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Comment by g9yuayon | Hacker News Reader

> "Families with resources turn to fee-required online algebra 1 courses in eighth grade, outside the public school system, or enroll their kids in private schools,"

Isn't this obvious result? The Russian School of Mathematics could manage to teach 10-year old kids basic algebra. And there's AOPS, there's Think Academy, and slew of local tutoring schools who can teach kids relatively advanced maths. Let alone many private schools. If I have the means, why would I not send my kids to such schools and therefore fuck up the funding of the public schools? Not that I want to, but it furiates me that the school administrators really hurt the kids who need public education the most in the name of equity. It also saddens me that the constituents are okay with such administrators.

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> in the name of equity

That's the problem. We're dealing with the critical theory definition of equity, which they define as the intentional redistribution of opportunity and resources along identity group lines to correct for present and historical injustices, as well as opportunities those groups have already had.

Critical theory and social justice adopts a distorted view of reality. Leave it to a school in San Francisco to show everyone what happens in real life when administrators adopt a policy based on that distorted view of reality -- inequality is only increased.

In fact, I'd classify critical theory alongside Marxism for adopting a false belief that some top-down forced redistribution of resources/wealth/opportunity/means of production/etc. is the way to true justice. That kind of belief backfires spectacularly when policy makers adopt it IRL.

Inequality is increased because those without resources aren’t receiving any new benefits and those with resources use those resources to compensate for the failure of the system to provide an education optimal path. It’s worse outcomes for both, except some people can shield themselves from the fallout. What new kind of self-inflicted damage will be required to realize the detrimental failure of this world view?

Where do the resources come from?

Also, among those who aren’t willfully ignorant, it’s well known that increasing resources increases inequality. The classic example is height: when resources are low everyone is short. But when resources are plentiful then those with the genes for height tower above those without.

> But when resources are plentiful then those with the genes for height tower above those without.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

Those who were short didn't fare worse in absolute terms. They only look worse off by comparison.

That's exactly analogous to SF not offering algebra (for the students without the means to take extracurricular classes, which are disproportionately Black and Hispanic) - none of them get algebra, so they're all worse off in math in the future. With algebra offered, Black and Hispanic students may be less successful on average at algebra than other groups, but at least Black and Hispanic students that can handle algebra get a chance for better math education.

The gist of it is, there needs to be great opportunities offered without prejudice.

In fairness, the issues surrounding height inequality tend to be more about relative height than absolute height. So sure, shorter people can still reach the same physical heights, absolutely speaking, but they are now being judged against a broader spectrum of heights relatively speaking. Which means that they're less likely to succeed at job interviews or in relationships, and therefore end up absolutely worse off than before.

Essentially, if something is a zero-sum game (e.g. there are only so many jobs around, if you get a job someone else won't), then even if someone isn't doing worse absolutely, they can still do worse overall relatively speaking.

Which isn't to say that we should be giving short people stilts and cutting the legs off tall people, but it's worth recognising that these topics are complex, and even if we're only talking about absolute benefits, people can still lose out relatively speaking.

So you figure people should give even more resources, and their children's futures, over to these people who actively hate them and just hope things will work out, despite all evidence to the contrary?

My obligation is to my children. I'm happy to entrust them to a system if I have faith in it, or the people running it. If I don't...it would be downright irresponsible.

Well you see we just haven't tried real socialism yet. The wealthy should not be allowed to give any kind of private education including tutors to their kids. And they shouldn't be allowed to interact with their kids at all because that too causes inequity. State boarding schools all around. Then we will achieve a classless society.

Exactly, that's where this line of reasoning goes.

In reality, the political leaders in charge of this societal reordering will themselves become the next upper class, and you can bet with certainty they'll give their own kids the best education and opportunities they can (which will be better than what they offer the masses).

It must suck to be poor but not belong to any one the correct identity groups nowadays. I am lucky I was born way before that, or I would never have be able to leave poverty.

Maybe the trick is to remove poverty, it's not hard to do

Sarcasm?

No, not at all, take 10% of the military budget, up the tax right for the high earners and make a better world. Imagine a place where no one had to be scared of living on the street, could get decent food, has access to free education and health care. What a wonderful world. It's totally within our capabilities and no one need suffer. Now I'm not saying it will be a great life but a basic life, it's been proved over and over that the limiting factor for a number of minorities is poverty, so unless you address that first nothing will be solved. Sure some people will abuse it, but think of the kids that will be able to get an education and eat properly, and its just easy.

