AsleepAtTheKeyboard
New Blood
- Joined
- Sep 3, 2005
- Messages
- 21
I hear all the time that the U.S. public school system has deteriorated, and quality of education is worse now than XX years in the past. I am bombarded by damning anecdotes, and nearly swept away with the sincere and fervent emotions of those assaulting a "broken" system. But before I join the chorus of condemnation, I wish to verify my (and others') assumptions. I don't like singing in falsetto.
Here is what I've been able to find so far, plus my concerns about the quality of data.
U.S. Math scores rank very poorly compared to other industrialized countries.
apa.org/monitor/mar05/scores.html (sorry, still can't link)
Concerns: This study has not existed for a long period of time, so the only thing I can see from it is that we currently rank poorly. I cannot infer decreasing quality unless I am given other data to complete the picture. Also, the difference between U.S. and first place is about 10%. Could a dichotomy between low-performing inner-city schools and standard school districts lower our average scores?
Standardized tests - I wasn't able to find any of these that kept the same standards over the past 30 years. One person I know claims that tests are being dumbed down, teachers protesting any version that reveals them to be incompetent.
Concern: absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. I still need more.
Literacy comparisons are slightly more sophisticated anecdotes, at least when I encounter them. Usually they take an example of 19th century writing and compare it with current classroom creations. The difference is vast.
Concern: Isn't there a selection process for which 19th century letters and other works survive? A Civil War documentary would hardly choose an unintelligible letter over one that is poignant, insightful, and eloquent. I can't be sure that these are fair comparisons - not just their best against our worse.
Anecdotes. Yes, anecdotes. But there are so many of them! I have a friend who tells me of his school's multi-million-dollar football stadium, but molding science textbooks. I hear public school science teachers who complain of $200 budgets. My own mother tells me that she never would have learned of World War II had not her father been involved in it. There are so many stories, seemingly a different dozen from each new person I meet.
Concern: These are still just stories, perhaps modified by time, distance, and retelling. Many of these I hear close to source, but in the end I still have no data, no large-scale facts to make quantified judgments on and from.
Conclusion: I have a collection of impressions and data that doesn't tell the whole story. Is this enough to reasonably conclude a declining school system, or is it merely a tower of leaky buckets? Where do I go from here for hard data?
Here is what I've been able to find so far, plus my concerns about the quality of data.
U.S. Math scores rank very poorly compared to other industrialized countries.
apa.org/monitor/mar05/scores.html (sorry, still can't link)
Concerns: This study has not existed for a long period of time, so the only thing I can see from it is that we currently rank poorly. I cannot infer decreasing quality unless I am given other data to complete the picture. Also, the difference between U.S. and first place is about 10%. Could a dichotomy between low-performing inner-city schools and standard school districts lower our average scores?
Standardized tests - I wasn't able to find any of these that kept the same standards over the past 30 years. One person I know claims that tests are being dumbed down, teachers protesting any version that reveals them to be incompetent.
Concern: absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. I still need more.
Literacy comparisons are slightly more sophisticated anecdotes, at least when I encounter them. Usually they take an example of 19th century writing and compare it with current classroom creations. The difference is vast.
Concern: Isn't there a selection process for which 19th century letters and other works survive? A Civil War documentary would hardly choose an unintelligible letter over one that is poignant, insightful, and eloquent. I can't be sure that these are fair comparisons - not just their best against our worse.
Anecdotes. Yes, anecdotes. But there are so many of them! I have a friend who tells me of his school's multi-million-dollar football stadium, but molding science textbooks. I hear public school science teachers who complain of $200 budgets. My own mother tells me that she never would have learned of World War II had not her father been involved in it. There are so many stories, seemingly a different dozen from each new person I meet.
Concern: These are still just stories, perhaps modified by time, distance, and retelling. Many of these I hear close to source, but in the end I still have no data, no large-scale facts to make quantified judgments on and from.
Conclusion: I have a collection of impressions and data that doesn't tell the whole story. Is this enough to reasonably conclude a declining school system, or is it merely a tower of leaky buckets? Where do I go from here for hard data?
