South Korea is the Bizarro World's United States
Bizarro World, as fans of DC Comics know, is just like our world. But backwards.
Sort of like South Korea. Which is just like the United States. But backwards. From BusinessWeek:
On June 14, President Lee Myung Bak’s government announced it would recommend that Korea’s schools end the Saturday classes, a feature of school life since the 1950s. Most schools now hold classes for four hours on two Saturdays a month. President Lee wants Koreans to consume more, and he hopes to wean the school system off its obsession with standardized tests. He figures giving kids and families the weekend off would help achieve both goals.
Study less. Consume more. And how do parents and kids feel about it? Well, just think about how they'd feel about it here, and then imagine the opposite:
Chung Eunjung, a mother of two sons in Seoul, says South Korea’s plan to give children extra playtime by ending Saturday classes means only one thing: more private tutoring.
Don’t expect the playgrounds to fill up with liberated kids, though. “It would be a brave mother who let them play,” says Chung, who spends $1,700 a month on additional classes. Even the kids sound focused. Eleven-year-old Charlie Lee takes 15 hours of cram courses in English and math every week. “I like those classes,” he says. “I can meet my friends and play with them.”
Just another reason why East Asian kids outperform American kids, especially in math and science. We've long comforted ourselves that it's all about "creative" knowledge or "free expression." But the future belongs to the engineers and the scientists. Not to the consumers.
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Jan '11
Re: South Korea is the Bizarro World's United States
Looks like they'll be consuming more private tutoring, so everybody wins.
Sep '10
Re: South Korea is the Bizarro World's United States
Science and engineering are creative enterprises. It is exactly there that Asian cultures tend to lag. This is not to say they it will always be so. But so far, the meme has held up well. Witness the 'Japan will take over the world' scare of c. 1990. What happened to Japan in the 90s? Pride goeth before the fall.
Education is more about quality that it is about quantity. Kids spend more than enough time in the schoolroom as it is. Adding more hours to the school year is not going to help. One of my high school teachers used to say that all of K-12 could be condensed into about half the time if the time were better spent. I'd add to that: get teachers from a group other than the bottom of their graduating college classes. More time in class just means more time wasted.
How to secure this improvement? It's not clear, but charter schools show some promise. Look to that model for ideas. My thought, rarely expressed in public, is that the educational system needs to be razed so we can start over without all its pernicious baggage.
Sep '10
Re: South Korea is the Bizarro World's United States
Science and engineering are creative enterprises. It is exactly there that Asian cultures tend to lag. This is not to say they it will always be so. But so far, the meme has held up well. Witness the 'Japan will take over the world' scare of c. 1990. What happened to Japan in the 90s? Pride goeth before the fall.
Education is more about quality that it is about quantity. Kids spend more than enough time in the schoolroom as it is. Adding more hours to the school year is not going to help. One of my high school teachers used to say that all of K-12 could be condensed into about half the time if the time were better spent. I'd add to that: get teachers from a group other than the bottom of their graduating college classes. More time in class just means more time wasted.
How to secure this improvement? It's not clear, but charter schools show some promise. Look to that model for ideas. My thought, rarely expressed in public, is that the educational system needs to be razed so we can start over without all its pernicious baggage.
Apr '11
Re: South Korea is the Bizarro World's United States
Not to knock on Asia scientists, but I have met many in my day. Not well established people with Labs, but the ones that come over to get PhDs or be post-Docs, and even some techs... They are all hard working, but the percent who are truly innovative scientist did not seem to me to be any higher then among American/European born and educated. I think there are plenty of reasons to fear that our education system is making people lazy, but its not making us less smart. Plus most of ones who are great innovative scientists still come here to work.
I think they get more education then us because unlike Americans they have to be proficient in English to succeed in science. We don't have to be proficient in Korean, Chinese or Japanese. If we did I think more Americans would spend time taking extra classes too.
Sep '10
Re: South Korea is the Bizarro World's United States
I've had experiences similar to Valiuth relates, and also with folks educated in India. Their higher education systems are still not of the caliber of ours, which is why the best come here to study. Our best students are still among the best in the world, in spite of the mediocre average performance. No single statistic encompasses the variety found in the US, from abysmal to superb.
For further insight, see this article in the Economist:
http://www.economist.com/node/18898286?story_id=18898286
May '10
Re: South Korea is the Bizarro World's United States
Rob, as drlorentz pointed out, don't underestimate the creativity required to be a good engineer. The whole point of engineering is coming up with novel ways to do new things within the constraints of reality.
Find the most innovative object in your house. It was created by engineers. Not only that, but the machines that made it were also created by engineers, and the machines that made those machines.
Mar '11
Re: South Korea is the Bizarro World's United States
Rob;
"Just another reason why East Asian kids outperform American kids, especially in math and science. We've long comforted ourselves that it's all about "creative" knowledge or "free expression." But the future belongs to the engineers and the scientists. Not to the consumers."
<Sigh> The science & engineering deficiency angle was the thrust of the post on the shuttle I did the other day. Re-reading it in the light of day, I realize that I should not be writing anything in the wee hours of the morning. Conciseness is not one of my strong suits, and probably had everyone's eyes rolling in boredom getting to the point. Mark (the continuity of invention to those who can see it) & drlorentz (inspiration & creativity of cracking the technological nut) did it more succinctly.
Edited on Jul 12, 2011 at 8:48am