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The Case For Lower Academic Standards
In any discussion of education reform, it’s only a matter of time before someone says we need to raise standards. It’s become such a commonplace suggestion that people repeat it without giving it any thought. Regardless, it’s being put into practice; many states, for example, now require Algebra II for graduation. Well, here is an inconvenient fact that seems to have escaped the notice of most reformers: Half of the students are below average — well, technically, below median — in academic ability. Those below-average students will not learn Algebra I, much less Algebra II. (Some of them may pass, but that is an altogether different proposition.)
And it’s not just algebra. Below-average students are not going to figure out the theme of Great Expectations, nor will they be able to explain complex metabolic processes in detail. Telling them that failure to do so should sentence them to a lifetime of poverty is an act of cruelty. This is why we should lower academic standards.
Or, rather, have more flexible standards that account for varying levels and kinds of ability. All but the least-talented should be able to write a simple paragraph that is clear in meaning and reasonably free of errors. They should be able to do the basic arithmetic that comes up in everyday life, including the ability to balance a checkbook and figure a percentage. They should have a basic understanding of how to interpret graphs and charts. They should know basic facts about science necessary to make better choices regarding health and public policy. They should know the basics of history and government necessary to citizenship. Their time in school should be spent on mastering these and similar matters, rather than having them pretend to read Paradise Lost or trying (and failing) to prove a theorem. And once they master these skills, they should be able to opt-out of school with no stigma to pursue vocational training or take a job.
An enormous amount of time in high school is spent trying to teach below-average students skills that will not be useful to them or that are simply beyond their reach. It serves only to render school a place of daily humiliation and misallocates significantresources. Reserve those resources for students that can benefit from them and let the others get on with their lives.
Published in Education
Streaming. Different streams of subject matter for different streams of student ability.
I think what you really want to say is, “Let’s offer more degrees.”
A diploma should represent its accomplishments. I have a BA in Mass Media and Communications. In presenting that fact, I am never asked to calculate payloads, thrust components or undertake surgical repair of an aorta.
But we only offer one high school diploma. To an employer it should mean that you can spell reasonably and construct understandable English sentences and paragraphs and that you can calculate percentages and do rudimentary math.
Since we’re talking about math standards, allow me to be the obnoxious know-it-all who points out that it is not necessarily true that half of the students are below average. Half of the students are below the median.
Otherwise, I agree entirely with your post. The goal of education should not be to force everyone to meet an unreachable goal, it should be to increase the knowledge and skills of an individual student to the most feasible extent possible for that individual.
I dislike Michael Moore, but watch his movies anyway; his latest movie included a portion devoted to education in Finland. Apparently, Finland used to rank about the same as the U.S. in education; their rise to the top is fairly recent. They attributed their success in part to short school days and no homework. They said they improved their education system by adopting American ideas, which I assume means that one or a handful of Americans came up with these ideas and Finland decided to try them. It is interesting, though, that their test scores went up when they made the kids work less and tried a different approach.
Also, teachers in Finland require a Masters degree, minimum.
Not so in the USA.
That’s because of what they won’t say or not allowed to say. The Finns bragging are like the boasts of people in Utah. If you have a fairly homogenous population and culture it’s easy to accomplish.
If you take a multicultural population and tell one fourth of them the educational system is biased against them and trying to rob them of their culture then no scheme you come up with will have any measurable success.
I have much confidence in the ability of the “average” student to accomplish a great many things. One of the main problems is that of motivation. Students are too busy breaking into the school wifi so they can continue their “Clash of Clans” saga to care about interpreting Great Expectations.
Another problem is home life with parents in survival mode and/or not attuned to books and academic riches. Students with barren home lives with not much to fuel conversation around the dinner table have a harder time caring about academics.
There are a lot of sharp kids out there. We don’t give up on them; we find a way to help them care. I’m not against streaming, but I am against applying the bell curve as the OP recommends.
Yes, and yes.
If it’s a Masters in “Education”, who cares?
I had to take a bunch of Education courses to be able to teach, ironically, an electrical wiring program at BOCES.
[insert head shake]
Precisely.
Yes. We should have different diplomas for different levels of accomplishiment.
I figured someone would point that out, but I thought it a bit less clunky to say average, especially since in a large, normally distributed population the mean and median end up being the same for practical purposes.
But :) Finland hasn’t always been at the top in terms of education; their position as number one is fairly recent. What with charter schools and private schools, wouldn’t it be possible for one or a few schools in America to try what Finland is doing and see if it works here?
According to this article, only one-in-ten teacher applicants in Finland make the cut.
How many school boards in the USA take pretty much anybody they can get?
