Blaming the “system” is easy but is it the whole picture?

How much of it is due to culture? Teachers in western countries are not as respected as teachers in other parts of the world. A few teachers abuse their authority and that results in outrage and lawsuits from parents, rightfully so.

I can imagine in many schools in the US, if a cellphone ban were to be implemented, there would be a large outcry from parents on how restrictive or overreaching that policy would be. Even if the net positives (as shown in the article) are proven to outweigh the pragmatic concerns (i.e I might need to be in communication with my child) why take the risk?

Not to be supporter of “the man” but it seems unfair to point the finger at a system that takes steps to preserve itself without also acknowledging the hostile environment in which it operates.

Parents have greater zeal in suing the school than they have in attending open board meetings.

I wouldn't group all Western countries together.

The US has always been unique in having a very libertarian, freedom at all costs culture.

For example in Australia we have recently banned children from using social networks and this was supported by about 80% of the population.

Is there no resistance to things like having to adult having to prove their age to social networks? How is that going to be done, BTW?

The same way it has been done for years when you sign up for a mobile plan etc.

You verify your age using either passport, driver's license, digital ID etc.

There are plenty of services that provide this.

So you have to show your ID to social networks. Very intrusive.

> Teachers in western countries are not as respected as teachers in other parts of the world.

It can not be true for most of Asian countries with a really rich history of beating bad students.

It is true, harsh teachers tend to be respected more, just as long as they are good at teaching and getting results.

Im from Asia, me and most of my peers were taught by our parents since childhood that teacher is equivalent to god, and we must be obedient, attentive and listen to teacher and his/her instructions, do all our homework, and if they punish us, it is for our own good.

Now its all the same tho, I don’t think the current generation has much respect for teachers, but even 10 yrs ago, when I was at school, we definitely did, and teacher was considered final authority, with class teacher/head teacher having the highest authority over everything, same with after class private tuition teacher.

One time was punished with having to write 71 computer programs in 5 days as an assignment, as punishment for not doing 7 in a week, i had to stay awake all night, and get it all done, or else i would have to stand outside classroom and do those assignments for as many classes as necessary, in front of other student’s parents as punishment in form of humiliation.

My parents explicitly sent me to that teacher, because he was strict. Strict teachers are respected even more, and tbh when done right, they do deliver great results, atleast they did for me.

Welp I’d say that teacher is the primary reason why im decent at programming now, and love it so much, he made it almost second nature for me to constantly think about solving computer programs, and coding things.

An important component is solving parent entitlement as well. They are stakeholders, not customers.

(~1600 school districts across 24 states in the US are on 4 day weeks to attempt to retain teachers)

> An important component is solving parent entitlement as well. They are stakeholders, not customers.

Only in public schools. At private schools, they are customers, and paradoxically the concomitant “entitlement” is not a bug, but a feature

Private school cohort is a minority, and those kids in the aggregate will do well because of their parents’ wealth, income, and time available. Private school teachers typically are compensated appropriately and empowered as well (as opposed to public teachers who are not). Managing expectations, but also realistic expectations.

(home/virtual school two kids under 10 in our family, my observations and perspective from interacting with both public and private schools and the parents there, ymmv)

The student-to-teacher ratio there is also wildly different. For example, it's 4:1 at one school in New York[1] vs. the 15:1 national average (it's 12:1 in New York)

[1]: https://www.stbernards.org/about-us/faculty--staff

[2]: https://usafacts.org/data/topics/people-society/education/k-...

I strongly agree that ratios are a component in student success. Regardless, if parents are not meeting their burden as stakeholders, student success is incredibly challenging. This applies across income strata.

TLDR “Do you value education and model that for your children?” (broadly speaking)

My apologies this was a long journey to the thesis.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2973328/

https://touroscholar.touro.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1... (page 6)

Anecdotal but I went to a fancy NYC private school (on financial aid) and what I heard was the teachers actually got paid less than public school teachers + lacked the union protections and whatnot. But it was worth it for the nicer environment and dealing with motivated students with parental pressure behind them.

Although you could make money in extra ways by networking with students for $300/hr SAT tutoring and such.

That was true, I believe though that they also didn’t have to do as much certification, but were also often better pedigreed (e.g. the math teacher may not have done a teacher prep program or been certified, but held a masters degree in math from a prestigious university)

Yes, my friend is a teacher in WA and taught in private and public schools; that matches her experience.

I think you are a little bit behind the times with current private/ charter schools. Charter School does not mean wealthy parents, it means non-public alternative that takes the public tax dollars and turns them private.

Private/ charter schools work off the fallacy that smaller school means better performance. They exploit the law of small numbers to support the fallacy. There will be one or two schools that do well while 1000 do not. Those that promote charter schools only talk about the two doing well as their example of why charter is good and pretend the other 1000 don't exist.

"Thinking, Fast and Slow", by Daniel Kahneman has a quick talk about this. Simple probability proves small / private schools are not good. Where are you more likely to find a mentor, in a school with 10 teachers or 200 teachers? Where are you more likely to find a friend, in a school with 50 or 5000 people? Where are you more likely to find a doctor, in a restaurant with 5 or 500 people? Where are you more likely to find a great walking stick, on the beach or in a forest?

There are less financial regulations and requirements for monetary rules with private than public. Those that run private schools exploit this for personal financial gain. "Education entrepreneurs" that can get a company car and use other tax evasive actions versus focusing on the education of the next generations.

I cannot speak to charter schools, I have no experience with them, only public and private (no vouchers accepted, some financial aid available depending on income).

