A new government means a new way of doing most everything. This includes school, and in particular for the older students, such as Upper Secondary or High school. Yes I'm going to make a point... further down. You'll have to read the whole post before it makes sense. At the moment we have one united schooltype for students between 16 and 19. There's a lot pf programs, you can choose between performing arts, media, farming, natural or social sciences, childcare, construcion and much much more. What they do have in common is that all of them gives you enough theoretical knowledge to continue to study at Uni level. Some of them are more theoretical some less, but whichever one you have attended, you can change your mind and go on to study something else, on a higher level, if you want to. The new government has proposed (ie, they're going to make it happen as soon as possible because they aren't likely to win the next election) to divide the schoolsystem in three. One school for those who wants to study at uni, one for those who wants to learn a trade/learn a job and one for those who wants to trainee their way to a new life. Only the first of those forms allows you to study at uni level once you're done. What will happen with those poor sods who doesn't know what they want to do for the rest of their life when they are 15? (that's about everyone at that point) What if you realise, after 15 years, that you don't want to work as a car mechanic anymore? Or that the carpenter decides that maybe taking an evening course at the uni because Chinese seems such a fun language? In Sweden we say that uni's supposed to be open for everyone, but it won't be with the new system, will it?
Mynona, what about post high school education, such as komvux? I am sure someone who misses two math courses, one swedish course and three history courses could study these after their high school graduation, to gain access to university studies. I studied the arts high school line when the Social Democrats ruled Sweden, and if I would like to enroll at the Royal Institute of Technology, I would still be required to take prepatory classes in math, chemistry, technics and physics. How does this differ from the Conservative Party's proposal?
hell man, i'm 28 and still don't know what i wanna do with my life. in the states, most highschools offer three diploma courses. 'general', which might as well be labled 'showed up. possibly took some tests. didn't learn anything. too stupid to bother teaching.', 'vocational', which translates to 'took woodworking and metalworking and lawnmower repair classes so they can get a job with a name on their shirt after they drop out', and 'college preperatory', which translates as 'the bare minimum education required by anyone who wants to be on the ordering end of the food counter at mcdonalds' now, because of the wide variety of junior and community colleges available in the states, you could get into a college or even a university without that 'college prep' diploma, if you had good enough test scores or picked a school with low enough standards. and you don't have to go into college/university straight out of highschool if you don't want to. but by and large the formula is: college prep + high test scores = straight into uni of your parents choice. twenty years later, you buy a big sports car and start fucking your secretary in what we call a 'mid life crisis', and then you get a divorce and your kids stop speaking to you. go america!
It's strange, the French government is working on something that sounds all to similar. I think it's a good idea to [b:719db20247]inform [/b:719db20247]kids better about what they can do, I was lucky enough to end up doing exactly what I wanted, but I'm still not sure how that happened. Hubby ended up being shunted into something he really hated, just because there were places to spare, and it has really f**ed up his life and carreer and self esteem for many years, and he DID know what he wanted to do at 15. On the other hand, they musn't be [b:719db20247]expected [/b:719db20247]to know what they want, just helped to find out... Now I don't know exactly what they want to do with universities, and I must say the unis in France are in a really bad shape at the moment, so something should be done, but as I don't really know what I'm talking about there, well, I'll shut up. Make the most of it, it doesn't happen often
In Ireland, we don't have to really choose very much until after secondary. . . when we go into secondary (at roughly 13) we choose a language and a couple optional subjects, and then we drop a few subjects after our Junior Certificate (at about 15) but not until we actually finish our Leaving Certificate do we actually have to really specialise. Which is good, cause I dunno what to do!
