2d ago

Fixable

54 comments

Throwing money at public education doesn't fix it. Some of the worst schools get well above average funding. There are of course outliers on both sides, but in the average case the US spends more for less in pretty much everything, spending even more isn't going to fix it.
- Are you suggesting that the quality of education will go down with more school funding? That doesn’t seem very logical.
  
  I think they're saying that an increase in school funding doesn't necessarily lead to an increase or decrease in quality of education. Like maybe it's essentially uncorrelated above a minimum amount to fund basics (lights, desks, teachers, etc.). There's a lot more factors than money at play here. In other words, a poorly-run school with bad policies, teachers, etc. is crap whether it has X million dollars or 2X million, and a well-run school is good even with a small budget.
  
  What about throwing money at teacher salary/education/recruitment?
  
  Exactly what I was thinking. 2 teachers for every classroom, highly paid career teachers, make the job attractive
  
  If that’s what they meant, I’m still gonna have to disagree, or at least point out that we are well below that level of funding where there are diminishing returns.
  The quality of the ‘basics’ matter, I believe teacher salary has a direct correlation to the quality of teachers. My current school (a community college), which is well-run is being forced to cut programs right now because they cant afford it. Our bookstore is closed. One of my professors needs to also work at a different school to support her child. Another of my professors was in a panic when his heater broke and he had to figure out to get it fixed cheap.
  I get that there are a lot more factors than money at play, but when you start taking a look at these problems, money is the common denominator and bottleneck for a lot of schools.
  
  The quality doesn't go down l, but it doesn't go up either.
- Having been through that system I have to say, it's inherently more about training students to be ok with having their movements and thoughts constrained, following instructions, being kept safely contained while their parents are at work, and (if you're trying for academic success) developing a toxic concept of self worth and "success", than helping them become informed and capable people. I don't understand how anyone can graduate and conclude, yes, more of this is what our society needs to thrive. Maybe they just choose not to think about what it was actually like because they don't have to deal with it anymore, or still buy into the idea that putting themselves through that gave them value because the alternative is too painful. There's a reason so many people have anxiety dreams about being in school even decades later.
  Not at all an endorsement of replacing school with child labor like some people seem to want, but we really need an entirely different way for people to have an opportunity to become literate and explore science and history etc. rather than putting more resources into this awful institution.
  
  Schooling definitely has many problems. There's a lot of competing interests and partially serving all of them is failing spectacularly.

54 comments