Mushmouth
05-20-2017, 10:19 AM
All the children in my son’s class at school are white. And when I say “class,” I don’t mean just the 17 kids in the same room with him; I mean all the children of the same age in the same grade in the entire school. I didn’t have to enroll him in an expensive private school or live in rural Vermont or the Scottish Highlands to get my son into this minority-free classroom. This is just what schools look like in Poland.
But what makes Poland’s achievements in international competitions more impressive are the advantages it doesn’t have. First, Poland doesn’t have the large education budget that many other high-achieving countries such as Japan or Finland have. Although it spends about the same percentage of GDP as the United States on education, actual outlays per student are about 40 percent of the US figure.
Back to things Poland doesn’t have: There are no school buses here, yet somehow parents manage to get their children to school. Good public transportation helps. There is a modest infrastructure for providing meals in schools, but the idea of schools feeding children as a public service to certain “communities” is unknown here. Poles who earn a fraction of the American average income pay for their children to eat at school while half the parents in the U.S. let the government pick up most or all of the tab.
American schools spend lots of time, money, and effort because of diversity. There are no metal detectors at the entrances to high schools here, no signs about gun-free zones, or “school resource officers” with their patrol cars conspicuously parked outside. There is no extra level of administration keeping track of whether certain groups are being disciplined or suspended at higher rates than others. No school’s performance is measured according to maintaining the “right” proportions of rewards and punishments among students of different races. Standardized test scores are analyzed in terms of the progress that is or isn’t being made by all students, not for signs of progress in closing “achievement gaps.” Testing here answers the question, “Are we getting better?” rather than, “Is the bottom catching up?” as in American schools.
There are no organized competitive high school team sports in Poland, either. You can debate the social and physical benefits of athletics, but it’s hard to explain to Poles that education budgets should fund football stadiums and travel expenses for teenagers to play games. Polish high schools establish reputations based on the classroom performance of their students and their later successes in life, not through a winning football or basketball team.
https://www.amren.com/commentary/2017/05/notes-white-country-part-iii-poland-schools-education/
But what makes Poland’s achievements in international competitions more impressive are the advantages it doesn’t have. First, Poland doesn’t have the large education budget that many other high-achieving countries such as Japan or Finland have. Although it spends about the same percentage of GDP as the United States on education, actual outlays per student are about 40 percent of the US figure.
Back to things Poland doesn’t have: There are no school buses here, yet somehow parents manage to get their children to school. Good public transportation helps. There is a modest infrastructure for providing meals in schools, but the idea of schools feeding children as a public service to certain “communities” is unknown here. Poles who earn a fraction of the American average income pay for their children to eat at school while half the parents in the U.S. let the government pick up most or all of the tab.
American schools spend lots of time, money, and effort because of diversity. There are no metal detectors at the entrances to high schools here, no signs about gun-free zones, or “school resource officers” with their patrol cars conspicuously parked outside. There is no extra level of administration keeping track of whether certain groups are being disciplined or suspended at higher rates than others. No school’s performance is measured according to maintaining the “right” proportions of rewards and punishments among students of different races. Standardized test scores are analyzed in terms of the progress that is or isn’t being made by all students, not for signs of progress in closing “achievement gaps.” Testing here answers the question, “Are we getting better?” rather than, “Is the bottom catching up?” as in American schools.
There are no organized competitive high school team sports in Poland, either. You can debate the social and physical benefits of athletics, but it’s hard to explain to Poles that education budgets should fund football stadiums and travel expenses for teenagers to play games. Polish high schools establish reputations based on the classroom performance of their students and their later successes in life, not through a winning football or basketball team.
https://www.amren.com/commentary/2017/05/notes-white-country-part-iii-poland-schools-education/