3 ms·

> to the top N people in the state, with N being decided by the payers (i.e. democratic electorate). I don't know how it works in the EU, but one issue I see w

> to the top N people in the state, with N being decided by the payers (i.e. democratic electorate). I don't know how it works in the EU, but one issue I see with that it has the danger of permanently locking people who grow up with worse early/middle/high school education into their socioeconomic status, i.e. it would prevent social mobility for those with less resources. Unless public schooling standards prior to college are also improved, limiting higher education to "top N%" students ensures entrenched socioeconomic inequity. I think there is already enough class-based discontent, and making it worse via limiting (one of the few) means of social mobility wouldn't help, I think.

SoftTalker 3y ago
In many (most?) EU contries, kids are evaluated and steered into vocational/trades or college-bound tracks at about middle-school age. College/university education may be free or close to it, but not everyone can go. EU approaches to education are more likely to lock you into your socieoeconmic status than those in the USA, where if you are smart but poor you will have schools falling over themselves to recruit you so their enrollment stats for "underserved" students look better.
- em-bee 3y ago
  are you sure? how many poor people in the US do actually get into college? i doubt that the number of poor european students that fail to qualify for college is higher than the number of poor students in the US that fail to qualify there. but i don't think we can find a good answer without looking at statistics.
toast0 3y ago
You could do top N% (round up) of each high school in the state as a first approximation and capture a lot of socioeconomic diversity, since there's (at least currently) a lot of clustering of poor kids at some schools rich kids at others. You've also got to have a second option. If you don't qualify for the state school scholarship based on high school grades or maybe alternate qualifiers like test scores, then community college is still an option, and when you graduate from that with an approved program, it should qualify you for state school. Maybe something something GI bill, although dangling college as a hook to get people into the military feels icky to me somehow.

SoftTalker 3y ago

In many (most?) EU contries, kids are evaluated and steered into vocational/trades or college-bound tracks at about middle-school age. College/university education may be free or close to it, but not everyone can go. EU approaches to education are more likely to lock you into your socieoeconmic status than those in the USA, where if you are smart but poor you will have schools falling over themselves to recruit you so their enrollment stats for "underserved" students look better.

em-bee 3y ago
are you sure? how many poor people in the US do actually get into college? i doubt that the number of poor european students that fail to qualify for college is higher than the number of poor students in the US that fail to qualify there. but i don't think we can find a good answer without looking at statistics.

toast0 3y ago

You could do top N% (round up) of each high school in the state as a first approximation and capture a lot of socioeconomic diversity, since there's (at least currently) a lot of clustering of poor kids at some schools rich kids at others. You've also got to have a second option. If you don't qualify for the state school scholarship based on high school grades or maybe alternate qualifiers like test scores, then community college is still an option, and when you graduate from that with an approved program, it should qualify you for state school. Maybe something something GI bill, although dangling college as a hook to get people into the military feels icky to me somehow.