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> As we look at ways to improve and update educational systems, does it still make sense to have kids grouped by age rather than by their level of intelligence?

by lutusp 13y ago

> As we look at ways to improve and update educational systems, does it still make sense to have kids grouped by age rather than by their level of intelligence? You need to learn how democracies work, and learn the political implications that accompany ranking people by intelligence. First, intelligence is a very poor social measure -- it's an unreliable gauge, it has been abused countless times for political ends, and it's not well understood. Read "The Mismeasure of Man" by Stephen Jay Gould to find out why. Second, even if IQ testing were reliable, it would still be politically unacceptable to rank people by IQ -- I mean, more than we already do. Certainly not in public schools -- can you think of why? People with different IQs pay the same tax rate -- intelligent people aren't taxed at a different rate. And public schools are run on tax revenues. Given that, would it seem fair to tax everyone at the same rate, but then spend more school tax dollars on intelligent kids than average ones? The final reason is because a democracy like this one tries to honor the principle of equal opportunity. Equal opportunity means the same treatment for everyone, regardless of personal differences including IQ. How people turn out depends on their differences. But how they are treated in school cannot pay attention to those differences without abandoning democratic principles. So, little or no attention paid to IQ, in the early grades, in public school. In college, especially privately funded ones, different story. And in adult employment, completely different -- there the rules are different. We're all unequal, in a bunch of ways including IQ. But in school we should be assured equality of opportunity.

vdaniuk 13y ago
Well, one could always argue that current educational system is much less effective for those with lower IQ and therefore in school only the semblance of equality is assured. This is evidenced by the number of children failing high school. Approximate figures are: 25% for US, 5% for wealthy northern european countries
- lutusp 13y ago
  > Well, one could always argue that current educational system is much less effective for those with lower IQ and therefore in school only the semblance of equality is assured. Actually, because of special education programs, those with both lower and higher IQs than the average get more attention than in the older system, which tended to focus on the average student. But for reasons I gave earlier there's an effort to maintain balance between resources expended for those above, ad below, the mean. This effort isn't always successful -- I'm speaking of a principle that isn't always a fact. > This is evidenced by the number of children failing high school. Approximate figures are: 25% for US, 5% for wealthy northern european countries. That's true but low IQ isn't necessarily the reason. There are other reasons -- a lax attitude toward education, anti-intellectualism in society as a whole, poor social discipline, and others. There are some results suggesting that bright kids drop out of school at high rates -- almost as high as the average dropout rate -- unfortunately the data aren't very reliable. This study (PDF warning): http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1356&context=doctoral http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?articl... Says: "Out of all high school dropouts, as many as 20% of them may be gifted (Renzulli & Park, 2000);" If that were true, then the gifted dropout rate almost equals that for average kids. But when we read the referenced article (PDF warning): http://www.sagepub.com/bjohnsonstudy/articles/Renzulli.pdf http://www.sagepub.com/bjohnsonstudy/articles/Renzulli.pdf We don't see the quoted figure, only references to other sources for a figure near 20%, but nothing reliable. I say this because I don't like throwing figures around that have no reliable basis. All I can say is there seems to be some anecdotal evidence that bright kids drop out in numbers nearly as high as average kids. There's another way to approach this -- we can look at adult achievement, although the link with IQ is problematical. Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, and many other well-known figures in society are (a) evidently gifted, and (b) dropouts from high school or college. I have to say I was surprised to discover there's no readily available, reliable IQ breakdown for dropouts. There are a huge number of psychologists, many unemployed or underemployed ... http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/09/10/219372252/the-most-and-least-lucrative-college-majors-in-1-graph http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/09/10/219372252/the-most... ... many of them studying really silly things, but none of them have taken this issue on, in spite of its importance. But I don't think the case can be made that those to the left of the IQ average are being unfairly treated, compared to the average or the gifted. I think they're all being treated equally badly. :)
brianchu 13y ago
Students in public schools are routinely ranked by intelligence. There's the entire concept of "class rank," in which students are in fact put in ranks by their GPA (a proxy for intelligence) and from which a valedictorian is chosen. Then there are standardized tests, which are fairly analogous to IQ tests. I think it's a rather serious overreach/stretch to link this to the broader workings of democracy.
- throwaway344 13y ago
  The difference from GPA/Standardized Tests is pretty clear. As those metrics are used inside the age group, competing exclusively with people born within a year or so of them.