The All Things Political Topic - As a Bright Lord bears Beacons of flame.

[Hurlshort]

3 hours ago, Darkpriest said:

@Hurlshot

I wonder what's your view, from the participant's of the edu system point of view, on such an article. 

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/achieving-equity-through-mediocrity-why-elimination-gifted-programs-should-worry-us-all

I tried to read the article. I really did. But it is total garbage. There are a lot of reasons gifted programs have fallen out of favor in recent decades. This guy is trying to force one data point down our throats while ignoring any others that don't fit his agenda. It is bad journalism.

As an educator, gifted programs have been a mess since the beginning because they are almost always driven by parents. Trying to identify which 4th grader is destined for genius is stupid. We all learn at different rates, have different bursts, different styles, etc. Taking a small group of kids and calling them gifted puts pressure on them to maintain that, and it alienates all the others. It is a stupid idea that hasn't born fruit. Our world is not led by a bunch of kids that got into the gifted program in 4th grade back in the 80's.

It most certainly is racist, but that is just another piece of data that makes it look terrible.

[Hurlshort]

Side note: Every one of my students is gifted and it is my job to help them tap into that. We don't need a special program. We could use smaller classes.

[BruceVC]

2 hours ago, Hurlsnot said:

I tried to read the article. I really did. But it is total garbage. There are a lot of reasons gifted programs have fallen out of favor in recent decades. This guy is trying to force one data point down our throats while ignoring any others that don't fit his agenda. It is bad journalism.

As an educator, gifted programs have been a mess since the beginning because they are almost always driven by parents. Trying to identify which 4th grader is destined for genius is stupid. We all learn at different rates, have different bursts, different styles, etc. Taking a small group of kids and calling them gifted puts pressure on them to maintain that, and it alienates all the others. It is a stupid idea that hasn't born fruit. Our world is not led by a bunch of kids that got into the gifted program in 4th grade back in the 80's.

It most certainly is racist, but that is just another piece of data that makes it look terrible.

Hurlshot are you sure the article is total garbage, its standard ZeroHedge which means their will always be certain truths, facts and relevant parts in the article  but then they make these sweeping inaccurate predictions or false\exaggerated  corollaries about certain realities or events 

I know this because I have been reading Darks ZeroHedge articles about the US  economy and global economy for the last  10-12 months or so and I came to realize how the articles get created and edited. Their are some clever people working their who are skilled at framing the more conservative view of topics in a reasonable  way but   leaning towards " gloom and doom " prognostications of the current liberal world and its economic policies 

But sometimes what they talk about  is true or a real concern to people throughout the world and its important to at least understand what they saying because then you will understand the concerns and anxieties that exist from the right and once these concerns are understood you can easily address them or at least address them with people who do want the truth and are not intransigent. Because you get people in the US on the far left and far right who have no interest in compromise or having a rational debate but its not everyone 

So for example the article mentions the following and its taken from the link below. Would you agree this teacher needs to be fired immediately for this type of bias and spreading of misinformation ? ( and he is white not that this  should influence your view )

Recently, a Virginia teacher denounced classroom discipline as a form of “white supremacy.” In a short video, Blacksburg High School teacher Josh Thompson described the Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports — or PBIS — as “white supremacy with a hug”: “The idea of just sitting quiet and being told stuff and taking things in a passive stance is not a thing that’s ‘in’ with many cultures. So if we’re positively enforcing these behaviors, we are by extension positively enforcing elements of white culture, which therefore keeps whiteness at the center, which is the definition of white supremacy.”

https://roanoke.com/news/local/education/blacksburg-teacher-calls-school-disciplinary-system-white-supremacy-in-viral-video/article_48b97df8-1660-11ec-b125-67b3f7a7e3a0.html

[Guard Dog]

6 hours ago, Hurlsnot said:

Side note: Every one of my students is gifted and it is my job to help them tap into that. We don't need a special program. We could use smaller classes.

That reminds me of two funny ones:

 

[Raithe]

 

[Pidesco]

https://reason.com/2021/10/14/woman-convicted-manslaughter-miscarriage-abortion-oklahoma-brittney-poolaw/

 

Land of the free. 

[BruceVC]

On 10/16/2021 at 4:01 AM, Hurlsnot said:

Side note: Every one of my students is gifted and it is my job to help them tap into that. We don't need a special program. We could use smaller classes.

