Lost Kid with ADHD found in CO - searchers adjusted search for ADHD...interesting...

[shmerham]

I would say that in my public school upbringing in what I'd consider a somewhat conservative town, creativity was encouraged quite a bit actually. Of course, there were times when you had to follow orders, but even for the hippiest of people, life requires that.

I think what schools don't do a great job of is teaching actions and consequence and risk and reward.

[Twoplanker]

I don't even know why I'm arguing with you, if that's even what I'm doing.

But I basically think that a primary goal of the education system as it is set up today is the same goal as that of boot camp - destroying indivuality and preparing the students for a life of blindly following orders. "The world needs ditch diggers too, Timmy."

Maybe I just listened to The Wall one too many times.

Who's arguing? We're discussing...

The world does need ditch diggers, and that's where NCLB goes wrong. Not all children can be excellent. Some children will never be able to score proficiently on standardized tests. We are so worried about leaving anyone behind that we're failing to help those at the head of the pack achieve their potential. Trust me, the Chinese are not worried about leaving children behind. And while we struggle to achieve the impossible (albeit touching) goal of leaving no child behind, the rest of the world is producing the world's best scientists, engineeers, and mathemeticians.

Anyway, my point is that there is no "primary goal". No one at the U.S. Department of Education is holding meetings to orchestrate some educational machine designed to suck the individuality out of students. Even if that were their goal, they're just not capable of pulling it off.

[Buzzworthy]

No one at the U.S. Department of Education is holding meetings to orchestrate some educational machine designed to suck the individuality out of students.

That you know of.

[Twoplanker]

[Sensisnow]

Who's arguing? We're discussing...

The world does need ditch diggers, and that's where NCLB goes wrong. Not all children can be excellent. Some children will never be able to score proficiently on standardized tests. We are so worried about leaving anyone behind that we're failing to help those at the head of the pack achieve their potential.

This is one subject that really hits a nerve with me. All through my earlier years of school (K-8) I was in the talented and gifted classes. I was constantly scoring in the 99th percentile on every standardized test, breezed thru every class and got straight A's without ever needing to study. By all measures I was a child prodigy. Yet the school that I attended refused to let me skip any grades and once I got to highschool there was a severe budget cut. Rather than cut out any extracurricular or sports activites, what did they cut out? That's right, all the AP classes. I went from being challenged in my talented and gifted classes to being thrown in with everyone else. Even in my senior year I wasn't close to learning the type of material that I was learning in 6th, 7th, and 8th grades.

The entire education system is out of whack. People promote sports programs because they generate revenue and popularity for their school, but toss any academic programs out the window because the school gets nothing out of them. The only people that get hurt are the ones whose potential is wasted because the school finds it more economically viable to turn out a bunch of jocks rather than geniuses.

[Spats]

Sudbury schools (http://www.sudval.org/) produce a greater percentage of successful adults than our public school system without requiring the students to attend any classes, take any tests, or study any particular subject. Plus a student's say is equal to a teacher's in running the school.

This alone exposes our entire educational system as a cruel failure.

To clarify: I'm not claiming any conspiracy.

I'm claiming that the original goal of the US public education system was to turn out obedient factory workers. This is clearly and explicitly stated by its architects in books they've written (from which my quote is taken).

I'm claiming that though this is no longer the goal of the system, the methods we use remain the same, and produce the same result, no matter what we intend. School still looks the same as it did: kids go to classes in large groups, sit in chairs and listen to teachers lecture them, and move around at the sound of bells.

There is a better way, but it goes against everything we've been taught by 12 years of obedience lessons. Learning is painful, right? And it has to be unwillingly drilled into you? Actually, no. Sudbury schools prove that the opposite is true. But we ignore them and go on like nothing's wrong, like we haven't destroyed the initiative and problem-solving skills of generations of Americans, like we don't notice that schools are getting worse each year and nothing we say, do, or spend seems to fix them.

Check out the site: it's eye-opening.
http://www.sudval.org

[Twoplanker]

Sudbury schools (http://www.sudval.org/) produce a greater percentage of successful adults than our public school system without requiring the students to attend any classes, take any tests, or study any particular subject. Plus a student's say is equal to a teacher's in running the school.

This alone exposes our entire educational system as a cruel failure.

To clarify: I'm not claiming any conspiracy.

I'm claiming that the original goal of the US public education system was to turn out obedient factory workers. This is clearly and explicitly stated by its architects in books they've written (from which my quote is taken).

