Wrong.
In the article, the nearest link that was supposed to prove that claim points to a blog post that uses the 2019 PISA data. And in that post, there's not just Ireland and Estonia in Europe that do better than USA, but also Finland, Poland and Sweden. US-Americans have a reputation of knowing little of the world geography, maybe that's why these countries were forgotten ;-)
The article also has a link to a blog about 2021 PISA data, but with a very limited sample: e.g. Estonia is missing. And Poland still does better than the USA.
leakycap•4mo ago
Students getting "dumber" implies something about the students, when the dumbest things I've encountered or heard of involve the staff and administration of US school systems
JumpCrisscross•4mo ago
"The PISA results are also a reminder of something that I think many Americans don’t know: America’s overall educational performance is above average for a rich country.
Our PISA reading scores were worse than Canada, Ireland, Estonia, and the rich Asian countries, but higher than everyone else in Europe. You used to be able to break out PISA scores by state, which would typically show things like Massachusetts doing better than any European country. But that breakdown is no longer available."
> Students getting "dumber" implies something about the students
A tree stunted by being grown in poor soil is still stunted.
bdangubic•4mo ago
both could be better but if you rely on any “system” or “administration” for your well-being you are not going to end up well…
opan•4mo ago
skylurk•4mo ago
- visiting museums
- going to the zoo
- running a lemonade stand
- volunteering at soup kitchen
- joining a sports team
My parents set me up for all of those, I would have just read books on the couch otherwise.
1718627440•4mo ago
skylurk•4mo ago
1718627440•4mo ago
Biology is famous for being only about memorization, but there is something in every subject. Grammar rules, vocab and poems in the language classes, laws in physics, philosophy has a bunch of concepts. What else are concept names in CS if not simply terms to be learned?
The point is however not only to train you how to learn or to get you to know facts, but most importantly to learn the tools of a subject and to let you be able to see abstractions. You need to do a lot of arithmetic before you can grasp analysis. I can't think of explaining mathematical models to a person who never got to use Numbers. A lot of things can only be learned by doing them.
Do you want to tell me anything you learned past class 6, can be learned by doing the activities you listed? It feels very weird to hear from people on the internet (who I think are adults), that they never moved on from being ~7 years old. (Sorry, that was not intended as an ad hominem, maybe you are a professor in X, but how can you explain, that you think school can be substituted by e.g. selling lemonade, past primary school?)
The alternative is that you are a modern da Vinci and could invent all of modern science yourself. In this case congratulations, but maybe you should have gone to university earlier. You would however realize that most people aren't like that and do learn more then selling lemonade at school.
skylurk•4mo ago
My school sucked, catering to the slowest students and bullying the self-motivated ones. The general view of the administration was that the whole universe was only a few thousand years old and was unlikely to last much longer.
I got a decent education, in spite of my school, thanks to my parents working hard to fill the gaps. Obviously the list above is not exhaustive, and it adapted as I got older.
So it was true for me then, and probably even more true in 2025, that the parents have full responsibility for the education of the student. Picking a school like yours would be a great first step, if that's an option.
1718627440•4mo ago
skylurk•4mo ago
But the curriculum was years behind, so by the time something showed up in the school material, a lot of kids had already learned it. Either outside of school, or just the previous year... the material always seemed recycled from year to year, just with ever increasing page count requirements for assignments. It was a private school, and thereby avoided scrutiny.
Come to think of it, I actually do remember a lot of rote memorisation of religious texts, though. Not sure how I forgot about it, it was a pretty stressful subject. We had to write those from memory in cursive too.
leakycap•4mo ago
If this is true, or even close - your kid desperately needs a new school, an IEP, or some other sort of immediate intervention.
bdangubic•4mo ago
the education begins and ends at home and is highly personal. in this day and age with everything kids have at their disposal, if they get majority of their education at school they are on the wrong track
leakycap•4mo ago
You spend $50k a year on a private school that is achieving 1% of the education needs of your child?
That's about $400 per average school day. Does this include food, boarding, and speciality IEP care or something?