6 hours ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

The issue definitely goes deeper than money. My district spends about $5k less/student than Philly and is one of the best public school districts in the state.

Underserved isn't just about money. 

It's the difficult problem to solve because government is poorly positioned to provide solutions to them. 

How do you compensate for a difference where in my district the average kindergarten student has been exposed to over a million words by parents able and willing to read to them from a young age, vs in Philly where it's statistically so much less? 

It's not just about the words; being exposed to these ideas provoke critical thinking and mental growth that cannot be made up later. 

Programs like Headstart attempt to narrow this gap, but they're expensive and unable to impact in ways that a home life pushing this can. There may be ways to improve there but short of wholesale takeover of early care and learning I fail to see how a community solution could ever make up for missing this at home.

IMO, we need to stop promoting/defending failing cultures. Schools should only be expected to educate kids, not raise them, not confuse them, teach them to hate themselves or subject them to political agendas.

"If it ain't broke, don't fix it." We've been "fixing it" for over 3 decades and every year it gets a little worse. How long before somebody says, "let's go back to what worked" ?

11 hours ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

The issue definitely goes deeper than money. My district spends about $5k less/student than Philly and is one of the best public school districts in the state.

Underserved isn't just about money. 

It's the difficult problem to solve because government is poorly positioned to provide solutions to them. 

How do you compensate for a difference where in my district the average kindergarten student has been exposed to over a million words by parents able and willing to read to them from a young age, vs in Philly where it's statistically so much less? 

It's not just about the words; being exposed to these ideas provoke critical thinking and mental growth that cannot be made up later. 

Programs like Headstart attempt to narrow this gap, but they're expensive and unable to impact in ways that a home life pushing this can. There may be ways to improve there but short of wholesale takeover of early care and learning I fail to see how a community solution could ever make up for missing this at home.

Well, we could start by not having programs in place that encourage those with a demonstrated history of parental failure to have even more kids while disincentivizing higher earners from having families. It’s almost as if offering more money to people who have more kids when they can’t raise the ones they have is a bad idea. Who knew incentives matter?

2 hours ago, vikas83 said:

Well, we could start by not having programs in place that encourage those with a demonstrated history of parental failure to have even more kids while disincentivizing higher earners from having families. It’s almost as if offering more money to people who have more kids when they can’t raise the ones they have is a bad idea. Who knew incentives matter?

Yeah, let's go with compelled placement of those extra kids in the homes of the childless non-poors instead.  Privileged big shot hedge fund managers with Asian heritage get double.  Free cherry slurpees for everyone, of course.

This was an absolute tragedy.  Affirmative action was far from perfect, but it was as good a hammer as we had to begin to right injustices that will take at least another half century to fix.  There will be Hell to pay when the SC swings back left.

8 minutes ago, dawkins4prez said:

This was an absolute tragedy.  Affirmative action was far from perfect, but it was as good a hammer as we had to begin to right injustices that will take at least another half century to fix.  There will be Hell to pay when the SC swings back left.

You should be celebrating the end of the poster child for systemic racism.

Just now, Outlaw said:

You should be celebrating the end of the poster child for systemic racism.

Ridiculous quote from a ridiculous man.

On 6/29/2023 at 5:22 PM, PoconoDon said:

While I understand the desired outcome of the AA program and its failures, the correct approach as I see it, is that personal descriptors should never enter the decision making process. 

I wonder if this decision will have any effect on scholarships?

 

Oh because personal descriptors don't affect anything in real life, right?  FFS.

30 minutes ago, dawkins4prez said:

Ridiculous quote from a ridiculous man.

Final Exam:

Affirmative Action is/is not a glaring example of systemic racism. Explain your answer.

59 minutes ago, dawkins4prez said:

Oh because personal descriptors don't affect anything in real life, right?  FFS.

No special treatment for anyone is the right approach. Wouldn't you agree?

Affirmative Action was a terrible policy that actually perpetuates the inequalities it purports to address. By having race play a factor in college admissions, it allows us to look at the makeup of university classes and feel like real progress is being made because of increased diversity. However, it's simply window dressing so white liberals can feel good about themselves while completely failing to address the actual sources of systemic inequality -- completely failed, quasi-racist ways in which we fund education in this country. It's the same insanity that leads to a policy of not prosecuting crime so people can take victory laps about lower levels of incarceration, instead of dealing with the issues that cause crime.

Want to deal with systemic inequality? Then deal with it as opposed to simply rigging outcomes to make it seem like you did something. Stop funding schools with property taxes. End the drug war or at least abolish mandatory minimums. Do the actual hard work.

The same groups that strongly support the SC decision here would fight tooth and nail against any proposal divorcing property taxes from school funding.

