Education matters: Readers have their say

China at our heels

I applaud the call for better schools in Georgia for our future economic well-being. In the next 10 to 20 years, maintaining our technological and scientific supremacy will become even more acute with the threat of countries such as China. Having traveled to China and observed their one-child-per-family policy, whereby the parents focus all their energy on having that child succeed academically, the end result is that China graduates more engineers and scientists than we do. That means the future inventions and scientific advances will come more from China than the United States, challenging the living standards we’ve become spoiled into expecting. We do lead in the number of kids wanting to be rock stars and athletes, but that will have limited impact on our balance of payments problem.

Also, as a financial advisor, I’m amazed at the widespread adult financial mathematics illiteracy I’ve experienced. Although the schools attempt to teach algebra, trig and calculus (which a fairly small percentage of students will use), it seems to me that more time should be spent drilling students to become proficient in decimals, percentages and fractions having to do with dollars and cents. I suspect that our subprime mortgage mess would not have been as severe if buyers understood the hard dollar challenges they’d be facing down the road had they known enough math to ask the right questions.

PHIL KAPLAN

East Cobb

Jefferson stressed education

While uniforms are fine, and charter schools and vouchers seem to meet some of the needs in the educational marketplace, they all cater to specific segments of the population. The lynchpin of education must continue to be an effective public school system. Thomas Jefferson said, “A people cannot be both ignorant and free.” He would urge us to do more to make the system we have now more effective.

FRANK D. ARNOLD

McDonough

Some students would be better off without college experience

In reading Maureen Downey’s column last week, “Is college too much to ask?” I suggest we ask a different question —- “Is college the right thing to ask?” It’s important to consider intrinsic motivation. If a student is intrinsically motivated to work with their hands, to be a plumber or a welder or an auto mechanic, we are doing them a huge disservice in tracking them to a four-year university. Not only will they be frustrated with the lecture-heavy, auditory-learner approach of academia and our universities, they will be unhappy, unmotivated and unlikely to finish.

For those who do finish and earn that coveted BA or BS, they will likely be less valuable in the market place. One of the experts in Downey’s column noted that Joe the Plumber earns $39,000 a year. I know many college graduates with BAs in journalism, sociology, history and English who are unemployed or working as restaurant waiters or hostesses. They would welcome a career that pays $39,000 a year. As was noted in the column, this is an average. It is not unusual for top plumbers, welders and auto mechanics to make over $100,000 a year.

In this debate about education, let’s keep in mind what motivates people from the inside and figure out how to encourage students to pursue this course. In the end, I think we would all take a happy plumber over an unhappy doctor or lawyer.

SCOTT SHELAR

Decatur

Obama gets school choice. Why not everyone?

Maureen Downey is right that nothing will take the place of a bright and energetic teacher and a student who comes to school ready to learn. However, she is wrong to call those wanting vouchers “snake-oil salesmen.” Our newly elected president has chosen (because he can afford it) to send his daughters to one of the most exclusive private schools in Washington.

Most people cannot afford it. In Europe, vouchers have been used successfully for years. The schools are better because there is competition.

We also need to make basic reforms such as not allowing every student to be placed in college preparatory classes. Tracking is really a good thing. The European model offers both university-track and vocational high schools. The system works well. However, most American politicians will not touch these types of reforms for fear of upsetting everyone from the National Education Association to the parents who mistakenly believe that Johnny really can make it in college despite his low test scores.

EDWIN WILLIAMS

Atlanta

Where’s the accountability?

There are several explanations for the extraordinary gains in CRCT scores reported by the AJC for certain schools. First, the original results may not have been valid. As reported earlier this year by the AJC, there is little negative consequence for students if they fail the CRCT. As the AJC found, few schools follow the state law about retaining the failing students. As a result, many students do not take the test seriously, and may not give it their best effort. Therefore, a gain after 18 days of remedial instruction in the summer might not be a surprise, especially if the students “just barely” failed the CRCT to start with.

However, another warning sign that these scores are far out of line is how they compare with the results of the Iowa Test of Basic Skills. While the ITBS is a different kind of test, children scoring in low percentiles would not be expected to do well on the CRCT. If the summer scores were valid, you would likely see a larger-than-expected jump in the ITBS scores in math this fall.

If not, either something miraculous is happening in these schools’ summer programs which we all need to replicate, or there is something funny going on with the incredible gains made by students at these schools.

What is the most disheartening is that once again, the newspaper is doing the kind of quality control check that the state Department of Education should have been doing all along. This testing administration validity check should have been going on for years, but it seems to take the AJC’s leadership to prod the DOE to do its job. How very, very sad. More accountability for teachers, but not for the DOE, once again.

GINGER M. MARINE

Ellijay