> What a wonderful world. It's totally within our capabilities and no one need suffer.

I get really scared when I hear anyone promise utopia. Literally every large-scale society that did turned into a hellscape after a while, and the idea itself never worked.

There was always someone who didn't buy into the idea, and they were blamed for why it didn't work. "If only those people were gone, then this would work and we'd be happy."

So millions die or are sent to the gulag or whatever it's called, and the idea is still not working.

China no longer promises its citizens a utopia. All they promise is a country that is powerful on the world stage. They're getting there, but it's still happening via exploitation. And the back alleys of Beijing still ring with abject poverty.

Interesting, China has managed to lift a large proportion of its citizens in a very short time. I wasn't suggesting a Utopia, merely raising the bar so the minimum level is better than it is now, surely that should be the goal of every advanced country. The current levels of poverty are negatively influencing the next generation.

> China has managed to lift a large proportion of its citizens in a very short time

You're conveniently ignoring the cultural revolution, which caused an ideological purity spiral resulting in millions dead.

China only began to prosper when they relaxed their economic policies and began to allow property/business ownership and international trade (especially with the West) back in.

Poverty is not eliminated in China, at all. The fact that they lifted a lot of people out of poverty doesn't necessarily mean they can lift all people out of poverty. Nobody else has achieved that. It's not as easy as you make out.

Also: the way they lifted all those people out of poverty was basically by freeing them to lift themselves out of poverty, by adopting an essentially capitalist system. You could say: they simply stopped holding people in poverty.

" Imagine a place where no one had to be scared of living on the street, could get decent food, has access to free education and health care. What a wonderful world. "

This wonderful world already exists in the US. Poor people have access to Medicaid / Emergency Rooms. The debate about food insecurity is whether or not poor people can afford fresh vegetables (because living on rice, cheap meats and canned peas/beans is not nutritious enough). About living in the street - if you are living on the street when you can get a job as a limo driver for $30 / hour just by walking in then maybe is your fault???

> if you are living on the street when you can get a job as a limo driver for $30 / hour just by walking in then maybe is your fault???

Wow, this is a joke isn't it?

People will willingly claim that critical theory is not connected to Marxism. We call these people wrong.

Marx is literally the godfather of critical theory, the Frankfurt school, post strcturalism and the rest of the fashionable nonsense cannon that parts of the left seem obsessed with.

Man, forget about Soviet Russia. I give you a more striking example: I was born in Brazil and started having algebra around this age, in a public school, where most of the kids, like me were either poor or at the best lower middle class. I don't even remember having a colleague that had at least one parent with a superior education.

I think the idea is that if it’s important to rich parents, they will grudgingly fund education for everyone. But as long as they have these outlets where they can just educate their own kids and leave everyone else behind, they will.

I'm not sure that's a fair generalization. I suspect many parents have the resources to improve their own kids' educations, but not the time/energy to try changing the school system politics / bureaucracy / laws / budgets in time for their kids.

Some students need to be left behind

Which ones are those again?

Those who can't keep up with the rest. The only alternative is to hold everybody back to the level of the dimwits, and that's atrocious.

Who gets to decide that?

Test scores?

Test scores aren't decision making agents. Are you thinking of a person?

You're being intentionally obtuse. If you have the capacity to have an accelerated program for 1,000 students in a district, then you rank by test scores and bring in the top 1,000.

My intentions aren't epistemologically accessible to you.

What parents commenters are doing is laundering agency through a testing regime. It's part of the process of the absolution of responsibility of consequence.

As an aside, it's clear that parent commenters aren't mature enough to be approached socratically. I regret their schools taught them to read and write. They clearly don't want to learn.

No, your intentions are very clear (and naive), you're just wrong.

Since we're clearly able to read each other's intentions, yours are to disrupt the legitimate line of questioning with a temper tantrum. I hope you see where assuming people's intentions ends up. I know you can do better than that.

You broke the site guidelines badly here. We ban accounts that do that, regardless of how provocative other comments were or you feel they were.