I wanted to not comment on this particular liberal sentiment because I know its generally well meaning  but its been bothering me since yesterday and felt I had to comment 

It really can lead to the wrong impression about life, for some young people,   being created which I am sure none of us want. We are not all  born equal or gifted in life and thats okay, you should focus on your strengths and sometimes all school environments do unintentionally miss out on finding those strengths for a variety pf reasons and its not the teachers fault 

But this idea of everyone being gifted reminds of this new notion where some schools no longer recognize some kids athletic prowess as being superior athletes and everyone gets  a " reward " at the end of some event instead of only the best athletes. I was terrible at sports at school and frankly I am fine with that reality, why should I get a  " reward " for being good at sports when I was wasnt? I was academic and good at things like debating and speech and drama and I got recognised for that which is what you would expect surly ?

And why  should this be a concern in RL ? Because  if all kids start being told you " all equally gifted " then it can unintentionally undermine the reality of how our societies incentivize you to work and achieve your sales target or other similar performance metric. In other words you need to make certain choices in life and work towards clearly defined goals to achieve many things. But I fail to see how some generalized view that their is no such thing as exceptionalism helps ?

So in summary you do have some brilliant\gifted students who have some  precocious skills  but not everyone and thats normal and  that shouldnt impact their life journey 

 

[Hurlshort]

13 hours ago, BruceVC said:

I wanted to not comment on this particular liberal sentiment because I know its generally well meaning  but its been bothering me since yesterday and felt I had to comment 

It is weird that you call this a liberal sentiment. Like, is it a conservative sentiment that only some people are good enough to succeed in life? "Hey kids, your potential is limited, so just kick back and accept your lot in life." 

[rjshae]

On 10/15/2021 at 6:57 PM, Hurlsnot said:

 

As an educator, gifted programs have been a mess since the beginning because they are almost always driven by parents. Trying to identify which 4th grader is destined for genius is stupid. We all learn at different rates, have different bursts, different styles, etc. Taking a small group of kids and calling them gifted puts pressure on them to maintain that, and it alienates all the others. It is a stupid idea that hasn't born fruit. Our world is not led by a bunch of kids that got into the gifted program in 4th grade back in the 80's.

I suspect that the primary benefit of gifted programs is to avoid boredom by the students because they don't have to wait on slow kids. If a teacher spends 80% of their time instructing 20% of the kids, that's not an optimal classroom.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

1 hour ago, Hurlsnot said:

Like, is it a conservative sentiment that only some people are good enough to succeed in life? "Hey kids, your potential is limited, so just kick back and accept your lot in life."

Yes, Charles Murray has been saying that since the 90s.

[Gorth]

1 hour ago, rjshae said:

I suspect that the primary benefit of gifted programs is to avoid boredom by the students because they don't have to wait on slow kids. If a teacher spends 80% of their time instructing 20% of the kids, that's not an optimal classroom.

Speaking from personal experience, I'm sort of happy that my small town school didn't have special programs for gifted children. Being one of those that stood out in a crowd, I spent several of my first years in school being dragged away from class, spending in a small room with a bunch of old geezers (not wearing lab coats, but I could almost imagine it), asking me question upon question, taking notes, showing me sequences of trigonometric shapes, asking questions about society, natural science... FFS, I was 8 years old and wanted to be outside and play ball! Being a clever kid, I came up with the idea of playing dumb. Hardest thing I ever did was to deliberately give wrong answers, pretending I didn't know about something or acting clueless. But it worked, after another year, they left me alone and I got to spend most of my school years in the library instead (because the teachers thought my constantly bored looking expression was "demoralizing" for my classmates, who had trouble with their assignments)

Edit: And my classmates needed the teachers a lot more than I did...

I still miss the smell of books to this day

 

[BruceVC]

5 hours ago, Hurlsnot said:

It is weird that you call this a liberal sentiment. Like, is it a conservative sentiment that only some people are good enough to succeed in life? "Hey kids, your potential is limited, so just kick back and accept your lot in life." 

I think you are misunderstanding me because maybe you have had his debate with others and you are sensitive to what you think I am saying?

