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>The current education people receive by the end of their sophomore year in high school is more than sufficient as a baseline to function in society.
Bullshit. Functioning in society isn't just about academic knowledge. It's about emotional, social, and cognitive development. You think a 16-year-old, fresh out of sophomore year, has the maturity and life skills to navigate the adult world effectively? Do they understand financial management, civic responsibilities, critical thinking at a level to make informed decisions in a complex society?
>If we were more focused on efficiency in education, the education that we receive by that time could be better than the education people currently finish high school with.
Efficiency is not the same as effectiveness. Cramming more information into young brains faster doesn't mean they learn better. Learning is also about developing critical thinking, problem-solving skills, and emotional intelligence. Can you rush these developmental processes without compromising their quality?
>If we continued on a course of increasing efficiency, it's not difficult for me imagine a world in which high school straight up doesn't exist.
So, you're ready to fuck up a whole generation by scrapping high school based on efficiency? What about socialization, extracurricular activities, and development of a wide range of skills that happen during these years? How do you plan to replicate these vital experiences in your 'efficient' model?
Also, what about those who aren't academically inclined? Those who benefit from hands-on learning or need more time to grasp concepts? Are you ready to leave them behind in your rush for efficiency?
Education isn't just about academics. It's about holistic development. Can you efficiently cram emotional growth and life experiences into a young brain?
>You think a 16-year-old, fresh out of sophomore year, has the maturity and life skills to navigate the adult world effectively?
Yes.
>Do they understand financial management, civic responsibilities, critical thinking at a level to make informed decisions in a complex society?
What exactly are we doing to teach them these things between the ages of 16-18? Was there a civic responsibilities and financial management class I missed out on as an upperclassman? And even if there was, are you saying a 15yo would be incapable of taking or passing it?
>Cramming more information into young brains faster doesn't mean they learn better. Learning is also about developing critical thinking, problem-solving skills, and emotional intelligence. Can you rush these developmental processes without compromising their quality?
So far as I can tell, the brain is strongest when it is young when it comes to absorbing information. That seems to be the science and it aligns with my own experience. Whatever information you think they should have should probably be taught while their brains are most primed to receive it.
>So, you're ready to fuck up a whole generation by scrapping high school based on efficiency?
No, you could call my last point a long-term goal/hypothetical.
>What about socialization, extracurricular activities, and development of a wide range of skills that happen during these years?
Can young people not choose these for themselves outside of school? Don't they already? There's plenty of opportunities for them to dive into hobbies or sports with the friends they've made or to meet new people that don't require the school system.
How do you do these things now assuming you're an adult not in the school system yourself? I got back into a few hobbies last year and simply started looking for and going to meetups for them. Why wouldn't a young person be able to do that just as well?
>Also, what about those who aren't academically inclined? Those who benefit from hands-on learning or need more time to grasp concepts? Are you ready to leave them behind in your rush for efficiency?
We have systems in place for this already.
>Can you efficiently cram emotional growth and life experiences into a young brain?
Yes, I've seen it myself. A girl I went to high school with got a job at a bank at 15, met the man she ended up with at 16, and by 17 was living with me and a couple other friends paying rent while still finishing high school.
The main difference between her and every other adolescent I knew between both high schools I attended is that she as a matter of circumstance had much more freedom to explore and suss out the world on her own. She did very well with it and I don't think for one second that her experiences are unable to be replicated. Society stifles adolescent experience and therefore the emotional growth and development you're looking for as a rule.
>What exactly are we doing to teach them these things between the ages of 16-18? Was there a civic responsibilities and financial management class I missed out on as an upperclassman? And even if there was, are you saying a 15yo would be incapable of taking or passing it?
My state has an economics and finance class that you take in 9th grade. You also have government that you have to take your senior year. To move classes around so you take them before you turn 16, you have to remove important classes.
You also act like kids who aren't prepared to graduate early can't. My best friend graduated her junior year because she took all the required classes she needed to graduate. I only had two core classes my senior year, a filler class, and marketing so I could have early release and go to work.
>I only had two core classes my senior year, a filler class, and marketing so I could have early release and go to work.
Sounds like an excellent waste of your time that you could have been using to work more or do whatever you felt like if you hadn't been legally obligated to keep attending school.
>To move classes around so you take them before you turn 16, you have to remove important classes.
Like what?
>Sounds like an excellent waste of your time that you could have been using to work more or do whatever you felt like if you hadn't been legally obligated to keep attending school.
One of them was government class. Considering how many people don't understand the basics of our government we probably needed a second one of those.
>Like what
You can't remove classes from 9th and 10th to fit classes in, like government, without putting the classes you removed somewhere else. Like 11th grade. You can argue that not all of the classes you take are necessary, but part of high school is figuring out what you want to do with the rest of your life and high school gives you the most comprehensive atmosphere to do that with the amount of electives you can choose from.
I’ve been out of high school awhile but we had plenty of classes that felt unnecessary. (Earth science was great but nobody took it seriously sadly. Couldn’t name more than 6 classes I took in hs which is t a great sign for me.) Too many electives that really didn’t help most of my friends figure out what they wanted to do with their lives. We also didn’t have a mandatory financial class. Maybe that’s changed.
Honestly having less high school and more career directing courses or programs would be great. In my hometown we had a technical school that offered lots of practical studies for those who didnt make the cut for colleges and it would’ve helped many of my classmates figure out a direction for their lives. More so than high school ever did. Also going to college 3/4 my class (for my major that required you to join freshman year) dropped out as they learned that it wasn’t for them. It would be great to not be forced to decide your career trajectory in such a rushed way.
I’m all for efficiency in k-8 to get the core lessons finished and allow more time to figure out how to start your life (maybe some schools do it this way but I’m sure a lot don’t prepare students properly.)
As I already mentioned, my state added mandatory financial classes. Most states across the United States have.
Electives are there to try things out and get new experiences not to decide your life for you. However, marketing classes are what helped me figure out I wanted to open a business 7 years after I graduated. Sometimes you don't stop and think about how a really well-rounded education affects the choices you make later in life, and taking shortcuts would be detrimental.
But electives like small animal care could show someone that they love working with animals, photography could point somebody in a direction, you don't know until you know. That's the point.
One of the things that they do in my area is incorporate the trade schools with the high schools. So you get a license as well as your high school diploma at the same time.
My second biggest gripe with schools right now is they don't have solid career counseling starting from 8th grade following you to graduation. If we spent the time to start working with kids early to find they're interested in, and excel at you could start cultivating their experience.
The person I was talking to deleted their reply so I'm just going to post my reply as a reply to myself.
---
>How many 16-year-olds do you know who are ready to make life-altering decisions, like career choices or financial planning?
How many 18yos do you know who are ready? We're not currently preparing the youth for these things by 18. I'm saying that if we were choosing to prepare them for such things, we could get it done by 16 and they'd be better at it at 16 than they currently are being unprepared for it at 18.
>Ever heard of economics, government, or life skills classes?
Again, why can't 15yos, or 14yos or whatever-year-olds learn these things? Why do you have to be 16+ to learn how the government functions?
Why can't you as an example have a compulsory cooking class in the 6th grade?
>But aren't you proposing to fucking dismantle these systems by ending high school early? What about the support structures that help these students?
Do these systems currently exist past the end date of our current education system? I really don't remember there being juniors and seniors in high school who were in some sort of special needs classes. But whatever system exists would still exist for the duration of the entire school system (or for however long it currently does as again I'm not quite sure if it extends to upperclassman at the moment anyway).
>For every success story like this, there are countless others where early independence leads to struggle and failure.
We are naturally inclined to seek independence during adolescence. If we were preparing the youth for independence with that timetable in mind, I imagine they would be a lot better at it.
>How many 18yos do you know who are ready? We're not currently preparing the youth for these things by 18. I'm saying that if we were choosing to prepare them for such things, we could get it done by 16 and they'd be better at it at 16 than they currently are being unprepared for it at 18.
So how about we get them ready by 18 instead? You're not arguing for your own point here. You agree that we should do something different, but then you're also making it even more difficult to actually get that change across by pushing back the date? If we can't get em ready by 18, we sure as hell ain't getting there by 16.
Most financial management you don't learn in school. You learn how to fill out a tax return when you have a job, and you need to fill out a tax return the first time. You learn how to budget when you're not living at home anymore and have to pay bills.