The system we currently have is that high schools focus on getting people into uni, but they offer trade base subjects that people can do as part of the same program that will get you into uni or you can go to a Tafe (technical college) and do a purely trade based qualification. But this a choice the student makes to go to the technical college, they have the option of going to a regular high school and doing the HSC program (with trade focus) and get the same certificate where if the mark is good enough they can go to uni... States have a system whereby every students sits a bunch of exams, all the marks are chucked together, by convoluted maths the marks are standardised and you are given a mark out of 100. If your mark is above the cut-off (set by the uni) for a degree program you can get into any program... For most programs it doesn't matter what subjects you did to get that mark, its just that some marks scale better and your likely to get a better mark in them. Now the argument is that basing admissions on just 1 mark is unfair and they want to have other criteria to consider but then it'll get murky and in danger of bias... What system do other countries use?
Personally, I don't find the US system to be that bad. The kids who are really smart can get grants and scholarships. And the kids who messed up in school can still generally work their butts off to get through university. Or at least some uni classes. The trouble is for middle ground test score poor kids. Well, that and our whole pre-uni education standards...
[quote:734d2bbfbd="Garner"]but by and large the formula is: college prep + high test scores = straight into uni of your parents choice. twenty years later, you buy a big sports car and start fucking your secretary in what we call a 'mid life crisis', and then you get a divorce and your kids stop speaking to you. go america![/quote:734d2bbfbd] Maybe things were differant a decade ago and on the opposite coast, but now-a-days Prep is considered a bit of a joke. Given how competitive the college admission system has become, to live the lifestyle you discribed one would have to have taken at least a few Honors/AP classes by the end of high school.
[quote:f371fdaf9b="spiky"] States have a system whereby every students sits a bunch of exams, all the marks are chucked together, by convoluted maths the marks are standardised and you are given a mark out of 100. If your mark is above the cut-off (set by the uni) for a degree program you can get into any program... For most programs it doesn't matter what subjects you did to get that mark, its just that some marks scale better and your likely to get a better mark in them. Now the argument is that basing admissions on just 1 mark is unfair and they want to have other criteria to consider but then it'll get murky and in danger of bias... What system do other countries use?[/quote:f371fdaf9b] Most uni courses have no subject requirements apart from English which is compulsory. Degrees through the army, airforce and navy, however, do have subject requirements. Ah... the UAI or other state equivalent. Joyous stuff. Not only is basing four years of real high school work mostly on one exam unfair, it weeds out all the people who actually have intelligence... not just the ability to regurgitate on command. Except for the practical subjects, which base 50% of the mark on one major project. Not to mention the campaign by the Howard government to make university admission based on wealth of parents rather than merits of student. The students who get a UAI above the guarenteed entry score get in, regardless of wealth, however... Once those are chosen, the rest of the places go to full fee paying students regardless of marks.
As Kaptenkaries said, we do have a rather extended adult education, which is going to be dismanteled, at least according to the information I have at the moment. There won't be a second chance, once you've chosen your future path, at 15, you won't be able to change. Also to be disbanded is the prepatory or 'extra' teaching for those who left 9th grade without a passing grade in Swedish, English or Maths. They also want to reinstate punishments in school that were taken away some twenty or thirty years agon. (those punishments are dentention and not being allowed in school for some time)
[quote:7db04d3c1e="QuothTheRaven"]Maybe things were differant a decade ago and on the opposite coast, but now-a-days Prep is considered a bit of a joke. Given how competitive the college admission system has become, to live the lifestyle you discribed one would have to have taken at least a few Honors/AP classes by the end of high school.[/quote:7db04d3c1e] *shrug* Honors and AP classes were effectively the exclusive providence of the College Prep diploma course. i'm sure a general or vocational student could have gotten into them if they tested high enough or had the teachers' permission, but the priority of assignment would go to the CP students. effectively, a CP diploma is a 'general' highschool education for those who aren't borderline (or bona fide) remedial students. if you're going for an upscale university, you need honors classes, AP classes (advanced placement. college level courses which include a hefty exam that can earn you college credit while in highschool if you score high enough), fantastic grades in all of them, and top scores on the SAT and ACT. but of the three common highschool diplomas, that's still part of the 'College Preparatory' program. in my highschool, the vast majority of students were on the CP track. it's the generic diploma these days. the honors and AP classes just serve to set the smart kids aside. and on that note, about 13 years ago they changed the way honors classes worked in georgia. prior to that, they'd been Gifted. you had to get a small screening that ammounted to a low grade IQ test to qualify for the gifted classes. after the changeover, however, qualification for an Honors level course only required a minimum performance on one of the endless batteries of standardized testing that we got exposed to. thus when i was in the 10th grade, suddenly we had a bunch of football players in honors english. some of them actually stuck around and did well in the course, but some of them were requesting a transfer to the non-honors equivalent within a fortnight.
