Saving Summer
issue 4 editorial page 5
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Before shortening vacation and lengthening schooldays, education reform needs to happen on a local level
Comparing Class time
1,146 1,013 Taiwan 1,005 Hong Kong 1,005 Japan 903 Singapore
>>news.yahoo.com
United States
On the other side of the Pacific, students in Japan spend about 1,005 hours in school, while US students spend 1,146. That’s about three more weeks of school. And yet, Japan routinely outscores the US in math and science testing. Despite this, some US politicians, including President Obama and his Education Secretary Arne Duncan, want to add school time to improve education – either lengthening the school day or the school year. Taking strong action on education is commendable but this plan is too ambitious. The proposal has two key flaws. First, there is no guarantee that adding time to the day will improve scores. Some studies do confirm that extra time works. Tom Loveless of the Brookings Institution, the nation’s most cited think tank, found that when some countries added time to their school days, their scores went up. But others find that unless extra time is very focused, it doesn’t help. According to a 2007 NY Times article, centrist think tank the Education Sector showed that students only benefit if the additional time is highly engaging. Besides, US students already attend more school than students in countries
the
A look at the yearly school hours of the Asian countries outscoring
us in math and science testing
a publication of shawnee mission east high school 7500 Mission Road, Prairie Village, KS 66208
Editors-In-Chief >>Tim Shedor >>Phoebe Unterman Assistant Editors >>Sam Logan >>Kevin Simpson Head Copy Editor >>Andrew Goble Art and Design Editor >>Michael Stolle News Editor >>Logan Heley News Page Editors >>Kennedy Burgess >>Kiki Sykes
oct. 19, 2009 issue 4, vol. 51
Editorial Editor >>Lilly Myers Opinion Editor >>Duncan McHenry Opinion Page Editors >>Kat Buchanan >>Raina Weinberg Features Editor >>Annie Sgroi Feature Page Editors >>>Kathleen Ireland >> Molly Troutman Spread Editor >>Aubrey Leiter Asst. Spread Editor >>Ian Wiseman
A&E Editor >>Mac Tamblyn A&E Page Editors >>Colleen Ireland >>Christa McKittrick Mixed Editor >>Emma Pennington Sports Editor >>Sam Logan Sports Page Editors >>Corbin Barnds >>Conor Twibell Photo Editor >>Mackenzie Wylie Assistant Photo Editor >>Katie East Freelance Page Editors >>>Maddy Bailey >> Sarah McKittrick Copy Editors >>Andrew Goble
whose scores are higher. If Obama and Duncan plan to spend or redirect $18 billion on a solution, it should be one that has conclusive evidence that it works. Not only is it unclear that more time is the solution, it’s not even clear that time is the problem. Obama and Duncan cite South Korea’s educational system as one where a longer school day is more effective. However, South Korea and other high-performing countries don’t necessarily do better just because they have more time. It’s not just how much time is spent, it’s also the way time is spent. If we’re going to look at how much time other countries spend in school, we should also look at how their schools work. Other countries’ methods of teaching or administrating may be more significant than just how much time they spend in school. The second problem is even if this solution definitely worked on a local level, it wouldn’t necessarily work on a national level. Schools have success when extra time is used efficiently. But making that time effective for every school in the country would be difficult. It’s hard enough making extra time efficient for even one school. Take East, for example. We already have
a version of extra time, seminar. While seminar can be productive, there are no objectives or standards to meet. Students can work on homework -- but they can also sleep, read or just goof around. The only real way to hold students accountable for that time would be to test them on what they learned. However, as No Child Left Behind showed, subjecting students to more testing doesn’t solve the problem. And if students still aren’t learning the material, the proposal has no answers for them. If two more hours of lectures and worksheets don’t work, it’s unlikely that three will. In theory, extra time can be effective. If a student needs help in chemistry and gets an extra hour one-on-one with a teacher, that’s time well spent. However, ensuring that experience for every student in a school would require enormous resources. What would likely then happen is that students will simply attend extra classes. But sitting through another calculus class with 40 other tired kids who understand won’t solve the problem. As Einstein put it, repeating an action and expecting different results is insanity.
>>Logan Heley >>Jack Howland >>Sam Kovzan >>Annie Sgroi >>Tim Shedor >>Kevin Simpson >>Michael Stolle >>Phoebe Unterman
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