Added: 1 year ago
From: KatieCouric
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  • To be honest, the opinions expressed about the 'hindrance' that technology has on learning is somewhat exaggerated. It's perhaps one of the most polarising of topics that you can present to parents and youth.

    Still, having watched the film, I, as a 17 year old secondary school (high school) student taking the IB Diploma, educational stress is something that certainly needs to be addressed.

  • My daughters high school has one upped the level. We have IB diploma for those who AP is just not hard enough? Also, sadly teachers do not know how their students are doing as they do not grade the tests or papers anymore.

  • it's the opposite for me. Maybe it's because I live in Toronto? But either way, when I was in the eighth grade, I was failing two classes, and I had an 67% average. Once I hit the ninth grade, my average went up by 10%. I feel as if my school actually TEACHES us, instead of making us memorize. We have to be independent thinkers.

  • Junior year was a nightmare. I never thought I could get that low, and I couldn't get lower. I had reached the abyss. I now thought I could seriously never get back to how I was before all this.. And now senior year has rolled around and I've started to get bad news..

  • All the while, I was in regular classes. Not one single honors. I got my first D+ in math (Alegbra 2). I was in a science class that was easier than my 8th grade biology class (with really intellectually challenged people.) It continued this way for the rest of the year, with a C in English and math, and in the one honors class, English, that I managed to get into the second semester I wound up with a D+.

  • The classes I had taken at my other school were not recognized by the new school and because I was already failing kind of, I had a hard time proving that I was supposed to be in higher classes, and I couldn't vouch for myself. All of junior year turned out to go worse than 9th and 10th combined. Also, this was the first year where my grades were in letters (I translated them before). I got my first F at the end of a quarter in English, which used to be my best subject.

  • In short, sophomore year was a disaster. By then, I had been clinically diagnosed as having depression. This crisis was degenerative. By the end of 10th grade, because I was doing so poorly, my parents decided to take me out of that school and put me in an American public school, which for me was a shock. I started 11th grade at a public high school in my town and was totally lost and inept at how this new school and system would work.

  • Anyways, my point is that once I got to high school, my work performance totally dropped and became someone who was not me. However, part of this was triggered by a quite depressing social crisis that hit at the end of 7th grade- and I was still fine in 8th grade. And then in 9th grade, I entered a depression. I started getting B's first, then C's, but I guess my head was somewhat still above water, and then, in 10th grade, I just started sinking further down.

  • I have to say the French educational system is much more challenging than the American one, which may seem totally contradictory and opposed to everything Vicki and her movie is trying to say in this interview that the U.S. has a more challenging system than any other country. I have lived the dual-system and can tell you for a FACT that just the French one is greater than or equal in intensity to the American one.

  • I think what this woman did is very proactive and admirable and I agree with a lot of the things she says in this interview because I myself am a victim of particular instances she is describing. All my life through middle school, I was a very good student and I had almost all straight A's. I went to a private bilingual school in NY that doesn't really follow the American education system and curriculum but the French education system and curriculum combined with part of the American curriculum.

  • John Gatto....Read some of his stuff!

    

  • You patronise the race to nowhere by stating that the young man who is working in a radio studio that you wanted to help him. What with your money. As you ask how come he was getting A grades in the beginning but began to fail in the end. The education system does not fit the African American child at all never mind white America who are all part of this created failing drama.

  • Yes! your right Vicki it is going to take a village to enact change as it takes a village to raise a nation (African proverb). The reason why he failed was because the system is so full of sterotypes about black males and they not only need academic education but the education of who he is, where he comes and how his past ancestors were great people. Not getting at him as we are all products of society, look at the weight he is carrying around.

  • Yes! your right Vicki it is going to take a village to enact change as it takes a village to raise a nation (African proverb).

  • The only way our kids will start to change as well, is if we as parents and caregivers and teachers lead as good examples, such as putting the computer away when our child asks us to play, shutting the blackberry off when we put them to bed, giving ourselves a break once in a while doing: nothing. Kids will see it is okay to do nothing and not be connected or achieving constantly.

  • Katie remains supreme. Composed and well articulated as always. Enjoy her video presentation of the producer of "Race to Nowhere". I thought it was some kind of car racing movie again. Lol

  • Finally someone who agrees that SAT is a bad thing if you get a terrible score and should re consider by taking it out from the serious consequences. I don't know, suicide? Seriously why make education a life or death situation? It's so sad hearing a 13 year old girl who committed suicide from a test.

  • Oh by the way Katie about your whole child fragmented brain theory I agree that constant texting/cell phone usage is unhealthy for anyone! I disagree with you though about heavy video game usage. Most of my friends and I who were the nerdy gamer types in high school outperformed everyone! I think there is a correlation between certain video games and critical thinking and this should be looked into!

  • In high school I basically quit doing homework. If my teachers told me to read chapters 1-3 and do all the assignments I would read those chapters on the bus and forget about the rest! I usually set the curve for the test every Friday and some teachers thought I cheated. They eventually learned that I could pass their tests and actually retain the knowledge without all the busy work! Some teachers hated me for this and gave me a D or a C, others thought I was awesome and gave me a B or an A!

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  • "Education is not to be viewed as something like filling a vessel with water, but rather assisting a flower to grow in its own way." Kids are motivated by anxiety and threat of judgment, not by knowledge of their own interests and natural growth of their personal creative abilities. With the growing class sizes and the republican war on working people, even the teachers aren't in a place to improve the situation.

  • Capitalism's influence on American Schooling is as toxic and ruinous as its effect on our political scheme. Once today's kids get to college and "the real world", they see that they are absolutely screwed. Our society is based on dominating your mind and then enslaving your adult life to debt. There is no freedom for creativity, everything is limited time-based competitive fact memorization. American schools are not even fit places for "normal" socialization.

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