Fortunately it doesn't look like you've been making a habit of this (at least not from a quick look at the account's recent posts in other threads), so this should be easy to fix. If you'd review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to using HN as intended, we'd appreciate it.

Please don't break the site guidelines with personal attacks or name-calling.

You've done this in other threads too, unfortunately (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35469483 was particularly bad). We have to ban accounts that post like this, so if you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules from now on, we'd appreciate it.

Personal attacks are not allowed here. Your comment would be fine without the first bit.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

The dumb ones so that smart kids can actually learn.

Kids who are disruptive/discipline problems. Teachers should not be removing slow students who do not cause issues in the classroom. Teachers should remove disruptive students. Disruptive students lose their learning pass, and all would benefit from such a situation.

Teachers becoming disciplinarians is where they become authoritarian, exploitive arbiters of ones future earning potential.

I'd encourage you to think critically about the design and implementation of such a system, the incentives it would generate and the moral hazards of enacting it. It's not like labeling kids as "unworthy of learning" could be abused.

Could you please not take HN threads further into flamewar? It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

A callous way to put it, but it could also be stated that setting people up for modest success is a much kinder position than setting them up for exceptional failure.

>Some students need to be left behind

Definitely. Let's start stack ranking[0] in kindergarten and expel (and make that stick nationwide!) the bottom 10% every year.[1]

By the time students get to high school, we'll have best schools in the world!

Those who have been expelled had already reached their intellectual peak, especially those in primary school. amirite? /s

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitality_curve

[1] Please use this is a "clear indicator of intent to parody" -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe's_law

Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments and flamebait? You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

The rich will always have those outlets, and nobody is going to take them away from them, because they have the power. Now, with the disappearing middle class, "just call them the rich, and make them pay for it" has been the default for a long time.

> The rich will always have those outlets

The Nordic countries have the best schools in the world.

Private schools are banned.

Well except for Sweden. They introduced vouchers in the 90s and as soon as they did, their rankings started rolling like dung down a hill.

Denmark has had a private school system for decades, and 15% of students go into the private schools (as a parent you pay a portion of the costs so it is not necessarily extremely expensive). "Private" mostly means that you still have to teach specific basics, but you can do it in your way like Montessori.

One advantage of the private schools is they can kick out students they cannot manage easily, while the public schools have to keep everyone. Some recent strutural changes in the public shools are said to have declined their quality, enough so that many government ministers, even of the left wing, are sending their children to the private schools.

I guess it's one of those Nordic myths -- like high minimum wage (there is none in Denmark).

> Some recent strutural changes in the public shools are said to have declined their quality, enough so that many government ministers, even of the left wing, are sending their children to the private schools.

they did that before too :) couldnt possibly expect the politicians to send their kids to the same filthy schools as the plebs now could we? :)

This is often repeated when talking about education, and it is absolutely wrong. Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland all have private schools.

> I think the idea is that if it’s important to rich parents, they will grudgingly fund education for everyone.

it doesn't cost more for a teacher to open up an algebra book and teach from that instead of from the pre-algebra book. unless there are scheduling difficulties which somehow prevent one classroom's worth of students from being crammed into the same room in the same slot, the imagined lack of money isn't going to impact the contents of the curriculum.

this isn't like when we thought we needed to cram schools full of computers and they were going to cost money. one math class is an expensive as another to teach. we don't even need new textbooks. hell, we probably don't even need textbooks, just have them do exercises online or something.

> one math class is an expensive as another to teach

On the contrary, I'm sure that a teacher who understands algebra well enough to teach it competently costs much more than the other kind, on account of being so rare.

> But as long as they have these outlets where they can just educate their own kids and leave everyone else behind, they will.

Education is a collective action problem. Parents care more about their own child's education than the education of other children. This should not be surprising, and it cannot be changed.

That's the first thing that my daughter was taught at RSM when she went in for 5th grade math - Algebra. They also start you with geometry in the 6th grade. I think they start Algebra a lot younger actually - maybe 2nd or 3rd grade. When I spoke to the principal of the my local RSM she said the earlier you start the better it is.

Edit:- They get homework they need to turn in. Early on I had to spend sometime with my daughter to help her cope. But once she had her concepts down its been pretty smooth sailing.

russian school of math is very popular at the schools my kids are at. i ask the parents why and they tell me they think math is important and the public school isn’t challenging them

For someone unfamiliar, what is Russian School of Math? A private school? An extra curricular activity?

