Are You Sattisfied With You're Edducation?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Ah, the American educational system!

I got through high school never having read Dickens, Austen, Thackeray or Defoe. My geography knowledge is such that my mother had to explain to me the other day where the hell Yemen is. My math skills—well, let’s politely avert our eyes from THAT subject. It wasn’t till I got to college that I started to really learn much, and MOST of my intensive studying has been on my own, post-college.

How about y’all? Are you happy with what your school system stuffed into your noggin?

2

Some of my teachers put as much emphasis on how to learn as to what to learn. Some teachers made learning fun. I didn’t read Dickens, Austen or the others (except Shakespeare), but did cover more modern classics (Golding, Orwell, etc). My school covered English well enough, but that wasn’t my chosen emphasis.

Yes, college broadens horizons far more effectively than high schools can, but why would that be so surprising? High schools have to handle everyone–including kids who simply don’t want to be there. Colleges, by their very nature, don’t.

It’s been my experience–and that of my friends–that if one wanted a fairly well-rounded (albeit limited) education from high school, all one had to do was pay attention. BUT my experience (late Sixties, early Seventies) probably differs from that of today’s high schoolers. The youngest brother of a friend boasted of getting B’s in American History, despite not knowing who Thomas Jefferson was. The kid considers education a waste of time, but that only begs the question about the ‘B’ grade. Either schools are seriously failing in their duties, or the kid was lying about his grades.

But in any event, “stuffing facts in someone’s head” shouldn’t be what education’s about. It should be about giving one the learning skills one needs for a lifetime. Sounds like you didn’t get shortchanged on that account, Eve.

3

I went to the local public high school, and not too long ago at that (I graduated in 1987).

I read Hesse, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, and more who I can’t remember right now. We did a section on the Bible as Literature in 9th grade. Tenth grade, let’s see, we read Steinbeck and enough Dickens to make him hate him still. Despite dropping math classes in my Junior year, I managed to learn enough Algebra & Geometry in high school to figure out the basics of programming and get my job here as a software engineer (I’m self-taught, no degree). Geography… hmmm… don’t remember doing much of that in high school, but I usually have a general idea of where a country lies. 'course, I think that comes more from playing Risk as a kid.

This kind of education is a big reason why if I ever decide to spawn, I’m moving back to home. There’s something to say for those backwater communities out in the middle of nowhere - some of the most influential teachers I had were in high school, and I still draw on that knowledge.

4

Hey Athena: Fellow '87 grad here.

Re the OP: I’ve always sort of felt my formal grade- and high-school education was, in a word, irrelevant. My mother taught me (and later my younger brother) to read at the age of three, so basically the whole subject of English was a wasted hour every day, because of how much and widely I read on my own. Math was easy and second-nature (I figured out the length-times-width-equals-area thing on my own, by counting the little pegs on top of a Lego block), until I got up to college-level pre-calculus, when it suddenly got non-intuitive and hard. My grandfather regularly played geographical games with my brother and me; he’d name countries, and we’d come back with the capital city, or he’d spin a globe and tell us what countries formed the surrounding borders and we’d have to name the country he was looking at. Plus I had gotten into the habit of reading his copies of “National Geographic,” “Scientific American,” “Time,” “Popular Science,” and whatever else was lying around when I visited, starting at a young age.

Yeah, basically, I was a precocious twit, and kind of an arrogant little cuss; I know I frustrated and irritated many of my teachers, who didn’t know what to do with me. I’m better now, sort of (ask my wife). But I still honestly feel the only things I absolutely learned from the ground up during my public education were (1) electronics, (2) German, and (3) typing. Everything else was just spackling over gaps, or non-class-specific social interaction.

5

My elementary education had a lot of holes. I recall learning about the War of 1812 every year for four years in a row (it was a local event), but we never learned anything about European or other history. Music class sucked; who the hell needs to know the Curwen time names? Science was good, art was useless, and I hated Language Arts (I can’t remember why).

