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150 Comments
- CaliforniaEagle, on 10/12/2009, -13/+90NO with a capital N
- Skeptica, on 10/12/2009, -2/+60The American classroom is a market driven classroom. The athletes get more attention and better pay, so students try to be athletes first. What America fails to do is to inspire the kids. Recently I participated in a "partnership for math" program. I found out the schools were bending over backwards to help the students. You can lead a jackass to the water, but you can't make him drink. Bending over backwards to help students wouldn't matter one bit if all students want is only to get the homework done. They can appreciate athletes practice many hours a day, and they can appreciate pianists practice many hours a day, but all they want to spend on math is 3 hours a week. Even a child prodigy that spends only 3 hours on Chopin's Fantasie Impromptu will be a terrible pianist. Once kids are inspired and they have a goal, putting in effort becomes natural. Athletes compete all semester long, students only study to pass the exams. Maybe we should have contests on the subjects they study all semester long, that will give them something to work on. They want to win, give them a contest.
- Bloodwine, on 10/12/2009, -5/+42Paying students for grades will just encourage cheating.
They'd have better luck if they'd bribe the media to turn intellectuals into sex idols. - AYOTTERIOT, on 10/12/2009, -1/+35throwing money at the problem isnt going to solve anything.
- Bloodwine, on 10/12/2009, -0/+14That sounds good in theory and I agree with the theory, but in practice it would make the teachers dumb down tests, provide study sheets which are pretty much the same as the tests, and engage in other activities to make them look like their students are succeeding in class.
- Kakumeikeahi, on 10/12/2009, -0/+13That's why my elementary school would teach to standardized tests rather then trying to actually teach.
Many students were pulled out of real classes for standardized test classes, and if not standardized tests how would you propose to decide the quality of a teacher? - captininsanity, on 10/12/2009, -2/+15No but I think teachers' pay should be decided on how well they teach...
- Arth718, on 10/12/2009, -0/+11Give students incentive to do well in class the first time around and save money on paying for teachers/resources for remedial classes?
- MediaCrisis, on 10/12/2009, -1/+11I'd rather see money go to a class account than individual students. I don't know about you guys, but as an alum of a public school, it would've been nice to have a prom with chairs. I can see our 10 year reunion being held one room away from AA. And people going back and forth, for that matter.
- Kekeh, on 10/12/2009, -0/+10I have a friend who's fairly adamant about the idea that students should get more course credit for each course depending on how good of a grade they get. So essentially a student that gets poor grades has to spend more time in the school going through more classes, than a student who puts in a lot of effort for his grades and learning.
Interesting idea I think, only useful for higher level schools though. - web2pointYo, on 10/12/2009, -1/+10Yes. 15 years or so down the road. Not exactly instant feedback.
- gordigor, on 10/12/2009, -0/+8What?
- GrammerPants, on 10/12/2009, -2/+10Lets look at other Countries and find out how they encourage their kids to do well in school. Oh yeah! Parenting....
- brad3378, on 10/12/2009, -0/+7Money can only go so far when it comes to motivating students. Buy them hookers instead and watch their grades soar.
- m0og0o, on 10/12/2009, -1/+8Did you read the article? The money would go into other school related activities. I don't see whats so bad about giving money to learn based on positive past performance learning.
It seems similar to setting aside the money to those types of programs (drivers ed, educational field trips) but now gives students a tangible goal to achieve rather than "you'll be smarter and make more money in the future" - chromerium, on 10/12/2009, -1/+8No.
http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation.ht ... - axb156, on 10/12/2009, -4/+11As a recent high school graduate, you sir are still an idiot. The point here is athleticism in the U.S. is revered way above intelligence. Furthermore, exorbitant pay and fame fuel ambitions of young and impressionable to pick up sports and stick with them in hopes of achieving a high paying career. All if this is spite of developing real world skills that are sought after in a workplace.
These athletes get inflated grades and personal treatment from teachers, which in turn means better scholarships and schools for further "education." Since most major universities are plagued by competitive sport, for financial reasons, these ignoramuses are pushed out with some generic degree, but a degree nonetheless.
After a failed attempt at a sports career; they later join the workforce with delusions of entitlement for a good paying job, because they have a piece of paper from university proclaiming they're qualified.
