Where Liberals Come FromFollow

Corrected for accuracy.

Which is amusing because while I was very very good at math and science when I was younger, by the end of High School, I was noticeably better at history and language type studies, and that trend continued as I got older.

I've never been to a math symposium or built a robot or any of that other stuff. I have, however, gone to debate and speech competitions (and did quite well). I won a first place "Voice of Democracy" award for a speech I wrote (in about an hour, after class, on the last day before the deadline). I just find it interesting that because I identify myself as an Engineer, you assume this means that my focus is in math and science. Engineering is half science and half art. That's what makes it engineering. You have to know enough about the sciences to know what will work and what wont, and have enough understanding of the arts to be able to start with a blank page and make something.


As to this issue itself? I'd change the direction of the whole "You have to go to one public school" thing. There really are movements to make it as impossible as can be to not attend a public school. We've had debates about this, with most liberals on this board agreeing that homeschooling (as one example) is bad and it's ok to put high restrictions on it to discourage it. This came about as a result of a California law which required that parents of home schooled kids obtain a teaching certificate.

There's also the opportunity cost attached to attending anything but a public school. If you are poor, you have no choice. You can't afford any other type of school. If you are middle class, it's a tough choice. You might like to send your kids to a private school, but you're already paying taxes to send them to the "free" public school. While I believe that tuition is tax deductible, that's never going to make up the difference in cost between public and private options (which has interesting relation to the health care debate btw).


I'll also point out that the reason why private schools are so expensive or restrictive (parochial schools are much harder to get into if you aren't super active in the local parish) is exactly because of the existence of public schools. It's impossible for anyone to compete for the working class persons business in terms of schools. Thus, no one aims private schools at that income range. Someone said that without taxes for public schools, how would there be schools? I think you'd be surprised. If we took all the money we currently pay in various taxes which end out funding public schools and let people keep that money, you'd find that local communities absolutely could afford to make their own schools, with their own rules.


Even if we don't go that far, why not instead of funding a public school system, give the money out in the form of vouchers? That way public and private schools could compete fairly for the same education dollars. This can only improve the overall quality of education for our kids, and eliminate a whole lot of corruption, inefficiency, and waste that exists within the system. The unfortunate reality is that each public school district knows that it's got a virtual monopoly on the kids growing up in that district. Most parents simply have no choice, and there's no real alternative available. If monopolies are bad (and I'm assuming we all agree they are), then one has to take a long look at our public school system. While it's not a complete monopoly, it's very very close. For about 80% of the population of the US, there simply is no choice available to them. It's public school, or public school.



Oh. Also, for the record, I'm never that impressed with "OMG! Look how uneducated this group is because they can't answer these test questions". They're usually pretty fabricated and questionable. But in this case, the problems with the US public school system run so deep and are so evident that this single survey really shouldn't matter one way or another. It's a disaster and needs to be fixed. There are some very obvious fixes we should apply. But there's a whole lot of political power involved in education, and that's difficult to fight against.

I find it interesting that you completely did not get the point. Actually, I find it rather dull. Do you see how I did that? I said it was interesting but actually meant something else implicitly. You seemed to gather the implicit presence of the polemic, but did not grasp its allusion, nor the object.



Yes, you see, in the enlightened world, we call such ideas as enabling everyone to obtain an education "justice." We also call such ideas as depriving your children of education so that you can raise them to be homunculi of your own ignorant and insidious agenda "criminal against human rights and freedoms."



Education isn't something to compete for, you calamitous, classist, capitalistic, creeping, cuntmold.



This is false.



This is also false.



Monopolies are bad things for economic issues. There is no such concept of a monopoly in a social issue. The government has a monopoly, and should have a monopoly, over the justice which is carried out in its borders; that is the function of the government, to make sure that people are not injuring other people on its watch. It is the only thing that can carry out this function, because when an individual does it, it is no longer justice. Your apparent either inability or unwillingness to consider issues as anything but economic allocation, the inability or unwillingness to consider something like going to fucking school, some process to be distributed according to an economic principle instead of justice or injustice quite frankly makes me want kill myself in despair of the world, for the chance that something so abhorrently immoral and disgusting as the position you hold is shared by anyone else.