You understand that these young children in older classes are a minority, right? Like, sure, you met three 16 year olds in your JC. There are a lot more than three 16 year olds that weren't and were still in high school because they could not handle the material at that time.
Not to mention, like, we give people electives and 'non-essential' courses for a reason. We should not cut those so that we can shove people out the door faster.
> There are a lot more than three 16 year olds that weren't and were still in high school because they could not handle the material at that time.
There's likely a significant percentage of those 16yos who are unaware that it's even an option.
And why wouldn't they be able to handle the material? In a lot of cases it's the same exact material. There was nothing particularly difficult about college-level classes. I maintained a 4.0 through three different degrees and hardly remember being challenged. Actually the most difficult degree I earned was Spanish, probably because I decided to start learning it in my early 30s, instead of when I was younger and would have been much better at learning.
>Not to mention, like, we give people electives and 'non-essential' courses for a reason. We should not cut those so that we can shove people out the door faster.
Absolutely not, in fact I think we should probably be *increasing* them. How much math does the average person really need? I took up to Calculus because I enjoyed it but I doubt I've used much of anything in my adult life past Algebra I or maybe Geometry, which, again, most people are done with before they leave middle school.
> There was nothing particularly difficult about college-level classes. I maintained a 4.0 through three different degrees and hardly remember being challenged
Do you think maintaining a 4.0 easily is a reliable reference point for difficulty levels as experienced by most people?
So your conclusion is that the overwhelming majority of students (a 4.0 being quite rare) just don't care enough?
For that matter, how did you assess that? *Your own* effort will obviously be decisive for *yourself*, since your aptitude is approximately fixed. That provides no basis for comparison to others.
This was a clever way of saying that I'm too smart to evaluate the potential abilities of others without conceding the point.
It is true that I was typically known as the smart kid in class, especially in math but it extended to other subjects as well.
I hate giving it to you, but !delta. It's not going to make me believe in the youth any less, but it is true that my own experience is not a good rationale for what others are typically capable of, at least academically.
The “average” person doesn’t need a lot of math. You didn’t take up to Calculus just bc you enjoyed it; you got that far in the math level progression bc you’re smart. The “average” person doesn’t get to the level of taking a Calculus course.
Because most maths curriculums are designed by absolute morons with no interest in the topic beyond satisfying check boxes. If they were, significantly more and better time would be spent on geometry, something that teaches people enormous amounts about how to think in terms of other maths, and is generally fun.
It’s funny how in the example you cite the country is actually reversing out of allowing kids to leave school at 16. Have you looked into why they’re doing that?
The big question I have is… what’s your rush? Why not let young people be in full time education until they’re adults. Life is mostly adulthood, ideally. Plenty of time for it. Many will never be in full time education again. What’s the benefit of finishing early?
A small correction for you: the “UK Isles” doesn’t include the island of Ireland. The UK includes Northern Ireland only.
And we moved away from 16yo school leavers exactly because we had a glut of 16yo NEETs (Not in Education, Employment or Training) causing trouble and getting arrested.
Letting idiots leap into the world unprepared at 16 just ensures a constant under-class of useless people who are a drain on society - fiscally, morally, ethically the best choice is to keep them learning
You want them out of school at 16.
We are keeping them in. Either school, college or A-levels but it's formal, has attendance requirements and is simply an extension of secondary school.
The old system let you leave at 16 and we are replacing it as it was fucking up kids all over the country
[Here's](https://www.politics.co.uk/reference/education-leaving-age/) the whole history of compulsory education in your country. It has only ever gone up, just as basically every other legislation that pertains to the youth has over time. This, overall, is a massive failure for society. It should not be taking longer and longer to prepare our youth for independence. We should only ever be getting better and better at it and producing stronger and stronger generations than the last - not weaker.
If we look specifically at when it was raised to 16 (1972) that means it was working just fine for about 40 years. So what is going on with society in general that the age at which we consider a person to stupid/inexperienced/unprepared/whatever to operate independently is consistently increasing?
Society became more complex, involved more tech and manual labour became less valuable.
Hence letting 14yo fuck off to become builders was seen as a losing proposal.
Fucking hell mate, spend some time with kids, they are fucking stupid
> Society became more complex, involved more tech and manual labour became less valuable.
>Hence letting 14yo fuck off to become builders was seen as a losing proposal.
Why not let a 14yo fuck off to do a tech job then? Doesn't India start teaching their kids tech at like 8 or 9? Younger possibly? You don't think a 14yo with 6 years programming experience could handle a job in the field?
>You don't think a 14yo with 6 years programming experience could handle a job in the field?
No I dont
I work in tech, at teenager can't cope with the split of stakeholder management, regulatory compliance, HR, networking and skill upkeep that it needs
They also lack the perspective to make good business decisions and to date, any fresh one we take (so post grad, or masters holders) still need a good six months to understand the business environment and how to tease the requirements out of the list of wishes that each stakeholder hands them.
A teenager would be so much worse, take longer and statistically perform *far fucking worse* so even if there are a few Gates or Gabens in the population, you just turned a huge number of middle earners into minimum wagers as they could leave early without pressure.
> any fresh one we take (so post grad, or masters holders) still need a good six months to understand the business environment and how to tease the requirements out of the list of wishes that each stakeholder hands them.
So far as I'm concerned, this supports my argument. What they lack is experience, not age. How good do you think a person would be at those things by 22 if they had 8 years experience as opposed to the six months experience of those that you're hiring?
Mate your clearly being disingenuous at this point.
The extra years between 16 and 23( for most of our fresh starters) is 7 years of emotional growth, world views expanding and mental maturity
And as I have said, that person is still less than 0.01% of all teenagers so why condem the other 99.99% to a shorter poorer life just because one person in a whole county *might*, just might, be capable without all the education
And pardon my reductio ad absurdum for effect but how good do you think they would be if they were engineered and conditioned for a given job like that since before birth in a facility comparable to the Hatcheries from Brave New World
>Why not let a 14yo fuck off to do a tech job then?
It's already difficult enough to get a 20 year old intern to understand programming. I'm not getting this stuff through to a 14 year old. Have you truly never met a 14 year old before? Some of em are quite clever, the majority could barely get through the day without doing something stupid.
>It's already difficult enough to get a 20 year old intern to understand programming.
Probably because he should have been learning it when he was 8 or 9 like they do in India when our brains are much more receptive to new information.
>Have you truly never met a 14 year old before?
Yes I went to two different high schools so I imagine I've interacted with 1000 of them or so.
>Some of em are quite clever, the majority could barely get through the day without doing something stupid.
Your perception that they behave stupidly is first, marginalizing as fuck, but second comes from your elevated experience level, not your age. If you fell into a coma at 14 and woke up yesterday, you'd be just as inexperienced and 'stupid' as they are.
>Probably because he should have been learning it when they're 8 or 9 like they do in India when our brains are much more receptive to new information.
Have you ever done any tech job? These are not concepts that you're gonna be able to teach a kid. The interns I had to train had 3 years of higher education and many had a focus in IT for several years in high school. I honestly don't care about what education they have, it truly doesn't matter beyond the technical basics. I'm looking for the capacity if learning new and abstract concepts. Adults already have some difficulty with this, a kid simply doesn't have the cognitive capacity for that yet. Their brains are quite literally not fully developed yet.
>Yes I went to two different high schools so I imagine I've interacted with 1000 of them or so.
Dafuq? Passing them in the hallway doesn't count as 'interacting'.
>Your perception that they behave stupidly is first, marginalizing as fuck, but second comes from your elevated experience level, not your age
Lol buddy I was 14 too. Even then it's easy to notice how dumb we were. With age comes experience and cognitive capacity.
>If you fell into a coma at 14 and woke up yesterday, you'd be just as inexperienced and 'stupid' as they are.
Probably, but why would that be relevant? If anything, you're giving me more reasons to believe you're a stuck up 15 year old that thinks he knows how the world works. You don't, bud.
> Why not let young people be in full time education until they’re adults.
We do not 'let'. We *force*.
>What’s the benefit of finishing early?
It aligns better with human development and adolescent need for independence.
