot like yours, but the teachers were terrible, and I'm not aware of anyone becoming wildly successful. Some fairly successful. Glad you enjoyed it, but I think you're giving it too much credit.
- 7y ago

alexpotato 7y ago

My mother is Italian and I used to live in England which means I spent many summers in Italy as a teenager. I also noticed that American teenagers seem to be very focused on the "let's make a group to exclude other folks" model. In Italy, however, the idea always seemed to be "let's include as many people as we can in the group!" Case in point: one summer in Italy, there was a girl that no one really liked but she was always included in any groups activities. It was unthinkable that you would exclude someone just because you didn't like them. I chalk this up to American "individualism" vs an older European model of "your town is basically an extension of your family". In the American model, what identifies you is what's different between you and someone else whereas in Italy, the group is how you identify yourself. There are certainly pros and cons to both. E.g. "Going along with the group" can certainly lead to problems. On the flip side, rugged individualism can lead to the type of loneliness described in the article.

dagw 7y ago
Let's be careful with the whole 'Europe' vs 'American' thing. The difference between say Italy and Sweden or Russia is probably larger than the difference between Italy and some US states.