Someone tell Kier Stacked not to indulge AI to educating our children
The US has its own track system, although it is not as popular as it once was. Basically your counselor would put you in a track based upon their appraisal of your aptitude. If you weren’t put on the college track then you would likely not be getting the high level math or english you would need for college. If you were in the trades track you would likely be taking autoshop or welding instead of calculus, for example
From around the age of 12, Dutch pupils are streamed into one of three secondary tracks, based on teacher recommendations and primary-school test results:
VMBO - the practical route that usually leads to vocational training HAVO - which typically leads to universities of applied sciences VWO - the academic route to research universities
The system is controversial, with critics warning that early streaming can disadvantage some children and be detrimental to a young person’s self-esteem.
And it does. People are convinced they are not smart for life because of some classification when they were at elementary school. I’ve met Dutch people who were acting all impressed that I went to university as if I’m some kind of genius.
Yes the support vocational education gets is great but I don’t see why kids need to be sorted like this at such an early age, especially since in a society that is not free from capitalist privilege family and background will play a big role. An egalitarian system would place all kids in the same stream and offer pathways within it.
when the alternative is the shitscape in the US, I’ll take the dutch’s attempt any day.
This system seems focused on education as a means for employment rather than education. This kind of focus on the material benefits of education results in a very mercenary view of the world. I think most people would agree that it would be beneficial to live in an educated society where everyone is curious and constantly learning, but this kind of tracking and sorting system seems designed to encourage a mentality where the ends justify the means since your future can be heavily influenced by what track you are placed upon. It would be one thing if students could pick their track and shuffle around as their interests change, but telling a kid, “You must get a math job because you are good at math” removes any agency and motivation for learning. It will turn into, “You must get good at math and get placed on the math track because that’s where all the high paying jobs are.” Education becoming a means to an end instead of the goal of school.
I did MAVO (middle/low education). We didn’t really learn anything there. Anyways, they don’t just let our kind on universities. You need to waste another 4 years to get a diploma elsewhere so you then can go and study for a bachelor’s. Then you’ve reached the maximum number of years you’re allowed to study and financing is over, so no option to study master’s or just anything else.
because somebody needs to do those jobs.
the issue is that we should not stigmatize working-class and vocational work as ‘less than’. because in many cases, it isn’t really less than sitting on your butt in a office 40 hours a week… it’s a lot more difficult.
but it’s not about the job… it’s about social class at the end of the day. it’s about sorting people into their appropriate social class and perpetuating the divide between the lower and upper halves of society, and giving lower half people the vague hope their kids can get into the upper half if they just are smart or hard working enough… which is rarely the case.
egalitarianism sounds nice, but the truth is not everyone can be CEO, in fact, very few people can. the vast majority of work is on lower paying end of the spectrum.
you can have it the other way too… you can have the USA system where people have worthless Masters degrees and work in food service? is that ‘better’? when those folks probably should have been sorted into something more vocational earlier in their lives that would have given them less debt, wasted less time, and made them wealthier in the end. but at least in USA ‘vocational’ work is considered for stupid and dumb people and is very stigmatized esp among the white-collar professional elites.
I don’t think the point of schooling should be to get a job. Children should pursue their interests while recieving an education wide enough to accommodate being trained in whatever field they decide to follow. A lawyer should know a little trigonometry. An engineer should know a little philosophy.
A job is just something you do to pay the bills. I don’t see any problem with a barista who followed their interests and got a degree in Mesopotamian Culture. It’s only a waste of time if you view education solely as a means to employment.
In much of the modern capitalist world, education is seen this way, unfortunately. I agree with you that people today are sorted into social classes based solely on how much money they make. It’s how we end up with Business Idiots; people like Elon Musk who are fucking idiots that don’t know how anything works. But since they are really good at making money, they are seen as paragons of society. The construction worker with a degree in Underwater Basket Weaving contributes more to society than any CEO, yet is seen as stupid and worthy of derision for both having a physical labor job and pursuing their interests.
Education always was and always will be primarily about employment.
The only people for whom it is not are those who are already rich. The system you want requires we all be millionaires before we even start our education.
No it hasn’t, that’s primarily a post ww2 thing.
Here’s an idea: education should not be about jobs, it should be about raising the next generation of citizens to take over being Humanity in this world. Or maybe I’m too Greek and bought too much in this idea of “paideia”.
A bit more practically, I like Quebec’s CÉGEP system. Not everyone ends up to university but almost everyone at least gets a taste.
OK so it should be about social indoctrination towards your ideals? what if other people don’t agree with your ideals? should they just not be educated?
Ah yes, indoctrinating people into… critical thinking, historical literacy, and the ability to argue in good faith. A terrifying agenda.
whose version of those though?
those things don’t exist in a vaccum, as much as you’d like to think they do. are we talking about the one where we think the modern liberal/leftism atheism is the pinnacle of human ‘critical thought’? because that’s typically the default presumption for most posters here.
We are talking about public schooling. Any system has to make choices about what counts as education, and someone will always call those choices “indoctrination.” Your extremist relativism makes public education policy impossible. In favour of what, exactly? Universal homeschooling? Go touch some grass, please.
So it’s like the premier League in football.
What a load of bullshit. There are opportunities for a select few and the simplest way to reduce the amount of Neets is by simply not counting them.
Just to be clear, what you’re describing is the UK government’s approach?( /serious)
No, the Dutch one :)