This waters down the value of a college degree driving the pay down for people with real education and real experience. Further, high production of "graduates" opens up more subpar colleges and programs that yield even lower qualified individuals withe college "degrees."
This drives the cost of menial labor up, since no one wants to clean toilets when they graduated from a (community) college. In turn those jobs are outsourced leaving a larger pool of "qualified" graduates jobless, further driving down the value of a degree...
I can keep going to what essentially ends up being a country with a destroyed economy; but this in a nutshell is what happens when the majority have a wrong set of priorities. - quirkopatra, on 10/12/2009, -0/+6I would just like to give you props for that comment.
- rocknog, on 10/12/2009, -1/+7If the problem is a lack of incentive, I think we have to consider the possibility that the problem is a lack of parents doing their goddamn jobs and instilling the value of education in their children. Parents are the most important influence when it comes to education. We seem to have a problem, however, with pointing out the obvious - we always have to find some external factor. It's like the school shootings - the media was all obsessed with violent video games and the like, but no one wanted to admit the possibility that it was simply negligent parents not paying attention to the fact that their children had serious problems.
- Maxjan, on 10/12/2009, -0/+6Skeptica,
You make too much sense, therefore this will not be done.
Sincerely,
Elected and Unelected Officials - CrimsonJones, on 10/12/2009, -1/+6Most conspiracy theorists do think they're smarter than everyone else.
- heliumflash, on 10/12/2009, -0/+5Whatever works and gets students learning honestly
- a2wickedd991, on 10/12/2009, -7/+12Horrible idea.
- italirican, on 10/12/2009, -1/+6Instead of money just give us cases of beer - that's the logical thing to do.
- Octanum, on 10/12/2009, -3/+8Agreed, it's completely unnecessary. We shouldn't have to award individuals for doing something that benefits them.
- Matman302, on 10/12/2009, -0/+5Wait a second, don't we already do this in college? They are called scholarships/grants, and if you don't do well you loose them.
- amoro99, on 10/12/2009, -2/+6If it costs less with better results, then what's the harm? Sure we'd all like kids to believe in the 'value of education', but when really does that apply after you leave school. At least this way you'd get them used to working hard for the money.
Now if it costs more with less results, then the idea is crap. - elephantstomp, on 10/12/2009, -0/+4If this happens, I want some back pay.
- cCPanda, on 10/12/2009, -0/+4 We should pay our teachers before we start paying students.
- adozeneggsmcgee, on 10/12/2009, -0/+4cool story bro
- mparker21311, on 10/12/2009, -2/+6Has it really come to this?
- gordigor, on 10/12/2009, -2/+5The students who don't study still won't study. It would be the 'good' busting thier asses while the 'bad' kids still reap the reward. Good idea but flawed.
- MediaCrisis, on 10/12/2009, -0/+3When I was in school the individual reward was not being an idiot. But I can see how that's not so sought after anymore...
- Aurabolt, on 10/12/2009, -0/+3You just described my high school experience. Class of 06.
- bugwayji, on 10/12/2009, -0/+3 Why not, those who keep propping up the Economic system that keeps crashing get paid. The Weather man/girl who is usually doing less than 50% on accuracy get paid. Politicians who couldn't organise a good poop get paid.
- lisaawesome, on 10/12/2009, -0/+3That's an interesting idea that I've never heard proposed before. There are some students who have absolutely no need to spend 4 years in high school even if they're taking all honors/advanced placement courses and this kind of proposal would really benefit them. It is also a great incentive for all students to truly try. Who wants to spend more time in high school school than they really have to? To me this idea seems like it would be a more integrated way for students to skip ahead a grade if they are working above their classmates.
- makotech222, on 10/13/2009, -0/+3my parents managed to teach me well that i should do good in school, i didnt need any money to do it. A dvd will make them happy, but so will love from a responsible parent.
- bdbr, on 10/12/2009, -0/+3"The athletes get more attention and better pay, so students try to be athletes first."
Surely only a few high school athletes would be stupid enough to think they'll make any money from that skill. And most of the ones that think they will, won't.
But you're right, most American students don't consider hours a day of study as reasonable until college. There certainly are some that do - in my daughter's school, there was a group of very competitive (mostly Asian) students that did study hours per day and received very good grades. - samsmartjr, on 10/12/2009, -0/+3But in the real world you can't get by on doing just what makes you happy. Most people out there work their jobs just for the pay.
