Are are American students struggling with math?

My state has so-called "Robin Hood" provisions where property tax money is confiscated from wealthier areas and given to poorer areas - and it is still a dismal failure. It isn't about the money - it is about the parents that don't give a crap about education - their own or their kids. You could pour quadruple the money into those "poor" districts, and it wouldn't change a thing.

 

Do you have ANYTHING meaning full to say or just insults and brain farts?

 

Money isn't the answer. We've tried that experiment.

Policy Analysis MONEY AND SCHOOL PERFORMANCE Lessons from the Kansas City Desegregation Experiment

 

There's truth in that. Parents to have to care.
But money is also a necessity.

 

Again, it's at a level you project from your posts. I just want to make sure you understand.

 

I respond as I'm addressed.

 

I grew up in Rolling Hills Estates, CA and attended Palos Verdes High School. The median home price in Palos Verdes Estates, CA where the school is located is $3M. Rolling Hills Estates is $1.9M. Rolling Hills is $4.2M. Rancho Palos Verdes is $1.8M.

Check out the schools that cover these cities.

Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District

Kids aren't struggling in Palos Verdes. They have good teachers.

Many schools, especially in poor communities, do not. Especially not STEM teachers.

Instructors, counsellors, special education teachers--their salaries make up most of the budget. Even if we privatize schools, having good schools will probably cost more money.

They don't "teach" (read: preach) CRT. It's barely worth mentioning in high school history courses.

My school had English, Social Studies (history, geography), Mathematics and Science as core subjects. Fail one of these and you repeat in the next semester. Fail in the Spring, you take it next Fall.

We need better math teachers. You have to pay them more money.

Nose around the website for the PVPUSD. See what they're teaching. That's where you want your kid to go to school. Think about it--the people in that school district can afford to send their kids to private schools. So how come they aren't? They aren't because the public schools are that good.

When I look at some of these big city school districts, I don't see how they can possibly provide a good education given they way they operate. Vouchers? Yes, providing they're for enough money that a poor parent can find a good private school without having to top up the voucher with money they don't have.

 

Not really. Not in poor communiities.

 

They need better math teachers and that's going to cost you more money. Pay up.

 

If testing made schools better, we'd have by far the best schools in the world. The "good old days" didn't turn out better students. Kids from our better schools run rings around kids from 50 years ago.

 

Parental support only goes so far when you have schools are as bad as they are in many poor communities.

Horatio Alger stuff? A lot of people never got very far up the ladder.

 

In schools, it wastes everyone's time--that's what's wrong.

 

The change they embraced was teacher salaries falling behind those for other college grads, women having opportunities outside nursing and teaching, and school budgets not keeping up with needs.

 

Nothing to contribute?

 

In wealthy communities, kids work their butts off.

 

and yet we're pumping tens of thousands per pupil.

Does have to be THAT prosperous - just give the tools so the student can fill a starter job would be nice.

 

If the test contains the material the student is supposed to know, then doesn’t it make sense to teach to the test? I mean, what are they supposed to teach? Stuff that’s not on the test?

 

A lot of money is already being spent on schools in CA.


The total overall funding (federal, state, and local) for all TK–12 education programs is $128.6 billion, with a per-pupil spending rate of $22,893 in 2022–23.

https://www.cde.ca.gov/fg/fr/eb/ba2022-23.asp

 

CRT isn't the devil it is a time waster and a lie. You do not have time for it in k-3.

It can't make it worse. Might as well claim thermometers make it hotter.

 

I solved the problem.

Labelled it racist and will disregard math from now on! Isn't that "progressed"?

 

We could do a better job if we had math specialists teaching kids at the lower levels. Too many times we have PE and shop teachers teaching math at the lower levels.

 

It isn't taught in schools.

How could one possibly teach Marxist nonsense to K-3?

 

Money is part of the answer.

 

Terrible analogy.

In this case, the assessment impacts how and what kids are taught. Most importantly the how.

The thermometer doesn't care what the temperature is. A teacher often cares more about how kids do on the assessment than how well they learn.

 

When I get on an airplane I want to know it was designed and built by engineers that got the correct answers, not designers who "adapted the curriculum" to their own needs. Catering to the survival of the passengers is a lot more important than keeping smiles on student faces.