Greeeeeat... Say hello to the "misinformed" generation

[ThunderPeel2001]

The Governator is pushing for changes...

Schwarzenegger Urges Schools To Ditch Books

http://www.imdb.com/news/ni0824212/

All hail the high quality teaching methods of Wikipedia... *thud*

AFAIU, it's the highly researched content that makes text books expensive, Mr. Schwarzenegger, not the fact they they're printed.

[syntheticgerbil]

"Our kids get their information from the internet, downloaded onto their iPods, and in Twitter feeds to their cell phones. So why are California's school students still forced to lug around antiquated, heavy, expensive textbooks?"

Learning by Twitter feeds? I feel sick to my stomach.

[Nachimir]

Lovely. Why stop at Wikipedia when you can expensively botch education by feeding it through every fad as it happens?

[SignorSuperdouche]

Whilst the Governor may not have a firm grasp of what he's talking about, I don't necessarily think it's a bad idea. If the state purchases text books in pdf form rather than a hard copy for each student then I don't doubt significant savings can be made without having a detrimental affect on the quality of teaching.

[Jake]

Whilst the Governor may not have a firm grasp of what he's talking about, I don't necessarily think it's a bad idea. If the state purchases text books in pdf form rather than a hard copy for each student then I don't doubt significant savings can be made without having a detrimental affect on the quality of teaching.

Crazy fucking old man ramble goin on here. Ignore this probably.

I have no actual insight into how this is actually going to work, but on the surface this sounds like the sort of great deal the State gets for itself, only to realize that they've been entirely boondoggled. (heh) The state never buys a textbook for every student -- they buy new textbooks what seems like every three to ten years (depending on the school's budget and how often the subject goes out of date) and pass them down used, one year to the next. I doubt the manufacturers of a digital PDF book would let a school "re-use" a file like that. Surely they would have to "issue a new license" with every new student. Would schools with lower budgets be able to say "we can't afford that, so we're going to have to extend the digital rights to this PDF document another year and give it to another student?"

Digital documents, especially ones which are paid for and signed with some sort of rights management, are almost never transferrable, and I don't think any digital rights system purchased on a government contract would have that degree of user friendliness to it.

So, let's do a word problem! Let's say a school in a poor part of the state keeps their math textbooks for 8 years, and a school in a great, affluent part of the state keeps their math textbooks for 2 years. If the digital copies were four times cheaper than the print ones (but had to be purchased once a year, a new license per student), the rich school would be saving money -- they'd be paying half as much as their previous Math textbook budget! -- but the poor school would be losing money, having to pay twice as much for textbooks over that 8 year cycle.

That is admittedly assuming a lot about how a system like that would work, so I am surely 1000% full of shit here. I'm just mashing together the base information I know about textbook purchasing, and the base information I know about purchasing digital goods (more specifically audiobooks and ebooks from places like iTunes, Audible, and Amazon), and then assuming that it will work slightly worse than it does in the private sector, because....

If there's one thing the government is complete balls at, it's contracting goods and services at an affordable price, and if there's one thing governments are confused and easily hoodwinked by, it's modern technology. These two things are unlikely to go together in any way that saves money. I've had the state charge me $5.00 for credit card processing before, for instance. Who on earth agreed to sign up with that payment processing service? No private business (no non profit organization even!) would be retarded enough to accept that type of gouging, but the state eats that shit up.

I think I'm just generally a little wary of the State digitizing itself, because so much of how a big government operates is (maybe unfortunately) based on the fact that it is a little creaky, and has a little leeway to flub things or let things take time to work their way through the system. Once everything is digital, any time allowed for just sort of... winging it... it is wholly removed by technology, but the rest of the system doesn't get adjusted to go along with it.

That said, I might be a crazy person. I live in fear of a near future where your vehicle registration status and the validity of your drivers license are tied to the computer which controls the ignition of your car, preventing someone from driving to the DMV to renew their expired license and registration. It's probably an irrational overly spun-out fear, but I like that in the world of analog bureaucracy there is a fair amount of implied gray area and wiggle room, at least for the minor shit. I worry that the more rigid and instantaneous enforcement of existing laws and procedures will cut that "by humans, for humans" wiggle room out, and will start seriously fucking over people who don't have the income or communication skills or life-togetherness to deal with it, which at the end of the day will do the opposite of what its supposed to.