I'm claiming that though this is no longer the goal of the system, the methods we use remain the same, and produce the same result, no matter what we intend. School still looks the same as it did: kids go to classes in large groups, sit in chairs and listen to teachers lecture them, and move around at the sound of bells.

There is a better way, but it goes against everything we've been taught by 12 years of obedience lessons. Learning is painful, right? And it has to be unwillingly drilled into you? Actually, no. Sudbury schools prove that the opposite is true. But we ignore them and go on like nothing's wrong, like we haven't destroyed the initiative and problem-solving skills of generations of Americans, like we don't notice that schools are getting worse each year and nothing we say, do, or spend seems to fix them.

Check out the site: it's eye-opening.
http://www.sudval.org

News Alert: Expensive Private School Attracts the Children of Well-Educated High SES Parents and Makes Them Into Successful Adults.

The requirement of a $6000/year tuition sure helps to make the cream rise to the top.

[Tap]

i'm glad that my thread has given you guys something to get so vitriolic about

and it's about time that.....hey...did anyone see that chicken?

[slim]

All through my earlier years of school (K-8) I was in the talented and gifted classes. I was constantly scoring in the 99th percentile on every standardized test, breezed thru every class and got straight A's without ever needing to study. By all measures I was a child prodigy. Yet the school that I attended refused to let me skip any grades and once I got to highschool there was a severe budget cut.

I feel terrible for you and your humongous brain and prodigy level of potential. You could have been Doogie Howser, MD if it weren't for getting fucked by the failures of the educational system. It's so sad.

[Joey Joe Joe Junior Shabadoo]

I would have to agree with most of two-plankers points on this. From my own personal experience in school(the first nine years in a catholic school were creativity was encouraged extensively) and hours of discussion with my sister who has a masters in elementary special-ed who spent the last 6 years teaching kids with emotional and developmental disorders in schools ranging from crappy public ones to nice private ones, many of the problems today stem from parents who are unable or more often unwilling to get involved in the childs education yet expect teachers to make their kids honor roll students.

The reason kids in private schools seem to get better educations is because their parents are taking a more active roll in the childs education, which is reflected by their choice of school; not because private schools use some different method of teaching. There are plenty of parents who cannot afford private school but take their childs education seriously and when they get involved their kids do better as result regardless of the school, at least that has been mine and my sisters experience. And as two-planker stated if you expect a school, public or private, to make your a child completely happy and well-rounded then you have unrealistic expectations and may be doing your child a disservice by not taking more responsibility in your childs education and well-being.

As my parents always told me, and many of yours did as well I bet, "whatever punishment you get at school will be twice as bad at home". Whereas nowadays my sister deals with more parents who refuse to admit their kid has ADD because they are ashamed(certainly and understandable reaction) or they come into parent teacher conferences demanding to know why their child is doing poorly and what is she gonna do about it.

Most schools can barely control the kids they have, much less program them in automatons through nefarious government plans. Individuality and creativity should be encouraged in school and they have their time and place there but there are also times in formal education where they need to be supressed(gasp, maybe not the best word choice). If a teacher has to try and teach 25 kids in 25 individual ways then no one will learn anything. My sister had to try that with the only 10-12 kids she had each day in special ed and if she got through to may 3 or 4 she thought it was a good day. If you don't like the education system then home-school them yourself.

[SnowToad]

News Alert: Expensive Private School Attracts the Children of Well-Educated High SES Parents and Makes Them Into Successful Adults.

The requirement of a $6000/year tuition sure helps to make the cream rise to the top.

My thoughts exactly. I can't even imagine what would happen if a failing public school system adopted this model.

[stump832]

I feel terrible for you and your humongous brain and prodigy level of potential. You could have been Doogie Howser, MD if it weren't for getting fucked by the failures of the educational system. It's so sad.

So true.

From this guy:


To this guy:


So much for the american dream.

[Joey Joe Joe Junior Shabadoo]

I feel terrible for you and your humongous brain and prodigy level of potential. You could have been Doogie Howser, MD if it weren't for getting fucked by the failures of the educational system. It's so sad.

Good point. Maybe he wasn't as smart as he thought. My older brothers school didn't have AP Biology so he took an independent study period, taught himself and got a 4(5 is the highest ap score) on the exam. Was that an option for you SnowRider?

[taynton]

my question is this - The article says that the searchers changed their tactics once they found out that the boy was Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder affected and without medication.

Exactly how did they change their search tactics?

Umm, maybe they all got baked?

He was found at about 4:20 p.m.

I think this might solve it.

