Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I'm not quite following you here, tnff. I think college-prep-track students are a LOT better educated now, than before.
Absolutely, no question about this in my mind.
Considering the preparation in math, science and literature my daughter and her peers received recently (She's now a college junior), it's clearly superior to my 70's education at the same HS as theirs.
They teach personal finance in my districts High School too. I didn't have it when I was in school but my Dad was an accountant and I learned from him. Again, just because some schools don't teach something, or you didn't have it when you were in school, heaven knows when, does not mean that's how it is across the US.
I'm not quite following you here, tnff. I think college-prep-track students are a LOT better educated now, than before. As for the non-college-track kids, IDK, that may not have changed much.
The comparison (between "then" and "now") may depend on the school, and what materials it chooses, what books, as to whether content is dumbed down or not. And how dumbed down can it be, if we're talking about colleges that require HS students to take college classes, or a number of AP classes, in HS? If we're to compare apples with apples, college-prep-track HS students now are much better prepared.
...
Another example, is that more science is required now. It used to be, that to get into any of the CA universities, students only needed basic biology in their final two years of HS. One lab science, and that's all. For some, that was the sum total of ANY science instruction they'd ever received in their 12 years of pre-college schooling.
Is history instruction watered down these days? I don't know, is it? Geography? That's always been kind of weak.
Compared to some of those 8th-grade tests kids in the early part of the last century had to pass, we've dumbed down. But compared to just a couple of generations ago, I don't think so.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blind Cleric
Absolutely, no question about this in my mind.
Considering the preparation in math, science and literature my daughter and her peers received recently (She's now a college junior), it's clearly superior to my 70's education at the same HS as theirs.
I think it's very school dependent. The top students in some schools may be better prepared than others. But that doesn't mean all students are better prepared. Having more science credits does mean they actually learned science. This is an area that many science professional societies and employers (including mine -- mine will actually pay employees some hours to donate to STEM) have become concerned about. Kids are taking more chemistry and physics but graduating without actually knowing chemistry or physics the high school level. They enter college chem labs without knowing how to make basic measurements or do basic experiments. In too many schools science classes are like the one my kids graduated from -- window dressing. Sure, they had the class and filled the square/checked that box. There's also staring to be a reluctance to accept AP for core because they are finding it's not actually preparing students for college level work. How well the student is prepared for college level work is more dependent on the teacher than the score on the AP test.
Look, if you've got someone claiming that schools may be "deliberately dumbing down" the curriculum, I think telling them to consider that it's their masculine brain telling them that, is a perfectly reasonable approach.
Your FEELINGS are valid? The ones about masculine brains?
I found this, from the The Onion. Science Channel Refuses To Dumb Down Science Any Further
Its bad, real bad. I really believe they want the population stupid. And to worship stupid.
Did you really just post from the onion as a source? On a thread about "dumbing down"? In a post where you complain about "the population" being stupid? Is this post supposed to be ironic?
Requiring more, in terms of calc, AP classes, etc, does not mean the students in high school are any more prepared than in the past. Making more classes available to the upper students is good, but does not mean other students are taking them, nor does it mean they are learning more general math, etc. In many ways this ties to the basic theme -- we may be graduating more students in more classes, but to do so have dumbed down the content so that a high diploma doesn't mean the same thing.
More students are taking AP classes than ever before. We know this objectively.
I think it's very school dependent. The top students in some schools may be better prepared than others. But that doesn't mean all students are better prepared. Having more science credits does mean they actually learned science. This is an area that many science professional societies and employers (including mine -- mine will actually pay employees some hours to donate to STEM) have become concerned about. Kids are taking more chemistry and physics but graduating without actually knowing chemistry or physics the high school level. They enter college chem labs without knowing how to make basic measurements or do basic experiments. In too many schools science classes are like the one my kids graduated from -- window dressing. Sure, they had the class and filled the square/checked that box. There's also staring to be a reluctance to accept AP for core because they are finding it's not actually preparing students for college level work. How well the student is prepared for college level work is more dependent on the teacher than the score on the AP test.
Thanks for explaining. There's probably wide variation from district to district and state to state, etc., as to how Subject matter is covered.
Did you really just post from the onion as a source? On a thread about "dumbing down"? In a post where you complain about "the population" being stupid? Is this post supposed to be ironic?
It was supposed to be funny and it was. You have not noticed that Discovery, Nat Geo and all the educational channels are just full on stupid now ? Remember when Discovery first came out and you actually discovered-learned things ?
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