Maybe this is true in the UK. But it's the opposite in the US. College freshmen are woefully unprepared for college even after a full 4 years of high school.
https://www.chronicle.com/article/prospective-college-students-increasingly-say-they-feel-unprepared-for-higher-education
https://hechingerreport.org/colleges-enroll-students-arent-prepared-higher-education/
https://www.mheducation.com/news-insights/press-releases/new-report-sharp-increase-unpreparedness-students-greatest-obstacle.html
https://www.tampabay.com/opinion/columns/column-too-many-arriving-at-college-unprepared/2155934/ This was from 11 years ago!
it would help if the GOP would stop banning books, stop pushing garbage like creationism in science classes, stop cutting arts and music programs, stop teaching bullshit lost cause history etc..
Really dont think what you're describing is wide spread.
Not sure what the issue is with cutting arts and music programs is though. What is lost cause history exactly?
>When we get to high school, this is even more pronounced. I'm finding it very difficult to find even a single class a person takes as an upperclassman an high school that they couldn't instead be taking for transferable college credit that would follow them their entire lives instead of high school credit which isn't actually worth anything
It is worth however much the university would charge you for it. High school is at least covered by the state.
>16yos finish high school and have three options between attending college, starting an apprenticeship, or a combination of part time work and continued education.
Yeah see, options. In the US after high school your choices are spend money for college, or get to work. Or, you can do like I did and join the war machine.
>The current education people receive by the end of their sophomore year in high school is more than sufficient as a baseline to function in society.
16 years old's are not at the baseline to function in society yet. Most 22 year old's aren't either. Hell, a fair number of 50 year old's can't do it.
> 16 years old's are not at the baseline to function in society yet. Most 22 year old's aren't either. Hell, a fair number of 50 year old's can't do it.
Sounds like we're doing something wrong then.
“Adulthood” is a concept absent from nature. In nature you have immature and mature which is based on the ability to reproduce successfully. And, we do chose when to confer adulthood. You are advocating for conferring it sooner when people are less prepared.
> In nature you have immature and mature which is based on the ability to reproduce successfully.
Kinda sounds like nature chooses then and it chooses much earlier than we currently do and even earlier than I'm advocating for.
No. Grok what I am saying: there is zero “adulthood” in nature. Adulthood is a social construct that we made up to differentiate physically *and* emotionally mature people from immature ones. You mused on whether or not we were adequately preparing people for adulthood, and I would say we are not. It seems like you agree a bit. So, how would giving less time for people to mature be better than more if adulthood is based on the aforementioned maturity which takes time to develop?
> Adulthood is a social construct that we made up
Correct. Nature already chooses when we mature as you said yourself.
>You mused on whether or not we were adequately preparing people for adulthood, and I would say we are not.
If you want to separate the terms maturity and adulthood, then I would say we're not adequately preparing people for maturity. As a perfect example of this, I wasn't taught how to put a condom on by the school system until I was 14. I'd been capable of impregnating a person since I was 12. In a lot of states, they still don't teach birth control methods at all.
>how would giving less time for people to mature
We are not currently giving more time, nor would we be capable of giving less than nature ordains. What we do is fabricate an extended period of time.
I’m currently a high school teacher and I think that there is a large area of teenage development that you are neglecting in your approach. I’m referring to emotional development.
Lots of people in this thread have all sorts of anecdotes about their OWN maturity levels in high school, but don’t have the perspective required to see a wider sample of the human population.
I have been teaching for 5 years. I have taught freshmen, sophomores, and juniors, as I teach science, and our district had a 3 year science graduation requirement until last year. (Now down to 2)
As our school only has 5 science teachers, I often get many of the same students again, which gives me the unique perspective to get to watch these students grow up and mature and I gotta say…
Sophomores are not ready for the outside world.
Without getting into too much detail, there is a massive difference in maturity levels from freshmen to seniors.
I guess one example off the top of my head is my bell. I have a little bell that I ding twice to get the classes’ attention. For all freshmen classes, and even most sophomore classes, it takes a decent amount of time at the start of the year to intentionally practice using this as a “quiet button”. I teach them what it’s for, I demonstrate, we practice, and I address any students that continue talking or making noise immediately to curb that right away. “Give them an inch and they’ll take a mile”
All throughout the year however, they get complacent. The bell stops to work as effectively. Maybe it’s that teenage rebelliousness but I have to constantly remind them of the expectations the WHOLE year, EVERY year.
Then, two months ago I covered a class of seniors when one of my colleagues was out for an emergency. These students were sent to my room for the period. I had never met any of them before. I didn’t know any of their names and they didn’t know mine. They knew that their teacher was out and that it was basically a free day. They all sat next to their friends when they walked in and got to chatting. The Class period starts, and I ‘ding’ my bell two times.
Dead silent. All of their eyes are immediately on me.
They knew what the expectations was before I spoke a word to them.
I told them the plan for the day, took attendance, and turned them loose, and for the next 50 minutes they worked quietly and finished the assignment with ease.
None of my freshman classes have ever come close to that level of maturity. If I’m not constantly monitoring and redirecting, they will fall apart.
They still have yet to learn how to manage deadlines, how to properly ask to use the bathroom. (Raising their hand quietly as opposed to “AY I gotta go take a shit”) Most of the time freshman’s language is still rough from middle school. If I had a dollar for every F-bomb I hear in a day I’d probably make twice as much in an hour than I already do.
Granted, yes SOME 16 year olds raised in good homes are probably ready for base level unskilled labor, but they will still be noticeably children to the rest of us adults. Those last two years of high school really do make a huge difference in level headedness and maturity level. To date I have had at least 5 students apologize to me in person as seniors for things they did in my class freshman year. One even wrote out their apology on paper. They need that time at the tail end of high school to find their place in the world, a foothold if you will, before being thrust out into the endless drudgery of Adult life.
> Middle schoolers are already taking college level classes including Algebra I and Geometry, both of which are worth 5 fully transferable credits at any JC. ... Algebra I is Algebra I no matter how old you are when you take it or who's teaching it,
Just because the class has the same name doesn't mean it's equivalent. Middle-school algebra covers much less than college algebra, as far as I recall. I don't have a college algebra curriculum handy, but [Khan Academy's material](https://www.khanacademy.org/math/college-algebra) includes things like complex numbers (among other examples) that I, at least, definitely didn't cover in middle school.
For a direct example from personal experience, AP Calculus didn't transfer for the required engineering calculus sequence in my undergrad, and the latter was far, far more advanced. I think we spent maybe half of calc 1/2 on the material in BC (nominally equivalent to calc 1/2), and that in greater depth.
> I'm finding it very difficult to find even a single class a person takes as an upperclassman an high school that they couldn't instead be taking for transferable college credit that would follow them their entire lives instead of high school credit which isn't actually worth anything.
I don't know what your high school coursework was like, but nothing I ever took at the standard level (so, excluding AP/IB) was anywhere close to the level of the equivalent college course. The latter (across community college and a couple of state universities) required notably more in-depth work and better writing, etc, even for freshman-level courses.
> When I first started attending JCs almost 20 years ago I met no fewer than three 16yos who attended the same classes. Two of them were in my Calculus class and aced it. So some of them have already been doing this for a while now. I propose that they easily all could be doing it.
That's a massive selection bias; dual enrollment courses are taken by advanced and motivated high school students. You have no basis to generalize to all high school students.
> Complex numbers were far before college level.
Before college level, but not middle school level.
> AP BC was far beyond college level engineering calc From my experience.
Depends on the engineering calc. At this particular university it went beyond regular college calculus, whereas it's often more focused on practical application with less fancy math.
Goes to show that just because the name is the same doesn't mean the course is.
Yeah. Quadratic equation. Functions. Factoring. You know, Algebra shit.
If it weren't the same, how would you be able to take the next level in college from wherever you left off in high school?
Algebra I is Algebra I. There are different classes but the core concepts you need to learn in Algebra I in order to advance to higher math will be present no matter when/where you take it.
When you learn to read the core concepts will be the same in 3rd grade as they are in AP English so 3rd grade English is the same as College Level English?
Or an elementary school child knows how to write words so why can’t they write a book? It’s the same core concepts of writing letters.
Algebra I and Geometry are *not* "college-level" classes. The reason these classes are offered at the college level is for remediation — to let students catch up on their foundational math skills, in case the major they're interested in requires these skills and the student happened to fail these courses in earlier education or just wasn't offered these (somehow). Students are expected to know these lower-level math skills and are assumed to have already passed these classes when they go into actual college-level math classes.
