Old 02-8-2006, 10:15 AM   #1
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Default The Aims of Education -- Skewed Too Far

Culture is activity of thought, and receptiveness to beauty and humane feeling. Scraps of information have nothing to do with it. A merely well-informed man is the most useless bore on God's earth. What we should aim at producing is men who possess both culture and expert knowledge in some special direction. Their expert knowledge will give them the ground to start from, and their culture will lead them as deep as philosophy and as high as art. We have to remember that the valuable intellectual development is self development, and that it mostly takes place between the ages of sixteen and thirty. As to training, the most important part is given by mothers before the age of twelve. A saying due to Archbishop Temple illustrates my meaning. Surprise was expressed at the success in after-life of a man, who as a boy at Rugby had been somewhat undistinguished. He answered, "It is not what they are at eighteen, it is what they become afterwards that matters."

In training a child to activity of thought, above all things we must beware of what I will call "inert ideas" -- that is to say, ideas that are merely received into the mind without being utilised, or tested, or thrown into fresh combinations.

In the history of education, the most striking phenomenon is that schools of learning, which at one epoch are alive with a ferment of genius, in a succeeding generation exhibit merely pedantry and routine. The reason is, that they are overladen with inert ideas. Education with inert ideas is not only useless: it is, above all things, harmful -- Corruptio optimi, pessima. Except at rare intervals of intellectual ferment, education in the past has been radically infected with inert ideas. That is the reason why uneducated clever women, who have seen much of the world, are in middle life so much the most cultured part of the community. They have been saved from this horrible burden of inert ideas. Every intellectual revolution which has ever stirred humanity into greatness has been a passionate protest against inert ideas. Then, alas, with pathetic ignorance of human psychology, it has proceeded by some educational scheme to bind humanity afresh with inert ideas of its own fashioning.

(Taken from Alfred North Whitehead's 'Aims of Education' 1929)


Funny, isn't it? I think people need to start taking a look at this type of thing and figuring out whether or not we're accomplishing the true purpose of education. Grades are given based upon what is known -- rarely how it is applied. Most of my classes are conducted in this fashion, and I feel the need to express my views on such a problem. As a result, this essay -- a rant, as it may be -- will address issues currently circulating in many educational systems.

Firsly, the issue of quantity versus quality. As far as personal experience goes, I have only one instructor with a skewed viewpoint on such a subject. We're expected to answer questions "on one full side" of a sheet of paper. If the response doesn't fill up the entire page, we're given a lower grade. As a result, twenty-two lines of senseless rambling often recieves a higher grade than twelve lines of a well-thought-out and honest answer. To make the problem worse, many of the questions asked are entirely ambiguous, making them nigh on impossible to completely answer. Work should be graded on how well a response is thought out -- certainly not on how much one can write out before his wrist hurts.

A second problem: general incompetence. I myself have experienced instructors who are not worthy of the title they hold. While their class structure is generally good, and their grading system is at least decent, there is no respect for them in the classroom. They simply do not possess the social skills -- or, in some cases, the intellectual competencies -- to keep an educational setting. In personal experience, when a teacher does not teach -- rather, he explores physics problems with the students -- then he has no right to teach.

The final problem is the basis of the material covered within a school setting. Therein lies the problem: it is covered, but never applied. Students are tested often on what they can remember -- their memorization skills and nothing more. This is the biggest problem in schooling. Granted, subjects such as history cannot be taught in any other way. However, English, mathematics, and science classes should be applied before the course is completed. It's only in this way that the student can truly learn to utilize the facts that they have learned. Otherwise, it's nothing more than a recital. To the credit of my mathematics teacher, everything we are taught is applied shortly afterwards, and continues to be applied. That is, though, the nature of mathematics.

Such are the problems with modern schooling. It is why we, as humans, do not develop quickly. We are too weighted down in "fact" that we fail to explore new territories. Therefore, I ask you to inspect yourselves as well as your instructors. Be sure they understand their duty to the next generation. Do not let yourself be corrupted by motionless and lifeless fact.
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Old 02-8-2006, 01:19 PM   #2
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Excellent points. Well written too.

