**** Elections thread *****

[BananaStand]

and the lack of emphasis on testing is perceived to be one of the key reasons why Finland has been doing well. Tests still are a a fairly easy way to gauge performance somewhat objectively.

wait, which is it? If Finland doesn't emphasize testing, and testing is how you gauge performance objectively, then how do you know if they're doing well? If you're putting ALL your stock in this PISA test, I think you're being a little glib. It's really not as simple and 'standardized' as you might think.

Some say that income inequality is bad.

And others say it's great. Again, Income "mobility" is the key, in my opinion. Of the poorest 20% in the US, nearly 2/3 of that population advances to a higher quintile within a generation. If that were impossible, then income inequality is bad. If there is robust income mobility, then the people on the bottom are there because they've chosen to be shitty people.

Today, 64 percent of the people born to the poorest fifth of society rise out of that quintile -- 11 percent rise all the way into the top quintile. Meanwhile, 8 percent born to the richest fifth fall all the way to the bottom fifth. Sometimes great wealth makes kids lazy and self-indulgent, and wrecks their lives
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2014/...nequality.html

I'm not sure what your point is. Singapore is on top, top 20 is dominated by asia and northern europe. The US schools have massive amounts of homework and tests are a weekly occurrence, yet you suck on PISA. Maybe even more work is needed there?

I'm not sure what your point is. Mine was that the hardest schools show the best test results. I'm not sure volume of homework and tests translates directly to 'difficulty'.

The PISA tests are standardized, even though clearly rigged since US is not on top.

Sounds kinda snarky. Maybe you're misunderstanding me. I'm not saying that Finlands schools are bad. And I'm not saying that US's are good. I am saying that they seem to have entirely different goals when it comes to educating kids, hence a standardized test result is not a great basis for comparison. Plus, as I said, the test doesn't seem to be as "standardized" as one may think.

Yeah, a tiny country dominating a whole global industry for 10 years is nothing, at least it in no way qualifies as engineering feat worth mentioning. Stop trolling.

The bolded is quite an exaggeration. McDonalds dominates Burger King. Coke dominates Pepsi. I'm not sure Nokia had that big of an advantage over Motorola, Samsung, LG, and whoever else. Nokia had a nice run....that's it.

If you think of the greatest minds in human history, how many of them were motivated by money?

Millions of them. Literally millions of them.

I think it'd be quite challenging to make over 50% be above average.

What? Are you kididing me right now? Isn't that the whole point of this argument....that Finland has so many kids acheiving at rates higher than the worldwide average? If Finland had an even distribution of below, average, and above average kids, then they would be in the middle of the pack in the world rankings. But they're not....they're at the top.