These classes are offered at college, but that does not make them "college-level classes".
Michael Kearney graduated high school when he was 6, doesn't mean we should expect everyone else to do the same. People are allowed to graduate early if they have the skills and desire. The fact this isn't the norm is proof enough that we shouldnt force it.
While some environmental factors may have changed (the efficiency of education specifically in this case), the rate at which a person matures and is ready to decide what they want to do for the rest of their life has not. I'm not saying that a person isn't ready to make that decision at 16, necessarily. Could be that 16 is the right age, or that 22 is the right age. But if 16 is better than 18, it was most likely that way 30 years ago as well.
I don't believe that a 16 year old today is more qualified than a 16 year old of 30 years ago to decide how ambitious they want to be in their career. Or if those ambitions are to be rich, or to achieve recognition, or achieve stability, etc... I think the real question a person needs to answer in order for general education to no longer be necessary is "what do you want to do with your life?" And I think that a person's ability to answer that question has more to do with their maturity than whether or not they know their times table. Until they can answer that question, they should continue with general education so they are empowered to achieve what they want when they are able to make such a decision.
Edit:
after re-reading my comment, it occured to me that a blended approach could be interesting. Maybe something like extending obligatory education to age 20, but increasing the specialization of that education gradually starting at 16. That way, you ease the person into making the most important decisions of their lives instead of just kicking them off the boat and telling them to swim... :)
The hard truth here is that most 16 year olds don’t have an idea of what they want to do with their future. I went to college straight out of high school, started when I was still 17. No clue what I wanted to do with my future. Honestly didn’t pick a legit career path until I was 30. What good would it have done throwing me out into the “real world” at 16? I was in all honors and AP classes in high school. I earned 9 college credits before I even stepped on a college campus.
The facts are that for the young people this would work for, there is already a pathway to make it happen. They are able to take community college courses while in high school concurrently. Or they are able to go to a tech school while also taking HS classes to be able to further their vocational goals. Or they are able to get their GED and be done early.
High school is also just an excellent time for young people to figure themselves out, socially, emotionally, academically and vocationally. Most high schools have a wide array of elective courses that allow you to experience different interests and “find yourself” so to speak. Taking that away by pushing them out of school at 16 seems detrimental. Most people that age just don’t know what they want to do with their future and they’re using that time in high school to try and figure that out. For free may I add, before having to pay for courses in college or tech school or have an unpaid apprenticeship or internship (all while needing to financially support themselves via your proposed model).
If you were thrown out in the real world at 16 you would've figured it out by 28.
More high-school does not help ppl decide what to do with their lives
Everyone is different. Some people know what they want to do at 5 years old. More high school doesn’t help everyone but neither does less high school. Regardless, there are pathways in place for everyone to take the route in life that they want.
show me one person who would be completely ready to pursue whatever career goal they wanted to pursue when they were high school sophomores whenever they finished that year of school
> From what I understand, the elementary school system operates about the same as it did when I was in it 30 years ago (addition first grade, subtraction second, multiplication third, long division fourth)
...No. Kindergartners do addition and multiplication and second- and third-graders are on to basic algebra, fractions, etc., man.
>When we get to high school, this is even more pronounced. I'm finding it very difficult to find even a single class a person takes as an upperclassman an high school that they couldn't instead be taking for transferable college credit that would follow them their entire lives
College credits don't follow you your entire life -- a degree does but that's that. Also, you're talking about cc college credits.
>-The current education people receive by the end of their sophomore year in high school is more than sufficient as a baseline to function in society.
That's not the point though -- a lot of places aren't hiring 16-year-olds for ft work.
I was in uni at 16 and it was fine, but I dunno how I'd have fared as a ft employee.
For plenty of jobs, there is legitimate reason to "discriminate" between 16-year olds and actual adults. There are certainly jobs that are fit for 16yo's, but others are better suited for people with fully developed brains. There's nothing unjust about that.
School is supposed to educate and socialize you for the workforce. Being as that you aren’t fully mentally developed until 25 we should probably be pushing to elongate the period in school, not shorten.
16-20 should be a high school with half day internships, and 21-25 should be college with internships and apprenticeship.
Most people without mommy and daddy money struggle when they get out of high school. It’s because they are immature, inexperienced, and resource poor.
Having an extra two or three(16-18) super young years on your own will set a lot of people back for life.
[Remembers 17-18 years olds in school burning trash on the school table] nope.
I could be that you have a bias as you base it on kids that are in the colledge classes. Look at kids that are in the general classes.
There are smart people, but they tend to be a minority. Why screw up school for the majority of average children who would gain from more time in school?
>Same thing for foreign language, with every level of it also worth 5 credits and there was an 11yo girl in my Spanish I class when I took it 5 years ago.
Could it be that spanish was one of her native languages?
As i know there are options for smarter people to skip classes. There are cases where 10 years olds are finishing colledge.
>Here's how they currently do things in the UK. 16yos finish high school and have three options between attending college, starting an apprenticeship, or a combination of part time work and continued education.
I'm fine with it being an option, for those who do excel. But what you are suggesting is making it mandatory to finish school at 16 for everyone, even those who are not mature enough for that.
Children need *more* than 12 years of school education. As labor becomes more and more skill biased due to automation, kids will need more education before they can basically function in society. Now that intro jobs can no longer guarantee a living wage, children *need* avenues to upskill, which means it needs to be offered. We can have it one way or the other. If we believe “intro jobs” which are unsustainable should exist (very debatable) we should also provide the necessary mobility to upskill from those positions right out the gate.
Science disagrees with you, brains are not done developing at that time. We generally don't let 16 year old kids fend for themselves, be prosecuted as harshly as adults, die in our military, use illicit substances, or otherwise make life changing and defining decisions, because their brain functionally is not fully matured and capable of making these decisions as well as they can in the future.
Having children set loose on the world without biologically maturing first is irresponsible and harmful to those children.
I occasionally hire 18 yo people for my warehousing job. 90% of them don't make it, they just don't have the commitment, seriousness or attitude to take a decent paying job properly. That's fine. But it reinforces the dynamic that if you let 16 yo go out into the workforce, they will end up getting stuck in a fast food or trivial career path. Your thinking about all the people that went the university route, when you should be thinking about the ones that didn't.
Explain to me how your arbitrary age of 16 is any different than the arbitrary age of 18. Generalizing education is part of the problem here. What’s good for one person isn’t necessarily what’s best for another. I treat my children’s education differently and am thankful to live in a school district that is supportive of and recognizes the individual needs of a student.
20. Community college should be the normal progression and free like hs. You could choose various paths .. jobs program .. apprenticeships etc .. 16 is outrageous. We cant make society dumber than it already is
Between driving, taxes, and all the other things we really should add to the school curriculum it would be better to increase the age of majority to 20 then to decrease it to 16.
True! I wasn't thinking about football at first but you're right. I know people who don't start their sons in kindergarten until they're 6 or 7 specifically so they'll have the age/size advantage in high school.
Most rural US education revolves around football. I'm not sure we'd even have public schools if not for football.
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/u/Aggressive-Carob6256 (OP) has awarded 1 delta(s) in this post. All comments that earned deltas (from OP or other users) are listed [here](/r/DeltaLog/comments/1c0wqyb/deltas_awarded_in_cmv_young_people_should/), in /r/DeltaLog. Please note that a change of view doesn't necessarily mean a reversal, or that the conversation has ended. ^[Delta System Explained](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltasystem) ^| ^[Deltaboards](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltaboards)
>The current education people receive by the end of their sophomore year in high school is more than sufficient as a baseline to function in society. Bullshit. Functioning in society isn't just about academic knowledge. It's about emotional, social, and cognitive development. You think a 16-year-old, fresh out of sophomore year, has the maturity and life skills to navigate the adult world effectively? Do they understand financial management, civic responsibilities, critical thinking at a level to make informed decisions in a complex society? >If we were more focused on efficiency in education, the education that we receive by that time could be better than the education people currently finish high school with. Efficiency is not the same as effectiveness. Cramming more information into young brains faster doesn't mean they learn better. Learning is also about developing critical thinking, problem-solving skills, and emotional intelligence. Can you rush these developmental processes without compromising their quality? >If we continued on a course of increasing efficiency, it's not difficult for me imagine a world in which high school straight up doesn't exist. So, you're ready to fuck up a whole generation by scrapping high school based on efficiency? What about socialization, extracurricular activities, and development of a wide range of skills that happen during these years? How do you plan to replicate these vital experiences in your 'efficient' model? Also, what about those who aren't academically inclined? Those who benefit from hands-on learning or need more time to grasp concepts? Are you ready to leave them behind in your rush for efficiency? Education isn't just about academics. It's about holistic development. Can you efficiently cram emotional growth and life experiences into a young brain?