A private, after-school extra curricular program. It’s a national company with many local branches (possibly franchised). Like Kumon, it’s a way for ambitious parents to buy extra academic classes and extra homework for their kids.

They give you a pencil, and the kid in line in front of you gets a calculator. When he flunks out, you get his calculator.

Is a wonderful program teaching math. I cannot recommend it enough. I recommend it to all my friends. It starts from basics - in kindergarten they do problems like "there are 4 birds on a branch. 2 fly away. How many are left on the branch?". And then it builds and keeps building. My son is taking it. My son was solving linear equations when he was 11 years old. I think this is the best education he is getting - and the one that will stay with him the most.

What else could possible result?

There are people who don't understand sociology and are only vaguely aware of pathological cultural factors (or possibly, though they are aware of them, wish to deny their existence) and demand that these problems be solved with bureaucracy.

Bureaucracy is only able to crudely affect these, and only in the most totalitarian of regimes. Mao or Stalin might have been able to rid their countries of pathological cultural factors (of course, instead of doing such they were more concerned with ridding themselves of potential rivals). California cannot at this point in time do any such thing.

nearly every other developed country managed to fund their schools system adequately, to provide a uniform system of education without heavy reliance on private schools. While you can't really guarantee equal opportunities for every kid due extracurricular support, at least the possible schools and classes are open to everyone independent of income.

So one should strive to eliminate private schools as much as possible. I entrenches inequality.

I don't think any intelligent person would make the accusation that we don't spend enough on education. On average, the United States spends an absurd amount per student. Even in the places where they spend less than this average per student, they're still spending more than throughout all of Europe.

The question really becomes not if we're spending enough, but what it is that we happen to be buying. How much of any given $1 you spend in taxes purchases textbooks, or pays teacher paychecks? Hell, how much on air conditioning in the summer so kids can concentrate on something other than the sweat dribbling down their foreheads?

How much is spent on the office building downtown that has nothing to do with teaching directly, but with people who manage the teachers? And with people who manage those managers?

> So one should strive to eliminate private schools as much as possible. I entrenches inequality.

If the only equality you can figure out how to manage is hammering down all the nails that stick out, what good is equality?

I wonder whether averages here "average out" the missing spending. I am not surprised that the average spending in San Francisco per kid is higher than most places, especially because of the prevalence of private schools. And, of course, more money is not always a solution if it's not used effectively. I would also guess that absolute spending per child is not really comparable without adjusting for cost of living, you can't outsource your teachers after all. The question is quite complicated.

> If the only equality you can figure out how to manage is hammering down all the nails that stick out, what good is equality?

I have not said that, but opportunities should be well thought out and available to each child. I am also convinced that there is a balance to strike here, classes should be diverse to not entrench inequality too much. Of course young mozart just needs more musical education, young warhol more art and young einstein more math.

The average spending isn't much affected by private schools. Not like you seem to think. No billionaires are spending $10million/year on their kindergarteners.

Public spending per pupil is quite high, when federal and state funding are both considered. Public students aren't being underfunded. The money's just not buying what you think it buys. Is that difficult to believe?

> I have not said that,

I don't know how to parse your first comment other than that. I don't want to live in the same country as someone who would deny my children the education I would provide for them, so that they can be turned into imbeciles in public schools. This is a deeply important issue for me. I will never allow mine to go near a public school.

There is no balance to strike. Let those who wish to do so, go their own way.

Look at a graph of public school spending per student. Now look at a graph of standardized test scores. Contemplate this

> Mao or Stalin might have been able to rid their countries of pathological cultural factors

Mao did rid of the meritocracy-based education system, replacing it with an identity-based system. That is, if you were born with the right identity (blue-collar worker, peasant (not farmer, mind you), and soldier), then you get to go to a university without even any test. If you were born with the wrong identity (the right, the anti-revolutionary, the farmer or any family who has property, the "rich", the "bad"), then you can't go to any college. The results? Just look at China in the 70s. What a fucking hell hole.

As a for Stalin or Soviet, they never gave up their elite education. In fact, elite officers had to be elite students as well. Those who are good at STEM could even get a little leniency when they made the so-called political mistakes.

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