From The Oregonian:
Updated: Oct. 19, 2023, 10:23 p.m.|Published: Oct. 19, 2023, 6:16 p.m.
By Sami Edge | The Oregonian/OregonLive
Oregon high school students won’t have to prove basic mastery of reading, writing or math to graduate from high school until at least 2029, the state Board of Education decided unanimously on Thursday, extending the pause on the controversial graduation requirement that began in 2020. …
Opponents argued that pausing the requirement devalues an Oregon diploma. Giving students with low academic skills extra instruction in writing and math, which most high schools did in response to the graduation rules, helped them, they have argued.
But leaders at the Oregon Department of Education and members of the state school board said requiring all students to pass one of several standardized tests or create an in-depth assignment their teacher judged as meeting state standards was a harmful hurdle for historically marginalized students, a misuse of state tests and did not translate to meaningful improvements in students’ post high school success.
Higher rates of students of color, students learning English as a second language and students with disabilities ended up having to take intensive senior-year writing and math classes to prove they deserved a diploma. That denied those students the opportunity to take an elective, despite the lack of evidence the extra academic work helped them in the workplace or at college, they said.
… Proving mastery of reading, writing and math on one of many standardized tests or a teacher-judged in-depth assignment was one of several Oregon graduation requirements. Students also have to earn a prescribed number of credits and complete an education plan that maps out how they can achieve post high-school goals.
By the way, you may recall reading last summer that Oregon’s National Assessment of Educational Progress scores have plummeted. But that apparently had something to do with only students getting free or reduced price lunches taking the NAEP in Oregon in the last go-round.
During the pandemic, Gov. Kate Brown signed a bill freezing the proficiency requirement, as standardized tests weren’t happening amid school closures. Lawmakers decided to order a more comprehensive review of graduation requirements.
After broad outreach to families, educators, students and employers, with a particular focus on people of color, the Oregon Department of Education recommended new graduation recommendations about a year ago. One of those was to scrap the requirement to show mastery of reading, writing and math. State lawmakers have not acted on that recommendation, and the department in the meantime asked the state board to continue its pause through at least the 2027-28 school year.
Speaking of the academic mastery requirements, Dan Farley, assistant superintendent of research and data for the department, told the state board Thursday, “They did not work. What they were designed to do is protect student interests. We have no evidence that they did that.”
Farley pointed to a 2021 analysis by Oregon’s Higher Education Coordinating Commission that found no clear evidence that implementing the proficiency standards improved the performance of Oregon high school graduates during their first year of community college or university classes.
In other words, people who aren’t bright enough and/or hard working enough to get a high school education are even less cut out for college education.
The report also notes that it’s possible that the level of skill required to meet Oregon’s since-paused academic mastery standards was “too low to improve college and university outcomes.” …
Whitney Grubbs, executive director for Foundations for a Better Oregon, a coalition of Oregon-based nonprofits that advocates for educational equity among other school reforms, wrote in public testimony that pausing or ending graduation requirements without proposing more effective and equitable alternatives “risks leading Oregonians to believe that our state is lowering expectations to artificially mask disparities” and reinforces false and prejudiced ideas that students’ demographics dictate their academic success.
“As Oregonians, we hold high expectations for students because we believe in the boundless potential of children,” Grubbs’ testimony said.
But what if the potential of children tends to be bounded?
OK, my guess is that there are two main factors in determining whether a student learns the basics in high school: innate intelligence and work ethic. The first one is tough to change, the second one less so.
I can see an aversion to punishing students just for being born with low intelligence. (I’ve suggested in the past the possibility of an Associates high school diploma rather like what junior college graduates get as a possibility.)
On the other hand, trying to minimize punishment of the less bright can hurt the inculcation of a good worth ethic.
It seems like data analysts should be trying to figure out the best tradeoff between the two factors. Probably the average major league baseball team alone has enough quantitative analytical firepower in its front office to take on this challenge, but I seldom see anybody try it with public schools because A) the race thing, B) the “boundless potential” wishful thinking.
So the kind of bright MIT grads who go to work for the Houston Astros have the good sense to avoid getting sucked into the tar baby that is public education. But then the rest of the public is left without a clue about the education of the next generation.
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I never had strong opinions about Oregon before Portland as an uber-left city became a meme.
After 2020, I really don’t care about that terrorist-loving state.
I never had strong opinions about Oregon before I visited it and its uber-left city, Portland.*
"After 2020, I really don’t care about that terrorist-loving state."
Oh, I care greatly what happens to it, believe me.
*Cue Achmed E Newman and his male-brain chiming in to extoll the beauty of scenic OregonReplies: @Achmed E. Newman
"You might not be interested in the ethos of Portland, but the ethos of Portland is interested in you."
"First they came for Portland, and I didn't care..."
"Hold your friends close, and your enemies closer."
Etc.
Make them Oregon grinders!
Sure, but there’s no cultural revolution going on in this country, no sireee, Bob!
The end of wokeness is coming… any day now, people…
Traditional American education started with the 3 R’s: reading, ‘riting, and ‘rithmatic. Woke Regime education starts with 3 new R’s: Race, resentment, and revolution (cultural first).
Restitution, Recompense, and Reparations.
It doesn’t matter whether the blacks can read or do basic arithmetic. Affirmative action is the Peter principle on steroids–blacks get mismatched into jobs they’re not qualified to do because corporate America needs to meet racial diversity quotas and there are not enough qualified blacks to go around. It doesn’t matter whether the DEI HR officer can read. The job was never intended to add any value other than meeting a Blackrock-imposed quota
I can see an aversion to punishing students just for being born with low intelligence. (I’ve suggested in the past the possibility of an Associates high school diploma rather like what junior college graduates get as a possibility.)
On the other hand, trying to minimize punishment of the less bright that can hurt the inculcation of a good worth ethic.