High school was better, with a well-rounded curriculum (of the courses I elected to take, that is), although grade 13 history was once again Canadian history.

I did feel somewhat unprepared for university, though.

6

The more I learn about education in general the happier I am with what I received. Hey, I chose to be an underachiever, the opportunities were there for me.

After my daughter’s experiences in Kindergarten and first grade, I would just like to take this opportunity to publicly thank my school district for using clustering as an educational policy. Thank you, school district! Thank you! Thank you!

7

My “education” in the public schools which I attended is the main reason I am so pro-private education today.

My elementary school was toying with the idea of politically correct curriculum before the words “politically correct” entered the vernacular. Sample question from my 3rd-grade math textbook: “Shabazz weighs 40 kilos. Consuela weighs 41 kilos. What is the difference between Shabazz’ weight and Consuela’s?”

In high school, it was mostly about babysitting and keeping the different castes from killing each other. We had the wannabe ganstas, the skater punks, the wannabe pimps, the goths… all people who wouldn’t piss on you if you were on fire. I seriously feared for my life in high school; learning was scarcely an option. And this was in a midwestern town of 100,000 or so; I shudder when I think of what it must be like for kids in the inner city.

When I got to college, I had no idea how to write a scholarly thesis or how to conduct research. I hadn’t read one word of Dickens, Dostoyevsky, or any of the other greats. I had no idea who Charlemagne, Genghis Khan or Joan of Arc were. And as for math: I scored a 14 on the math portion of the ACT test. Knocked my composite down so much I barely got accepted to college.

Yeah, I think my education sucked dirt.

8

Subjects my high school curriculum covered brilliantly:

Mathematics (I knew far more then than I do now. Sigh.)

U.S. history and government

Foreign languages (In general, I’ve found that high school foreign language instruction is far superior to the college and grad school versions – partly because there’s more classroom time, and partly because high school teachers know better than to tell their students to sit still and memorize paradigms.)

English (They did have a definite bias toward standard Western-canon authors and interpretations. The only female author I remember reading during my last two years of high school was Emily Dickinson; I once received a C on an AP English essay because I found Clytemnestra the most sympathetic character in the Oresteia. But we learned the basics of critical reading and interpretation, which are far more important than political correctness in the long run.)

Subjects it didn’t cover at all, or paid lip service to:

Geography

Science (Partly my fault, since I wasn’t paying attention. But what are you going to do when your physics teacher doesn’t speak English well enough for you to understand him, nor does he appear to know or care whether you’re listening?)

European / world history (I knew virtually nothing about any country outside of the US when I graduated, except for what I picked up in Spanish class. I think this is probably the worst flaw in our educational system.)

Art (We were required to take one arts course. Typing counted.)

9

Well the Canadian system isn’t too bad as far as I can tell though it seems like I’m learning lots of junk… too bad I didn’t stick with it properly then I would be out of high school right now instead of going to a special school to get the credits to grad. The way I figure it I’ll be 19 when I get my diploma and who knows what I’ll go into then?

So far as I can tell though, as I mentioned before, my education isn’t gonna do me much in real life. English most of the stuff I already know its just a fine tuning of what I do know. (I have been read to and reading since an early age as well) Math a lot of the stuff I will never ever use again in my lifetime (I am not planning on going into anything like engineering or anything like that) Social is a lot of junk really and for the most part a breeze to get through. And so on and so forth. I’m looking forward to going to University/Trade School (wherever I decide to go) because at least then I can learn stuff I can use AND want to learn.

Overall I’d say my education isn’t too bad though.

10

It’s not much better in Australia though. My education (graduated in 1980) wasn’t stellar and certainly wasn’t deep. But now it seems even more shallow. I’m putting together a curriculum for homeschooling my son and I am stunned at the levels which are acceptable for primary education.

I was also really dismayed about a decade ago when my 9 yo stepdaughter could barely read a chapter book and that was acceptable!

11

Wasn’t that the sequel to “Where the boys are?”

12

Hell, I didn’t make it through GRADE SCHOOL without Thackeray!

