I ask her if she knew how much the schools in CA got from the government. She didnt know. I asked if she thought we should cut education and she said no because the government has already cut so much that the school already has almost nothing left that they can cut. When I told her that CA spends 97 billion per year on education, she told me "Yes, but most of that is spent on staff" Then I asked the magic question. How much does the government give for each student per day? She told me about $40. I said, so $40 dollars times 30 students and each class is getting $1,200 per day. I'm guessing you are not paying the teacher anywhere near that. She laughed and cited "alot goes to administration which is technically staff" After she told me that the school had nothing left they can cut, I kid you not, the very next day, I found out that the school hired a musician to come to the school and play for the kids for an hour. When I said "What the heck?" They said "Oh studies have been done that show that kids learn better when they are exposed to music. I said "Oh right...good job then because kids really have NO access to music when they are outside of school" This is just another reason I think we should cut more money out of education. They are wasting it on things not needed. They do these "studies" that supposed show kids doing better if this or that happens, but I get a feeling those studies are done just as an excuse to get more money from the government. I know many of you say, we cant cut education because our kids will be dumb, but thats not true. They will still get exactly the same education, just that more of the fat will have to get cut.
<object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/UawUHbKCzws&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/UawUHbKCzws&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object> <object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/viGBUCVe7-4&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/viGBUCVe7-4&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object> <object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/ZuQHNwch-eA&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/ZuQHNwch-eA&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object> <object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/iwSWl8pxKx4&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/iwSWl8pxKx4&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>
I only watched the first 2 but thats some excellent reporting. I think all parents should get to choose whatever school they want their kids to go to and I think all schools should be privatized and the government could pay half of what they pay now (or what the video said that they spend 1/3rd what the public school did) The schools that fail go out of business and the successful ones grow. This would be great for our educational system and it would save our government a ton of money. The owner of the school has some skin in the game so he wants to make sure it successful.
What does it cost the taxpayer to have one soldier per day? Shouldn't we be spending as much on educating our children as we do in keeping a military force? Ignorance of a mass scale will destroy out society faster than any other weapons of mass destruction out there...
Typical tired rhetoric of a socialist. What about the amount of money being spend on staff. When not cut 50% of the staff ( non teachers) and give that money to the soliders or the taxpayers.
In your estimation, is education valued by the Japanese? Would you be happy if we followed a Japanese like education model?
I think the problem is not the $ but the discipline. 1) Have a dress code till college. 2) Allow teachers to whack kids with long rulers and break up fights. 3) Allow principles to expel kids for not following the rules, including being quiet in class, not harassing other students, and showing up for class. 4) Teach useful skills in high school since not every student is going to go to college, and even most colleges don't teach anything useful so work with local businesses for both high school and college to be able to train students to do the work these businesses require instead of importing foreign workers. I would also include mentoring programs where students could work in these businesses for school credit. Before doing IT work, I did a little substitute teaching. One of the schools I taught at you had to go through a metal detector, 1/2 the students were dressed in gang colors. In another, one day a fight broke out in the class, I did stop it, but not sure if that was against school policy. Oh, and yea, many students did not want to learn anything even when I taught in private school. Trust me from what I heard from Japanese and other country schools its the exact opposite, which is why many students are not learning enough to go forward in the job market.
I don't know about the whacking kids. I think what would be more important is for the parents to discipline the kids and backup the teachers and schools 100%. It falls on the parents to enforce the law, not the teachers. Kids have to know that they are going to get in serious trouble with the parents if they screw up in school. Also, elimination of co-educational system would probably allow for more focus in the teenage years...
I don't know about the whacking kids. ---------------------- Here's the problem with whacking the kids in school or whacking kids in general. (If the kid gets whacked at home to comply) Let's say in home A, the kid gets 5 whacks and home B the kid needs a good 10 whacks or so to comply. Now when the kid gets to school, how many whacks do we give the kid in home A and home B, since we can't possible know how many are needed. In both instances, 3 whacks won't work, so we'll try 5, then 10. Whatever the number, the point is are we ready to move up to the level is necessary to get kids to comply, if not, the discipline is pointless.