On 11/4/2012 3:30 AM, Warp wrote:
> I hear that at many places in the United States (although I'm sure it's
> not the only country in the world with this problem, but I get the
> impression that it's one of the worst of its kind) boards of education
> are often staffed by people who are completely illiterate in terms of
> science and education. And it's precisely these people who decide what
> is and isn't taught at schools. Apparently they get to those positions
> for political reasons and because of a buddy system, not because they
> would be the most competent for that position.

In our district there was no political pressure to leave certain topics 
unsaid.  Evolution was as much a part of the curriculum in biology as 
the periodic table was in chemistry.

My experience was that up until seventh grade (children aged 12-13 
years), science education was zilch, and past that point there was very 
little rigor until high school, and then only for those students who 
elected to take the classes where stuff was actually taught.

Politics had nothing to do with it.  The district administration had 
simply decided that science wasn't important.

If I had to lay a finger on one characteristic of our public school 
establishment that is especially bad, I would have to say that it has a 
great tendency to be influenced more by fads than by sound principles.

The New Math was one such fad.  It had a particular theory about how 
math should be taught, and as far as I can tell from looking into it, it 
was implemented on a large scale without any significant testing to see 
if it was as effective as its proponents claimed.  By all accounts it 
was a failure.

Regards,
John

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