I like a lot of what they do in Finland, such as not starting kindergarten (what they call preschool) until the kids are six, and even then it is play-focused rather than academic. They don’t try to teach the kids to read until later (except for those few who are ready early).
Education levels of teachers matter little. Communication skills of teachers matter far more.
I don’t suggest giving up on anyone. I think everyone should be educated to the limits of his ability. The fact remains some kids are smarter than others and therefore have different educational needs and opportunities. Not fair of course, but who expects the world to be fair? (Rhetorical question.)
Population characteristics play a role (perhaps the defining role):
“…A Scandinavian economist once said to Milton Friedman, ‘In Scandinavia, we have no poverty’. Milton Friedman replied, ‘That’s interesting, because in America, among Scandinavians, we have no poverty, either’.” – Cato
Yes, all students are different. And there are faster, more advanced students.
But “limits of his ability” is a nebulous standard. When I teach a lesson, be it to a lower or higher performing group, or a mixed one, I do it confident that the whole class* will be able to grasp the material and respond accordingly. Otherwise, why am I wasting my time–and expending considerable energy?
*with one or two exceptions whose needs are being met through a specialized program
It’s important to remember that school is often useful for more than just knowledge. It may also impart the useful skills of discipline, work ethic, self-control, respect, and many others.
I think the success of approaches like Finland’s depend very much on whether or not kids are getting the above lessons at home. For a child growing up in a family which reads to their kids, has a structured (and somewhat quiet) dinner at the table, has each child take on a few chores, etc., there is little need for early schooling to teach them these skills.
But for kids raised by single working parents whose early childhood consists of sitting in front of a TV or playing with siblings, getting an early start on the uncomfortable social skills might make all the difference later in life.
The problem of kids who have the ability to do higher level work, but lack the motivation is a separate problem, but also important. We probably need a track for them to, but with higher level learning focused on more practical career preparation rather than college prep.
On the other hand I have run into biology teachers that were not remotely competent scientists or biologists. Hard to teach something you don’t really understand. Of course understanding something doesn’t mean you can communicate it effectively either. But, if all you can do is communicate then you have a very hard cap on the amount of knowledge you can impart to people.
In my view one of the problems with Highschool is that there is really very little depth to the whole thing. Setting high standards is often just setting up a reason for grade inflation. It is not actually providing students with the ability to delve further into a topic.
Pick any discipline and the level of scholarship and study that can be done is nearly limitless. This does not become apparent until probably collage. Education should focus on helping someone achieve a profound level of mastery and knowledge on a particular subject of their interest/competence.
Not everyone has to be able to do calculus, but certainly everyone can become skilled and knowledgeable in something. That isn’t really an option for anyone in high-school. Mile wide, inch deep.
What’s possible and what’s probable is two entirely different things.
True, but I’d still like to see less focus on academics for the younger kids. The average boy isn’t ready to read until about age seven; forcing reading instruction on a kid that isn’t ready does far more harm than good. Preschool should be about learning to get along and to control impulses. The academic stuff can wait until later. For almost any academic task–reading, algebra, whatever–it’s better late than early.
Having administered thousands of IQ tests as part of neuropsych assessments, there are two things I know about kids education and cognitive capacity:
I think the issue with practical career prep is that it is a moving target. The traditional scholastic idea/ideal is about learning a set of broad skills that can be applied to a narrow field to achieve specific mastery. Really what people have to be taught is shown how they can learn and develop such abilities.
It is not so much important that any one student learns the periodic table (for example), but that they learn that they can indeed master such kind of knowledge if they have to. You can’t really know what skills will or wont be in demand because that changes all the time. The idea of education is to teach people how to acquire specialized skills. The only way to teach them this is by helping them actually do this. Rather than giving them introductory lessons on everything.
Lack of a rich home life as described above explains the under performance of many children, not brains or ability. The Matthew Effect:
Home life can be the root of motivation and behavior problems, too.
I spent several years as a technical trainer and I saw guys who had just learned their topics and who knew little beyond the course content do a fantastic job because they had great communication skills. I saw a lot more instructors with a lot of experience in the field and deep knowledge of the field who were totally ineffective in the classroom. Obviously a combination of the two is best, but if I have to choose I’m going with the communicator. And that was borne out in our business. Students in classes with good communicators came back for other courses. Students in the others did not. There is a threshold of knowledge that is necessary–you have to know the course content–but beyond that it doesn’t matter a whole lot in my experience.
It also depends on who your students are. If they are advanced students looking to extend their knowledge they need an instructor with more knowledge. Someone learning the more basic stuff needs someone who can explain things very clearly.
Yep!