> Where are you more likely to find a mentor, in a school with 10 teachers or 200 teachers? Where are you more likely to find a friend, in a school with 50 or 5000 people?

This is such nonsense. Beyond a certain (very low) number, the number of people at the school doesn't help you with those things, because you can only meet so many people. You have classes with a fixed number of teachers, and a fixed number of students in each class. Furthermore, it's usually roughly the same cohort in each class. So even at a school of 5000 people, you only productively meet a small fraction anyways. Besides that, the premise is seemingly that a good school is one where you can find a maximally good mentor and friend. But schools are for teaching things, so ensuring you can find a slightly better mentor or friend at best marginally improves the school as a school. If the charter school is better than a public school in some other dimension, then that will surely overshadow this miniscule effect.

You've seemingly borrowed an argument for larger cities and applied it to schools without understanding it. If I am lacking something in a small town, I either put up with it, or move to another town where I will surely lack something else. If I lack something at a school, I have the choice to switch schools to one where I am better provided for (assuming I'm given that option) or find something to supplement that lack outside of school (say a club, sports team, etc).

>You've seemingly borrowed an argument for larger cities and applied it to schools without understanding it.

I don't know that argument and never heard it.

Intellectual sorting will be applied in a real world.

By saying you have to meet all 200 teachers or 5000 students to find a mentor or friend would mean you have to try on all shoes, or cloths at a store to find the proper one(s). Your shoe, shirt, and pants size, with your acceptance of brands, greatly reduces the "you can try on only so many shoes, shirts, pants" argument. [0]

Is the student into robotics? Most likely only a STEM teacher would be into robotics, which reduces the number of teachers to meet to find a mentor. See a person wearing a shirt for a band you like, more passive intellectual filtering to find a friend and reduce the number of people to interaction with to find a friend. Into beat-boxing, perform at the school talent show and communicate to all 200 and 5000 students at once. You still might be the only one into beat-boxing though. More Intellectual filtering that go against "having to meet everyone to find a friend or mentor" argument.

Say you want to go out to a movie and there are 100 movie theaters in your area. Will you go to each one to find the right theater and movie? Or will you start sorting based on physical distance, known history, online checking of movies the theater is playing and times? Will you stop once you found something to go and see after viewing the 3rd theater or will you look and analyze all 100?

Dating apps, meet-up apps, social media channels or groups, even Hacker News, are all forms of Intellectual filtering, to assist in the "lacking something else" bonding.

Lets rephrase it. Say you want to have sex. Which would most likely help you reach that objective? Which has a high problematical outcome to achieve what you want, asking 10 people or asking 100 to have sex?

[0] I have abnormal size feet. As a kid, only found shoes that fit at stores with the larger product selection that sold only shoes. Had to try on countless number to find a single pair that fit. This feed my disdain for shoe shopping. As an adult, purchase them online because not even Nike sells my size, and I don't have to waste days trying multiple on.

> Is the student into robotics? Most likely only a STEM teacher would be into robotics, which reduces the number of teachers to meet to find a mentor. See a person wearing a shirt for a band you like, more passive intellectual filtering to find a friend and reduce the number of people to interaction with to find a friend. Into beat-boxing, perform at the school talent show and communicate to all 200 and 5000 students at once. You still might be the only one into beat-boxing though. More Intellectual filtering that go against "having to meet everyone to find a friend or mentor" argument.

I would say that running this "intellectual sorting" over schools themselves is far more productive then running it over individuals in a school. Suppose you find a really good friend at a school, who happens to not share any of your classes; or a mentor who happens to not teach any of your requirements. Going to a school in which most people have already passed a basic filter for compatibility would leave you far better off than running that filter over every person in a school. Like having a shoe store only for people with large feet.

except customer is not always right at private schools, the school makes the rules, you get to sign the agreement and then pay a bunch of money and the stfu. my kid goes to private school, no electronics of any kind are allowed. over the years many parents bitched about it which went as good as you can imagine - “there are many other options for your child’s education…”

You have to get all the parents onboard and have other options.

absofuckinglutely NOT. parents are fucking idiots. you start asking parents shit and you end up with “oh this book should not be in the library.”

the way it should work (and it does in many private schools I scouted for my kid) is that school sets the rules, you sign the rulebook - end of the story. no discussion and 1,000,000% no parent involvement of ANY kind

If I could afford to send my kids to private school, I would happily pay a premium for a school with a strict anti-phone-policy. Not least because I’d want to find a place where the other parents are on the same side as me on this issue.

What happens if both parents work?

You do the best you can, but you’re likely setup for failure.

As a parent in the trenches, I do not recommend children to anyone who is not fully prepared and informed for twenty years of a form of hardship.

https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/parents-under-pressu...

I was asking about the 4 day class week. It makes it very hard to have two working parents.

(Also note that the 20 years is only an optimistic lower bound.)

Ahh, my apologies. With regards to the 4 day week, parents are exposed to additional childcare costs I presume. The perils of having children in a macro that considers them a luxury good, and is unwilling to subsidize daycare nor pay teachers more. If you go into it knowing you’re going to suffer (cannot afford daycare, childcare, etc), that’s a choice.

> Also note that the 20 years is only an optimistic lower bound.

Strongly agree.

We're talking about banning cell phones all day (not just during school hours).

I don't think teachers should control what kids do outside of school. Teachers aren't parents (or jailers).

> giving teachers and schools more freedoms

Sounds like socialism (/s)