I laugh bitterly when I hear about vouchers being the salvation of American schools because I’m a product of a private education. The nuns were not brilliant teachers, but they were better than the civilian teachers. They were what was left after the better-paying public jobs were filled; barrel scrapings working for little more than minimum wage. Class size ranged from 48 to 52 kids. It wasn’t until high school that I learned that non-Catholics were involved in world history–my education was parochial in more ways than one. My eighth grade math teacher would write the day’s assignment on the board and leave for the rest of the hour. My school was the last stop before Juvenile Workfarm Junior High. Need I go on?

My kids’ schools are worlds better! I wish I could go to school today!

Eve, darling, there was no loss that you were not taught Thackeray or Defoe in high school because they could not write! Austen, yes; Dickens, maybe. But suggesting Thackeray is like suggesting … Bulwer-Lytton!

13

I can’t really remember what I learned in school vs. what I learned from life. It’s been over 10 years since I last stepped foot in a classroom yet I’m toying with the idea of going back to school to finish up the ever admired college degree.

I am reminded of how much I don’t really know by my 12 year old when I see all the stuff she is learning in school. So I’m pretty satisfied with our education system when I see all that she is learning.

To quote her in a recent essay she wrote. “Some people don’t go to college because they don’t think they are smart enough. You have to set high expectations for yourself if you are going to succeed in school.” Makes me feel like an idiot! Guess I better get my ass back in school before she totally surpasses me and I’m asking her to spell check MY papers.

Peace

14

I think my school did a pretty good job. We even had a full range of AP classes, taught by teachers who actually cared and liked their students.

My major complaint is not the school’s fault: I was too immature and sheltered to understand and/or care about history and literature. It was all just drudgery. Now I find myself having to look up such things as the founding of Israel to figure out what the current news is all about.

But I can still recite the first line of my 11th grade oratory entry:

Quo usque tandem abutere, Catalina, patientia nostra?

15

I think too many people (unfortunately many of them being current students) confuse what a school can do. A school can’t teach you anything, it can only offer you an opportunity to learn. Virtually every school in this country has the resources to provide a good education. But
if you’re foolish enough to decline to learn when the opportunity is offered, you’ll pass through the educational system unscathed by knowledge.

16

In two words: Hell no.

[semi-rant]
My grade-school learning experience was overall rather excellent. I learned mostly about basic mathematics and expanded my vocabulary significantly in those years.

Middle-school and high-school were horrid. There were, of course, a few gems in the shitpile. For instance, French was terrific, and if I had made any attempt whatsoever to keep up that foreign language skill, I’d probably be speaking it fluently.

High-school math ranged from tolerable, to moderately interesting, to horrid. Gym … let’s not get into that.

College, so far, is worse than high-school by far. It’s the same thing, really, only the teachers don’t bother to actually teach it; they assume you’ll just absorb the information somehow, even if it was never stated in lecture and isn’t in the text. Yes, I know college is supposed to be where people learn to teach themselves, but if that’s the case, why the hell does it cost so much money? I could buy a stack of “For Dummies” books for a fraction of the cost that would give me an equivelant education.

Speaking of books, my high-school library had a copy of “Chariots of the Gods” (or whatever that book is that claims aliens built the pyramids) yet didn’t have anything by Carl Sagan. The only computer books they had were about programming in Apple Basic, yet they recently purchased a couple dozen brand new laptops for student use. One wonders about priorities.

IMHO, schools focus far too much on passing the class, and far too little on actual learning. In my experience, this holds true K-12, and into college as well. I’ve had more than one teacher over the years who has said that it doesn’t matter that I didn’t understand something, because I got a decent score on the test.