We've had something similar in place in the Netherlands for quite a while. At age 12, when we enter high school, Dutch school kids are put in 3 different streams according to what advice they were given by their primary school. Passing the top band will get you into uni, the one below that into a less prestigious equivalent, etc. I've always thought it has some clear disadvantages. The amount of polarisation is quite extensive. Because it is put into place at the start of high school, there are very few established friendships and most social interaction will develop within specific classes. Also, it does not take individuality into account. Some students excel at science, but struggle with language, for instance. Because every band requires a similar skill level for every subject, they will be judged on their language marks. Recent immigrants whose grasp of Dutch is still developing, in particular, can be limited because of this. I can also see distinct advantages, however. There is a great deal of flexibility in changing bands here. This does mean that slow developers do not have to lag behind initially and can still ultimately achieve the same results. Also, after getting a diploma in one level there is always the option of not leaving high school and taking additional courses at the next level to earn that diploma. The same stacking system is in place for the university-type institutions. Education does become slightly more tailored to the individual and there is a certain social safety in the polarisation, but there is also a pretty large cultural divide between levels and, although it stimulates some students more adequately, it can potentially limit others quite significantly as well. Tertiary education should be accessible, but at the right levels. Keeping funding attainable requires some amount of realism.
[quote:ed8f286a3e="Mynona"]They also want to reinstate punishments in school that were taken away some twenty or thirty years agon. (those punishments are dentention and not being allowed in school for some time)[/quote:ed8f286a3e] How exactly do they punnish disruptive behavior if they don't have detentions?
We have a standard base in high school, with divisions in math and english into three groups based on the students' abilities. In 10th grade and onwards students have to choose a certain addition to that standard base, be it a combination of physics and computers (which I did), chemistry and biology, carpentry or even art. As you can see, there are both purely educational as well as purely practical groupings here, as well as a pick and mix of both. The the group in which the student remains of those three I mentioned earlier will later affect the difficulty of the exam the student will have if he remains in that group until the very end of his education, and the worth of the grade he gets in that exam as far as universities are concerned changes accordingly. In truth, after the 10th class transfers from group to group are rare. As for uni later on...? Someone who studied physics and was in the top group in english won't have to take extra courses to complement this knowledge in the university, and will most likely get accepted more easily.
Okay I think living in a small town is equal to living under a rock. We didn't have honors or AP classes at my high school and only about 3 classes were considered college prep. I'm sure honors and AP classes are helpful and different universities have different acceptance requirements but you can get by on mediocre grades and ACT scores and pretty much anyone with a GED can get into a community college. Scholarships are awarded to the really smart or the really poor. I would also like to add that all prerequisites can die, I hate them. I especially hate them now in college because I want an associates in science degree and I get to take a whopping 3 science classes.
[quoteQuothTheRaven"] At the moment, we don't need them. Sure, there are a few noisy students, but they can be told off or, in extreme cases, get 'thrown' out of the classroom. Swedish classrooms and classes are more free than their UK/US equivalents. I've heard teachers from England marvel at the fact that if a Swedish teacher leaves the classroom the students will continue what they are doing, though the level of noise may rise. We are less rigid than 'you' are. No calling the teacher by her surname for one thing, and no calling the stuents by that either. Students who don't show up for classes lose their grant (if above 16), and gets a mark that means 'couldn't be graded because of lack of gradable material' The grade thing starts in the 8th grade (14 year-olds) which is when our students are graded for the first time. You won't pass primary school (up to and including 9th grade) if you have that particular 'grade'. That way, it's worse than a 'failing' grade.