It sucks that schools in poor areas have to stretch the use of their textbooks a year or two beyond their intended shelf life, but if that's the only thing they can do to stay afloat until a better, real long-term solution comes to pass, then that's what they should do. Taking that away from them without fixing anything else won't fix anything, it'll just effectively throw them out on the street. If you want to "phase out textbooks," you need more solutions in place than "this plan is cheaper because it uses technology instead of paper."

Also, unrelated to all of that, I don't think Schwarzenegger has ever been right with his ideas for how to manage California's schools, so maybe I'm not giving this particular issue a fair shake, but I have generally found him to be full of shit when it comes to public services (especially schools and hospitals/medical care).

[OssK]

I'm an interesting person, therefore all I had to say is that I pretty much agree on everything mister Rodkin stated above.

There, I said it, thanks for reading.

[SignorSuperdouche]

Well Jake, everything you brought up is a legitimate concern, but I don't think it's fair to dismiss the idea because it might get fucked in it's execution.

I'm not saying this is the right answer, I'm just not sure it's the wrong answer either. I certainly see no harm in the Governor of a state bringing it up for discussion.

[David]

cWxaGqjQKvE

[Jake]

Well Jake, everything you brought up is a legitimate concern, but I don't think it's fair to dismiss the idea because it might get fucked in it's execution.

I know. I'm just an turning into an untrusting asshole as I age, apparently, but also Arnold's track record with California's schools has been extraordinarily subpar, which is amazing given that California's public school system was already low ranking and shit before he got here.

[Patters]

snip

I completely agree on your points, the Secondary school I attended was originally terrible (with promise of getting better). We hardly ever had new textbooks etc, however more recently (about 04-08) it has got a lot better with new everything, due to increasing grade scores etc. I think we had the highest percentage of A grade a levels in the whole of hertfordshire in 2008 (for maths 95% and further maths 100%). However my university (Manchester) has an online system implemented across the whole range of subjects and it is the biggest pile of wank I have ever used (and I have used Sonicstage). This is bettered by the maths departments website and the lecturers own sites.

If this is only for books then it could be a good idea, however the loaning of textbooks to students just seems right to me, they use it for questions over the course of the year and then return it once done. If there were online books I would bet there would be printed example sheets, which can cause a lot more waste overall. Also I cannot see this being only used for text books.

Finally if you get rid of all of the books then you could never have a decent book burning.

[vimes]

I'm not really sure how the US education system got to the point where the manual differs from one school to another, it simply escapes me how a government can leteach school handle the very resource they work with.

In France - until some point in university - everybody get the same books which are bought by the government (even in the private school, I think); and, surprisingly from a country that loves to argue about everything, it never was presented like an issue.

Otherwise, digitization of study material seemed awesome to me since I discovered the free online course of MIT and the google scholars.

I live in fear of a near future where your vehicle registration status and the validity of your drivers license are tied to the computer which controls the ignition of your car, preventing someone from driving to the DMV to renew their expired license and registration.

You're not crazy, this is definitely going to happen. And sooner that anyone expect : as we speak, the french government is putting together the system that's kinda going to do this for internet access:eek:

[ThunderPeel2001]

If there's one thing the government is complete balls at, it's contracting goods and services at an affordable price, and if there's one thing governments are confused and easily hoodwinked by, it's modern technology. These two things are unlikely to go together in any way that saves money.

Most reasonable rant ever

(I especially liked the above quote.)

Now... where are our thumbs?? (I just gave you a thumbs up... Can you see it? Well, can you?)

[Horticulture Tycoon]

I think I'm just generally a little wary of the State digitizing itself, because so much of how a big government operates is (maybe unfortunately) based on the fact that it is a little creaky, and has a little leeway to flub things or let things take time to work their way through the system. Once everything is digital, any time allowed for just sort of... winging it... it is wholly removed by technology, but the rest of the system doesn't get adjusted to go along with it.

Speaking as someone who has a lot of experience dealing with state-level government programs at work (namely Medicaid), I can tell you that increasing the level of technological sophistication of any beaurocracy has nearly no effect whatsoever on the effectiveness of the program on the whole. Government programs are creaky and lethargic yes, but not because of poor technology, but rather because of the absence of accountability for the people who run these programs, who are essentially allowed to lean on their shovels for their entire careers. I can tell you that most state Medicaid programs are fairly sophisticated in terms of the technology they use, but get someone on the phone and nobody knows what the hell is going on.