Nearly everything I know (which, admittedly, doesn’t amount to much) I taught myself, or learned from a non-school source.
[end rant]

17

i think either educators don’t have enough brains to figure out what information is important or there is deliberate sabotage going on.

the best education i got was from reading sci-fi books, starting in 4th grade, 1961. so i was watching the beginnings of the space program and reading where some pretty smart people thought it could lead at the same time. the big 3, assimov, heinlein and clark, plus others covered hard science, philosophy, history, politics, war and military strategies all in hypothetical scenarios without trying to brainwash one into loyaty to a country, system or government.

some libertarians use heinlein as an economic philosopher. LOL!

the book CULTURAL LITERACY from the late 80’s was supposed to be great and had a list of 5000 terms that every american should know. however NET WORTH, ASSET & LIABILITY were not in the list. i guess americans are supposed to be financial dummies.

Dal Timgar

18

I endured 12 years of Catholic School Education.
Like Dry, most of the stuff revolved around the theme of
*Catholics Are Number One and Everyone Else Is Number Two.
*

My educational career was lackluster and I blame myself. I was a perpetually average student ( except in religion, where I just *couldn’t seem to grasp the concept of giving a rats ass *) and I don’t think I took SAT’s or PSAT or PreSAT. I have no collective memory of it. If I did take it, I’m sure I dropped the national average.

That said, I will say that my education, or how I spent 12 years of WoolGathering, was outstanding.

Shocking?

English: I read lots of dull dull books (Moby Dick needs to be hit by a comet) contemplated poetry ( dull) and did alot of writing and speeches. ( I was the shy kid that did exceptionally well at speeches, much to everyone’s collective surprise) Every one of the books I read has come in handy in my real life. Every time it has been in a trivia related game. Because of this foundation in literature, I actually get some-to-most of Dennis Miller’s references.

Science: I have no collective memory of science except 9th grade chemistry, where my brother (already graduated from college with his degree in chem) helping me in the Chem for retards 101 class. We stayed up until 3am because the hitler youth that he was read too much into the basic instructions. Naturally the teacher suspected, and I told her too, because it was too obvious that I could know so much about something like that. That is my only memory of science.

Math * The last math class I actually took ( I graduated in 1984) was Freshman year, 1980. It was either geometry or algrebra. It was also the last time I had a nun. Sr. Mary Amnesia. All I remember about this class was that she stopped class for the entire period because someone had accidently spilled the pencil shavings from the sharpener on the floor. I just remember thinking * Yeah, I’m going to learn alot from this one…. ( IIRC, she did not teach, but punished us for the next two classes -two days-before someone finally decided to say DEAR GOD I SPILLED THE SHAVINGS. That guy is probably still in detention.

First and foremost, I suck at math. I want these words on my tombstone.

*History * My love of history did not come from the teachers I had, but they were good at teaching such a dry subject.

*Religion * One of the thrills of having religion with a bunch of stick up the butt teachers is asking questions like, " Well, when are we going to learn about the other religions?" To receive, “There are no other religions, Shirley.”

19

OrcaChow wrote:

Maybe the kid can’t spell `D’?

I found my high school education satisfactory from the standpoint of making it clear that I was far smarter than my peers – though most of the studies that I really excelled in I did on my own. But once I got to college, I discovered the value of being surrounded with people I cannot assume are morons, some of whom are actually way ahead of me.

I didn’t get bored with my studies in school, though I could have been pushed a lot harder.

20

Me too. Then again, I did read Shakespeare, Cormac McCarthy, Robert Kennedy, William Faulkner, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Robert Penn Warren, Carson McCullers, and Nathaniel West, so I figure they did okay. Learned nothing in Physics, but loved Biology, and even had fun with Chemistry; learned as much math as I allowed myself (wish I’d taken more), and enjoyed every second that I worked on the newspaper. In retrospect, about the only part of my high school education with which I’m dissatisfied, I’d say, would be my creative writing class, which was one of those joke classes for kids who needed an easy way to fulfil an English requirement (to the disappointment of a few of us who wanted to learn some creative writing). I really wish someone would’ve told me, “Steve, this story sucks for exactly these reasons:…”

As for college, when I put in the effort, I was amply rewarded.

So in general, I am actually pretty satisfied with my education. I could’ve taken better advantage of it, but I’ve got the rest of my life to make up for that.