We COULD go back to the idea 💡 of tracking and admit not EVERYONE is cut out for college and identity the top 15, 20% of students that a rigorous college education would benefit, then send the next 30-35% on to post high school specialized education aimed at giving them real world job skills without needing a college degree.
For the bottom 50% we could onshore manufacturing and crack down on illegal immigration to give them jobs that while not exciting or creative allow them to have a solid income to rent or buy a place to live and start a family.
Alas, that won’t happen as the College/Government Industrial Complex needs people to attend college and take out ruinous loans, Parents and women are brainwashed that not attending college makes you stupid, and manufacturing is icky and dirty and makes Gaia cry 😭.
So we send illiterate dolts into the world so their feeeeewings aren’t hurt 😢, and nothing works anymore.
Main function of school for 50% of kids is a glorified baby sitting service, so let's be honest and structure it that way.
The weird thing is, Oregon is only 2% black and about 3.5% Hispanic. A whopping 10% say they are 2 or more races but I have no idea what that could mean in a state with such very low non-White population. Did all the low IQ Whites move there at some point in history? Are these the descendants of the people who got lost trying to get to California?
In NY State we used to have a 2 tiered diploma system, a Regents diploma for the college bound, a “local” diploma for those not continuing on. It worked so well they had to do away with it and have now just lowered the standards for a Regents diploma. America, Idiocracy.
I think there's more to this though. Portland is a classic example of a humiliation society, where People of Color write lists of chores for whites to prove their obedience, and then assign punishments on the basis of whiteness instead of their behaviors. That's how humiliation works. This can only happen when there are dozens of squishy whites for every POC, because otherwise the violence will knock whites out of their headspace and into coping strategies where there is no time for politics because physical safety is at risk. Hence, the most masochistic behaviors tend to come from the whitest cities.
Oregon is one of many places in the US where there are a few loony urban conglomerations–with very high concentrations of verbalist, often government funded/mandated/enabled parasites–which are able to electorally dominate–abuse and loot–the surrounding normal, unexceptional, but still productive white-bread Americans.
We need another American Revolution–a revolution of rainbow separation–so that normal Americans can again govern themselves.
First, until you are willing to directly lead the charge, your call for open revolt is impotent.
Second, “normal Americans” is whatever a person wants it to mean from their perspective.
We are literally returning to the stone age so negroes can protect their fragile egos.
Coming to an airline cockpit near you.
That is a really chilling, disturbing, but accurate, thought. Also soon coming to your next surgery. I expect also that incompetence from mass-DEI will make basic infrastructure increasingly unreliable in the near future. Look forward to more brownouts/rolling blackouts, spot shortages of food, public water supplies that are contaminated (this has been happening in Baltimore, and as you might expect, the authorities do not always promptly notify the public), basically anything you take for granted as part of a modern technological society will increasingly malfunction. South Africa may be our future.Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Prester John
https://www.thedailybeast.com/air-canada-pilot-fired-over-disturbing-social-media-posts-after-hamas-attacks-israelReplies: @International Jew
They could just issue the high school diploma and college degree to strong, smart historically stupid minorities on day one. Everybody would be happier. Just saying.
On the other hand, trying to minimize punishment of the less bright that can hurt the inculcation of a good worth[sic] ethic.
Delete “that?” Some of us are too bright and become lazy or sloppy, too. I sure didn’t get my dad’s money’s worth out of my expensive education, either during it or in the 40 years since.
My dad used to tell me about working with naval officer/noncom HBCU grads in the 60s and 70s who were functionally illiterate, so I guess we’re going back to that. Also that black sailors would go to Southern white officers instead of Yankees when they had problems, contrary to the stereotype.
Long ago Oregon had a “no Negroes allowed” law.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierce_v._Society_of_Sisters
It pitted the Knights of Pythias against the Knights of Columbus. SCOTUS sided with the latter. The state's most important river was named for Kit, after all.
I DO believe in fairies. I DO believe in fairies. I do, I do.
The Race, Resentment, and Revolution course is considered the beginner course. Do not forget about the advanced course that follows:
Restitution, Recompense, and Reparations.
OT – once upon a time, Steve Sailer opposed the “invade the world, invite the world” uniparty coalition.
Does he still?
Or is he now fully on board with the “invade the world” neocons who currently control American foreign policy?
Limitless billions to Ukraine & Israel?
Once they can pass a simple reading and writing test, we should let kids quit school with parental consent, and send them off with a big sparkly Certificate of Awesomeness signed by their choice of Michelle Obama or Larry the Cable Guy. Everyone would be better off.
Steve sez:
I say:
The second one is also tough to change. Don’t you think that what we call “work ethic” is just as genetically determined as other behaviors? I do.
(Okay, for the simple-minded, this does not mean I think work ethic is entirely determined genetically. Rather, it is, like all other accomplishments and abilities, part nature and part nurture.)
BTW, Steve, you left out the odd mental cases of top students who develop neuroses — after years of abuse — and suddenly drop out. Nobody bothers to study them. What a waste. They become bankers and mutual fund salesmen.
tl, dr: Charlton asserts both intelligence and conscientiousness are to a large extent heritable.
https://medicalhypotheses.blogspot.com/2009/08/reliable-but-dumb-or-smart-but-slapdash.html
In the 1980s, “Peace Now” (שלום עכשיו; Shalom Achshav) published a periodical called “New Outlook” (if I remember correctly).
The writers (editor?) frequently used the term “wishful non-thinking” instead of “wishful thinking“. The former usage is more appropriate than the latter in most cases.
OT:
The Rolling Stones • Hackney Diamonds playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nsgVCCHAcnZQSMaZXY62TYNUrtLifHMHM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackney_Diamonds
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t87B4frtEh8Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Jim Don Bob
This is probably true. Maybe with monumental efforts these students could have demonstrated minimum proficiency in math, reading and written English, but after a few months the demonstrated proficiency would likely have evaporated, and they would still only be qualified for the crummy jobs that they are going to assume anyway. If you want to help African Americans and other small achievers, cut off immigration. This would compel management/capital to pay higher wages for these crummy jobs, or the crummy work wouldn’t get done. Life sucks when you have a crummy job, but it sucks a lot less if the pay is decent. But we few, we happy few over here know this.