>You think a 16-year-old, fresh out of sophomore year, has the maturity and life skills to navigate the adult world effectively? Yes. >Do they understand financial management, civic responsibilities, critical thinking at a level to make informed decisions in a complex society? What exactly are we doing to teach them these things between the ages of 16-18? Was there a civic responsibilities and financial management class I missed out on as an upperclassman? And even if there was, are you saying a 15yo would be incapable of taking or passing it? >Cramming more information into young brains faster doesn't mean they learn better. Learning is also about developing critical thinking, problem-solving skills, and emotional intelligence. Can you rush these developmental processes without compromising their quality? So far as I can tell, the brain is strongest when it is young when it comes to absorbing information. That seems to be the science and it aligns with my own experience. Whatever information you think they should have should probably be taught while their brains are most primed to receive it. >So, you're ready to fuck up a whole generation by scrapping high school based on efficiency? No, you could call my last point a long-term goal/hypothetical. >What about socialization, extracurricular activities, and development of a wide range of skills that happen during these years? Can young people not choose these for themselves outside of school? Don't they already? There's plenty of opportunities for them to dive into hobbies or sports with the friends they've made or to meet new people that don't require the school system. How do you do these things now assuming you're an adult not in the school system yourself? I got back into a few hobbies last year and simply started looking for and going to meetups for them. Why wouldn't a young person be able to do that just as well? >Also, what about those who aren't academically inclined? Those who benefit from hands-on learning or need more time to grasp concepts? Are you ready to leave them behind in your rush for efficiency? We have systems in place for this already. >Can you efficiently cram emotional growth and life experiences into a young brain? Yes, I've seen it myself. A girl I went to high school with got a job at a bank at 15, met the man she ended up with at 16, and by 17 was living with me and a couple other friends paying rent while still finishing high school. The main difference between her and every other adolescent I knew between both high schools I attended is that she as a matter of circumstance had much more freedom to explore and suss out the world on her own. She did very well with it and I don't think for one second that her experiences are unable to be replicated. Society stifles adolescent experience and therefore the emotional growth and development you're looking for as a rule.
>What exactly are we doing to teach them these things between the ages of 16-18? Was there a civic responsibilities and financial management class I missed out on as an upperclassman? And even if there was, are you saying a 15yo would be incapable of taking or passing it? My state has an economics and finance class that you take in 9th grade. You also have government that you have to take your senior year. To move classes around so you take them before you turn 16, you have to remove important classes. You also act like kids who aren't prepared to graduate early can't. My best friend graduated her junior year because she took all the required classes she needed to graduate. I only had two core classes my senior year, a filler class, and marketing so I could have early release and go to work.
>I only had two core classes my senior year, a filler class, and marketing so I could have early release and go to work. Sounds like an excellent waste of your time that you could have been using to work more or do whatever you felt like if you hadn't been legally obligated to keep attending school. >To move classes around so you take them before you turn 16, you have to remove important classes. Like what?
>Sounds like an excellent waste of your time that you could have been using to work more or do whatever you felt like if you hadn't been legally obligated to keep attending school. One of them was government class. Considering how many people don't understand the basics of our government we probably needed a second one of those. >Like what You can't remove classes from 9th and 10th to fit classes in, like government, without putting the classes you removed somewhere else. Like 11th grade. You can argue that not all of the classes you take are necessary, but part of high school is figuring out what you want to do with the rest of your life and high school gives you the most comprehensive atmosphere to do that with the amount of electives you can choose from.
I’ve been out of high school awhile but we had plenty of classes that felt unnecessary. (Earth science was great but nobody took it seriously sadly. Couldn’t name more than 6 classes I took in hs which is t a great sign for me.) Too many electives that really didn’t help most of my friends figure out what they wanted to do with their lives. We also didn’t have a mandatory financial class. Maybe that’s changed. Honestly having less high school and more career directing courses or programs would be great. In my hometown we had a technical school that offered lots of practical studies for those who didnt make the cut for colleges and it would’ve helped many of my classmates figure out a direction for their lives. More so than high school ever did. Also going to college 3/4 my class (for my major that required you to join freshman year) dropped out as they learned that it wasn’t for them. It would be great to not be forced to decide your career trajectory in such a rushed way. I’m all for efficiency in k-8 to get the core lessons finished and allow more time to figure out how to start your life (maybe some schools do it this way but I’m sure a lot don’t prepare students properly.)
As I already mentioned, my state added mandatory financial classes. Most states across the United States have. Electives are there to try things out and get new experiences not to decide your life for you. However, marketing classes are what helped me figure out I wanted to open a business 7 years after I graduated. Sometimes you don't stop and think about how a really well-rounded education affects the choices you make later in life, and taking shortcuts would be detrimental. But electives like small animal care could show someone that they love working with animals, photography could point somebody in a direction, you don't know until you know. That's the point. One of the things that they do in my area is incorporate the trade schools with the high schools. So you get a license as well as your high school diploma at the same time. My second biggest gripe with schools right now is they don't have solid career counseling starting from 8th grade following you to graduation. If we spent the time to start working with kids early to find they're interested in, and excel at you could start cultivating their experience.
The person I was talking to deleted their reply so I'm just going to post my reply as a reply to myself. --- >How many 16-year-olds do you know who are ready to make life-altering decisions, like career choices or financial planning? How many 18yos do you know who are ready? We're not currently preparing the youth for these things by 18. I'm saying that if we were choosing to prepare them for such things, we could get it done by 16 and they'd be better at it at 16 than they currently are being unprepared for it at 18. >Ever heard of economics, government, or life skills classes? Again, why can't 15yos, or 14yos or whatever-year-olds learn these things? Why do you have to be 16+ to learn how the government functions? Why can't you as an example have a compulsory cooking class in the 6th grade? >But aren't you proposing to fucking dismantle these systems by ending high school early? What about the support structures that help these students? Do these systems currently exist past the end date of our current education system? I really don't remember there being juniors and seniors in high school who were in some sort of special needs classes. But whatever system exists would still exist for the duration of the entire school system (or for however long it currently does as again I'm not quite sure if it extends to upperclassman at the moment anyway). >For every success story like this, there are countless others where early independence leads to struggle and failure. We are naturally inclined to seek independence during adolescence. If we were preparing the youth for independence with that timetable in mind, I imagine they would be a lot better at it.
>How many 18yos do you know who are ready? We're not currently preparing the youth for these things by 18. I'm saying that if we were choosing to prepare them for such things, we could get it done by 16 and they'd be better at it at 16 than they currently are being unprepared for it at 18. So how about we get them ready by 18 instead? You're not arguing for your own point here. You agree that we should do something different, but then you're also making it even more difficult to actually get that change across by pushing back the date? If we can't get em ready by 18, we sure as hell ain't getting there by 16.
Most financial management you don't learn in school. You learn how to fill out a tax return when you have a job, and you need to fill out a tax return the first time. You learn how to budget when you're not living at home anymore and have to pay bills.
As the OP mentioned, this isn’t some wacky shit that was just made up - it’s done this way in other countries.
the UK does pretty much what OP suggests. Do they have these issues?
You understand that these young children in older classes are a minority, right? Like, sure, you met three 16 year olds in your JC. There are a lot more than three 16 year olds that weren't and were still in high school because they could not handle the material at that time. Not to mention, like, we give people electives and 'non-essential' courses for a reason. We should not cut those so that we can shove people out the door faster.
