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Question

Who else thinks the our education system is failing?I can't pay attention in class, and either can ne one else. I'm scared for my future, and our future as a country. I think our drop out rates are going to be raised if something isn't done. If your a teen do u feel given up on too?

Answer 1

The only person responsible for you getting an education is you.

If you can't pay attention in class, consider leaving your cell phone, MP3 player, and hand-held video game at home, and ignoring your classmates, focussing your attention on your teacher. If you don't have distractions, you'll have nothing else to do but pay attention.

Answer 2

i am 15 and i think that the education system works for those that realize that they need to pay attention even though the classes can sometimes be very boring. I often do not pay attention but when it comes time for the test i am up till four in the morning studying. I do not feel given up on because the kids that drop out of school and that fail classes are the ones that don't care enough about themselves to pay attention and get good grades. How is it that Asians are almost always good students? it is because they haven't been Americanized into believing that they can do whatever they want. Asians and other foreigners in America are just glad that they don't have to be in communist country's or countries to poor for good education. I think you need to realize that people come and send their kids to America for our good educational systems. You are just giving up on yourself and are blaming it on the government which is making a fool of yourself. Take advantage of being able to get an education which is something that billions of people around the world wish they had. You are just lazy.

Answer 3

every high school student feels this way. that is why they drop out. they figure why even try if I'm going to fail any way.

I am 27 years old, i was pregnant at 17, finished school 2 months before i gave birth, got a job 2 months after giving birth, quit working, and enrolled in college to work towards becoming a CPA. Keep in mind that I have 3 children not just one.

If I can do all this, then you can make your educational experience as challenging as you want it to be.

Answer 4

The quality of education issue has to do with too many demands on teachers, not enough time per student, and constant changes in curriculum, programming, etc. However, until a few decades ago, education was optional. Most people had a 3rd, 6th, or 8th grade education at best. Only those going on to become business owners or professionals and therefore were college bound went on through high school.

Most people in the United States are unaware of this now, and consider childhood education to be a right rather than a privilege (even though in most areas of the world apprenticeship and manual laborer tracks are still very much the norm).

That "optional" aspect of education, until the middle of the 20th century, meant that anyone who was not a natural academic learner left school and either took on an apprenticeship for skilled crafts, or became a manual laborer. Teachers did not need to have much training in order to teach the "natural" learners, at least until the college prep stage. Even there, the students by that point had good study skills and were motivated, so the demands of a teacher were relatively simple. A century ago, a person could be a teacher for children with a high school diploma, and only needed a college degree for high school and college instuctor positions. Those college degrees only involved subject knowledge training, not any sort of deep involvement in actual teaching strategies or methology. This was because STUDENTS WHO HAD DIFFICULTY LEARNING WERE NOT TAUGHT ACADEMICS.

As academic education became mandatory, and then achievement of all students, including the students with extreme difficulties, became important, teacher training needs started to climb. Teachers today, in order to be good, have to be highly skilled and flexible diagnosticians, curriculum designers, instructors, psychologists, social activity coordinators, and social workers, all at once. No child, regardless of learning ability, can fail to make progress or the teacher is blamed regardless of any other factors affecting that child (motivation, personal interests, any disabilities, home environment, etc.).

However, our society's perceptions of what a teacher does and what value teaching has did not keep up with the real and actual demands of the profession. Over the past 50 years, teachers have been expected to teach more and more students, with increasing levels of interfering factors to their learning, with less and less comparative resources.

Now, given that, if you have 180 students (6 class periods of 30 students each) per day, that means that to see each student individually each day you would have to give no more than 2 minutes per day to each student. That would be without giving whole-class instruction on anything. Any questions about why your current education experience seems distant and impersonal?

Now, teachers are paid off property taxes through the state, by grouchy taxpayers who don't want to actually shell out to ensure truly effective student to teacher ratios. We really need twice as many teachers, and half the class sizes we have now. That funding can't be found through cutting teacher pay....teacher incomes are already 1/2 to 1/3 that of other professionals with similar levels of training and responsibility. Keep in mind that teachers really do have a year-round job (even though they are in class with students for "only" 36 weeks). The "off" time is spent planning lessons, taking professional development courses, attending seminars, and working at second jobs to deal with paying off student loans and trying to support their families.

So, unless people are willing to pay double on their property taxes, or unless we go back to optional rather than mandatory education, the situation will pretty much remain the same.

So, your learning is up to you. Either YOU read the textbooks, pay attention to the lectures, seek help from the teacher during that less than 2 minutes they have for you personally each day when you don't understand something, and find links between school work and practical applications, or you don't.

Answer 5

I'm not a teen but I was one 30 years ago. I think mostly the educational systen has already failed. Rise out, don't drop out. I once met a kid who skipped school to visit the Museum of Natural History in NY in order to learn something. Scarry !!!
Learn in spite of being in school. College is sometimes a little better.

Answer 6

Well, I can say that we're doing okay in Ontario, Canada. The drop-out rate is slowly dropping. The only issue we've got is with not enough students getting through higher (grades 11-12) mathematics; most people don't take it, and many who do drop or fail the course.

Answer 7

Don't worry about other's at this point. Just get through school on your own and for yourself. To involve yourself in subjects that don't pertain to your education is to fall by the wayside with everyone else. You seem to have the sense of mind to be aware of what is going on around you. I'm sure you can use that discipline to get through school and graduate. Besides, if you do want to affect change, you will need to graduate high school and college too.
Good luck to you in whatever your future endeavors hold for you!!!

Answer 8

The education system has been failing for years. The teachers aren't even educated.

Answer 9

If you are eighteen, register to vote. Volunteer with the political party of your choice. Make a difference. DON"T wait for someone else to tell you what to do or what you should be satisfied with.Join one of the armed forces, learn a job, then make a difference if your life, then make a difference in someone else's life!

Answer 10

Look you have to help your self. Some teachers are becoming lazy and they don't care. You need to study and read as much as possible. Read, read, read! So that you don't get caught in the same Stupid web as your lazy teachers. Nine times out of ten they don't understand what they are doing while they are trying to teach you, especially if they're new.