I have to agree with you on nearly every level. It drives me mad sometimes; the horrible quality of our education at times and the direction it's going. It has become obsessed with a quantifiable grading system where the grade is everything...or, that is more or less the reality constructed around you, where as the real fact of the matter is grades more often than not paint a horrible picture of one's abilities, and are often destructive to students. We're not being bred to be thinkers and people that can go beyond the box; we're bred as machines. Memorize memorize and do exactly what you're told! I realize we're a capitalist society, but the system still sucks XD

Also, the teacher comment...yes, I cannot stand teachers that do not know how to teach. But sadly half of the teachers I get it seems, especially in the harder science subjects, are absolutely horrible teachers XD
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Old 02-8-2006, 02:14 PM   #3
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I think an excellent example of this can be found in my current Chemistry class. It's meant to be taught over a trimester, but apparently the administrators didn't want us to have a free period... so they forced our teacher to stretch it out over three trimesters. Thus, we never do ANYTHING in that class and we all just play games on our computer while the teacher (who, despite being very nice, is totally unable to do what she has been told to) talks about random stuff. I get 100s without even paying attention to anything, because the tests cover so little material.

Of course, I am at a private school now, so things are significantly better off than they were last year. Public schools are nothing more than dumping grounds for the incompetent, both teacher and student-wise. I had one really great teacher last year, but all of the others were terrible (one was fired halfway through the year for failing everyone for no reason). There were maybe 10% of people per grade that even cared about school. Truly deplorable.
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Old 02-8-2006, 02:20 PM   #4
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Still... if there's a better way to change the whole system that would acturlly work, I'd love to hear it. We don't even have it bad at all compared to some other countries. My cousins in China work 5 times harder than I do, and everything they do is based on memorization. Maybe I just go to good school system, but I happen to like most of my teachers and our curriculum.

Either way, school today is alot less about memorization than school was 50 years ago(or in 1929) and teachers are more competent as a whole. I recently read George Orwell's memoir, Such, Such Were the Joys. This issue isn't his main topic, but he does address this problem, but he even notes that there have been improvements since he was in school.

Not that there isn't any room for improvement, of course. You just have to realize how lucky we are to even get the education we are receiving today.
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Old 02-8-2006, 04:31 PM   #5
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In that aspect you are correct esupin...we could be worse off. However, if it wasn't for people like us in the first place it wouldn't have changed to begin with. I don't expect instant results, but I do believe in recognizing problems and improving upon whatever needs to be improved. I don't think much is being done right now about grades, as an alternate system would be very difficult to come up with and implement. Instead, I think even less weight should be put on grades for the time being, both at home and in class. If there were more emphasis on learning - understanding - applying, and less emphasis on getting high grades ...things would improve slowly.

That and more options in class. The school system is currently very confined. There are many resources for those that are challenged...however, (here. as far as I know atlantic canada's education system is pathetic in comparison to what some of you are getting, so this may be cause for increased fustration XD) there are absolutely no resources for those underchallenged. This leads towards hatred for the system in many cases IMO and in the end wastes a lot of potential. This is most prominent in the early years. There are many challenges in University; however, for many there are absolutely none on the road to get there.

I think tests and exams are weighted far too much as well (tests 45% of term and exams 35% of whole mark here). We're so obsessed with test scores as a method of determining what you know. It doesn't work. Oh and, who actually remembers any of the crap they memorized after they leave school? Oh, noone? A more thoughful, flexible education system would produce far more level headed, high end thinkers rather than wasting minds.


I was reading times asia recently and they have a had a lot of problems with their education system and it's being revamped, atleast in korea/japan. So yes, it's a well known problem that asia's school system sucks shit. Though, it seemed to appear as a good thing as their robot's IQ's increased far ahead of the rest of the world...until they were hit with record amounts of drop outs and suicides...and human heads in the mail.
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Old 02-8-2006, 04:56 PM   #6
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My school system must be pretty damn good, then. I don't really have any problems with my school system, except for some minor gripes that don't have to do with education(I guess the only bad thing is that they cut down the classes you can take from 8 to 7). You all should move to my town. We have programs that allow kids to take college courses at UMass or another school if they're already finished all the courses our school teaches(some kids finish all the math courses by the end of Junior year). Our school also subscribes to Virtual High School, which allows us to take courses not available in our school.