I am not saying " only some kids  can or should succeed in life ". School is a foundation and what you learn and believe at school has a huge impact to  your life choices and journey afterwards

But life is about different strengths and different skills that some people are good at and some people simply arent. And some people arent  prepared to work hard  or make the right choices

So why create school environments where we dont like to recognize or incentivize brilliant, hard working or gifted students ? Life is not about guaranteed equality and you cant legislate this reality away 

 

[BruceVC]

3 hours ago, Gorth said:

Speaking from personal experience, I'm sort of happy that my small town school didn't have special programs for gifted children. Being one of those that stood out in a crowd, I spent several of my first years in school being dragged away from class, spending in a small room with a bunch of old geezers (not wearing lab coats, but I could almost imagine it), asking me question upon question, taking notes, showing me sequences of trigonometric shapes, asking questions about society, natural science... FFS, I was 8 years old and wanted to be outside and play ball! Being a clever kid, I came up with the idea of playing dumb. Hardest thing I ever did was to deliberately give wrong answers, pretending I didn't know about something or acting clueless. But it worked, after another year, they left me alone and I got to spend most of my school years in the library instead (because the teachers thought my constantly bored looking expression was "demoralizing" for my classmates, who had trouble with their assignments)

Edit: And my classmates needed the teachers a lot more than I did...

I still miss the smell of books to this day

 

Gorthfuscious !!! I cant believe you are openly talking about how you rejected " being a clever kid " !!!

And you not embarrassed by rejecting your privlidege, you anarchists ...what are our  societies going to do with you 

  

[Gorth]

3 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

Gorthfuscious !!! I cant believe you are openly talking about how you rejected " being a clever kid " !!!

And you not embarrassed by rejecting your privlidege, you anarchists ...what are our  societies going to do with you 

  

Preferably leave me alone I think?

[ComradeYellow]

Most of my family are deeply religious (In a deep blue northeastern state no less) so securing a banging education and discussing academic and scientific theory at the dinner table was never really a part of my upbringing unfortunately.  "Either work with your brain or work with your back!" was the rationale I received for staying in school.  The town I grew up in was pretty hickish and stupid though, so it's not like the public schools offered a strict and advanced educational curriculum ...whoever was the darling who was attractive, good at sports, and was well connected with the community received priority. xD

[BruceVC]

31 minutes ago, ComradeYellow said:

Most of my family are deeply religious (In a deep blue northeastern state no less) so securing a banging education and discussing academic and scientific theory at the dinner table was never really a part of my upbringing unfortunately.  "Either work with your brain or work with your back!" was the rationale I received for staying in school.  The town I grew up in was pretty hickish and stupid though, so it's not like the public schools offered a strict and advanced educational curriculum ...whoever was the darling who was attractive, good at sports, and was well connected with the community received priority. xD

Yes same as me, the " beautiful people " got more attention at school and everyone hung on the words of the rugby and other sports captains in assembly 

But thats the reality of early  life and its temporary and more because of " school culture ". Its okay because things can work out differently when it comes to life outside of school and we not defined necessarily by our failures or successes at school 

[Darkpriest]

@Hurlshot

I'm not sure how the 'gifted kids' classes worked, but I think they are a better solution to the 'dounce' classes that were created in some other areas of the world (to weed out really slow or problematic kids and let others flourish and be pulled forward by the 'gifted' ones)

Might argue which one is better, but in my view, world is highly competitive and each 'team' in the world should play for their best players to be best. You see that in sports, you see that in business, and you see that in science. 

 

The push for the results and enabling and pushing your top talents on more demanding tracks is what gives groups an edge. Rush for medicricy and foolish concept of 'social' equity, will just mean that a given group is overall weaker. Aspiring powers, such as China understand that, that's why they are pulling ahead in tech and engineering. 

 

Look at the most recent article in Financial Times on hypersonic capabilities of China, which left US confused and worried. (possibly a game changer) 

 

Why do you think they are pulling ahead in tech? 

[Hurlshort]

6 hours ago, Darkpriest said:

Might argue which one is better, but in my view, world is highly competitive and each 'team' in the world should play for their best players to be best. You see that in sports, you see that in business, and you see that in science. 

You are simplifying what makes a successful sports, business, or science team. It isn't just the best players playing all the time. There are going to be roles to fill, there is going to be hard work that needs to get done, and there is probably going to need to be some opportunity and luck. 

