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My sister sent my niece to one, as even her 'private' middle school in Newton, MA, was just not strong enough. She did sign up my niece in every summer class sh
by ardit33 5y ago
My sister sent my niece to one, as even her 'private' middle school in Newton, MA, was just not strong enough. She did sign up my niece in every summer class she could, without overloading her. It was always my nieces' choice, and half the time she choose arts and half science. Now, my niece is able to do college entry level data science classes (she is about to become a Junior in HighSchool), and she actually likes it a lot.
American schools are too soft on science in general. I did grades 1-11 in Albania and my senior year of HighSchool in the US. Some of my schooling in Albania was done under communism, and some after communism fell in the 90s.
The Albanian school was brutal in teaching science. Biology started at 5th grade, pre-Algebra at 5, and full blown Algebra at 6, physics at 6, and Chemistry at 7. Then in highschool you did the same, but more advanced. There was no choice at all, you had to do them all. The only choice in HS was a second foreign language. The whole idea was that you have to know all the basics of ALL sciences, so in college you know what to choose and pursue. If you never tried, you will have no clue if you liked something or not. (also basic music knowledge, sheet reading, and arts was a requirement as well).
When I came to the US, I was flabergasted how behind most of the kids were in science. I took AP physics, and it became boring as it was things I had done in 8th grade. I got 800./800 on the SAT 2, physics.
The math part, I took AP calc, and it was advanced enough, especially the part B to challenge me. But this was clearly an elective that only about 30 students took it, while back home it was a requirement for all.
Unfortunately, the current movement on dumbing down math and science in the name of 'equity' is a step behind and very dispiriting. It is bound to hurt poorer but smart kids, that can't afford private tutoring and have to rely only on public schools. Extreme progressive Liberals are killing science and progress in this country, and are becoming actually regressive and backwards.
P.s. The only advantage of American teaching on science was that it relies more on experiments to teach concepts, while the Albanian one had no equipment, or lacked the basics of it. Heck, in the 90s we didn't even have glass on the windows and had to freeze all winter. Also basic electricity was lacking half of the winter.
Ps2. Most Americans have it good (condition wise), they just don't know it
Ps3. This is a good video how schooling was back then (in 88). Notice how the kids are wearing jackets inside, as there was no heating
https://youtu.be/yZD1jaKbz2g?t=251 https://youtu.be/yZD1jaKbz2g?t=251
- rrss 5y agoOut of curiosity, do you recall which ap physics course you took?
- ardit33 5y agoI don't remember exactly, but it was the most advanced they offered. This was in Virginia, in 98-99. My teacher (Mr. Norris) was excellent, but it was clear that the overall course was something that I had done years before back in Albania. Since I knew a lot of things already, I was probably a bit annoying at class (having always the response), but I made some good friends in that class.
- whimsicalism 5y agoThis is interesting. I studied physics at Harvard with many of the best of the best, there were a few from Romania. I would be surprised if those people could be solving AP Physics C problems by 8th grade. 1 & 2, easily of course, but C is quite different. If you found calculus BC hard-ish and physics easy in comparison, I think you were taking 1 & 2 as C was much harder. SAT II physics is a joke. Virginia probably has some of the best STEM education in the entire country, at least the northern bit. Certainly better than what you can get at most schools outside of some in California, the boarding schools, and NYC magnets.
- seer 5y agoNot op, but I remember what got me into sciences was the “kids soviet encyclopedia”. Specifically the physics section. We had “big soviet encyclopedia” and “kid” one on our bookshelf (A point of pride for my grandparents). Nobody told me that by “kids” the authors meant “teens”, so around 13yo I devoured those books whole. Taught me structure of the atom, chemistry and lots of fascinating physical phenomena. And made most of the physics material easy to grasp up till last HS grade. It had little maths, concentrating more on the understanding rather than the rigorous descriptions, which made the maths to describe them quite obvious, when I had to learn them in school. Not sure if the current state of wikipedia is better or worse for that purpose- it was much better structured and paced for sure.
- 5y ago