Schools with varying degrees of funding.

Ok, here's what I don't understand. I heard in the last thread that how much money each school recieves depends on surrounding housing values. This strikes me as so much bullshit. Surely you should get a certain sum of money for the base operating requirements to run a school plus a certain amount for every student (to calibrate for smaller and larger schools) so as to give all schools equal funding?

It sounds like, hearing comments like that, that schools are deliberately weighted against people in poor neighbourhoods. I've heard this before, but this time it prompted me to actually grumble about it.

Oh yeah, it's monumentally fucked up. There should be a national board that gives funding proportional to size and student body, and perhaps a little extra for better test scores or something to encourage competition among the schools for better education. But the US hates national anything, and even the state governments can't be bothered to devise a sane and fair system. There would be outcry if people pushed for a system like that now, because the real estate market would get screwed up, since "great school" is one of the biggest selling points they have. I still think there should be an overhaul though. A few years of messed up markets would be offset by better education and better opportunities for the poor everywhere, as well as better paychecks for inner city schoolteachers, which would encourage better teaching and less apathy.

Wait, wouldn't it still be possible to have a Great School(TM) under such a system? if an inner city school got more funding and became better, it would become a Great School(TM) attracting more people, right?

So... all this inequality and civil strife and the rest over... housing prices... well I only have one thing to say to the politicians and their supporters who have allowed this.

Get your fucking acts together. There should have been marches on the fecking capitol over this.

@Enkufka: But the thing is, poor neighborhoods get bad funding, so they don't have Great Schools, and thus, no one moves to those poor neighborhoods to infuse them with capital, and thus, they stay poor and continue to have Not Great Schools. The school system is handled by district/county, not the state or national government. Only the taxes from that district or county go to fund the schools, so obviously poor neighborhoods get poor schools.

Oh, I totally agree with the idea of schools funding being tied into the property values as totally screwy. The quality of the housing your parents can afford affects which school you can go to... which affects your education and ability to get into a good college, get a good job, etc.

Really, even social-net averse Republicans all about pulling yourself up by your bootstraps should be for equalizing education. Because if everyone's education is around the same quality, it's the kids who are willing to work hard for those A's which should have the advantage.

Why don't politicians ever touch these topics?

I mean, I live in a fairly rich neighborhood, and we're complaining about budget cuts even though we have a really nice campus and good teachers. The people who are really suffering due to the lack of funds don't even have a voice to complain. Sure, the GOP will balk at the idea of a Federal education system, but at least make it at the state level. Even liberal California does nothing of the sort.

@Chainsaw: Its all part of the same logic as No Child Left Behind.

Namely. It certainly couldnt be that mismanaged funding on our parts and absolutely crushing the ability of teachers to teach students in a way tailored to their students while overcrowding them and underfunding them is whats causing poor schools to faail, No, it must be that theyre just lazy bastards. if we take away money from them, maybe theyll work harder.

@OTOH: I meant that under a system where school funding is not tied to property taxes.

What does the No child left behind do because what I've seen from American TV shows it cuts funding from the poor schools because they have kids full of thickies.

It requires standardized tests from all schools, and bases funding on those scores. Net result, schools teach how to take tests, not how to think. Schools which don't perform well get less funding.

When in reality they should be getting more funding so they can afford to pay more competent, caring teachers.

Its essentially "if you fail this standardized test, we give you even less funding because this will somehow force you to teach better"

It's an all-stick-no-carrot approach, which has been shown not to work time and time again.

Lack of funding = bad teachers. Bad teachers = insufficient education. Insufficient education = cuts in funding.

See the cycle?

edited 2nd Aug '11 1:40:15 PM by DrunkGirlfriend

And the logic behind it is basically 'well, throwing money at it willy nilly didnt work so maybe cutting money from it will make it worjk"

It also doesn't help that even good teachers are paid peanuts by the public school system, and that most people with a degree in education tend to either go on to teach higher education, or to seek out private schools. Nobody wants to get paid slightly more than minimum wage eight months out of the year (teachers traditionally don't get paid over the breaks, but since they're never technically lose their job, they don't qualify for unemployment) to do a thankless job.

Yep. I dont plan to teach, but I can assure you, if I decide eventually to use my art degrees to teach, It['ll be at a college level where the pay isnt awful.

Finland's system is great, although there are some problems with scaling it up this much. They require every teacher to have a master's degree, make teaching a highly prestigious and lucrative job, and then once they've produced these great teachers, they quite meddling and let them do what they do best. Its kids have fewer hours in school, less homework, and still, the best international test scores.

Homework is usually nothing more than busywork over here. Stuff like worksheets and other stuff that's nothing more than rote memorization.

Yep. Decent education doesnt start till college in the US, really. And even then, only if you want to learn. A lot of kids hit college, realize theyre expected to think critically instead of absorb propaganda and talking points, get mad, and fail out.

I don't know about that actually. A lot of US colleges seem to blow money on private ventures and whatnot instead of quality education. A lot of college curriculum is extremely iffy.

I find that the most significant problem, outside of funding, is that people lay their blame on teachers whenever something goes wrong and will sit there and turn it into a session of "i hate teacher unions" and "i love unions", instead of solving anything.

Beyond that, I think states should fund schools to equalise the playing field. Then federal money should be used to then equalise the states.

It'd be nice if the US adopted a system like this. Less fuckwits trying to get a job they think they can't be fired from.

A lot of problems with schools involves a too large standardized mandatory component, with a too small of a selectable criteria. And not enough speed changing courses at early levels. Or a "pass and quit" requirement for the mandatory courses.

Nonetheless, its far less iffy than the public system. The local public system up to graduation made you rotely memorize dates and names in american history, along with hilariously patriotic versions of history. cultural and socioeconomic actions of other countries were completely glossed over.

My english class up through senior year similarly kept harping on grammar and so forth instead of getting to the meat of literature and composition.

Math was rote memorization with barely any explanation.

Science was usually the only field where the teachers made any effort to try and make the material fun and informative.

It'd also help if curriculum could be tailored to the student. I'd imagine I would have enjoyed much more complicated and in depth classes on history or economics and art/theatre and music in highschool. You woulda likely loved more engineering focus and whatnot.

Instead of the current system where its basically "okay. heres all your core shit. and heres one throwaway class on any topic you may want to pursue in life"

edited 2nd Aug '11 3:47:54 PM by Midgetsnowman

I am constantly grateful that my school offers AP courses with competetent teachers - you get a much more balanced view of history, and books like A People's History of the United States are used.

Honestly, while a lot of the US public school system is screwed up, I think it comes down to funding and No Child Left Behind. Good neighborhoods do have good schools - that just needs to be spread to the rest of the country. And it would be nice if regular classes adopted the critical thinking mentality of AP classes, and just leveled down the amount of stuff covered and the difficulty of the work. What I like best about AP is the attitude, really.

I'm not sure how tailor made you can make a curriculum. You need a certain level of interchangeability for things like moving to a different school and accreditation.

Most of arithmetic is rote memorization for a reason. Proofs look like this. Teaching how the tools work is pretty much the only purpose of it.