[aeturnum]

I think that all makes sense in a narrow way but I think you are sidestepping the actual challenge of education.

As the root comment pointed out - we already know that you improve outcomes by excluding low performers. Schools that can be selective take advantage of that. If you are in a position to attend one of those restrictive schools it may improve your outcomes!

However, the question of "how to do a good job educating kids" on a national level must include everyone in the measure. It might be worth having schools for troubled kids! But you have to look across the results of the troubled kids and the more normate ones. I think the root comment's point is that...this seems to have copied the techniques that charter schools use to improve their educational outcomes...but that arguably those schools are not "solving" the same problem as public schools and comparing them does not reveal any insights.

[jvanderbot]

Actually I disagree that a measure of success of an educational system is its breadth. If serving 95% achieved vastly better outcomes and 5% received no education (or an alternative one!) Would that necessarily and absolutely be worse? What about 99/1 or 99.9 etc

[toomanyrichers]

Agreed. It’s uselessly idealist to imagine you can serve the 100% without making the 99% much worse off. Actually worse than useless — it’s making things worse for the 99%!

Having seen just how much damage a single disruptive student can do, I think there must be alternatives for those that need them — if only to stop disrupting everyone else.

[aeturnum]

> If serving 95% achieved vastly better outcomes and 5% received no education

Good luck convincing the families of the 5%! I'm not arguing this approach wouldn't improve outcomes - just that it's not considered an acceptable solution to "the problem of education." So it doesn't seem like a good faith contribution to the conversation the article is addressing because I believe it's already been rejected as an option.

[brightlancer]

> Good luck convincing the families of the 5%! I'm not arguing this approach wouldn't improve outcomes - just that it's not considered an acceptable solution to "the problem of education." So it doesn't seem like a good faith contribution to the conversation the article is addressing because I believe it's already been rejected as an option.

Of course it's an option: this is why charter schools, private schools and home schools are increasingly popular!

Government education is the only meaningful way in which the majority of people are prohibited from meaningful choices for their kids because the government says "but what about the bottom 5%" -- so folks _opt out_ of government education entirely.

This is why "progressive" (i.e. leftist) politicians and activists are trying to make opting out as difficult as possible -- even though "marginalized minorities" disproportionately support opting out.

But despite the "progressive" (i.e. leftist) politicians and activists, the alternatives are increasingly popular. It's slow, but there is improvement on the alternatives.

[davemp]

The truly disruptive students will likely receive no meaningful education regardless.

[rayiner]

> As the root comment pointed out - we already know that you improve outcomes by excluding low performers.

That’s not quite the point. By excluding low performers, you can improve the outcomes of the other kids, beyond what would be possible by mixing everyone together. So you can achieve a net societal improvement that way.

[ZeroGravitas]

If those excluded kids are just moved from selective charter schools to non-selective public schools then, by the same argument, they'll be reducing the outcomes of the non-disruptive kids who don't have parents involved enough to take advantage of the system.

So unless these charter schools have a side business selling Soylent Green made from disruptive pupils and those with learning disabilities, they're not actually improving overall results.

[aeturnum]

> By excluding low performers, you can improve the outcomes of the other kids

Isn't this is what the root comment is saying? I did not summarize the entire thing but that was my understanding of its point.

> you can achieve a net societal improvement that way.

You can improve the outcomes of the non-low-performers, but it's hard to say it's a "net societal improvement" because the low performers are also part of society.

[brightlancer]

> You can improve the outcomes of the non-low-performers, but it's hard to say it's a "net societal improvement" because the low performers are also part of society.

That depends on the improvement vs loss -- IME, it is a net improvement.

With 100 students, 5 are disruptive, verbally abusive, maybe physically violent. How much does that 5% bring down the other 95%? If we remove that 5% from the other 95%, how much does the 5% lose versus the 95% gain?

IME, the gains in the 95% are miles ahead of the losses in the 5%, which makes it's net improvement.