Ted Leung on the air : School is bad preparation for success?

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Wed, 31 Mar 2004

David Brook's New York Times opinion piece Stressed for Success? (free registration required) is a good angle on what's wrong with education in America. Brooks is writing to high school seniors who are awaiting the moment of joy (or doom) of college acceptance (rejection). It was hard to pick just one part of the editorial to except (and I don't feel right block quoting the whole thing), but here's the quote that stuck out to me the most.

More than anything else, colleges are taking a hard look at your grades. To achieve that marvelous G.P.A., you will have had to demonstrate excellence across a broad range of subjects: math, science, English, languages etc.
This will never be necessary again. Once you reach adulthood, the key to success will not be demonstrating teacher-pleasing competence across fields; it will be finding a few things you love, and then committing yourself passionately to them.

[22:58] | [society] | # | TB | F | G | 4 Comments |

But then, the skill of teacher-pleasing is just as useful later in life as it was in school. My own experience is that good grades seldom require skill, and certainly not talent. It certainly helps to have the skills and talent -- it opens up another path to good grades. But the bulk of grades are won or lost based on teacher-pleasing skills. (Maybe I'm still a little bitter because I had poor teacher-pleasing skills ;)

Perhaps that's a good argument for standardized testing.
Posted by Ian Bicking at Thu Apr 1 09:35:07 2004

I suppose it depends on your definition of useful. If useful means being able to do as you are told, then I'd agree that's useful. The harder I look the more I see that Gatto (and many others) are correct when they say that schools are optimized for producing people that follow directions.
Posted by Ted Leung at Thu Apr 1 10:37:38 2004

I think it is impossible to have a school system that properly handles exceptionally talented people. These have to somehow survive 'normal' school or to find some special one (which might be very difficult because expensive, too far, etc.)

I also think that it is actually very good to require knowledge and skills in wide range of subjects - it is a school, not commercial enterprise. Would you be happy with yourself if you have only cs knowledge knowing nothing about e.g. history or chemistry? I don't think so...
Posted by Radovan Janecek at Thu Apr 1 23:20:20 2004

I knew someone would comment on the breadth issue, and actually, I agree. It's not so much the breadth that I have an issue with, its the way it's taught and evaluated.

I was more interested in the passionate commitment part of the quote. I think that passion (which induces people to work hard) is more important than talent. But that's a whole other post.

Note also that the article is about "success" whatever that means. Unfortunately, success and being educated are not very related.
Posted by Ted Leung at Thu Apr 1 23:27:50 2004

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