Liberalism. Holding down standards in the name of diversity

[Geosurface]

I guess the plan is to go from a society which produces hardly any viably educated members, to one which produces none.

Sounds like a good plan.

 

[Victorian Gray]

I guess the plan is to go from a society which produces hardly any viably educated members, to one which produces none.

Sounds like a good plan.

Perhaps fertile ground for recruitment?

 

[Jhhnn]

We always believe in equal opportunity. Opportunity is a chance. When you guarantee equal results, there is no chance involved. I love the liberal mentality though. Hold back those that could excel as it is unfair to those who can't.

Yeh, and in a system of limited resources, conservatives want to advantage the advantaged even more.

Smarter? You get even more advantages with gifted programs!

Richer? Even better public schools in richer communities & private schools for those who can afford it! And vouchers so that public schools can be completely gutted.

Yeh, I know, you got equal opportunity swinging from the stem end of your bladder.

 

[Matt1970]

Yeh, and in a system of limited resources, conservatives want to advantage the advantaged even more.

Smarter? You get even more advantages with gifted programs!

Richer? Even better public schools in richer communities & private schools for those who can afford it! And vouchers so that public schools can be completely gutted.

Yeh, I know, you got equal opportunity swinging from the stem end of your bladder.

Yes Jhhnn, we know you feel failure only proves unequal opportunity, and only by government redistributing wealth to others can society be fair.

 

[nehalem256]

Yeh, and in a system of limited resources, conservatives want to advantage the advantaged even more.

Smarter? You get even more advantages with gifted programs!

Richer? Even better public schools in richer communities & private schools for those who can afford it! And vouchers so that public schools can be completely gutted.

Yeh, I know, you got equal opportunity swinging from the stem end of your bladder.

Yeah its not like there are any special school programs for kids that arent smart :whiste:

 

[Zaap]

Mixed issue for me.

On one hand, yes, Kindergarten is way too early to be splitting up kids based on some being 'gifted'. (In higher grades, based on actual academic performance in school, then by all means.)

On the other hand, "lack of diversity" is chickenshit, cop-out reasoning. (As it virtually always is).

 

[Jhhnn]

Yeah its not like there are any special school programs for kids that arent smart :whiste:

And at that, their opportunities aren't really equal, are they?

Of course not. They can't be. It's like anybody being free to invest a million bucks, but not everybody has a million bucks in the first place.

We owe it to ourselves to mainstream as many marginal kids as possible, get them up to speed or close just so they have much of an opportunity at all.

 

[Jhhnn]

Yes Jhhnn, we know you feel failure only proves unequal opportunity, and only by government redistributing wealth to others can society be fair.

Nice strawman! Bravo!

 

[Moonbeam]

Blah Blah Blah, Blah Blah Blah Blah

Oops, I spoke above your level of understanding. Sorry!

 

[Double Trouble]

Sounds like a terrible idea. Dragging down the high performers because you don't like collective racial composition of the high performing group? Really dumb. I guess they think it better to dumb down everyone than to face the reality that not all kid are the same.

 

[Matt1970]

Oops, I spoke above your level of understanding. Sorry!

•Narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) is a chronic (lifelong) mental condition. With NPD, your thoughts and behaviors cause problems with your relationships. You feel that you are better and smarter than everyone else. You may act out in ways that cause problems with your daily life activities, such as work and school. With NPD, you need to be the center of attention and feel that you should be loved by other people. You have trouble caring about others and their feelings. You want to control the people and events in your life.


•With NPD, acting like you are better than others may help hide a low self-esteem. With NPD, you do not like to be told you are wrong. You may act out meanly if others do not treat you as you feel you should be treated. You only do nice things for others if you will be rewarded right away. When you have NPD, you cannot stop your behaviors even if it is hurtful to others. It is hard for you to trust others, and you have trouble asking for help.

 

[Jhhnn]

Sounds like a terrible idea. Dragging down the high performers because you don't like collective racial composition of the high performing group? Really dumb. I guess they think it better to dumb down everyone than to face the reality that not all kid are the same.

Except that's not what the spokesperson actually said, which was

“Our Kindergarten classes will be heterogeneously grouped to reflect the diversity of our student body and the community we live in,” Miss McDonald said in the letter posted on Flickr.com.

There was no "because" other than the usual right wing accusatory conjecture as fact routine. She didn't give a reason, so they made one up to suit their purposes.

 

[nehalem256]

And at that, their opportunities aren't really equal, are they?

Of course not. They can't be. It's like anybody being free to invest a million bucks, but not everybody has a million bucks in the first place.

We owe it to ourselves to mainstream as many marginal kids as possible, get them up to speed or close just so they have much of an opportunity at all.

So we should hold back gifted kids to try and make things more equal?

Don't we have a thread about how progressives are really in favor of progress going on? :hmm:

 

[Jhhnn]

So we should hold back gifted kids to try and make things more equal?

Don't we have a thread about how progressives are really in favor of progress going on? :hmm:

How is equal opportunity holding back gifted kids?

If they already have an advantage, then we should provide them with more just because they already have one, right?

 

[Matt1970]

How is equal opportunity holding back gifted kids?

If they already have an advantage, then we should provide them with more just because they already have one, right?

It's called letting kids learn at the pace they are capable of. It's the same reason why we have special classes to help those who learn at a slower pace. By your own logic every kid should learn at the pace of the slowest kid in class.

 

[nehalem256]

How is equal opportunity holding back gifted kids?

If they already have an advantage, then we should provide them with more just because they already have one, right?

You are advocating putting gifted kids in with regular kids in order to hold them back. How is putting the gifted kids together and teaching them at a faster pace providing them an extra opportunity? Both groups are granted the educational opportunity to learn at their own pace.

And by "advantage" you mean they are superior.