“It seems like data analysts should be trying to figure out the best tradeoff between the two factors. Probably the average major league baseball team alone has enough quantitative analytical firepower in its front office to take on this challenge”
No, YOU, Mr. Sailer should take on this f—- up situation. Offer up your services. Make a difference.
“Higher rates of students of color, students learning English as a second language and students with disabilities ended up having to take intensive senior-year writing and math classes to prove they deserved a diploma”
Which is what they ought to be doing, rather than watering down standards.
Work ethic enhancement for boys in particular is low-hanging fruit. Instead of basing incentives on a tacit indication of approval (I.e. good grades mean the teachers think you’re a good boy), base them on concrete achievements, such as building things that work and do cool stuff, figuring out why Napoleon lost at Waterloo, navigating by sextant, etc.
There’s a big crisis in education in that lots of boys are completely baffled by the rules that emerge in an 80% female institution. Not to mention the fact that putting adolescent boys in the same room with adolescent girls is not helpful for focusing attention on the blackboard.
Does he still?
Or is he now fully on board with the "invade the world" neocons who currently control American foreign policy?
Limitless billions to Ukraine & Israel?Replies: @Achmed E. Newman
Vinteuil, I give John Derbyshire credit where it’s due. He agrees with Peak Stupidity per the following from his most recent Radio Derb podcast/transcript:
Agreed! My bolding.
particular focus on people of color
Let’s just refer to them as “Bipox” and save on verbiage.
Oregon’s early NEA got a bill passed banning parochial schools. Their allies? The Klan.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierce_v._Society_of_Sisters
It pitted the Knights of Pythias against the Knights of Columbus. SCOTUS sided with the latter. The state’s most important river was named for Kit, after all.
The Rolling Stones • Hackney Diamonds playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nsgVCCHAcnZQSMaZXY62TYNUrtLifHMHM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackney_DiamondsReplies: @Buzz Mohawk, @Buzz Mohawk, @Anon, @duncsbaby
First I’ve heard and seen. I expected crap, but this is legit. Love it. (Love the SL convertible too. We have a CLK.) Clever video incorporation of their earlier selves. Shameless, like their image. Like WGAF. They’ll rock till their dead, and Charlie already did. Thanks.
“Oregon high school students won’t have to prove basic mastery of reading, writing or math to…”
write for the Oregonian, apparently.
“Basic mastery” Is there anything basic about mastering a trade, language, skill, etc? It seems basic understanding would have been a better term.
Or maybe master basics would have been better, since it’s more precise.
In NY State we used to have a 2 tiered diploma system, a Regents diploma for the college bound, a "local" diploma for those not continuing on. It worked so well they had to do away with it and have now just lowered the standards for a Regents diploma. America, Idiocracy.Replies: @Half Canadian, @Anthony Aaron, @Sleep, @bomag
Does Oregon have a meaningful Native American population?
We need another American Revolution--a revolution of rainbow separation--so that normal Americans can again govern themselves.Replies: @Corvinus
“We need another American Revolution–a revolution of rainbow separation–so that normal Americans can again govern themselves”
First, until you are willing to directly lead the charge, your call for open revolt is impotent.
Second, “normal Americans” is whatever a person wants it to mean from their perspective.
No manufacturing will locate to an area with illiterate and innumerate high school graduates.
Perhaps rural Oregon will still teach the kids so that companies will consider those parts of Oregon.
Some of this stuff really is getting Mao-Cultural-Revolution-levels-of-loony.
Frankly, you could lower diploma requirements to just basic hygiene and conversational English — and half of the 2023 class would still fail.
Meanwhile, in 1912: rural Kentucky 8th grade exam:
https://www.bullittcountyhistory.com/bchistory/schoolexam1912.html
Even taking out the parts that were more commonly known, based on relatively recent events etc… I’ll wager most current PhDs, let alone Oregon high school seniors, couldn’t measure up to an 8th grade rural Kentucky boy in 1912. And at the risk of sounding condescending, I’ll repeat: rural Kentucky.
Oregon dropped in NAEP scores but there were some states that dropped more. Oregon’s drop was pretty typical for a blue state. There’s no way only free or reduced lunch kids took the test. In that case, Oregon would probably score dead last.
The Rolling Stones • Hackney Diamonds playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nsgVCCHAcnZQSMaZXY62TYNUrtLifHMHM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackney_DiamondsReplies: @Buzz Mohawk, @Buzz Mohawk, @Anon, @duncsbaby
OT, yeah, from 1971, and totally cool:
Thanks, Buzz.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TxH2DDKAZYReplies: @Buzz Mohawk, @cool daddy jimbo, @Howard Sutherland
They should still give the tests just to collect the data, but maybe not require them for graduation. That they are not giving the tests is proof that part of the motive for this is obfuscation of reality.
And yes, remediation classes don’t work. California two-year public colleges used to require remediation math and English classes. Some students before they were admitted full-time. Very few ever were able to pass the entrance requirements even after those tests. Now they do “remediation” for students during regular classes that they are allowed to attend, ha ha ha. The professors know that they are not to be flunked.
And there’s a genre of blog that I read written by anonymous high school stem teachers, and they describe what’s involved in a remediation class. You make sure by any means necessary that the student passes, and this involves contracting the scope of material covered, reducing the difficulty, and doing intense practice the day before tests on problems very very close to what will show up on the desk. Three days later, the students are rarely able to pass these same tests.
Link?
After 2020, I really don't care about that terrorist-loving state.Replies: @Kylie, @bomag
“I never had strong opinions about Oregon before Portland as an uber-left city became a meme.”
I never had strong opinions about Oregon before I visited it and its uber-left city, Portland.*
“After 2020, I really don’t care about that terrorist-loving state.”