[Sensisnow]

I feel terrible for you and your humongous brain and prodigy level of potential. You could have been Doogie Howser, MD if it weren't for getting fucked by the failures of the educational system. It's so sad.

Never claimed I would've been Doogie Howser, I was simply trying to point out yet another shortcoming of our educational system. Next time I'll stick to copy and pasting stories from the interweb rather than share personal experiences. It'll be less taxing on my humongous brain that way.

[Spats]

News Alert: Expensive Private School Attracts the Children of Well-Educated High SES Parents and Makes Them Into Successful Adults.

The requirement of a $6000/year tuition sure helps to make the cream rise to the top.

You can compare the Sudbury schools to traditional private schools with similar or greater tuition, of which there are plenty. The Sudbury schools do not lack.

Did you actually read anything on the site, or just see the "private school" flag and dismiss it out of hand?

Let's repeat:

No classes.
No tests.
No requirements for the students to do anything specific at all at any time.

The kids can play video games or Magic: the Gathering all day if they want, or go out in the woods and fish all day if they want. No one stops them. Yet somehow they all become literate, motivated, functional adults.

Are you going to argue that children of parents who can afford $6,000/year are intrinsically more self-motivated than those of parents who can't or won't? Isn't that 1920s eugenics in disguise?

(Not to mention that $6K is cheap by private school standards, and unlike college, not completely out of range of a middle-class household. There is also financial aid.)

Are you going to argue that there's something special in the water? Then how come there are so many such schools? And how come they're not all in rich neighborhoods? (The one near me is in Santa Clara, not up in Woodside or Los Gatos.)
http://www.sudval.org/07_othe_01.html

Yes, the Sudbury model is a threat to traditional education, because it shows that our whole national system of forced education is, at best, nearly equal to letting kids control the process themselves. This upsets people who have spent a lot of time and effort trying to figure out how to make the current system work. I'm sorry about that.

[Evmo]

I call some BS here, b/c your pushing of this system is as if it is the perfect answer for all people out there, and that it is "the" answer.

There isnt one "right" way. Sudbury may have a good track record, but I am sure it isnt the perfect situation for certain individuals. A challenge to the system, yes, a good alternative, yes, "the" answer, no.

As an ADD kid with the H in the middle, I am pretty sure that a little more structure benefitted me moreso than this system would have.

At the end of the day, some smart people come out of dumb schools, and some dumb people come out of smart schools. Some have better stats than others, but to push one as the universal "next step answer" is a little shortsighted...

You can compare the Sudbury schools to traditional private schools with similar or greater tuition, of which there are plenty. The Sudbury schools do not lack.

Did you actually read anything on the site, or just see the "private school" flag and dismiss it out of hand?

Let's repeat:

No classes.
No tests.
No requirements for the students to do anything specific at all at any time.

The kids can play video games or Magic: the Gathering all day if they want, or go out in the woods and fish all day if they want. No one stops them. Yet somehow they all become literate, motivated, functional adults.

Are you going to argue that children of parents who can afford $6,000/year are intrinsically more self-motivated than those of parents who can't or won't? Isn't that 1920s eugenics in disguise?

(Not to mention that $6K is cheap by private school standards, and unlike college, not completely out of range of a middle-class household. There is also financial aid.)

Are you going to argue that there's something special in the water? Then how come there are so many such schools? And how come they're not all in rich neighborhoods? (The one near me is in Santa Clara, not up in Woodside or Los Gatos.)
http://www.sudval.org/07_othe_01.html

Yes, the Sudbury model is a threat to traditional education, because it shows that our whole national system of forced education is, at best, nearly equal to letting kids control the process themselves. This upsets people who have spent a lot of time and effort trying to figure out how to make the current system work. I'm sorry about that.

[Spats]

There is a nationwide emphasis on team sports, pep rallies, and "special education" over any sort of tracking or gifted/talented programs. This is true nearly everywhere, in every school district.

This emphasis proves my point about the current system, which is that it is designed to foster obedience (49! 36! Ten-hut!), conformity (Give me a C! Give me an O!), and creating the maximum number of functional worker drones (special education).

Helping children actually reach their potential to learn, create, and lead is clearly not a priority. We talk a lot about how student initiative is fostered and rewarded, but when's the last time anyone got a poor grade for sitting down, shutting up, and doing what they were told and nothing more? Exactly. Occasionally we fail to punish initiative, and then we pat ourselves on the back for being progressive.

Please note: I'm not taking schools to task for "not fostering creativity" or any of the other 1970s happy horsefeathers. I'm taking them to task for clinging stubbornly to a model of education that gives exactly the opposite results we're asking for.