I'd be willing to bet that an initiative like digitizing textbooks would have almost no effect on either the quality of education or the size of the education budget in the state of California. A school's budget is what it is, and if it does turn out that schools are saving money on textbooks because of this program, they'll just end up spending that surplus on a new football field or teacher's lounge or God knows what else. Because the oversight is probably not going to be there to prevent it from happening.

[gdf]

Over here, the depressing and broad trend appears to be the use of technology for the sake of it. Public services have made a horribly late and overzealous leap to the internet, and no more is this in evidence than in my secondary school. Because of Thatcher's government cutting a third of the budget from the original building, it was outsized and falling to bits within twenty years. Consequently, it had to be replaced (the private finance initiative used to jumpstart the process is largely incidental within this context) and the new school opened three years ago. Its proliferation of "SmartBoards" and laptops of dubious utility, coupled with gleefully idiotic moves like digital class registers, only serve to strengthen my conviction that, sometimes, we're just better off without digitalisation. Put computers where they are needed, do not overreach to the point of ridicule.

[Chris]

I'm not really sure how the US education system got to the point where the manual differs from one school to another

It didn't "get to that point," it's always been like that. The idea of even being able to have every school in a country of 300 million citizens operate on the same curriculum would be logistically nearly impossible for most of history. It's only in the era of mass communication and mass media that such a thing would be possible. Furthermore, since the United States is, of course, made up of states with the power to run their own education systems, it's not too surprising that every school in the country isn't run the same way.

Federally-imposed standards are a frequently-discussed step, but who knows where it will go.

[vimes]

So, if I understand this right, education is decided state by state ?

On a related note, if anyone can enlighten me while staying simple in his/her explanation : how do the US define what is of the responsibility of the federal government and what is handled by each state individually ?

[Max]

So, if I understand this right, education is decided state by state ?

On a related note, if anyone can enlighten me while staying simple in his/her explanation : how do the US define what is of the responsibility of the federal government and what is handled by each state individually ?

That's a pretty huge question and an enormous source of debate in the US, but on a basic level the U.S. Constitution gives very few requirements for exactly what the federal government does (namely, make, interpret, and enforce laws) but there are oodles of federal laws that decide what the federal government will do. States have their own constitutions that direct what they're responsible for, as well as all the state laws. There's occasionally conflict, like in California when the state allows medicinal marijuana but federal agents raid pot dispensaries for violating federal law.

So, every state is different in what it does for its citizens -- there are a dozen and a half states that control the sale of liquor, while the rest let it flow freely. What decides this is almost entirely written in law, some in constitutions.

[elmuerte]

it's the highly researched content that makes text books expensive

that made me smile

[ThunderPeel2001]

that made me smile

Well, it's true... Reference books are not just more expensive because they've got more pages, it's because the content takes more time (and therefore money) to produce.

[elmuerte]

Reference books, maybe.

But not the average book used in basic education. In fact, most of what they contain are for a large part public knowledge, and even in that case the book creators fuck up .

[Noyb]

I once saw a full-priced statistics book with the following formula for combinations:

          r!
nCr = ---------
       r!(n-r)!

No, that's not a typo on my end. The book really wanted you to believe from that equation that the number of ways you can take r individual items out of a group of n (without order mattering) is always a fraction. Oh, and it was a third edition.

[toblix]

I once saw a full-priced statistics book with the following formula for combinations:

          r!
nCr = ---------
       r!(n-r)!

HOLY MOTHERFUCKING SHIT!

[ThunderPeel2001]

Reference books, maybe.

But not the average book used in basic education. In fact, most of what they contain are for a large part public knowledge, and even in that case the book creators fuck up .

Erm... okay. ALL reference books are based on pre-existing published research. For example, do you believe that the people who write the Encyclopaedia Britannica do the scientific experiments themselves -- or do they just do research before writing their entries?

[DanJW]

Most elementary/primary-level, and even most secondary level science textbooks (in UK at least) are way out of date in terms of current scientific knowledge.

Of course that's partly about teaching children science one step at a time, because even most adults can't wrap their heads around the current models of chemistry or physics. It's what Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen call "lies-to-children", an important part of human development.

Of course things are still not very good, otherwise we wouldn't have situations like this...

[ThunderPeel2001]

Absolutely. I remember all my friends who did Physics at a higher level were disappointed that their first lesson consisted of "forget everything you've been taught, it's basically wrong". Lol.

Pretty astounding about how people can't even remember basic "where's your heart?" questions, though. Yipe.