I realize many schools are not nearly as endowed as mine, so I guess one problem is the fact that we cannot get enough money for the schools to change and improve.
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Old 02-8-2006, 05:46 PM   #7
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Imbalance in the system is an annoyance as well. There is an imbalance in everything in life, people arn't equal, but the fact is, there are massive imblances in education within countries, and even beyond states/proviences to the different schools within a city. This is annoying. How can Universities even look at your marks with a straight face not knowing what those pretty little numbers/letters really mean? They have no fucking clue what they measure. It varies, there is nothing real it measures. Not even hard work, marks still vary from teacher to teacher for the same amount of work.
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Old 02-9-2006, 03:15 PM   #8
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Default Re: The Aims of Education -- Skewed Too Far

I'm glad you live in the world of the ideal, maybe one day you'll break down and see the schooling process for what it is.

I'll just rebut your last paragraph since it is a summary of what's written above.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Neonatrias
Such are the problems with modern schooling. It is why we, as humans, do not develop quickly.
...What? Oh I see, schooling is the reason we develop slowly not one of the other three million confounding variables inevitably lurking behind your argument.

Quote:
We are too weighted down in "fact" that we fail to explore new territories.
No, not really. I think you've conveniently completely ignored another massive reason that schooling is 'failing': Personal Drive. I've always been a person to love knowledge. Even now, I find myself browsing stuff like set theory and nonlinear algebra on wikipedia even though I still can't understand them; however, I know a lot of other people who don't give a shit about any of that. The process of adding application to "fact" doesn't magically make you explore new territories.

Quote:
Therefore, I ask you to inspect yourselves as well as your instructors. Be sure they understand their duty to the next generation.
"Hey teacher, I don't think you are fulfilling your duty through the manner in which you conduct the class."
"Go to the principal snob."

or

"Hey professor, I don't think you are fulfilling your duty through the manner in which you conduct the class."
"Get out of my fucking class."

Inspect away, but you can't "Be sure they understand their duty." Stop believing in a just world and accept the fact that you will inevitably get shitty teachers.


Quote:
Do not let yourself be corrupted by motionless and lifeless fact.
Fact is most certainly not motionless and lifeless. Maybe you should stop letting yourself get corrupted by the unfounded belief that application somehow defines importance, value, and weight in life.

I mean, I can sure as fuck do a volumetric integral to give you the region contained within an object existing in 2000 dimensions, but where the hell am I going to apply that?
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Old 02-9-2006, 03:21 PM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Reach
Imbalance in the system is an annoyance as well. There is an imbalance in everything in life, people arn't equal, but the fact is, there are massive imblances in education within countries, and even beyond states/proviences to the different schools within a city. This is annoying. How can Universities even look at your marks with a straight face not knowing what those pretty little numbers/letters really mean? They have no #$#ing clue what they measure. It varies, there is nothing real it measures. Not even hard work, marks still vary from teacher to teacher for the same amount of work.
I don't even know why I'm going to explain this because maybe only one or two of you (reach included) have a chance in hell at grasping it, but here goes:

Look at the tiers of education as organic processes. At the top level, you have the government creating the schooling system. As an organic process, the government's ultimate goal is to ensure that it will continue to exist in the future. Therefore, the goal of the government's education system is to mold us in such a manner as to be more congruent with and able to aid the government.

As you descend down the tiers, you can see this process applied to other areas: School districts -> individual schools -> individual teachers. Ultimately, the driving belief behind all of these organic processes is to ensure that it will exist for as long as it can. For the school districts and individual schools it is to generate good marks so as to create a good reputation and continue to receive funding. For individual teachers, it is the same, but also they now start imposing some of their personal beliefs into what they teach so as to make you more congruent with their philosophies (because ultimately, on a grand scale if everyone was congruent with their beliefs they would live in a world more suited to aid them).

So, as you can see, the variability between beliefs and manners to ultimately ensure the existence of the organic process is what leads to the variability in the validity of grades among different teachers, schools, districts, and governments.

