Damn Yankee

Threedee said:
And everyone is different, but some students do need these programs if compulsory education is going to be anything other than a complete waste of there time.

I got to observe one gifted class of middle schoolers. They were pretty bright, witty, and generally impressed me with their level of knowledge for their age.
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Everyone thinks they're smarter than everyone else.
 
Damn Yankee said:
Douchebag I lived through the socialist education utopia that you wish for growing up in Taxachusetts.

Back in the late 1940's when my parents were educated right, with the gifted kids challenged, and my Dad won a full ride scholarship to Boston College High School. When he graduated he enlisted in the Army and after they tested him they declared him too valuable to send overseas, and set him up designing ballistic missiles. He beat out all the college grads and all he had was a high school education.

But when I went through school Massachusetts had turned into your socialist utopia and we were all treated the same. My Mom like all the others read Spock's (no not the Vulcan) book about how to raise kids. I tested real high on the IQ and she burned the test results so I "wouldn't feel superior" to the others. I spent my elementary years staring at the clock, junior high getting in fights and high school drinking and getting stoned, graduating dead center in the middle of my class.

When I went to college I struggled through calculus, taking seven semesters to pass four. It wasn't until I met the right girl who saw my potential that I straightened out, was able to apply myself and after 9 semesters I graduated with a degree in engineering, cum laude. In my last semester I was offered me a full ride scholarship for graduate school in environmental engineering along with a teaching assistant position. Haven taken too long to finish my bachelor's I had bills to pay so had to refuse. Then during my first job stint I was offered a full ride scholarship to John's Hopkins for a degree in Industrial Hygiene. I refused that again because of my overdue loans.

Its a long story but the jist of it is that I was held back because of your socialist utopia. It took me 4 or 5 years longer to get to the point that my Dad did. And lost the opportunity for free graduate school education.

Because of that I hate you liberal socialist pigs with all my soul. You can go fuck yourself, abort your babies, and rot in hell for the rest of eternity. :burn:
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SM, I am not making this argument because of any hostility to those who do well. I do not believe in making society more equal by handicapping the top performers. I have said nothing of the sort.
 
Mott the Hoople said:
But when I went through school Massachusetts had turned into your socialist utopia and we were all treated the same. My Mom like all the others read Spock's (no not the Vulcan) book about how to raise kids. I tested real high on the IQ and she burned the test results so I "wouldn't feel superior" to the others. I spent my elementary years staring at the clock, junior high getting in fights and high school drinking and getting stoned, graduating dead center in the middle of my class.

Well we got that in common too SM. You just pretty much described my high school years. I remember one of the girls in the national honor society cried when she found out I scored higher on the SAT then her ( I was a serious long haired hippy freak at the time). I laughed at her and called her stupid for getting so wrapped up about a freaken test and then I told her I hadn't even studied for the test, which was true.

Good grades are nice but not the be all end all of life. I know an engineer who's a Princeton Grad. He runs a Sub shop. I wouldn't let him design a bird house for me. He's one of the most inept engineers I ever worked with but he did go to Princeton and graduated with honors as an EE. When I was in grad school the honor students were uniformly the worst clinicians. They had zero instincts on how to apply what they learned matched by an utter lack of compassion, empathy or the semblence of a bed side manner. Grades are just one measure of success but not the only one.
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I made a 35 on reading on the ACT, an almost perfect score. Shitty on everything else. Balanced out to a 27. I slept three hours the night before (specifically because I was worried about the test, I actually stayed awake for six hours in bed and slept three). I was running on an amount of caffeine so insane that I was shaking. But anyway, I'm a damn good reader, and if I read it, I understand what you're saying! Now if I could only translate this to the marketplace...

Most of the people who make high grades have good discipline. At the end of the day it doesn't matter if your good because of discipline and practice or because you have magical powers, they judge you just the same. But for some reason people seem to value the latter more. However, that does not always translate to practical matters...
 
Threedee said:
And everyone is different, but some students do need these programs if compulsory education is going to be anything other than a complete waste of there time.

I got to observe one gifted class of middle schoolers. They were pretty bright, witty, and generally impressed me with their level of knowledge for their age.
Click to expand...

What I've seen happen, to kids who are "gifted", is that if they aren't continually challanged, they get lazy and don't work up to their ability.

I've got a 9 year old Grandson that falls into that category and I've told the school that if he finishes the assignment(s), then he needs to be given harder work.
 
FAGGOT OF DEBATE said:
I made a 35 on reading on the ACT, an almost perfect score. Shitty on everything else. Balanced out to a 27. I slept three hours the night before (specifically because I was worried about the test, I actually stayed awake for six hours in bed and slept three). I was running on an amount of caffeine so insane that I was shaking. But anyway, I'm a damn good reader, and if I read it, I understand what you're saying! Now if I could only translate this to the marketplace...

Most of the people who make high grades have good discipline. At the end of the day it doesn't matter if your good because of discipline and practice or because you have magical powers, they judge you just the same. But for some reason people seem to value the latter more. However, that does not always translate to practical matters...
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But how did all that help you, when you finally got promoted to the 2nd grade?? :cof1:
 
USFREEDOM911 said:
What I've seen happen, to kids who are "gifted", is that if they aren't continually challanged, they get lazy and don't work up to their ability.

