[wil421]

Why should you have to get credits before you leave High School? Just teach more advanced subjects in both High School and College.

I agree with what you are saying but I think it’s a product of a failure somewhere else in the education system. No child left behind and other programs hinder education by applying one size fits all policies.

[maxerickson]

I didn't say that. I said it should be available to every student, which is not the case.

It's directly a failure of the primary education system, but it is more a failure of leadership and resources than anything else.

As far as NCLB, the response to it is a bigger problem than the law. There's nothing in it stopping states from investing in both helping underachieving students and in helping other students get ahead. NCLB didn't tell Oklahoma to slash taxes and burn their schools.

[skookumchuck]

> a failure of leadership and resources

Why is it more expensive to teach, say, calculus than algebra? Offering more advanced classes should not cost more.

[thoth]

Well, the more difficult/specialized the subject, the fewer available teachers. Plus, someone that knows calculus well enough to teach it likely has other job prospects (competitive pay).

[skookumchuck]

I guess I'm the opposite, you'd have to pay me extra to induce me to teach the more basic material.

[chrisseaton]

> Why is it more expensive to teach, say, calculus than algebra?

Because educating someone to teach more advanced subjects takes more times and resources.

[skookumchuck]

But the teachers have masters degrees.

Besides, teaching college freshman calculus is not exactly magneto hydrodynamics.

[chrisseaton]

But most of them don't have masters degrees in mathematics, do they? Many of them will have a generic Master of Education degree.

The normally accepted education level for teaching a university-level class is a PhD.

[skookumchuck]

You don't need a masters degree in math to teach freshman calculus.

I was taught freshman calc by grad students - with no "education" training whatsoever. Perhaps these "masters" of education are learning the wrong things.

Freshman calculus just isn't that hard, and isn't much beyond algebra. This "gee math is hard" crap is, well, crap. No PhD is necessary. Hell, I taught it to my kids on the kitchen table, and I have no advanced degree and never took a course in education.

[ams6110]

High schools may have trouble finding teachers who are qualified to teach advanced subjects, also they may not have enough students to really justify a class at that level.

Whereas a Community College may have an easier time finding instructors, since there aren't licensing rules or a need to employ the instructor full-time. Also they draw from a wider student population so may not have as much difficulty filling a class.

[skookumchuck]

> High schools may have trouble finding teachers who are qualified to teach advanced subjects

One wonders about such teachers who have advanced masters degrees in education. Why are they not qualified to teach freshman college material?

[dragonwriter]

A Masters degree is usually qualification to teach college in the field of the degree (regular faculty in community colleges, lecturers in major universities—though lecturers are somewhat rare).

A masters in education is qualification to teach education classes, not other subjects.

[thoth]

Someone with a masters in education may or may not have the knowledge required for a particular subject, say a math or science. Or another way, just because someone has a masters in education doesn’t mean they can teach any specific class. Their background could be in counseling, administration, school psychology, or education methodology... not, for instance, typical high school subjects.

[skookumchuck]

A degree in anything but the subjects they teach? Does that mean that a high school physics teacher knows nothing more about physics than high school physics?

[dragonwriter]

> Does that mean that a high school physics teacher knows nothing more about physics than high school physics?

Probably not; the state policies adopted under the pressure of NCLB and it's successors put strong pressure on districts to hire teachers with at least a bachelor's degree in the field taught for secondary schools, and even teachers that don't will often have additional coursework as part of college breadth requirements.

[Retric]

Students are not equally skilled. The majority of students are not really a collage level English and History and Math and Art class starting in 11th grade, though a significant number could take a subset of those.

Simply making High School arbitrarily harder is kind of meaningless if most students would fail the material.

[gowld]

Only the best art students are ready for collage level Art classes in 11th grade.

[phamilton]

This sort of leads into competency based advancement rather than time based advancement. Rather than having a 4 year program where you rank graduates by competency (gpa), have a higher bar of competency and have people graduate at different rates.

[maxerickson]

That's part of what I'm getting at when I talk about it being an available track.

You can still have everybody lined up to finish ~17 or 18, just allow more variation in what they have finished. If someone doesn't plan to go on to college, maybe they don't need to take college prep math classes and can take classes that will serve them better.

[throwawayjava]

> Just teach more advanced subjects in both High School

Many affluent high schools have an abundance of AP/IB courses. Many high schools also have additional college-credit courses (where the high school acts as a sort of proxy for a local college, often a community college). At a "good" high school, students can combine all of these options to have not just a year, but even junior or senior standing by the time they start college.

There are three problems with this approach:

1. Not all high schools are affluent / have their crap together enough to offer these options.

2. students need to be prepared. Enough of them that you can fill a course. This can be a barrier in less affluent areas.

3. Students have to know about this option, usually starting in middle school so that they can begin working ahead early (e.g., finish algebra in middle school).

> ...and college

The pattern here seems to be picking the college vs. picking the more advanced courses at the college. So, you don't take "more advanced couses at regional State campus"; instead, you go to (your field's equivalent of) MIT/Stanford/Berkeley/CMU. Or at least the state flagship. C.f., algorithms at an elite university vs. algorithms at the branch campus of a middling state system. The differences in both depth (rigor) and bredth are, in many cases, quite extraordinary.

> No child left behind and other programs hinder education by applying one size fits all policies.

Do you have any data to justify this assertion? AP offerings have increased since NCLB was enacted.

I don't disagree with you that NCLB is a net harm, but I don't think it's accurate to place the blame there for this particular problem. (Also, whenever NCLB comes up, it's worth pointing out that states bear a lot of responsibility -- they have quite a bit of leeway in how NCLB is implemented.)

[arca_vorago]

You shouldn't have to, but it should be offered for multiple reasons. It eases the hs college transition, it gets you a head start on prereqs and credits, among other things.

I will be forever grateful that my high school encouraged this.

[gowld]

If the credits are standardized its easier to compare "advanced high school course" to "remedial college course"