Oh, I care greatly what happens to it, believe me.
*Cue Achmed E Newman and his male-brain chiming in to extoll the beauty of scenic Oregon
Isn’t Reparations one of the Rs?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t87B4frtEh8Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Jim Don Bob
I’d almost forgotten this song, but I used to listen to this off the Hot Rocks compilation, my intro to the Rolling Stones about a decade later. Great stuff, and this sounds so much like the one on the album, I thought maybe the recording was from this show. Nope – wiki says it was recorded at Madison Square Garden, NYC.
Thanks, Buzz.
I never had strong opinions about Oregon before I visited it and its uber-left city, Portland.*
"After 2020, I really don’t care about that terrorist-loving state."
Oh, I care greatly what happens to it, believe me.
*Cue Achmed E Newman and his male-brain chiming in to extoll the beauty of scenic OregonReplies: @Achmed E. Newman
Yeah, and I know you like him, Kylie, but I just watched Lance White in the last episode of Season IV of The Rockford Files, and I gotta say he really screws up Jim’s investigations. Jim ended up with a rifle round hole in the passenger side door of his Firebird because of this prima donna. Hopefully, it’ll be repaired by Season V.
But Lance was okay, right?
That settles it. I'm getting the whole series on DVD. None of this going to a liberry with some old woke bat in charge to borrow the DVDs. Lance deserves better. So does JSR, for that matter.Replies: @Stan Adams, @Achmed E. Newman
In NY State we used to have a 2 tiered diploma system, a Regents diploma for the college bound, a "local" diploma for those not continuing on. It worked so well they had to do away with it and have now just lowered the standards for a Regents diploma. America, Idiocracy.Replies: @Half Canadian, @Anthony Aaron, @Sleep, @bomag
NY State also got rid of a literacy test requirement for people to get a teaching certificate … that’ll work out well … teachers that cannot read, write and understand English being allowed to ‘teach’? Really?
CLK is better. Don’t get me started about Active Body Control.
On the other hand, trying to minimize punishment of the less bright that can hurt the inculcation of a good worth ethic.
We COULD go back to the idea 💡 of tracking and admit not EVERYONE is cut out for college and identity the top 15, 20% of students that a rigorous college education would benefit, then send the next 30-35% on to post high school specialized education aimed at giving them real world job skills without needing a college degree.
For the bottom 50% we could onshore manufacturing and crack down on illegal immigration to give them jobs that while not exciting or creative allow them to have a solid income to rent or buy a place to live and start a family.
Alas, that won’t happen as the College/Government Industrial Complex needs people to attend college and take out ruinous loans, Parents and women are brainwashed that not attending college makes you stupid, and manufacturing is icky and dirty and makes Gaia cry 😭.
So we send illiterate dolts into the world so their feeeeewings aren’t hurt 😢, and nothing works anymore.Replies: @Redneck Farmer, @bomag
While we are fortunately onshoring manufacturing, many of the “not college material” don’t have the skills to work in a factory or warehouse.
Everywhere I go, every semi I pass on the highway, there are help wanted signs. This kind of libtard stupidity, done in the name of kindness, does not help one iota.
Agreed, but:
– in 2008 a whole lot of big banks and financial firms would have gone bankrupt, because of gross mismanagement. They were all bailed out at taxpayer expense. So why do we care about excellence anyhow? Surely a dull-normal lazy person of color can drive a fortune-500 firm into the ground, and get bailed out, just as easily as some allegedly smart (but still functionally imbecilic) non-person-of-color?
Does it even matter any more?
As the old saying goes, as with fish, rot starts at the head. Perhaps the core issue is not our schools, but our elites and our institutions….
“Giving students with low academic skills extra instruction in writing and math…” “Giving low I.Q. students extra instruction in writing and math…” FIFY
“Oregon high school students won’t have to prove basic mastery of reading, writing or math to graduate from high school until at least 2029, the state Board of Education decided unanimously on Thursday, extending the pause on the controversial graduation requirement that began in 2020. …” Hmm. Sounds familiar. Sandra Day O’Connor, is that you?
The only way to do deal with this is for employers to toss the resumes of black applicants. And then scholarly frauds like Marianne Bertrand will scream, “Racism!”
“‘Scholarly Research’ Asserting Racist Employment Discrimination Against blacks is Exposed as Fraudulent!”
https://nicholasstixuncensored.blogspot.com/2017/06/scholarly-research-asserting-racist.html
It’s worth pointing out that life is full of punishment. You’re punished for being old, for being fat, for being argumentative, for being short, for being clumsy, for having body odor…
These days, you’re punished for being white. Why — in particular — shouldn’t you be punished for being stupid? It’s not like this is some unique injustice.
“I just watched Lance White in the last episode of Season IV of The Rockford Files, and I gotta say he really screws up Jim’s investigations. Jim ended up with a rifle round hole in the passenger side door of his Firebird because of this prima donna.”
But Lance was okay, right?
That settles it. I’m getting the whole series on DVD. None of this going to a liberry with some old woke bat in charge to borrow the DVDs. Lance deserves better. So does JSR, for that matter.
You can inculcate work ethic independent of academics for the low IQ. Have them help with simple tasks like collecting books, cleaning the chalk/white board whatever. Let them get that associates high school degree by being pleasant and reliable and by mastering a few basic and helpful topics.
But also make that degree a shield for them: require any contract they sign to be co-signed by someone smarter who acts as their fiduciary.
Oregon Trail 2023
But Lance was okay, right?
That settles it. I'm getting the whole series on DVD. None of this going to a liberry with some old woke bat in charge to borrow the DVDs. Lance deserves better. So does JSR, for that matter.Replies: @Stan Adams, @Achmed E. Newman
https://archive.org/details/PDTV0144
I don't know why I didn't think to check the Internet Archive. It has the first season of "Leave It to Beaver", among other cultural gems.