I've got a 9 year old Grandson that falls into that category and I've told the school that if he finishes the assignment(s), then he needs to be given harder work.
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Exactly!

Some kids have intellectual gifts that need to be nurtured and encouraged.

Just like there are some kids with athletic talents, there are those with talents for math or for reading comprehension. To maake those gifted kids sit in the classes with all the others who happen to be the same age is ridiculous.

Education is not a "One size Fits All" proposition.
 
Mott the Hoople said:
But when I went through school Massachusetts had turned into your socialist utopia and we were all treated the same. My Mom like all the others read Spock's (no not the Vulcan) book about how to raise kids. I tested real high on the IQ and she burned the test results so I "wouldn't feel superior" to the others. I spent my elementary years staring at the clock, junior high getting in fights and high school drinking and getting stoned, graduating dead center in the middle of my class.

Well we got that in common too SM. You just pretty much described my high school years. I remember one of the girls in the national honor society cried when she found out I scored higher on the SAT then her ( I was a serious long haired hippy freak at the time). I laughed at her and called her stupid for getting so wrapped up about a freaken test and then I told her I hadn't even studied for the test, which was true.

Good grades are nice but not the be all end all of life. I know an engineer who's a Princeton Grad. He runs a Sub shop. I wouldn't let him design a bird house for me. He's one of the most inept engineers I ever worked with but he did go to Princeton and graduated with honors as an EE. When I was in grad school the honor students were uniformly the worst clinicians. They had zero instincts on how to apply what they learned matched by an utter lack of compassion, empathy or the semblence of a bed side manner. Grades are just one measure of success but not the only one.
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Certainly true. I scored a respectable 680 in math, which is the only reason I got accepted into engineering school. That plus it was the tail end of the baby boom years and they needed asses to fill their seats.

High school wasn't a complete loss for me. I couldn't get a regular job because my Dad made too much money, and all the local businesses were taking advantage of a State program that paid 1/2 of the wage of "underprivileged" kids. Yet another of SkidMark's Socialist Utopia ideas with unintended consequences. So I scratched around for every penny, mowing lawns, moving furniture and such. Those cash businesses put enough in my pocket where I could repair my broken dirt bike (parlayed in another deal, another story), buy lots of automotive tools, fix my car, buy gas and cigs, etc. I developed a lot of street smarts and common sense that served me well. Most engineers I've worked with consider me somewhat of a magician when coming up with ways to get things done.
 
FAGGOT OF DEBATE said:
I made a 35 on reading on the ACT, an almost perfect score. Shitty on everything else. Balanced out to a 27. I slept three hours the night before (specifically because I was worried about the test, I actually stayed awake for six hours in bed and slept three). I was running on an amount of caffeine so insane that I was shaking. But anyway, I'm a damn good reader, and if I read it, I understand what you're saying! Now if I could only translate this to the marketplace...

Most of the people who make high grades have good discipline. At the end of the day it doesn't matter if your good because of discipline and practice or because you have magical powers, they judge you just the same. But for some reason people seem to value the latter more. However, that does not always translate to practical matters...
Click to expand...
Yup, that's my point. I think in the SAT I broke 500 in the math/science portion (did well in science, average in math) and well over 700 in the written/english portion for a combined score of over 1200. Didn't mean shit for me as it wasnt' good enough for a scholarship with my grades, my parents didn't have the money to send me to the school I wanted to go to (Case Western) and you don't need a 1200 sat to get into State U. In those days you only needed to have a high school diploma and be a resident of the state.

My attitude was that unless you came from a family with money, and I didn't, it was pretty much just another standardized test and I figured, and rightfully so, that if after four years of high school to prepare for the damned thing that if you needed to study for it, well you had missed the point all ready. So I went in with a fresh mind and no anxiety and did very well. I got the fourth highest grade in my class and many of my teachers were shocked beyond words that I had done so well.

You know what's funny? When I filled out my application for State U they asked for my SAT score and I didn't record it and by the time some one noticed I was half way through my second term and I got a 3.0 in my first term.
 
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WinterBorn said:
Exactly!

Some kids have intellectual gifts that need to be nurtured and encouraged.

Just like there are some kids with athletic talents, there are those with talents for math or for reading comprehension. To maake those gifted kids sit in the classes with all the others who happen to be the same age is ridiculous.

Education is not a "One size Fits All" proposition.
Click to expand...

My 9 year old Grandson was assigned to help other kids, in his class, last year.
KInd of like a minature Teacher's Aide.
 
In WA state, you can pretty much get into Wazu, Western, Central, and Eastern without much effort at all. The U, however, is looking for 4.0 students with strong SAT scores, and lots of activity during high school. This is a new stance taken on in 2002 to clean up its image and look better than the other colleges, but even still, it was always much harder to get into. I didn't even bother applying, but I got accepted at Wazu (having been in 4-H might have helped my likability there) and Seattle U (where I have legacy status). In the end I applied a year later to a small, obscure college (it became a university at the start of my freshman year) near the capital that was noted statewide for its engineering and education programs.
 
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