I don't mind the sports analogy for my classroom. But if I'm a coach and I have a roster of 35 players, it seems a lot smarter to utilize the strengths of all 35 of my players then to just focus on a few that have the most obvious strengths. It is my job to get them all across home plate, or the end zone, or in the penalty box or whatever analogy you think fits best. 

The San Francisco Giants won 107 games this year. They didn't have the most talented line up in the league. What they had was a massive coaching staff that worked hard to get the most out of their players, and players that understood what their strengths were. 

So if we want to have more success in education, we need smaller classes and more teachers. We don't need programs that exclude the students. 

[Raithe]

On the divergence away from education...

Texas Agency Shuts Down LGBTQ Teen Suicide Hotline - Second Nexus

TX Scrubs LGBTQ Suicide Hotline From Website After Abbott's Challenger Accuses Him of 'Promoting' Transgender Policies

[Malcador]

51 minutes ago, Hurlsnot said:

You are simplifying what makes a successful sports, business, or science team. It isn't just the best players playing all the time. There are going to be roles to fill, there is going to be hard work that needs to get done, and there is probably going to need to be some opportunity and luck. 

I don't mind the sports analogy for my classroom. But if I'm a coach and I have a roster of 35 players, it seems a lot smarter to utilize the strengths of all 35 of my players then to just focus on a few that have the most obvious strengths. It is my job to get them all across home plate, or the end zone, or in the penalty box or whatever analogy you think fits best. 

The San Francisco Giants won 107 games this year. They didn't have the most talented line up in the league. What they had was a massive coaching staff that worked hard to get the most out of their players, and players that understood what their strengths were. 

So if we want to have more success in education, we need smaller classes and more teachers. We don't need programs that exclude the students. 

Just execute the ones that fall behind.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

9 minutes ago, Malcador said:

Just execute the ones that fall behind.

But then the financial lizard brains may have to get a real job.

1 hour ago, Hurlsnot said:

You are simplifying what makes a successful sports, business, or science team. It isn't just the best players playing all the time. There are going to be roles to fill, there is going to be hard work that needs to get done, and there is probably going to need to be some opportunity and luck. 

I don't mind the sports analogy for my classroom. But if I'm a coach and I have a roster of 35 players, it seems a lot smarter to utilize the strengths of all 35 of my players then to just focus on a few that have the most obvious strengths. It is my job to get them all across home plate, or the end zone, or in the penalty box or whatever analogy you think fits best. 

The San Francisco Giants won 107 games this year. They didn't have the most talented line up in the league. What they had was a massive coaching staff that worked hard to get the most out of their players, and players that understood what their strengths were. 

So if we want to have more success in education, we need smaller classes and more teachers. We don't need programs that exclude the students. 

I don't really like analogies because it seems to me that a classroom is fundamentally different than a business or sports team. The kids aren't really competing with another class room the same way that sports teams do and if you're manufacturing products or services for commercial use then you're probably violating some kind of labor laws. You're trying to guide the kids to make sure they develop skills to succeed, that's not really analogous to what a business does and I think trying to treat it that way will be disastrous.

As someone who was in "gifted" programs until mid high school, I can certainly say that I would have benefitted more from a smaller class size with more involved teachers than what being put in a program. Maybe that wouldn't have helped much because Texas education is not great to begin with, but I think it would have been better than what I actually got.

[BruceVC]

1 hour ago, Malcador said:

Just execute the ones that fall behind.

I thought you were opposed to the death penalty ?

[Malcador]

I wasn't being serious.  Am against the death penalty for the dangers of incompetence and too many people get overrun by their desire for a revenge orgasm with it.

Edited October 18, 2021 by Malcador

[ComradeYellow]

Steven van Zandt Says America Is On the 'Brink of A New Civil War' (msn.com)

Every once in a while you get stunned when a celebrity shares an identical overarching opinion on current affairs.  Cheers, Steve!

[BruceVC]

https://www.thedrinksbusiness.com/2021/10/furious-diner-left-stunned-by-37000-bill-at-salt-baes-new-london-restaurant/

Imagine having the money to spend about $51K on a meal.....a single meal for 4 people ( and it doesnt matter they are complaining. They still ordered it )

Now that is outrageous and an example of ostentatious and egregious consumption