Anyway, thanks for the link.Replies: @Stan Adams
write for the Oregonian, apparently.
"Basic mastery" Is there anything basic about mastering a trade, language, skill, etc? It seems basic understanding would have been a better term.
Or maybe master basics would have been better, since it's more precise.Replies: @Achmed E. Newman
Maybe master baitics would be better here, Mike, because that’s all they’re doing.
Golly! Couldn’t this lead to “Imposter Syndrome”?
But Lance was okay, right?
That settles it. I'm getting the whole series on DVD. None of this going to a liberry with some old woke bat in charge to borrow the DVDs. Lance deserves better. So does JSR, for that matter.Replies: @Stan Adams, @Achmed E. Newman
Just getting my money’s worth, Kylie. That’s be a small part of the $80 million or so bond issue that I voted against 5 years ago or more, voted in by those who love to spend OPM. It was used for big renovations that made the branch library and the main one… the same size with different furnishings.
See the 1st segment of 3 minor doses of stoopiditee. It all adds up, though. and More stupidity at the library – the big one. From the latter post:
Luckily, there are no old woke bats at the branch near us. They may be woke though – not stopping me from wearing my DeSantis hat, – but they’re very nice to us because we come a lot and they really don’t have so many people to see. It’s an easy, stress free gig.
As a lazy guy who aced standard testing, I say it is ridiculous that Oregonians can’t “guess” the obvious.
And yes, remediation classes don’t work. California two-year public colleges used to require remediation math and English classes. Some students before they were admitted full-time. Very few ever were able to pass the entrance requirements even after those tests. Now they do “remediation” for students during regular classes that they are allowed to attend, ha ha ha. The professors know that they are not to be flunked.
And there’s a genre of blog that I read written by anonymous high school stem teachers, and they describe what’s involved in a remediation class. You make sure by any means necessary that the student passes, and this involves contracting the scope of material covered, reducing the difficulty, and doing intense practice the day before tests on problems very very close to what will show up on the desk. Three days later, the students are rarely able to pass these same tests.Replies: @Shale boi
“And there’s a genre of blog that I read written by anonymous high school stem teachers, and they describe what’s involved in a remediation class. ”
Link?
The American upper middle class got excited about immigration in the 1960s precisely for this reason. Far easier and more pleasant having domestic help from Mexico or Guatemala than having to hire an angry black woman.
OK, my guess is that there are two main factors in determining whether a student learns the basics in high school: innate intelligence and work ethic. The first one is tough to change, the second one less so.
The assertion that a person’s work ethic is less tough to change definitely requires evidence. Also, how less tough? If it’s 5% less tough to change work ethic than innate intelligence then that is not promising. If it is 80% less tough to change work ethic, then maybe you are on to something.
My sense, based on experience, is that work ethic is distinctly mental. The kids who go to college from elite, re: demanding, private schools definitely have a leg up on public school students for freshmen year. The elite preparatory schools do just that, they habituate students to the rigors of college in ways public schools do not. Students arrive knowing how to write essays and how to schedule time sufficient to keep up meet class demands. They also have a better sense of the effort needed to succeed in their new surroundings. At good preparatory schools kids that can’t keep up are, or used to be, given their walking papers. The sifting happens earlier and, were our schools better, we’d be thinning the herd in the public schools too instead of waiting for college to do it.Replies: @Cloudbuster
All rational thought and any cultural norm or policy that follows from it is evaporating like dew under a hot sun. The negro menace strikes again…and again…and again.
There's a big crisis in education in that lots of boys are completely baffled by the rules that emerge in an 80% female institution. Not to mention the fact that putting adolescent boys in the same room with adolescent girls is not helpful for focusing attention on the blackboard.Replies: @G. Poulin
Back in high school Biology class I was surrounded by four absolutely beautiful girls, I mean real stunners. I didn’t learn any biology.
In NY State we used to have a 2 tiered diploma system, a Regents diploma for the college bound, a "local" diploma for those not continuing on. It worked so well they had to do away with it and have now just lowered the standards for a Regents diploma. America, Idiocracy.Replies: @Half Canadian, @Anthony Aaron, @Sleep, @bomag
Oregon seems to have missed out on the tech boom as Seattle and San Francisco took all of the big prizes. Seattle’s dominance over Portland may go back to business-friendly tax laws in Washington in the 1990s and thirty years of inertia. I don’t think that would have a big effect on academic performance in Oregon as a whole, but they may have a smaller smart fraction than their neighbors to the north and south.
I think there’s more to this though. Portland is a classic example of a humiliation society, where People of Color write lists of chores for whites to prove their obedience, and then assign punishments on the basis of whiteness instead of their behaviors. That’s how humiliation works. This can only happen when there are dozens of squishy whites for every POC, because otherwise the violence will knock whites out of their headspace and into coping strategies where there is no time for politics because physical safety is at risk. Hence, the most masochistic behaviors tend to come from the whitest cities.
Meanwhile, in 1912: rural Kentucky 8th grade exam:
https://www.bullittcountyhistory.com/bchistory/schoolexam1912.html
Even taking out the parts that were more commonly known, based on relatively recent events etc... I'll wager most current PhDs, let alone Oregon high school seniors, couldn't measure up to an 8th grade rural Kentucky boy in 1912. And at the risk of sounding condescending, I'll repeat: rural Kentucky.Replies: @Sleep
That is very impressive, though perhaps we should temper this with the fact that not all kids actually went to school. A quick search led me to Reader’s Digest, which suggests that in 1910, 59% of school-age children attended school, and only 11% of high-school age children did. From this we can assume that for very young children, attendance rates were very high, but quickly dropped off towards the higher grades. By eighth grade we could be looking at about 50% or perhaps quite a bit less. Now, it’s not necessarily the case that the students who stayed in attendance were always the smartest ones, but I’d expect some correlation, so these very difficult academic tests might have been too difficult for the majority of students back then, too.
The US didn't even cross the 50% mark for high school graduates until the late 1960s -- with a 90% white population. And I'm sure that to get to that point, high schools were already at least slightly easier than they'd been for previous generations... but still considerably more rigorous and comprehensive than they are today.
I'm sure it was tempting to think the improving trend could ultimately result in 100% literacy and graduation, just as it must have been tempting to think that 10% of the non-white population would ultimately assimilate. The Flynn effect of the post-war boom fooled people into seeing an improvement that would only increase, so good intentions toward a liberal utopia were a lot more persuasive... until the ceiling was reached and the returns started dimishing quickly.
“Coming to an airline cockpit near you.”
That is a really chilling, disturbing, but accurate, thought. Also soon coming to your next surgery. I expect also that incompetence from mass-DEI will make basic infrastructure increasingly unreliable in the near future. Look forward to more brownouts/rolling blackouts, spot shortages of food, public water supplies that are contaminated (this has been happening in Baltimore, and as you might expect, the authorities do not always promptly notify the public), basically anything you take for granted as part of a modern technological society will increasingly malfunction. South Africa may be our future.
Peak Stupidity on Harvesting the fruits of a half-century of Affirmative Action:: Part 1 - - Part 2 - - Part 3: Anecdotal Interlude - - Part 4 and Part 5.
After 2020, I really don't care about that terrorist-loving state.Replies: @Kylie, @bomag
I suppose one should care, on some level. Coming soon to a city near you, and all that.
“You might not be interested in the ethos of Portland, but the ethos of Portland is interested in you.”
“First they came for Portland, and I didn’t care…”
“Hold your friends close, and your enemies closer.”
Etc.
What does a person need to know how to do if the destiny planned for them by our worthless elites is to be an antidrone meat shield in the Chinese conquest of Siberia? Distinguishing forward from backward?
On the other hand, trying to minimize punishment of the less bright that can hurt the inculcation of a good worth ethic.
We COULD go back to the idea 💡 of tracking and admit not EVERYONE is cut out for college and identity the top 15, 20% of students that a rigorous college education would benefit, then send the next 30-35% on to post high school specialized education aimed at giving them real world job skills without needing a college degree.
For the bottom 50% we could onshore manufacturing and crack down on illegal immigration to give them jobs that while not exciting or creative allow them to have a solid income to rent or buy a place to live and start a family.
Alas, that won’t happen as the College/Government Industrial Complex needs people to attend college and take out ruinous loans, Parents and women are brainwashed that not attending college makes you stupid, and manufacturing is icky and dirty and makes Gaia cry 😭.
So we send illiterate dolts into the world so their feeeeewings aren’t hurt 😢, and nothing works anymore.Replies: @Redneck Farmer, @bomag
Agree.
Main function of school for 50% of kids is a glorified baby sitting service, so let’s be honest and structure it that way.
In NY State we used to have a 2 tiered diploma system, a Regents diploma for the college bound, a "local" diploma for those not continuing on. It worked so well they had to do away with it and have now just lowered the standards for a Regents diploma. America, Idiocracy.Replies: @Half Canadian, @Anthony Aaron, @Sleep, @bomag
Something about those furthest from the action being the most fanatical about the cause.
Oregon is one of the Whiter states in America and has a very small Black population , just 2% are Black.
I assume the standards are being eliminated mostly due to the influx of Latinos , since Hispanics are now 25% of the public school students in Oregon and blacks are less than 3% of the students.
My wife teaches at a high school which is 80% Hispanic and the administration does everything they can to coddle the students so they do not drop out of school…despite this a significant number of the Hispanic students quit school at 16 …they would drop-out earlier but here in NJ they force them to stay in school until turning 16. Logically most should drop out of school, since the schools do not teach them anything useful. They would be better off getting jobs or learning a skill. Why are they being forced to study biology and history when they cannot speak or read English ?
There is a huge incentive to keep these illiterate kids in school to keep the funding up and the teachers want to keep their jobs, thus they need these students to stay in school…it is very easy teaching Hispanic students, much easier than teaching whites or blacks. They are more timid and you never have to deal with the parents. If you do want to talk to the parents they will not be antagonistic like the Black and white parents…
By eliminating any standards the students are less likely to quit school, thus the schools get more funding and there are more jobs for teachers etc…The Latin kids know they cannot pass these exams, thus they have little incentive to stay in school…but if the standards are eliminated they are more likely to stay in school to pass the time and get a diploma. Eliminating the standards is a jobs program for teachers and administrators.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t87B4frtEh8Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Jim Don Bob
The Stones were at their peak then. Mick Taylor is on fire in this.
Two words: Lisa Fischer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yGFuX2KDQsReplies: @Jim Don Bob, @Joe Paluka
Not to slight Brian Jones (RIP) or Ron Wood - or Keef himself - but the Rolling Stones have never had another guitar player like MT. Clapton-quality. So I think the MT years were the Stones' instrumental peak.
I wonder if MT still has that beautiful Gibson Les Paul (a 1959?) that's in so many of these pictures and other video clips.
TSMC is having so much trouble finding people in Arizona to build their new fab that they want to bring in help from Taiwan. The local unions are against this, of course.
Everywhere I go, every semi I pass on the highway, there are help wanted signs. This kind of libtard stupidity, done in the name of kindness, does not help one iota.
The Rolling Stones • Hackney Diamonds playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nsgVCCHAcnZQSMaZXY62TYNUrtLifHMHM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackney_DiamondsReplies: @Buzz Mohawk, @Buzz Mohawk, @Anon, @duncsbaby
Boomers still young and relevant!
Thank you!
I don’t know why I didn’t think to check the Internet Archive. It has the first season of “Leave It to Beaver”, among other cultural gems.
Anyway, thanks for the link.
That link covers the first four seasons. If you check the comments there’s a link for seasons five and six.Replies: @Kylie
Allow me to make a constructive proposal.
Instead of facing demanding tests on the thee Rs let the “students of color” show they can fill in a colouring book. They should surely manage that.
I don't know why I didn't think to check the Internet Archive. It has the first season of "Leave It to Beaver", among other cultural gems.
Anyway, thanks for the link.Replies: @Stan Adams
You’re welcome.
That link covers the first four seasons. If you check the comments there’s a link for seasons five and six.
I was disappointed to see only Season 1 of LITB is available there. Still a valuable resource.
The assertion that a person's work ethic is less tough to change definitely requires evidence. Also, how less tough? If it's 5% less tough to change work ethic than innate intelligence then that is not promising. If it is 80% less tough to change work ethic, then maybe you are on to something.Replies: @Steve Sailer, @Curle
It’s easy for a school to change students’ work ethics for the worse.
I think this boils down to “rewarding hard work insults the lazy.”
So far, alas, even in Oregon football coaches and employers haven’t taken this theory to heart…
The assertion that a person's work ethic is less tough to change definitely requires evidence. Also, how less tough? If it's 5% less tough to change work ethic than innate intelligence then that is not promising. If it is 80% less tough to change work ethic, then maybe you are on to something.Replies: @Steve Sailer, @Curle
Weirdly, was having this conversation yesterday.
My sense, based on experience, is that work ethic is distinctly mental. The kids who go to college from elite, re: demanding, private schools definitely have a leg up on public school students for freshmen year. The elite preparatory schools do just that, they habituate students to the rigors of college in ways public schools do not. Students arrive knowing how to write essays and how to schedule time sufficient to keep up meet class demands. They also have a better sense of the effort needed to succeed in their new surroundings. At good preparatory schools kids that can’t keep up are, or used to be, given their walking papers. The sifting happens earlier and, were our schools better, we’d be thinning the herd in the public schools too instead of waiting for college to do it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TxH2DDKAZYReplies: @Buzz Mohawk, @cool daddy jimbo, @Howard Sutherland
Mick Taylor was an important factor in the Stones’ greatest period. He is underappreciated.
Still, though, the more I look and listen, the more I understand the significance of Keith Richards. Charlie Watts called Keith “the leader,” and he said he followed Keith!
Normally, a drummer lays down the beat, but not in the Stones’ case. Keith is the riff man. He is the rock and roll guitarist who took his inspiration from the 1950s originators, and we can hear it.
And he made his home out here in the Connecticut woods with his wife Patti. They sent their two daughters to public school here, and I have heard about that and I love it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TxH2DDKAZYReplies: @Buzz Mohawk, @cool daddy jimbo, @Howard Sutherland
That was great, but I beg to differ.
Two words: Lisa Fischer.
Listen to this where Mick plays a melody line throughout the song.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oPInSfh6H4Replies: @Cool Daddy Jimbo
The second one is also tough to change. Don't you think that what we call "work ethic" is just as genetically determined as other behaviors? I do.
(Okay, for the simple-minded, this does not mean I think work ethic is entirely determined genetically. Rather, it is, like all other accomplishments and abilities, part nature and part nurture.)
BTW, Steve, you left out the odd mental cases of top students who develop neuroses -- after years of abuse -- and suddenly drop out. Nobody bothers to study them. What a waste. They become bankers and mutual fund salesmen.Replies: @charles w abbott
This article by Bruce Charlton from more than a decade ago clarifies the issue.
tl, dr: Charlton asserts both intelligence and conscientiousness are to a large extent heritable.
https://medicalhypotheses.blogspot.com/2009/08/reliable-but-dumb-or-smart-but-slapdash.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TxH2DDKAZYReplies: @Buzz Mohawk, @cool daddy jimbo, @Howard Sutherland
Thanks for this. I thought I was familiar with most of the recordings of Gimme Shelter with Mick Taylor that are still around for us to listen to. But not this one – and it’s really something.
Not to slight Brian Jones (RIP) or Ron Wood – or Keef himself – but the Rolling Stones have never had another guitar player like MT. Clapton-quality. So I think the MT years were the Stones’ instrumental peak.
I wonder if MT still has that beautiful Gibson Les Paul (a 1959?) that’s in so many of these pictures and other video clips.
Good. Let it all burn to the ground. Our public school system needs to die. Want to know who owns McGraw-Hill, the largest textbook publisher in the US? Robert Maxwell. Yeah, that Robert Maxwell, father of Ghislane Maxwell, ex-girlfriend/madam of child molester Jeffrey Epstein. Robert Maxwell was a Mossad agent and was found floating face down while out on his luxury yacht. Israel gave him a state burial. What was a Mossad agent doing controlling our textbook publishing industry? Got to control the narrative as they say. History is written by the victors. And now with states rushing to adopt Kindergarten sex ed, more new textbooks need to be written. Kaching.
The American revival needs to start with the ending of our public schools, where impressionable young minds are first poisoned against all things good that our grandparents taught us.
It’s already in Canada.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/air-canada-pilot-fired-over-disturbing-social-media-posts-after-hamas-attacks-israel
Two words: Lisa Fischer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yGFuX2KDQsReplies: @Jim Don Bob, @Joe Paluka
That was pretty good, but one Tina Turner was enough.
Listen to this where Mick plays a melody line throughout the song.
Just another sign of a civilization in total freefall.
That is a really chilling, disturbing, but accurate, thought. Also soon coming to your next surgery. I expect also that incompetence from mass-DEI will make basic infrastructure increasingly unreliable in the near future. Look forward to more brownouts/rolling blackouts, spot shortages of food, public water supplies that are contaminated (this has been happening in Baltimore, and as you might expect, the authorities do not always promptly notify the public), basically anything you take for granted as part of a modern technological society will increasingly malfunction. South Africa may be our future.Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Prester John
Agreed on the decline in competence that I have *noticed* all around me over the last few years. It’s not just the aftermath of the PanicFest either.
