site banner
PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   3834 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for August 18, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

2
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Private schools' main benefit is selection effects, but they select based mostly on income. You're paying out the nose just to be among other people who can and are willing to pay out the nose. This is a problem because while income is correlated with IQ it's not a particularly strong correlation, and you'll still end up with plenty of slow kids in class who drag the rest of the class down.

To be clear, what I'm looking for is a school system that sorts people based on intelligence and allows the quick kids to actually move ahead. I expect you'd pretty quickly have elementary school kids doing college-level tasks (to the extent "college-level" means anything) if they're allowed to set the pace rather than letting it be set by the slowest rich kid in the neighborhood. Given a group of kids 2 standard deviations above average (so 5% of all classrooms) you should probably be entirely done with high school before 9th grade using only half-days.

Private schools are definitely the best existing solution, besides maybe one-on-one private tutoring, but they're insufficient. They don't get the outcomes they should be getting. And the things I mentioned (challenging education, intelligent peers, sensible mental health policies) aren't the only benefits of living in a sane jurisdiction, just the most salient.

I think this used to be called "Gifted and Talented" programs when I was in elementary/middle school. I don't know if they still exist.

Even if they don't explicitly point this out, language immersion programs have a similar functional effect for ensuring your kid has higher-than-average-quality peers (and, if your kid is legitimately over-performing, it's a great distraction). They're also less likely to be targeted by progressives because it's not a sciences/excellence thing.

Yeah, I was in one and it was utterly insufficient. The peers, at least, were great, but the curriculum was still quite slow. Still better than nothing, but a long way from what's needed.

To be clear, what I'm looking for is a school system that sorts people based on intelligence and allows the quick kids to actually move ahead.

Isn’t this just selective public schools like those in some big cities like NYC where the student body is like 75% Asian?

If it is I'd like to learn more about them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specialized_high_schools_in_New_York_City

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats