America Behind in Math and Science

They can't without a lot of money.

I would support simply putting in place in public schools a system that separates problem students out of the general population of students. We had 'public' high schools for those kids when I was growing up. Kept them from interfering with everyone else.

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"There ain't no devil, there's just God when he's drunk." - Tom Waits

i'd rather invest the kind of money it would take to actually make a private school transition into developing a modern system of motivation that appeals greater than "you should WANT to learn". Adults don't work because they merely WANT to work. We should condition kids to excel for the sake of their own gain even if we have to emulate life in our capitalist society and pair financial with intellectual gains.


the book it strategy on a widescale, of you will.

Yeah, I think that's an interesting approach. Would be cool if someone could put it into practice in a few schools to see how it plays out.

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"There ain't no devil, there's just God when he's drunk." - Tom Waits

The primary reason I spend the extra money to send my kids to private schools is so I have more control over my children's education. If public school kids were allowed in (with vouchers, for example), there would be no point in sending them to private schools. If that happened, I would probably opt for home-schooling.

I disagree. I've seen a great deal of flexibility and creativity from my kids' teachers over the years, and while it is true that some schools do teach to the test (particularly here, in Florida), it is also true that what is being tested is basic literacy skills that every student needs. Without those basic literacy skills, it's difficult to give kids critical thinking skills. That's why our math scores have actually gone up, comparatively speaking. I heard that yesterday on NPR, in fact.

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"If waterboarding is okay, why don't we let police do it to suspects?" - Jesse Ventura

oh it's being tested right now. Indeed, I suspect this will be the next giant, earth destroying issue that makes it's way up the talking point mountain by the 2010 election cycle.

thats exactly the point that unravels almost the entire argument of those who propose private schools will become some kind of educational panacea. THEN, would the public be expected to pay tuition to parents who decide to homeschool their kids after a private school failure?

xsited should really stop making sense. It's screwing up southpaw's argument.

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"If waterboarding is okay, why don't we let police do it to suspects?" - Jesse Ventura

There's no question in my mind that vouchers are a bad idea. Not only would they allow just anybody into a private school, but they would give the government more control over private schools. I certainly don't want that. If the people who send their kids to public schools want better schools for their kids, they should get more involved. Obviously, our elected leaders (like Obama, for example) have little faith in the Public School system since most send their kids to private schools.

Okay, I got few a GREAT cleaning solutions for you, they will get rid of all the germs and grime with ease. The best one is mixing hydrogen-peroxide with bleach.

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If you can dream it, I can code it.
Every hand's a winner, and every hands a loser, the best you could hope for is to die in your sleep.

Math and science is responsible for ALL the tech we have, and with the decline in advancements coming from the US this isn't surprising at all.

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If you can dream it, I can code it.
Every hand's a winner, and every hands a loser, the best you could hope for is to die in your sleep.

That's your view.

My complaint against public schools is that they are not held to a high enough standard. I don't really care which kids are going there or not. I think that if schools were put in the hands of private companies and given goals to meet, the competition would be much higher because, as opposed to now, companies that no longer performed would not keep their contracts and companies that did well could keep them.

Costs would decrease and performance would increase.

I agree with the necessity of basic literacy skills for a foundation. I'm talking more about 6th grade and on. Furthermore, you have said in the past your kids go to a great school with decent teachers. I think we can agree that is becoming more and more of a rarity these days.

Of course not. If a parent decides to homeschool, why should the public pick up the slack?

Not really, he/she is coming at it from an entirely different angle than I am.

What's that supposed to do, explode or something? Whatever I guess it's hilarious to make fun of me today.

Um no, I was actually trying to prove that you do use science everyday ... but if you don't know then I failed, though you did prove that you need to go back to school. Many common household cleaners can be mixed to create very dangerous gases and poisons, that just happens to be my favorite.

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If you can dream it, I can code it.
Every hand's a winner, and every hands a loser, the best you could hope for is to die in your sleep.

Even in the 1980s, I had to hire foreigners to fill technical positions in R&D because there weren't any qualified Americans. It's gotten worse since then with no improvement in sight.