Without rigidly imposing some strict global format for how achievement is measured, it is futile to try to standardize marks across societies.
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Old 02-9-2006, 03:54 PM   #10
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Ap makes good points.

The mark thing is fairly obvious...and I already grasp it. Doesn't mean I like it. Not that I don't put up with it, I do well in school, however, everyone likes to rant about how shitty it can be at times. Just another part of the natural process. Unless you like school. There is a major difference between schooling and knowledge. I love knowledge - however, I disliked most of what I was learning in school till around...12th grade.
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Old 02-9-2006, 04:10 PM   #11
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Always the cynic ap...

Both you and Reach are correct in that marks aren't the same between teachers teaching the same class in the same school (best comparison, as they are most closely related) or between schools, or between states, or countries.

But c'mon ap... the reason they aren't the same is that they want to survive? Extremely cynical and definately not a driving factor. Surely at our core, we WANT to keep our jobs. So that works for the teacher... but at the same time, teachers tend to be somewhat unbiased in grades (there are always examples to prove contrary, but lets assume not everyone is as cynical as you ap and agree that most teachers are TRYING to give good educations to their students and also TRY to give fair marks).

IMO the driving forces behind why there is not a more uniform performance between classes is that not every teacher is of the same caliber. 2 teachers could teach the same material, but 1 could teach it better than nother, resulting in different grades. Also that not every class has the same caliber of students. 2 honors classes could perform differently even with the same teacher. lazy honors students would accept Bs, the ones with drive would work for the As.

But, to look into it further... which school systems generally outperm others? Rich suburban public schools almost always outperform their city counterparts (ignoring private schools and the elite city public schools). Why? Rich towns have higher tax revenue, larger donations from parents above taxes, and usually more state funding (although I'm not 100% sure of this). The tax dollars per student are MUCH higher in the burbs, allowing the schools to spend more money on teacher's salaries (attracting the better teachers), more money on technology (my school system has their own planetarium... no idea how many others do), and more on surroundings.

Another thing... test scores prove that suburban students out perform city students in standardized tests. This is somewhat related to the above paragraph. Generally, people who are rich are also intelligent and educated. They bring their children up to the same standards. Generally (again), would you think that a house cleaner, bus operator, or garbage collector would bring their children up to have the same educational drive as that of a lawyer, accountant, doctor, or scientist? And, in where would those groups usually live? Exactly.


As with most of my CT rants, I feel that they are not nearly as organized as they could be... such is the way of writing things off the top of my head with no proofreading. ANYWAY... my solution to all of this would be to have GPA weighted. Use some form of a multiplier based on your school's standardized test scores to even the playing fields.... basically, the higher your school's performance, the lower your multiplier.

It would allow for an A student from a good school to match up with a B student from a bad school. But, I don't see this as being fair. It answers the question posed... of how to standardize things between schools... but it doesn't make things fair. In this method, A students from my HS who got into Ivy League schools would have the same "score" as B students from inner-city schools... students who alsmot certainly would not be qualified for Ivy League courseloads. It would also limit the potential score of a good school, while allowing for students who excel from bad schools to be rated much higher than students who excel from good schools.

Clearly... not a system that would actually work. :-/ But, my points are still valid, and ap is still a cynic.
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Old 02-10-2006, 08:50 AM   #12
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Good work on ripping it apart, AP. Seriously, I'm glad you presented the other side of the coin there. To be honest, I wrote the entire thing in about 35 minutes, while I was fairly enraged. So it's inevitably biased.

However, I think that since the content is opinionated, response is bound to be the same way. I like to make people think; my job isn't necessarily to change people's minds about anything. I want to present at least some reasoning for why people act as they do, and possibly how to reform those actions.

I would like to think that your points don't entirely invalidate mine -- in fact, much of them can be twisted into bias if you really wanted to do it.

And Tass, cynical as AP might be, don't base things on that. Ad hominem is a logic flaw.
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Old 02-10-2006, 12:35 PM   #13
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I wasn't basing my long post on ap's cynical nature... just pointing it out and using it to explain WHY he took the direction that he did. I also disagree mostly with his reasoning, and explained why and what I feel the real reason is.
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