And there are a lot of students in school who don't apply themselves because they don't get rewarded for it. Why should a 5-year-old try to earn good grades so he can have a high paying job when he's 30? Children don't understand things like that. They do, however, understand that getting an A will let them buy a DVD they want. So I'm very much in favor for this. - samsmartjr, on 10/12/2009, -0/+3You'd have to give some kind of individual incentive though. For example, maybe allow kids who do well to have prizes sent to them. Personally, I think kids will work hard if they see an award for them.
Another thing that needs to be done is for schools to find ways to market non-athletic competitions. For example, we should have music teachers who have their classes put on rock concerts and English teachers who teach their students how to write articles and short stories and then collect them into an anthology and sell them. The proceeds could then go to the high school to pay for those individual departments. It also teaches students how to do those things for a paycheck and teach them the business side of art, literature, and culture. - Ishiguro, on 10/12/2009, -0/+3Your statement is valid, in that money shouldn't necessarily be the number one goal in life, but money is the method we use to distribute limited goods and services in the most fair way. So, I can be happy if I have enough money to buy the limited goods and services that support my happiness.
- Beylan, on 10/13/2009, -0/+2Why not? They already get paid to drop out with decades of welfare checks.
Maybe if we paid them to study they would actually amount to something other than a useless drain on society. - lisaawesome, on 10/13/2009, -0/+2It's definitely not a perfect idea but I think we do need to start entertaining more nontraditional routes of education. I think this one size fits all education really serves no one well.
- bdbr, on 10/12/2009, -1/+3It should be up to the *parents* to decide whether to pay their child to do well in school. I did. I told my daughter that if she didn't do well in school, she should get used to being poor. She graduated high school with a 4.2 average. :)
- mdelling, on 10/12/2009, -0/+2Except that in france, it is almost impossible to fire someone.
- neomatrix724, on 10/12/2009, -0/+2Seriously? We're at the point that we have to consider paying students to do well? It is the responsibility of the FAMILY to explain the importance of education and going to school.
Kids these days are coddled and pampered and believe that they are entitled to a cellphone, entitled to a car, entitled to good grades and entitled to go to college and then entitled to a job, etc. They need to realize that they aren't entitled to any of those things. They have to work towards it. If they put in effort, and apply themselves, they will be rewarded with the ability to support themselves.
All this coddling and sense of entitlement brings is a nation of idiots. <s> How about this...if you have a student who's doing poorly and the parents don't seem to care? Call the parents in for a conference and then smack them upside the head...maybe that will teach em. </s>
...P.S. GET OFF MY LAWN! - xerodustrial, on 10/12/2009, -0/+2Students need encouragement in a multitude of different ways -- and I'm sure paying some of them helps. Specifically, this helps students in the lower economic brackets, because it gives them an income relative to their time spent attempting to educate themselves, rather than spending that time in the street hustling for the same dollars.
But for the middle and upper class students, it will probably encourage cheating. In fact, I'm fairly certain of it. The line between "a bunch of students getting together and studying to get great grades and get paid" and "a bunch of students getting together to try to cheat to get great grades and get paid" is a pretty fine one.
After all, look at standardized testing in America. The best and most expensive prep courses aren't teaching kids how to actually answer the questions on the SAT. They teach them how to recognize the structure of the questions on it so that they can make good scores without actually having to apply real effort or really attempt to answer the question. You cannot expect them to not want to cheat the system when cheating the system is what we teach them to do at every step. - hfactor, on 10/13/2009, -0/+2"Who cares if they fail at school resulting in a fail in life?"
I'm pretty sure it's an advantage for society as a whole if you try to keep the fail-at-life rate as low as possible. That's a no-brainer. That's the reason politicians are concerned with education in the first place. - mdelling, on 10/12/2009, -1/+3In my department most of the professors are excellent teachers who do a damn good job of making the subjects interesting, and no one pay attention.
The problem is that kids now days don't see the big picture. They only go for immediate gratification, like facebook games, rather than realizing that knowing your stuff and getting an awesome job will be better in the long run. If you change that, people will pay attention. - PopcornDave, on 10/12/2009, -0/+2Wouldn't that be NON with a capital N - which would be redundant.
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