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This article is a good platform for a series of solid specific observations. I particularly liked this one toward the end: “ It could mean compressing the time

This article is a good platform for a series of solid specific observations. I particularly liked this one toward the end: “ It could mean compressing the time teenagers have to sort out their hierarchies and pillory outsiders, by turning schools into minimalist places in which people only study and learn. All the elaborate rites of dances and games could take place under other auspices. (Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools.)” Hallelujah. End the role of high school as a monolith for teen life. I also liked the call for more fluid stratification of students: “ It could mean schools in which age segregation is not so strict, where a twelve-year-old might mentor a seven-year-old and be mentored by a seventeen-year-old; schools in which internships, apprenticeships, and other programs would let older students transition into the adult world before senior year. ” This all essentially boils down to “freedom.” Meaning also flexibility and choice. For all the expectations piled on high school students they are given very little agency.

barry-cotter 5y ago
> Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people In China those things would often be cram schools. In Korea that’s even more common, practically universal. If you think the college rat race and obsession with prestige in the US is bad it’s nothing like as bad as in developed East Asia. (Japan may be slightly less awful but still much worse than anywhere in the cultural as opposed to political West.)
- dannyw 5y ago
  Australian here, a more limited role of extracurricular activities do t always mean more cramming. I know that's not what you said, but that's the implication I got from your comment
ng12 5y ago
> Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools. This doesn't ring true to me. Unless you played sports there was really no reason to hang around after school. Contrast this to many Japanese schools where being part of a school club is more or less expected.
giantg2 5y ago
"This all essentially boils down to “freedom.”" But school is about creating obedient subjects so that the government can maintain status quo. I don't see them promoting anything that is radically different which has the potential to undermine the thought processes that support out institutions.
- kiba 5y ago
  Ok. Where is the evidence that schools are created to create obedient subjects for governments to maintain status quo?
  - pharmakom 5y ago
    The UK government uses public schools to push their preferred narrative around British history and “Britishness”. However, I think the real reason for schools is that the government sees a return on investment via taxation of a higher skilled workforce.
  - oblio 5y ago
    Schools kind of are for that, but it's not actually a bad thing despite the negative framing. The goal of the public school system is to create active, disciplined, stable, civilized citizens with strong bonds for each other despite natural tribal tendencies.
    - giantg2 5y ago
      Seems like they are failing then. A substantial majority of people do not understand thw way the government is supposed to work nor their parts in it. https://woodrow.org/news/national-survey-finds-just-1-in-3-americans-would-pass-citizenship-test/ https://woodrow.org/news/national-survey-finds-just-1-in-3-a...
      - oblio 5y ago
        It is working. Americans generally feel American, Chinese feel Chinese, Romanians feel Romanian. That's the great end product of school education up to about 14-18 years.
PragmaticPulp 5y ago
> (Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools.) Those extracurricular activities are opt-in activities to be done with other people. The more kids are surrounded by technology, the more I appreciate structured social activities. Some kids are definitely motivated to get up and out of the house and do things in the real world day after day, but now that everyone is surrounded by endless digital entertainment it's tempting to just stay home and do... nothing. I have great memories of school-centric extracurricular activities. All of my friends at the activities enjoyed them too. With few exceptions, we weren't forced to be there. We actually enjoyed it and had fun. I understand that some people had negative high school experiences, but I'm always stunned to read HN comments insisting that everyone must have had a miserable time in high school. That said, there were a few families who opted out of our high school and decided to home school. The few kids I knew who were forced into home school by their parents were not happy about it. I don't exactly see how forcing everyone out of the high school structure would somehow improve that situation.
- dannyw 5y ago
  To be fair I stayed at home a lot during my high school years and I wasn't doing nothing. I was teaching myself how to code, working on cryptocurrencies, and interacting with people on forums that felt a lot more authentic than social media today. One of those interactions turned into a long term relationship. It's not all bad. Definitely think it's important to have physical learning and the social interactions that come from that though, but beyond that you don't need to force people to do extracurricular stuff at school. (The standard subjects should be well balanced and have a mix of things, from maths and science to art and PE, etc, with a gradual increase in flexibility and self-choice in what to keep).
- andai 5y ago
  I just wished I had had a choice. In my country, homeschooling is illegal and alternative schools get shut down by the police.
  - 5y ago
hyperpallium2 5y ago
Age segregation moderates bullying.
- msla 5y ago
  Smaller classes and teachers who aren't checked out moderate bullying. It's expensive because you have to pay for a lot of good, motivated teachers, but it works.
- LordDragonfang 5y ago
  Does it though? I feel like the classes in which I had the most camaraderie with others were the mixed-age ones (math, grouped by ability, AP classes, and swim, a mixed bag). Likewise, the significant majority of my friends were first in grades above, and then below me. And it's not as if people of the same age can't bully each other. Even with younger children I don't think it's as much of an issue for bullying. In fact, if such mentorship programs are voluntary, I'd wager there would be less of a problem; you'd be surprised at how empathic children can be when placed in an older/younger pair. There's also an self-evident dynamic of power there - it's when children are expected to act as peers that squabbles for power most frequently manifest as bullying.
- barry-cotter 5y ago
  I really doubt that and given that there are no school systems that don’t age segregate I am virtually certain there’s no evidence to that effect.
- Negitivefrags 5y ago
  If you put a 14 year old with a 12 year old, the 14 year old doesn’t feel any need to bully the 12 year old. They are naturally higher in the hierarchy and don’t feel any threat from the 12 year old. The same is not true with two 14 year olds. I went to a mixed age school and then left that to go to a segregated school. The first had no bullying and the second had a lot.
  - klyrs 5y ago
    WTF? I was definitely bullied by kids 2 years ahead of me.
froh 5y ago
voluntary extracurriculars outside school are the privilege of affluent families. extracurriculars at school help kids from less educated background to do choir, theatre, arts and team sports, ...
- phreeza 5y ago
  In my experience in Germany this was not the case at all. Sports clubs see youth work as a way to ensure their own future, not as a profit center. I suspect youth work is also often subsidized.
  - froh 5y ago
    you have to go to your sports club. who gets you there initially? if your family doesn't support you, getting into sports needs quite some luck. I'm with you once you're in other parents might compensate and support you. Vive le "Ehrenamt". greetings from Bavaria.
phreeza 5y ago
One of my fondest memories of my childhood in Germany was trying out all the different sports clubs in my home town during summer break. All the sports clubs organized events where they showed their sport, with the hope of recruiting new members, and there was a "vacation-pass" which listed all these events along with other stuff like free entry to museums and the like. It was a great way to spend the vacations at home, being entertained at very little cost, especially for less affluent families who didn't go on vacation abroad.
6510 5y ago
Whenever a teacher got stuck trying to explain something I always jumped the opportunity to do it for them. Since I just learned the subject myself I understood how one could fail to understand it. edit: of course there is also something to be said for surrounding yourself with knowledgeable people if one wants to learn something. (as opposed to oblivious teens)
jl2718 5y ago
I suppose it depends on whether it is important to build long-lasting relationships in early life. A lot of people I knew ended up back together in their later life despite living hundreds of miles apart for over a decade. I’m not sure there is any better opportunity for this. No other time in life comes even close to the bond permanence of high school.