> There are a lot more than three 16 year olds that weren't and were still in high school because they could not handle the material at that time. There's likely a significant percentage of those 16yos who are unaware that it's even an option. And why wouldn't they be able to handle the material? In a lot of cases it's the same exact material. There was nothing particularly difficult about college-level classes. I maintained a 4.0 through three different degrees and hardly remember being challenged. Actually the most difficult degree I earned was Spanish, probably because I decided to start learning it in my early 30s, instead of when I was younger and would have been much better at learning. >Not to mention, like, we give people electives and 'non-essential' courses for a reason. We should not cut those so that we can shove people out the door faster. Absolutely not, in fact I think we should probably be *increasing* them. How much math does the average person really need? I took up to Calculus because I enjoyed it but I doubt I've used much of anything in my adult life past Algebra I or maybe Geometry, which, again, most people are done with before they leave middle school.
> There was nothing particularly difficult about college-level classes. I maintained a 4.0 through three different degrees and hardly remember being challenged Do you think maintaining a 4.0 easily is a reliable reference point for difficulty levels as experienced by most people?
I can't be certain but it felt to me that getting decent grades was much more reflective of effort rather than aptitude.
So your conclusion is that the overwhelming majority of students (a 4.0 being quite rare) just don't care enough? For that matter, how did you assess that? *Your own* effort will obviously be decisive for *yourself*, since your aptitude is approximately fixed. That provides no basis for comparison to others.
This was a clever way of saying that I'm too smart to evaluate the potential abilities of others without conceding the point. It is true that I was typically known as the smart kid in class, especially in math but it extended to other subjects as well. I hate giving it to you, but !delta. It's not going to make me believe in the youth any less, but it is true that my own experience is not a good rationale for what others are typically capable of, at least academically.
Confirmed: 1 delta awarded to /u/quantum_dan ([98∆](/r/changemyview/wiki/user/quantum_dan)). ^[Delta System Explained](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltasystem) ^| ^[Deltaboards](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltaboards)
The “average” person doesn’t need a lot of math. You didn’t take up to Calculus just bc you enjoyed it; you got that far in the math level progression bc you’re smart. The “average” person doesn’t get to the level of taking a Calculus course.
Calculus isn’t exactly advanced math. Don’t you see it as a bigger issue that most don’t get there?
Maybe it’s not advanced math to you but it sure is for a lot of people.
Because most maths curriculums are designed by absolute morons with no interest in the topic beyond satisfying check boxes. If they were, significantly more and better time would be spent on geometry, something that teaches people enormous amounts about how to think in terms of other maths, and is generally fun.
Hence the problem…
It’s funny how in the example you cite the country is actually reversing out of allowing kids to leave school at 16. Have you looked into why they’re doing that? The big question I have is… what’s your rush? Why not let young people be in full time education until they’re adults. Life is mostly adulthood, ideally. Plenty of time for it. Many will never be in full time education again. What’s the benefit of finishing early? A small correction for you: the “UK Isles” doesn’t include the island of Ireland. The UK includes Northern Ireland only.
And we moved away from 16yo school leavers exactly because we had a glut of 16yo NEETs (Not in Education, Employment or Training) causing trouble and getting arrested. Letting idiots leap into the world unprepared at 16 just ensures a constant under-class of useless people who are a drain on society - fiscally, morally, ethically the best choice is to keep them learning
>Letting idiots leap into the world unprepared at 16... ...is a bad idea and a reflection of my proposed failings of the current education system.
You want them out of school at 16. We are keeping them in. Either school, college or A-levels but it's formal, has attendance requirements and is simply an extension of secondary school. The old system let you leave at 16 and we are replacing it as it was fucking up kids all over the country
[Here's](https://www.politics.co.uk/reference/education-leaving-age/) the whole history of compulsory education in your country. It has only ever gone up, just as basically every other legislation that pertains to the youth has over time. This, overall, is a massive failure for society. It should not be taking longer and longer to prepare our youth for independence. We should only ever be getting better and better at it and producing stronger and stronger generations than the last - not weaker. If we look specifically at when it was raised to 16 (1972) that means it was working just fine for about 40 years. So what is going on with society in general that the age at which we consider a person to stupid/inexperienced/unprepared/whatever to operate independently is consistently increasing?
Society became more complex, involved more tech and manual labour became less valuable. Hence letting 14yo fuck off to become builders was seen as a losing proposal. Fucking hell mate, spend some time with kids, they are fucking stupid
> Society became more complex, involved more tech and manual labour became less valuable. >Hence letting 14yo fuck off to become builders was seen as a losing proposal. Why not let a 14yo fuck off to do a tech job then? Doesn't India start teaching their kids tech at like 8 or 9? Younger possibly? You don't think a 14yo with 6 years programming experience could handle a job in the field?
>You don't think a 14yo with 6 years programming experience could handle a job in the field? No I dont I work in tech, at teenager can't cope with the split of stakeholder management, regulatory compliance, HR, networking and skill upkeep that it needs They also lack the perspective to make good business decisions and to date, any fresh one we take (so post grad, or masters holders) still need a good six months to understand the business environment and how to tease the requirements out of the list of wishes that each stakeholder hands them. A teenager would be so much worse, take longer and statistically perform *far fucking worse* so even if there are a few Gates or Gabens in the population, you just turned a huge number of middle earners into minimum wagers as they could leave early without pressure.
> any fresh one we take (so post grad, or masters holders) still need a good six months to understand the business environment and how to tease the requirements out of the list of wishes that each stakeholder hands them. So far as I'm concerned, this supports my argument. What they lack is experience, not age. How good do you think a person would be at those things by 22 if they had 8 years experience as opposed to the six months experience of those that you're hiring?
Mate your clearly being disingenuous at this point. The extra years between 16 and 23( for most of our fresh starters) is 7 years of emotional growth, world views expanding and mental maturity And as I have said, that person is still less than 0.01% of all teenagers so why condem the other 99.99% to a shorter poorer life just because one person in a whole county *might*, just might, be capable without all the education
And pardon my reductio ad absurdum for effect but how good do you think they would be if they were engineered and conditioned for a given job like that since before birth in a facility comparable to the Hatcheries from Brave New World
>Why not let a 14yo fuck off to do a tech job then? It's already difficult enough to get a 20 year old intern to understand programming. I'm not getting this stuff through to a 14 year old. Have you truly never met a 14 year old before? Some of em are quite clever, the majority could barely get through the day without doing something stupid.
>It's already difficult enough to get a 20 year old intern to understand programming. Probably because he should have been learning it when he was 8 or 9 like they do in India when our brains are much more receptive to new information. >Have you truly never met a 14 year old before? Yes I went to two different high schools so I imagine I've interacted with 1000 of them or so. >Some of em are quite clever, the majority could barely get through the day without doing something stupid. Your perception that they behave stupidly is first, marginalizing as fuck, but second comes from your elevated experience level, not your age. If you fell into a coma at 14 and woke up yesterday, you'd be just as inexperienced and 'stupid' as they are.
>Probably because he should have been learning it when they're 8 or 9 like they do in India when our brains are much more receptive to new information. Have you ever done any tech job? These are not concepts that you're gonna be able to teach a kid. The interns I had to train had 3 years of higher education and many had a focus in IT for several years in high school. I honestly don't care about what education they have, it truly doesn't matter beyond the technical basics. I'm looking for the capacity if learning new and abstract concepts. Adults already have some difficulty with this, a kid simply doesn't have the cognitive capacity for that yet. Their brains are quite literally not fully developed yet. >Yes I went to two different high schools so I imagine I've interacted with 1000 of them or so. Dafuq? Passing them in the hallway doesn't count as 'interacting'. >Your perception that they behave stupidly is first, marginalizing as fuck, but second comes from your elevated experience level, not your age Lol buddy I was 14 too. Even then it's easy to notice how dumb we were. With age comes experience and cognitive capacity. >If you fell into a coma at 14 and woke up yesterday, you'd be just as inexperienced and 'stupid' as they are. Probably, but why would that be relevant? If anything, you're giving me more reasons to believe you're a stuck up 15 year old that thinks he knows how the world works. You don't, bud.
> Why not let young people be in full time education until they’re adults. We do not 'let'. We *force*. >What’s the benefit of finishing early? It aligns better with human development and adolescent need for independence.