Hard to have an equal society when some people are intrinsically superior to others huh?

Which is probably why liberals are advocating for holding back superior people in order to make things more equal.

 

[theeedude]

We always believe in equal opportunity. Opportunity is a chance. When you guarantee equal results, there is no chance involved. I love the liberal mentality though. Hold back those that could excel as it is unfair to those who can't.

At first day of kindergarten, you don't know who could excel and who couldn't. You simply know whose parents could afford pre-K and whose couldn't.

 

[Matt1970]

At first day of kindergarten, you don't know who could excel and who couldn't. You simply know whose parents could afford pre-K and whose couldn't.

You may be right, but that isn't the argument they are making now is it?

“Our Kindergarten classes will be heterogeneously grouped to reflect the diversity of our student body and the community we live in,” Miss McDonald said in the letter posted on Flickr.com.

“At PS 193, we believe that all children can learn and achieve high standards. We also know that we want all children at PS 193 to have equal access to high quality, challenging curriculum, and to have ample opportunities to master complex material and build academic and personal self-confidence. We also want our classes to reflect the diversity of our community. We believe we can have both: classrooms characterized by rigor and diversity.”

 

[compuwiz1]

The problem people don't see yet is the impact of the new common core curriculum that is being taught in our schools. It's actually a liberal indoctrination program, aimed to manipulate our kids from a very young age. Do some research on it. If I had school aged kids they would not be allowed anywhere near a public school, but be educated privately.

 

[Jhhnn]

It's called letting kids learn at the pace they are capable of. It's the same reason why we have special classes to help those who learn at a slower pace. By your own logic every kid should learn at the pace of the slowest kid in class.

Strawman #2!

 

[Jhhnn]

You are advocating putting gifted kids in with regular kids in order to hold them back. How is putting the gifted kids together and teaching them at a faster pace providing them an extra opportunity? Both groups are granted the educational opportunity to learn at their own pace.

And by "advantage" you mean they are superior.

Hard to have an equal society when some people are intrinsically superior to others huh?

Which is probably why liberals are advocating for holding back superior people in order to make things more equal.

They're only superior in terms of conventional measures of intelligence. It doesn't speak to other valuable human qualities at all.

Gifted programs, in general, have better student to teacher ratios, not to mention extra funding.

So, uhh, what's next? Will you claim that test scores being better among wealthy suburban school districts is because the kids are smarter, or what?

 

[Moonbeam]

•Narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) is a chronic (lifelong) mental condition. With NPD, your thoughts and behaviors cause problems with your relationships. You feel that you are better and smarter than everyone else. You may act out in ways that cause problems with your daily life activities, such as work and school. With NPD, you need to be the center of attention and feel that you should be loved by other people. You have trouble caring about others and their feelings. You want to control the people and events in your life.


•With NPD, acting like you are better than others may help hide a low self-esteem. With NPD, you do not like to be told you are wrong. You may act out meanly if others do not treat you as you feel you should be treated. You only do nice things for others if you will be rewarded right away. When you have NPD, you cannot stop your behaviors even if it is hurtful to others. It is hard for you to trust others, and you have trouble asking for help.

Pure psychobabble, especially that shit about a need to feel superior because of low self esteem.

 

[Geosurface]

If a kid has a diagnosed developmental disorder, that's different.

Right, because people either have a completely obvious, undeniable mental disability OR if they don't, then they're all exactly the same as everyone else who doesn't. Only these two categories exist - undeniably retarded vs. exactly the same as everyone who isn't. That doesn't at all fly in the face of how biology works (a gradient) or anything.

At first day of kindergarten, you don't know who could excel and who couldn't. You simply know whose parents could afford pre-K and whose couldn't.

Teachers deal with kids of that age for a living. I expect ranchers can probably size up good genetics and promising breeding candidates when they have a new calf born or go to a cattle auction, pretty quickly and reliably after enough years.

You may not like the comparison, but I don't find it hard to believe that teachers can at least sometimes pick up (pretty quickly) who the gifted kids are. If they miss one they can add him to the classes later.

They're only superior in terms of conventional measures of intelligence. It doesn't speak to other valuable human qualities at all.

But intelligence is connected to a lot of other valuable human qualities. Many of which depend on intelligence to some degree.

It's like anybody being free to invest a million bucks, but not everybody has a million bucks in the first place.

Right, which is why we shouldn't let ANYONE invest a million bucks no matter how beneficial it is to our economy and society, because not everyone can!

So, uhh, what's next? Will you claim that test scores being better among wealthy suburban school districts is because the kids are smarter, or what?

Well, IQ is linked to income... and mainstream IQ heritability estimates from such sources as the American Psychological Association are all pretty high like, 75% heritable or near that.

So, you would expect to find intelligent people over-represented among the more well to do portions of your society.

The same genes which enabled their parents to succeed in adulthood are enabling the kids to succeed in childhood.

 

[BoberFett]

How is equal opportunity holding back gifted kids?

If they already have an advantage, then we should provide them with more just because they already have one, right?

The true nature of "liberalism" rearing it's ugly head...

 

[Double Trouble]

Except that's not what the spokesperson actually said, which was



There was no "because" other than the usual right wing accusatory conjecture as fact routine. She didn't give a reason, so they made one up to suit their purposes.

You must have missed this part:

We also want our classes to reflect the diversity of our community.

It sure appears that they are doing this because of some notion of 'fixing' lack of diversity among the high performing group of students.

Each student should be able to learn at their pace. That is impossible to do unless you have a 1-1 teacher to student ratio. Splitting off smaller sections of classes to better cater to the needs of the students makes sense. The only opposition comes from those who apparently don't like the outcomes, they want the outcomes to adhere to some arbitrary rules that nature obviously does not follow.