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Except the systems and the goals are completely different. In the old days, yes, the boys were told to sit their asses down and listen, for the period of time that class was. But class was shorter, intermissions longer, and rough play was allowed during the intermissions. In addition, a GOAL of the old system was kicking kids out. A huge attrition rate is desirable because only a small % of people were expected to continue on with school. It would be a waste for Jimmy to keep going to school forever when he's going to work on the farm anyways.
In many ways, the failure of our current system is the lack of attrition, particularly among the girls. But I'd think halving the number of boys currently in university and cutting girls to about that number would be a huge improvement.
But if the system says attrition is bad, it should look at the causes of attrition.
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