American children are falling further behind other nations every year. Do you think we can out-memorize the Japanese or out-obey the Chinese? Of course not. Then how do we plan to maintain our global leadership?

[Twoplanker]

Are you going to argue that children of parents who can afford $6,000/year are intrinsically more self-motivated than those of parents who can't or won't?

Yes, now you've got it.

Parents that can afford, and that are willing to spend $6000 per year on their children's education are likely to: have high IQs, be financially successful and stable, be motivated to partipate in their children's education, and to maintain supportive, healthy home environments. I'm sure that the Sudbury school's students are wildly successful when compared to the rest of our countries' students which are likely to be the children of parents that: have low IQs, are low socio-economic status, and that are less likely to provide their children with stable, supportive home environments. It's a selection effect. Apples and oranges.

Isn't that 1920s eugenics in disguise?

Smart parents that maintain a good home have smart kids that do well in school. I'm not arguing for social policy I'm just stating a fact.

[Joey Joe Joe Junior Shabadoo]

There is a nationwide emphasis on team sports, pep rallies, and "special education" over any sort of tracking or gifted/talented programs. This is true nearly everywhere, in every school district.

I'm sorry but this just plain wrong. The schools in my county(much of which was farms and trailer parks, I had 3 on my bus route alone) offered almost every AP course available and if it wasn't offered at our high school you could get bussed to one that did for that period. And the year after I left they started and International Baccalaureate program, which by most standards is even harder than AP classes. Not to mention the cosmetology and auto mechanics programs offered for kids who knew that college wasn't for them. Only certain schools had it but the county would bus kids to that school if they wanted that program. And yes this was all in public schools. So please, become more informed before you make sweeping generalizations about programs and schools that work fine for thousands of kids every year.

[P_McPoser]

Actually, here in the U.S. those kids are likely to do fair to middling in school in an absolute sense, but be well-socialized and be capable of doing well in non-quantitative fields later on in life, if they are public school products. The exceptions that I see around me are generally kids who, though they go to public school, receive a high amount of extra tutoring, be it from mom & dad or tutors in the traditional sense.

Boy I'm glad that mom and dad hired all those tutors for me while I was in school and helped me get all those A's! Holy Shit! Good thing I took a job in a non-quantitive field like engineering. Damn the public school system and it damming me into my hellish life of graduating early from HS, completing a college degree, and owning a home at age 22. Fuck I wish had rich parents to send me to a private school...

Surprise: Public or Private School...It's the family that makes the difference...Not necessarily the quality of education. One only performs as well in school as he is expected to by his parents. I was fortunate to have loving, hard working, middle class parents of average intelligence who would beat my ass for bringing home a C.
My dad, when called into school, immediately always took the principles\teachers side, and recommend harsh punishments....How often do you see that shit anymore?

[Viva]

The Fins do a good job while starting the "serious" stuff relatively late. Singapore does a good job with a more-structured approach. The Indians do well with a lot of drills. The Russians do well with more emphasis on theory...we don't do well. We don't do particularly well teaching, say, foreign languages in our schools, either.

And I learned how to think for myself, how to think outside of the box, and to not be afraid to question current dogma here in the US. We do pretty well at that.

[P_McPoser]

There are lots of high-IQ, caring, committed parents who simply trust the "great" public schools to teach their kids well..

By definition this would make them low-IQ, non-caring, uncomitted parents. Raising and educating your children is not entirely the responsibility of the government, and with our education system, that is an even more dire assumption. Parental involvement in some form or another is what results in a child being sucessfully educated. I was educated in some of the lousiest public schools in the US (Arizona). The difference between the good students and bad students at my school was overwhelmingly the involvment that the parents took in their children's school work and lives.

edit: Forgot to add that your east-coast private school elitism is not very well disguised.

[stuckathuntermtn]

sorry! that was me!

[Twoplanker]

Actually, here in the U.S. those [smart] kids are likely to do fair to middling in school in an absolute sense...

Actually, no. Here in the U.S. and around the world, general cognitive ability (which is highly heritable) is also very highly correlated with academic performance and career performance. That is, smart kids do well in school and at work. The following is a link to one of many meta-analyses that support this (I just happened to Google this particular one). A meta-analysis is an aggregration of lots of data; in this case nearly 200 studies and 20,000 subjects.

http://www.apa.org/journals/releases/psp861148.pdf

This meta-analysis finds what many studies before and after it have found: general intelligence is very predictive of success in almost all aspects of life.