busyReport Says Education Gaps Create "Permanent Recession"
Stacy Teicher Khadaroo, The Christian Science Monitor: "Educational achievement gaps are typically measured in terms of test scores - across lines of race and income, or even across state and national borders. But what if they were measured in dollars?"
One way to improve matters would be to narrow or close the gaps in education. Another would be to put some serious effort into matching people's interests and abilities to suitable careers. Right now, we are wasting a tremendous amount of human potential; we should not be doing that.
Re: Thoughts
April 24 2009, 20:20:52 UTC 12 years ago
No. Really no. Demonstrably no. Mental intelligence and other forms of intelligence are spectral effects, and everyone has things they are better at or worse at, but the different ranges of people move through the world quite differently. Most people are average and behave according to expectation. Slow people have less to work with, more limitations, literally a slower processing speed and fewer knacks. They have to do more things bit-by-bit instead of leaping to correct conclusions ... like somebody going through an obstacle course who can't jump. Gifted people are quicksilver, they think wider and faster and deeper than average. They make leaps that ordinary people can't make or wouldn't even consider ... like somebody going through an obstacle course who can fly. Half the time it's "What obstacle?"
Failure to take these differences into account can cripple or kill.
>> Children who can't thrive under the same conditions as we did, who aren't interested in the same things, don't excel in the same ways, etc., aren't as 'intelligent' as we are. <<
Not necessarily, although that's a common misconception. Intelligence expresses itself in various ways.
>> Intelligence cannot be measured intelligently. <<
It can, it's just not as easy to do that as most people believe. Measuring it on a test is challenging, because high intelligence can be obscured by other factors, such as lack of education, personality issues, divergent culture, or poor test-taking skills. The best gauges I've seen are more holistic, looking at how a person moves through life, summing up a lot of different factors.
>> Too bad our public schools don't search for what makes a child unique, what will make this child happy and encouraged to develop his or her potential; to instill a love of learning, a celebration of our differences, a desire for mutual understanding and cooperation.<<
Now this I agree with, because there are different areas of strength and weakness, and people really need to learn what they are good at and enjoy doing. The schools do almost none of that, and it's what they should be emphasizing from about junior high onward.
Re: Thoughts
April 25 2009, 00:01:23 UTC 12 years ago
Ohhhh! This! My younger daughter is not an academic, in the least. But, if you live long enough, you will know her name. She has had a natural hand/mind/eye for art since she was a young toddler. I've seen her turn her artistic gift to varied media: writing, writing music, photography, performing music, poetry, and many others in her (nearly 18) years. Awarded often at state level visual arts during grammar school, she first published poetry in junior high and attended a couple of "art school" high schools. However, it may be as a goth/fetish model you will first encounter her. She also makes art of herself.
She never was the voracious reader like myself or her sister. Her favorite book had no words at all, received when she was three and treasured still. She was about eight when I asked her why it was her favorite still, worried about her lack of reading. She answered, "When you read a book, it's the same story every time. When I look through this one, it's a different story every time." She'll eventually have her academic sister do her accounting, I'm sure.
Re: Thoughts
April 25 2009, 00:32:22 UTC 12 years ago
That is very insightful. *chuckle* Though to be fair, I and other word-people can get that effect out of a word-book.
>> She'll eventually have her academic sister do her accounting, I'm sure.<<
*LAUGH* I had math teachers come down on me and demand how I'd handle math after I left school. What were they, STUPID? In the real world, you don't do something really important if you know you'll get it wrong -- you ask or hire someone competent to do it for you. But my smartass answer was, "Marry into it."
Which is what I actually wound up doing. Heh.