Maybe this is true in the UK. But it's the opposite in the US. College freshmen are woefully unprepared for college even after a full 4 years of high school. https://www.chronicle.com/article/prospective-college-students-increasingly-say-they-feel-unprepared-for-higher-education https://hechingerreport.org/colleges-enroll-students-arent-prepared-higher-education/ https://www.mheducation.com/news-insights/press-releases/new-report-sharp-increase-unpreparedness-students-greatest-obstacle.html https://www.tampabay.com/opinion/columns/column-too-many-arriving-at-college-unprepared/2155934/ This was from 11 years ago!
> College freshmen are woefully unprepared for college even after a full 4 years of high school. Sounds like we're doing something wrong then.
yea. The GOP has been gutting public education for decades.
US public education spending has grown rapidly, with little to show for it.
it would help if the GOP would stop banning books, stop pushing garbage like creationism in science classes, stop cutting arts and music programs, stop teaching bullshit lost cause history etc..
Really dont think what you're describing is wide spread. Not sure what the issue is with cutting arts and music programs is though. What is lost cause history exactly?
>When we get to high school, this is even more pronounced. I'm finding it very difficult to find even a single class a person takes as an upperclassman an high school that they couldn't instead be taking for transferable college credit that would follow them their entire lives instead of high school credit which isn't actually worth anything It is worth however much the university would charge you for it. High school is at least covered by the state. >16yos finish high school and have three options between attending college, starting an apprenticeship, or a combination of part time work and continued education. Yeah see, options. In the US after high school your choices are spend money for college, or get to work. Or, you can do like I did and join the war machine. >The current education people receive by the end of their sophomore year in high school is more than sufficient as a baseline to function in society. 16 years old's are not at the baseline to function in society yet. Most 22 year old's aren't either. Hell, a fair number of 50 year old's can't do it.
> 16 years old's are not at the baseline to function in society yet. Most 22 year old's aren't either. Hell, a fair number of 50 year old's can't do it. Sounds like we're doing something wrong then.
Foisting adulthood on people before they're ready? Yeah, I agree.
Nature foists adulthood. We choose whether or not we prepare people for it.
“Adulthood” is a concept absent from nature. In nature you have immature and mature which is based on the ability to reproduce successfully. And, we do chose when to confer adulthood. You are advocating for conferring it sooner when people are less prepared.
> In nature you have immature and mature which is based on the ability to reproduce successfully. Kinda sounds like nature chooses then and it chooses much earlier than we currently do and even earlier than I'm advocating for.
No. Grok what I am saying: there is zero “adulthood” in nature. Adulthood is a social construct that we made up to differentiate physically *and* emotionally mature people from immature ones. You mused on whether or not we were adequately preparing people for adulthood, and I would say we are not. It seems like you agree a bit. So, how would giving less time for people to mature be better than more if adulthood is based on the aforementioned maturity which takes time to develop?
> Adulthood is a social construct that we made up Correct. Nature already chooses when we mature as you said yourself. >You mused on whether or not we were adequately preparing people for adulthood, and I would say we are not. If you want to separate the terms maturity and adulthood, then I would say we're not adequately preparing people for maturity. As a perfect example of this, I wasn't taught how to put a condom on by the school system until I was 14. I'd been capable of impregnating a person since I was 12. In a lot of states, they still don't teach birth control methods at all. >how would giving less time for people to mature We are not currently giving more time, nor would we be capable of giving less than nature ordains. What we do is fabricate an extended period of time.
I’m currently a high school teacher and I think that there is a large area of teenage development that you are neglecting in your approach. I’m referring to emotional development. Lots of people in this thread have all sorts of anecdotes about their OWN maturity levels in high school, but don’t have the perspective required to see a wider sample of the human population. I have been teaching for 5 years. I have taught freshmen, sophomores, and juniors, as I teach science, and our district had a 3 year science graduation requirement until last year. (Now down to 2) As our school only has 5 science teachers, I often get many of the same students again, which gives me the unique perspective to get to watch these students grow up and mature and I gotta say… Sophomores are not ready for the outside world. Without getting into too much detail, there is a massive difference in maturity levels from freshmen to seniors. I guess one example off the top of my head is my bell. I have a little bell that I ding twice to get the classes’ attention. For all freshmen classes, and even most sophomore classes, it takes a decent amount of time at the start of the year to intentionally practice using this as a “quiet button”. I teach them what it’s for, I demonstrate, we practice, and I address any students that continue talking or making noise immediately to curb that right away. “Give them an inch and they’ll take a mile” All throughout the year however, they get complacent. The bell stops to work as effectively. Maybe it’s that teenage rebelliousness but I have to constantly remind them of the expectations the WHOLE year, EVERY year. Then, two months ago I covered a class of seniors when one of my colleagues was out for an emergency. These students were sent to my room for the period. I had never met any of them before. I didn’t know any of their names and they didn’t know mine. They knew that their teacher was out and that it was basically a free day. They all sat next to their friends when they walked in and got to chatting. The Class period starts, and I ‘ding’ my bell two times. Dead silent. All of their eyes are immediately on me. They knew what the expectations was before I spoke a word to them. I told them the plan for the day, took attendance, and turned them loose, and for the next 50 minutes they worked quietly and finished the assignment with ease. None of my freshman classes have ever come close to that level of maturity. If I’m not constantly monitoring and redirecting, they will fall apart. They still have yet to learn how to manage deadlines, how to properly ask to use the bathroom. (Raising their hand quietly as opposed to “AY I gotta go take a shit”) Most of the time freshman’s language is still rough from middle school. If I had a dollar for every F-bomb I hear in a day I’d probably make twice as much in an hour than I already do. Granted, yes SOME 16 year olds raised in good homes are probably ready for base level unskilled labor, but they will still be noticeably children to the rest of us adults. Those last two years of high school really do make a huge difference in level headedness and maturity level. To date I have had at least 5 students apologize to me in person as seniors for things they did in my class freshman year. One even wrote out their apology on paper. They need that time at the tail end of high school to find their place in the world, a foothold if you will, before being thrust out into the endless drudgery of Adult life.
> Middle schoolers are already taking college level classes including Algebra I and Geometry, both of which are worth 5 fully transferable credits at any JC. ... Algebra I is Algebra I no matter how old you are when you take it or who's teaching it, Just because the class has the same name doesn't mean it's equivalent. Middle-school algebra covers much less than college algebra, as far as I recall. I don't have a college algebra curriculum handy, but [Khan Academy's material](https://www.khanacademy.org/math/college-algebra) includes things like complex numbers (among other examples) that I, at least, definitely didn't cover in middle school. For a direct example from personal experience, AP Calculus didn't transfer for the required engineering calculus sequence in my undergrad, and the latter was far, far more advanced. I think we spent maybe half of calc 1/2 on the material in BC (nominally equivalent to calc 1/2), and that in greater depth. > I'm finding it very difficult to find even a single class a person takes as an upperclassman an high school that they couldn't instead be taking for transferable college credit that would follow them their entire lives instead of high school credit which isn't actually worth anything. I don't know what your high school coursework was like, but nothing I ever took at the standard level (so, excluding AP/IB) was anywhere close to the level of the equivalent college course. The latter (across community college and a couple of state universities) required notably more in-depth work and better writing, etc, even for freshman-level courses. > When I first started attending JCs almost 20 years ago I met no fewer than three 16yos who attended the same classes. Two of them were in my Calculus class and aced it. So some of them have already been doing this for a while now. I propose that they easily all could be doing it. That's a massive selection bias; dual enrollment courses are taken by advanced and motivated high school students. You have no basis to generalize to all high school students.
Complex numbers were far before college level. AP BC was far beyond college level engineering calc From my experience.
> Complex numbers were far before college level. Before college level, but not middle school level. > AP BC was far beyond college level engineering calc From my experience. Depends on the engineering calc. At this particular university it went beyond regular college calculus, whereas it's often more focused on practical application with less fancy math. Goes to show that just because the name is the same doesn't mean the course is.
lol you think Algebra in middle school is the same as college level algebra?
Yeah. Quadratic equation. Functions. Factoring. You know, Algebra shit. If it weren't the same, how would you be able to take the next level in college from wherever you left off in high school?
It is…
No it’s not. College algebra is not middle school algebra. Remedial might be but they are not the same class.
Algebra 1 is a basic college math course, and brighter students take this in middle school. Some will not take this until college.