barry-cotter 5y ago

> Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people In China those things would often be cram schools. In Korea that’s even more common, practically universal. If you think the college rat race and obsession with prestige in the US is bad it’s nothing like as bad as in developed East Asia. (Japan may be slightly less awful but still much worse than anywhere in the cultural as opposed to political West.)

dannyw 5y ago
Australian here, a more limited role of extracurricular activities do t always mean more cramming. I know that's not what you said, but that's the implication I got from your comment

ng12 5y ago

> Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools. This doesn't ring true to me. Unless you played sports there was really no reason to hang around after school. Contrast this to many Japanese schools where being part of a school club is more or less expected.

giantg2 5y ago

"This all essentially boils down to “freedom.”" But school is about creating obedient subjects so that the government can maintain status quo. I don't see them promoting anything that is radically different which has the potential to undermine the thought processes that support out institutions.

kiba 5y ago
Ok. Where is the evidence that schools are created to create obedient subjects for governments to maintain status quo?
- pharmakom 5y ago
  The UK government uses public schools to push their preferred narrative around British history and “Britishness”. However, I think the real reason for schools is that the government sees a return on investment via taxation of a higher skilled workforce.
- oblio 5y ago
  Schools kind of are for that, but it's not actually a bad thing despite the negative framing. The goal of the public school system is to create active, disciplined, stable, civilized citizens with strong bonds for each other despite natural tribal tendencies.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    Seems like they are failing then. A substantial majority of people do not understand thw way the government is supposed to work nor their parts in it. https://woodrow.org/news/national-survey-finds-just-1-in-3-americans-would-pass-citizenship-test/ https://woodrow.org/news/national-survey-finds-just-1-in-3-a...
    - oblio 5y ago
      It is working. Americans generally feel American, Chinese feel Chinese, Romanians feel Romanian. That's the great end product of school education up to about 14-18 years.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago

> (Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools.) Those extracurricular activities are opt-in activities to be done with other people. The more kids are surrounded by technology, the more I appreciate structured social activities. Some kids are definitely motivated to get up and out of the house and do things in the real world day after day, but now that everyone is surrounded by endless digital entertainment it's tempting to just stay home and do... nothing. I have great memories of school-centric extracurricular activities. All of my friends at the activities enjoyed them too. With few exceptions, we weren't forced to be there. We actually enjoyed it and had fun. I understand that some people had negative high school experiences, but I'm always stunned to read HN comments insisting that everyone must have had a miserable time in high school. That said, there were a few families who opted out of our high school and decided to home school. The few kids I knew who were forced into home school by their parents were not happy about it. I don't exactly see how forcing everyone out of the high school structure would somehow improve that situation.

dannyw 5y ago
To be fair I stayed at home a lot during my high school years and I wasn't doing nothing. I was teaching myself how to code, working on cryptocurrencies, and interacting with people on forums that felt a lot more authentic than social media today. One of those interactions turned into a long term relationship. It's not all bad. Definitely think it's important to have physical learning and the social interactions that come from that though, but beyond that you don't need to force people to do extracurricular stuff at school. (The standard subjects should be well balanced and have a mix of things, from maths and science to art and PE, etc, with a gradual increase in flexibility and self-choice in what to keep).
andai 5y ago
I just wished I had had a choice. In my country, homeschooling is illegal and alternative schools get shut down by the police.
- 5y ago

hyperpallium2 5y ago

Age segregation moderates bullying.

msla 5y ago
Smaller classes and teachers who aren't checked out moderate bullying. It's expensive because you have to pay for a lot of good, motivated teachers, but it works.
LordDragonfang 5y ago
Does it though? I feel like the classes in which I had the most camaraderie with others were the mixed-age ones (math, grouped by ability, AP classes, and swim, a mixed bag). Likewise, the significant majority of my friends were first in grades above, and then below me. And it's not as if people of the same age can't bully each other. Even with younger children I don't think it's as much of an issue for bullying. In fact, if such mentorship programs are voluntary, I'd wager there would be less of a problem; you'd be surprised at how empathic children can be when placed in an older/younger pair. There's also an self-evident dynamic of power there - it's when children are expected to act as peers that squabbles for power most frequently manifest as bullying.
barry-cotter 5y ago
I really doubt that and given that there are no school systems that don’t age segregate I am virtually certain there’s no evidence to that effect.
Negitivefrags 5y ago
If you put a 14 year old with a 12 year old, the 14 year old doesn’t feel any need to bully the 12 year old. They are naturally higher in the hierarchy and don’t feel any threat from the 12 year old. The same is not true with two 14 year olds. I went to a mixed age school and then left that to go to a segregated school. The first had no bullying and the second had a lot.
- klyrs 5y ago
  WTF? I was definitely bullied by kids 2 years ahead of me.

froh 5y ago

voluntary extracurriculars outside school are the privilege of affluent families. extracurriculars at school help kids from less educated background to do choir, theatre, arts and team sports, ...

phreeza 5y ago
In my experience in Germany this was not the case at all. Sports clubs see youth work as a way to ensure their own future, not as a profit center. I suspect youth work is also often subsidized.
- froh 5y ago
  you have to go to your sports club. who gets you there initially? if your family doesn't support you, getting into sports needs quite some luck. I'm with you once you're in other parents might compensate and support you. Vive le "Ehrenamt". greetings from Bavaria.

phreeza 5y ago

One of my fondest memories of my childhood in Germany was trying out all the different sports clubs in my home town during summer break. All the sports clubs organized events where they showed their sport, with the hope of recruiting new members, and there was a "vacation-pass" which listed all these events along with other stuff like free entry to museums and the like. It was a great way to spend the vacations at home, being entertained at very little cost, especially for less affluent families who didn't go on vacation abroad.

6510 5y ago

Whenever a teacher got stuck trying to explain something I always jumped the opportunity to do it for them. Since I just learned the subject myself I understood how one could fail to understand it. edit: of course there is also something to be said for surrounding yourself with knowledgeable people if one wants to learn something. (as opposed to oblivious teens)

jl2718 5y ago

I suppose it depends on whether it is important to build long-lasting relationships in early life. A lot of people I knew ended up back together in their later life despite living hundreds of miles apart for over a decade. I’m not sure there is any better opportunity for this. No other time in life comes even close to the bond permanence of high school.