# Finland - less school time = much better results **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 30, 2016, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471 "2016-04-30T00:52:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/21 "2016-05-04T08:14:20Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > If you look into those numbers, keep in mind that poor students often have more adverse childhood experiences than rich children, consequently suffering more learning disabilities and social/emotional difficulties, consequently needing additional services. And sometimes part of the reason a family has a lower social status than their neighbor has to do with inheritable learning disabilities, such as dyslexia. If you have dyslexic grandparents who barely set foot in school back when schooling wasn’t the default, dyslexic parents who left it as soon as legally possible without ever having managed to learn to read, the dyslexic children won’t have anybody who can help them with either learning to read or their homework (actual situation for one of my classmates; luckily she and her elder sister managed to learn to read and later generations get checked for dyslexia as soon as they grab a book). ---
**Author:** ![Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barkis_is_Willin)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/22 "2016-05-04T15:16:18Z")
> [@JohnClay](#): > > … > “There’s nothing different in any of our schools. They are the same.” > … Including the students. This is why it’s pointless to compare Finland or Germany or China or Japan to the United States. They are largely homogeneous societies while the U.S. is easily the most diverse among them. You can’t just take another country’s system, one that no doubt works very well for them, and apply to the entire United States. Yes, Finland, a country with the population of Minnesota, does great. And guess what, Minnesota does great with education too! ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/23 "2016-05-04T15:34:45Z")
> [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](#): > > Including the students. This is why it’s pointless to compare Finland or Germany or China or Japan to the United States. They are largely homogeneous societies while the U.S. is easily the most diverse among them. You can’t just take another country’s system, one that no doubt works very well for them, and apply to the entire United States. Germany has enormous social differences and very complicated issues, as well as a long history of internal division with so many little sides they make my head hurt. Your ignorance is not a measure of their reality. ---
**Author:** ![Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barkis_is_Willin)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/24 "2016-05-04T15:56:28Z")
To ease your head pain: > **[List of countries ranked by ethnic and cultural diversity level](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_ranked_by_ethnic_and_cultural_diversity_level)** > > This article contains lists of countries ranked by ethnic and cultural diversity level. > The lists are commonly used in economics literature to compare the levels of ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious fractionalization in different countries. > Fractionalization is the probability that two individuals drawn randomly from the country's groups are not from the same group (ethnic, religious, or whatever the criterion is). Note that in Fearon's analysis, only groups containing over one perc... I’ll grant you those results are over a decade old and Germany has certainly accepted more immigrants than the others I mentioned, but it is still a much less diverse country than the U.S. ---
**Author:** ![CCitizen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@CCitizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CCitizen)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/25 "2016-05-04T19:59:11Z")
> [@JohnClay](#): > > then after trying some new ideas their schools became number 1 while the U.S. is number 29. **Their top secret is no homework, and the younger ones go to school for 20 hours a week.** They have the shortest school days and shortest school years in the entire Western world. I can relate. After being required to do a PhD in MATH which I dislike, I feel **disgust** for work. I am disgusted by math. ---
**Author:** ![CCitizen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@CCitizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CCitizen)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/26 "2016-05-04T20:24:35Z")
Doing **too much** unpaid and unwanted work makes one feel like **\**. ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2016, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/27 "2016-05-05T01:28:59Z")
> [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](#): > > To ease your head pain: > > [List of countries by ethnic and cultural diversity level - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_ranked_by_ethnic_and_cultural_diversity_level) > > I’ll grant you those results are over a decade old and Germany has certainly accepted more immigrants than the others I mentioned, but it is still a much less diverse country than the U.S. You’re only taking one measure of diversity, though. In the US English is the same across the country; German exists in a variety of quite distinct regional dialects. 87% of Americans consider themselves “middle class”; Germany is, or at least perceives itself as, a much more socially stratified country. I don’t claim to know Germany well, but from my limited observation social and cultural differences are much more marked between the different regions than seems to me to be the case in the US. And so forth. I don’t think it’s meaningful to say that one country is more “diverse” than another unless you are quite specific about the specifica characteristic whose diversity you are measuring. ---
**Author:** ![Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barkis_is_Willin)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2016, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/28 "2016-05-05T13:10:58Z")
> [@UDS](#): > > You’re only taking one measure of diversity, though. If you check the cite you’ll see differently. There are two studies, one measuring two characteristics of diversity (ethnic and cultural) and one measuring three (ethnic, linguistic, religious). So, that’s more than one measurement of diversity. > [@UDS](#): > > In the US English is the same across the country; German exists in a variety of quite distinct regional dialects. 87% of Americans consider themselves “middle class”; Germany is, or at least perceives itself as, a much more socially stratified country. I don’t claim to know Germany well, but from my limited observation social and cultural differences are much more marked between the different regions than seems to me to be the case in the US. And so forth. So you refute the studies I cited with your own observations of a country you admittedly don’t know well. Obviously, I disagree. Really, we don’t need to get hung up on Germany. If it’s more comfortable, we can just exclude them from the conversation. But my point stands that comparing the U.S. education system to those of much smaller, more homogeneous societies is comparing apples and oranges. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2016, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/29 "2016-05-05T14:03:50Z")
> [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](#): > > To ease your head pain: > > [List of countries by ethnic and cultural diversity level - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_ranked_by_ethnic_and_cultural_diversity_level) > > I’ll grant you those results are over a decade old and Germany has certainly accepted more immigrants than the others I mentioned, but it is still a much less diverse country than the U.S. Internally and historically as well, did you even read my post? Color isn’t the only measure of difference there is. ---
**Author:** ![Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barkis_is_Willin)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2016, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/30 "2016-05-05T15:28:23Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Internally and historically as well, did you even read my post? Color isn’t the only measure of difference there is. The studies I cited include, as I mentioned in the post above yours, ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious diversity. ---
**Author:** ![Chief\_Pedant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@Chief\_Pedant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chief_Pedant)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2016, 10:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471/31 "2016-05-14T10:52:32Z")
> [@mozchron](#): > > Sure you can see which systems work and which don’t. [Like most things, the answer to this weighty question is $$$.](http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/04/29/upshot/money-race-and-success-how-your-school-district-compares.html?smid=fb-share&_r=1) > > For those who don’t want to click the link, its to a very nice study in the NYTimes, showing (unsurprisingly) that the richer the school system, the better the kids do. > > Also some very interesting data on racial issues, corrected for income. The answer to this weighty question is not just $$$. It is the ability to learn as well, which differs markedly among various population groups. Note in your article, for example, that normalizing for socioeconomic status does not erase the achievement gap. This is a well studied, very consistent observation. Good teaching makes a difference, as does the ability to be taught. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/finland-less-school-time-much-better-results/753471.md?page=1)