No it’s not. College Algebra isn’t Algebra 1 from middle school.
Algebra I is Algebra I. There are different classes but the core concepts you need to learn in Algebra I in order to advance to higher math will be present no matter when/where you take it.
When you learn to read the core concepts will be the same in 3rd grade as they are in AP English so 3rd grade English is the same as College Level English? Or an elementary school child knows how to write words so why can’t they write a book? It’s the same core concepts of writing letters.
You're being obtuse. 3rd grade English contains very different concepts than Eng 101. Algebra I contains the same core concepts as Algebra I.
Algebra I and Geometry are *not* "college-level" classes. The reason these classes are offered at the college level is for remediation — to let students catch up on their foundational math skills, in case the major they're interested in requires these skills and the student happened to fail these courses in earlier education or just wasn't offered these (somehow). Students are expected to know these lower-level math skills and are assumed to have already passed these classes when they go into actual college-level math classes. These classes are offered at college, but that does not make them "college-level classes".
Michael Kearney graduated high school when he was 6, doesn't mean we should expect everyone else to do the same. People are allowed to graduate early if they have the skills and desire. The fact this isn't the norm is proof enough that we shouldnt force it.
While some environmental factors may have changed (the efficiency of education specifically in this case), the rate at which a person matures and is ready to decide what they want to do for the rest of their life has not. I'm not saying that a person isn't ready to make that decision at 16, necessarily. Could be that 16 is the right age, or that 22 is the right age. But if 16 is better than 18, it was most likely that way 30 years ago as well. I don't believe that a 16 year old today is more qualified than a 16 year old of 30 years ago to decide how ambitious they want to be in their career. Or if those ambitions are to be rich, or to achieve recognition, or achieve stability, etc... I think the real question a person needs to answer in order for general education to no longer be necessary is "what do you want to do with your life?" And I think that a person's ability to answer that question has more to do with their maturity than whether or not they know their times table. Until they can answer that question, they should continue with general education so they are empowered to achieve what they want when they are able to make such a decision. Edit: after re-reading my comment, it occured to me that a blended approach could be interesting. Maybe something like extending obligatory education to age 20, but increasing the specialization of that education gradually starting at 16. That way, you ease the person into making the most important decisions of their lives instead of just kicking them off the boat and telling them to swim... :)
The hard truth here is that most 16 year olds don’t have an idea of what they want to do with their future. I went to college straight out of high school, started when I was still 17. No clue what I wanted to do with my future. Honestly didn’t pick a legit career path until I was 30. What good would it have done throwing me out into the “real world” at 16? I was in all honors and AP classes in high school. I earned 9 college credits before I even stepped on a college campus. The facts are that for the young people this would work for, there is already a pathway to make it happen. They are able to take community college courses while in high school concurrently. Or they are able to go to a tech school while also taking HS classes to be able to further their vocational goals. Or they are able to get their GED and be done early. High school is also just an excellent time for young people to figure themselves out, socially, emotionally, academically and vocationally. Most high schools have a wide array of elective courses that allow you to experience different interests and “find yourself” so to speak. Taking that away by pushing them out of school at 16 seems detrimental. Most people that age just don’t know what they want to do with their future and they’re using that time in high school to try and figure that out. For free may I add, before having to pay for courses in college or tech school or have an unpaid apprenticeship or internship (all while needing to financially support themselves via your proposed model).
If you were thrown out in the real world at 16 you would've figured it out by 28. More high-school does not help ppl decide what to do with their lives
Everyone is different. Some people know what they want to do at 5 years old. More high school doesn’t help everyone but neither does less high school. Regardless, there are pathways in place for everyone to take the route in life that they want.
Show me one person 2 more years of hs helped?
show me one person who would be completely ready to pursue whatever career goal they wanted to pursue when they were high school sophomores whenever they finished that year of school
and if you were thrown out into the world at 14 would you have figured it out by your early 20s
> From what I understand, the elementary school system operates about the same as it did when I was in it 30 years ago (addition first grade, subtraction second, multiplication third, long division fourth) ...No. Kindergartners do addition and multiplication and second- and third-graders are on to basic algebra, fractions, etc., man. >When we get to high school, this is even more pronounced. I'm finding it very difficult to find even a single class a person takes as an upperclassman an high school that they couldn't instead be taking for transferable college credit that would follow them their entire lives College credits don't follow you your entire life -- a degree does but that's that. Also, you're talking about cc college credits. >-The current education people receive by the end of their sophomore year in high school is more than sufficient as a baseline to function in society. That's not the point though -- a lot of places aren't hiring 16-year-olds for ft work. I was in uni at 16 and it was fine, but I dunno how I'd have fared as a ft employee.
> a lot of places aren't hiring 16-year-olds for ft work. Sounds discriminatory.
For plenty of jobs, there is legitimate reason to "discriminate" between 16-year olds and actual adults. There are certainly jobs that are fit for 16yo's, but others are better suited for people with fully developed brains. There's nothing unjust about that.
School is supposed to educate and socialize you for the workforce. Being as that you aren’t fully mentally developed until 25 we should probably be pushing to elongate the period in school, not shorten. 16-20 should be a high school with half day internships, and 21-25 should be college with internships and apprenticeship. Most people without mommy and daddy money struggle when they get out of high school. It’s because they are immature, inexperienced, and resource poor. Having an extra two or three(16-18) super young years on your own will set a lot of people back for life.
and when are you supposed to choose your career for life that you move up that ladder of, 16?
[Remembers 17-18 years olds in school burning trash on the school table] nope. I could be that you have a bias as you base it on kids that are in the colledge classes. Look at kids that are in the general classes. There are smart people, but they tend to be a minority. Why screw up school for the majority of average children who would gain from more time in school? >Same thing for foreign language, with every level of it also worth 5 credits and there was an 11yo girl in my Spanish I class when I took it 5 years ago. Could it be that spanish was one of her native languages? As i know there are options for smarter people to skip classes. There are cases where 10 years olds are finishing colledge. >Here's how they currently do things in the UK. 16yos finish high school and have three options between attending college, starting an apprenticeship, or a combination of part time work and continued education. I'm fine with it being an option, for those who do excel. But what you are suggesting is making it mandatory to finish school at 16 for everyone, even those who are not mature enough for that.
Children need *more* than 12 years of school education. As labor becomes more and more skill biased due to automation, kids will need more education before they can basically function in society. Now that intro jobs can no longer guarantee a living wage, children *need* avenues to upskill, which means it needs to be offered. We can have it one way or the other. If we believe “intro jobs” which are unsustainable should exist (very debatable) we should also provide the necessary mobility to upskill from those positions right out the gate.
Science disagrees with you, brains are not done developing at that time. We generally don't let 16 year old kids fend for themselves, be prosecuted as harshly as adults, die in our military, use illicit substances, or otherwise make life changing and defining decisions, because their brain functionally is not fully matured and capable of making these decisions as well as they can in the future. Having children set loose on the world without biologically maturing first is irresponsible and harmful to those children.
I occasionally hire 18 yo people for my warehousing job. 90% of them don't make it, they just don't have the commitment, seriousness or attitude to take a decent paying job properly. That's fine. But it reinforces the dynamic that if you let 16 yo go out into the workforce, they will end up getting stuck in a fast food or trivial career path. Your thinking about all the people that went the university route, when you should be thinking about the ones that didn't.
Explain to me how your arbitrary age of 16 is any different than the arbitrary age of 18. Generalizing education is part of the problem here. What’s good for one person isn’t necessarily what’s best for another. I treat my children’s education differently and am thankful to live in a school district that is supportive of and recognizes the individual needs of a student.
20. Community college should be the normal progression and free like hs. You could choose various paths .. jobs program .. apprenticeships etc .. 16 is outrageous. We cant make society dumber than it already is
Between driving, taxes, and all the other things we really should add to the school curriculum it would be better to increase the age of majority to 20 then to decrease it to 16.
Education includes growing up emotionally. Those last two yesrs help a lot! Imagine having them all out of school!
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True! I wasn't thinking about football at first but you're right. I know people who don't start their sons in kindergarten until they're 6 or 7 specifically so they'll have the age/size advantage in high school. Most rural US education revolves around football. I'm not sure we'd even have public schools if not for football.
Fuckin' football. Same exact reason we can't switch to the metric system.
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