Edited, Sep 18th 2009 6:56pm by Pensive

I was a non-practicing Catholic my whole life, then in 6th grade my mom decided to send me to the local Catholic school, where I had never even attended church. All they wanted was our money.

Edited, Sep 18th 2009 6:13pm by AshOnMyTomatoes

Getting a reasonable income is not the purpose of educating yourself. The fact that education is viewed as such is a miscarriage of justice elsewhere, primarily in how there doesn't exist some other function uniquely suited to preparing people for work, that can take up that role, as it should be, in a society that values knowledge as more than a means to market product.

Elucidate you say? No, you didn't, but I will anyway.

Far be it from a company or employer to actually care enough about his/her employees, to take responsibility for his or her own goddamn business, to provide specific work education or correspondence courses which serve the function that the employer wants. It's much easier to shirk the responsibility and look for someone had to pay for his/her own training, for just for the chance of slobbering on the enormous capital driven **** after completion, I agree.

Edited, Sep 18th 2009 7:42pm by Pensive

That sounds like an excellent prescription for society.

Actually it sounds more idiotic than school vouchers.

On the contrary, middle school was great. We had a pool, and that's around the time the girls started developing. Swimming classes were fun.

Sometimes you'd get people like me, who could test into the highest possible school they applied to without more than a few hours studying and then waste it by slacking off horribly during high school.

I would think a decent compromise would be to offer a cheap short course for some sort of home-schooling certificate or liscence or something, and then require that those who homeschool their children, while I having a certain amount of freedom in what material they teach, would be required to teach specific subjects as per the public school's cirriculum such as English, History, Math, Geography, basic science, and some sort of phys ed.

If none of that makes sense, note that I've had all of three hours sleep in the last 2 days.

On a note about that, most of the Middle School students are given high school recommendations based on their academic strengths, abilities, and which University they would be planning on attending eventually. So almost all students do end up passing at least one of the schools they apply for. You're also not stuck never being able to enter a High School or College. You can keep taking the test for as long as you would like within reason, they also care very little about which grade you got before. You can get a 28% on the first time, and a pass on the next and they wouldnt give a damn.

In Japan, any high school also costs money, public or privately, ontop of the potential juku/supplementary schools, which costs more money ontop of that. The tuition costs of a private high school in Japan is about twice the cost of a public school. About 94% of Japanese aged 15-18 attend High School, 25% of those attend private schools, and about half of high school students attend the juku.

I'm trying to remember specific prices, but generally the yearly cost of a Public school is around ¥240 000. An example of a private high schools tuition, the high school attached to my university, is ¥1 114 100. Gakushuin (the former school of the aristocracy which is now open to the public) High School is 658 000.

University costs are quite low though, in general. The higher education which is seen as the top, the Eight Imperial Universities (ie: Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka...) are all public universities. Public Universities are Â¥535 800 yen per year, with a Â¥282 000 matriculation/enrolment fee. Waseda University, one of the well known private universities, costs Â¥860 000 per year on average. Gakushuin University is 854 200. The private university I am attending, [国際基督教大å¦, Kokusai Kirisutokyō Daigaku] is Â¥1 359 000. This gives an idea how much higher education costs are in Japan.

On a side note, I just realized how expensive the University I'm at is in comparison. I think it might have to do with its small number of students and the schools specialized field, but thats just speculation.

Edited, Sep 19th 2009 7:34am by Keikomyau

America needs a new 'Common Enemy'.

Its the only thing that makes you all play nicely together

Realistically speaking, it's the only thing that makes anyone older than five play nicely together.

That's between half and a third of what you'd pay in the US.

So no, they're not getting ripped off pretty hard - people in the US are.