Peak Stupidity on Harvesting the fruits of a half-century of Affirmative Action:: Part 1 – – Part 2 – – Part 3: Anecdotal Interlude – – Part 4 and Part 5.
And not just domestic help either. I can’t remember the last time I saw a leaf-blower who wasn’t from either Mejico or points south.
That is a really chilling, disturbing, but accurate, thought. Also soon coming to your next surgery. I expect also that incompetence from mass-DEI will make basic infrastructure increasingly unreliable in the near future. Look forward to more brownouts/rolling blackouts, spot shortages of food, public water supplies that are contaminated (this has been happening in Baltimore, and as you might expect, the authorities do not always promptly notify the public), basically anything you take for granted as part of a modern technological society will increasingly malfunction. South Africa may be our future.Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Prester John
Unless of course the Powers That Be are anticipating the emergence of drone passenger aircraft (they’re already working on drone fighter aircraft).
That link covers the first four seasons. If you check the comments there’s a link for seasons five and six.Replies: @Kylie
Excellent, thanks again.
I was disappointed to see only Season 1 of LITB is available there. Still a valuable resource.
Also easy to change innate intelligence for the worse, just hit the smart kids over the head with a hammer.
Still, it’s mostly a matter of garbage in, garbage out.
Bad Students, Not Bad Schools
I’m sure you are familiar with the book and the author (and his propensity for typos) but he makes a good and true point, doesn’t he? Haven’t you made essentially the same point overall for years?
GIGA
And of course it’s GIGO!
Sorry about the garbage from me (GFM.) Did I mention typos?
You have to admire the profound dishonesty. The coin of the realm is impudent insolence in service of destroying what remains of a once vibrant middle class.
While Grubbs believes in the boundless potential of children, the rest of us observe the unlimited deployment of gaslighting to enable the destruction of another generation of American schoolchildren.
Zee Zhing Pen (Chinese Emperor Xi Jinping and sibling of Pig Pen from the Charlie Brown cartoons) is smiling.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/air-canada-pilot-fired-over-disturbing-social-media-posts-after-hamas-attacks-israelReplies: @International Jew
Though I wouldn’t want that guy for a friend, when it comes to firing someone for extracurricular opinions, I still believe what the left used to pretend to believe: that defending the freedom of speech of the most reprehensible people defends the freedom of all of us.
It doesn't say anything about speech by individuals. I agree that people should say what they want to, and that companies should have the right to fire people for any reason. Actions have consequences.
There is also that eensy weensy problem that a non-zero number of these morons act on their beliefs. Just last week, one of them stabbed a school teacher to death in France. He was a known wolf and had been talked to by the police the day before and then released because he posed no threat.
Listen to this where Mick plays a melody line throughout the song.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oPInSfh6H4Replies: @Cool Daddy Jimbo
Man, they looked like children!
You want a sci-fi story that says where this is all going, read Paolo Bacigalupi’s ‘Pump Six’. This is almost certainly not what the left-wing author intended, but I think he saw it anyway.
The 1st Amendment to the Constitution says, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances”.
It doesn’t say anything about speech by individuals. I agree that people should say what they want to, and that companies should have the right to fire people for any reason. Actions have consequences.
There is also that eensy weensy problem that a non-zero number of these morons act on their beliefs. Just last week, one of them stabbed a school teacher to death in France. He was a known wolf and had been talked to by the police the day before and then released because he posed no threat.
Good point! That seems about right. Given 1910 US demographics, probably 1 out of every 10 children was simply unable to benefit from education, and another 3-4 who could really only handle ‘grammar school.’ Since at least half of the population went to farms or factories by or around puberty, this wasn’t exactly a worrisome state of affairs.
The US didn’t even cross the 50% mark for high school graduates until the late 1960s — with a 90% white population. And I’m sure that to get to that point, high schools were already at least slightly easier than they’d been for previous generations… but still considerably more rigorous and comprehensive than they are today.
I’m sure it was tempting to think the improving trend could ultimately result in 100% literacy and graduation, just as it must have been tempting to think that 10% of the non-white population would ultimately assimilate. The Flynn effect of the post-war boom fooled people into seeing an improvement that would only increase, so good intentions toward a liberal utopia were a lot more persuasive… until the ceiling was reached and the returns started dimishing quickly.
If you loot or shoplift for a living, you don’t need no educayshun and you only need the most basic math to sell Fentanyl. The State of Oregon, is being led by a lunatic governor who once she’s destroyed the state is planning to grab her diploma in womyn’s studies and jump in her Subaru with her wife/husband and move to the new gated community she’s developing in Southern California called Canyonlands.
Two words: Lisa Fischer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yGFuX2KDQsReplies: @Jim Don Bob, @Joe Paluka
Mick is a perfect example of how effective adenochrome is at keeping you youthful.
Nah, imposter syndrome only strikes the self-aware.
The Rolling Stones • Hackney Diamonds playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nsgVCCHAcnZQSMaZXY62TYNUrtLifHMHM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackney_DiamondsReplies: @Buzz Mohawk, @Buzz Mohawk, @Anon, @duncsbaby
I must admit that I was genuinely surprised that this isn’t terrible. Maybe it was the young chick probably born in this century cavorting on the stunt car.
Leftism is a virulent disease.
My sense, based on experience, is that work ethic is distinctly mental. The kids who go to college from elite, re: demanding, private schools definitely have a leg up on public school students for freshmen year. The elite preparatory schools do just that, they habituate students to the rigors of college in ways public schools do not. Students arrive knowing how to write essays and how to schedule time sufficient to keep up meet class demands. They also have a better sense of the effort needed to succeed in their new surroundings. At good preparatory schools kids that can’t keep up are, or used to be, given their walking papers. The sifting happens earlier and, were our schools better, we’d be thinning the herd in the public schools too instead of waiting for college to do it.Replies: @Cloudbuster
But there’s a selection effect there already. The kids going into the elite prep schools are, genetically, more gifted than kids in urban public schools. I guarantee it.