30 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

Affirmative Action was a terrible policy that actually perpetuates the inequalities it purports to address. By having race play a factor in college admissions, it allows us to look at the makeup of university classes and feel like real progress is being made because of increased diversity. However, it's simply window dressing so white liberals can feel good about themselves while completely failing to address the actual sources of systemic inequality -- completely failed, quasi-racist ways in which we fund education in this country. It's the same insanity that leads to a policy of not prosecuting crime so people can take victory laps about lower levels of incarceration, instead of dealing with the issues that cause crime.

Want to deal with systemic inequality? Then deal with it as opposed to simply rigging outcomes to make it seem like you did something. Stop funding schools with property taxes. End the drug war or at least abolish mandatory minimums. Do the actual hard work.

I am the #1 proponent of decriminalization in here, of course it's more important than AA was.  But AA was still a valuable piece to the puzzle.  We have generations of college educated minorities because of it.  It has been absolutely crucial in getting college education as a something that minority families actually do and pass down.  

 

It was unfair to who?  Fringe white candidates?  Now it will again be unfair to fringe minority candidates who are statistically less likely to pay off their loans and be future boosters.  We can't do things like full on reparations so this was a completely sane and effective compromise.  AA was hard work, as proven by how gleefully it gets overturned now.  The logic and fairness to it had holes.  It's effectiveness was shaky.  But it did work in making university graduates more diverse.  It absolutely increased the mean education level of minority populations.

 

 

2 minutes ago, dawkins4prez said:

I am the #1 proponent of decriminalization in here, of course it's more important than AA was.  But AA was still a valuable piece to the puzzle.  We have generations of college educated minorities because of it.  It has been absolutely crucial in getting college education as a something that minority families actually do and pass down.  

 

It was unfair to who?  Fringe white candidates?  Now it will again be unfair to fringe minority candidates.  We can't do things like full on reparations so this was a completely sane and effective compromise.  AA was hard work, as proven by how gleefully it gets overturned now.  The logic and fairness to it had holes.  It's effectiveness was shaky.  But it did work in making university graduates more diverse.  It absolutely increased the mean education level of minority populations.

 

 

Uh...Asians say hello. We do exist. And it was massively biased against us.

I know liberals only like to acknowledge the existence of Asians when they can play a victim narrative for us, but we actually don't cease to exist when it's inconvenient for your narratives.

18 minutes ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

The same groups that strongly support the SC decision here would fight tooth and nail against any proposal divorcing property taxes from school funding.

I would?

Can you tell me what else I support?

16 minutes ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

The same groups that strongly support the SC decision here would fight tooth and nail against any proposal divorcing property taxes from school funding.

a) not sure why you would think that?  Why would someone who supports this decision be against divorcing property taxes from school funding?

b) Vikas, who supports this decision, just said he would propose to end funding schools with property taxes.

1 hour ago, Outlaw said:

Final Exam:

Affirmative Action is/is not a glaring example of systemic racism. Explain your answer.

Final exam for you:  Stick 3 fingers up your arse and tell me if shite is color blind.

Just now, vikas83 said:

I would?

You're an outlier in a lot of ways.

There's no way most parents in my district for example would be on board with swapping the funding they get from local property taxes with state and federal. They want to go the other way, and reduce federal & state level funding so they can assert more Dunning-Kruger driven stupidity on the district. 

3 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

Uh...Asians say hello. We do exist. And it was massively biased against us.

I know liberals only like to acknowledge the existence of Asians when they can play a victim narrative for us, but we actually don't cease to exist when it's inconvenient for your narratives.

Oh please spare me the perfect immigrant BS.  AA should have been tweaked to make up for that error.  You don't have to tear down something that the other 90% of minority populations really needed just so you can beat your chest buddy.

3 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

Uh...Asians say hello. We do exist. And it was massively biased against us.

I know liberals only like to acknowledge the existence of Asians when they can play a victim narrative for us, but we actually don't cease to exist when it's inconvenient for your narratives.

You model minorities need to learn your place.

 

Just now, JohnSnowsHair said:

You're an outlier in a lot of ways.

There's no way most parents in my district for example would be on board with swapping the funding they get from local property taxes with state and federal. They want to go the other way, and reduce federal & state level funding so they can assert more Dunning-Kruger driven stupidity on the district. 

I'm against federal government overreach in almost every case, but this is an exception. We have an obligation to ensure equal opportunity (at least as much as possible) in education. The goal should be to remove the impediments to achievement, thereby obviating the need for different standards as an adult.

2 minutes ago, dawkins4prez said:

Oh please spare me the perfect immigrant BS.  AA should have been tweaked to make up for that error.  You don't have to tear down something that the other 90% of minority populations really needed just so you can beat your chest buddy.

I'm not an immigrant, but nice racist assumption. Shockingly, many Asians are natural born US citizens.

2 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

I'm against federal government overreach in almost every case, but this is an exception. We have an obligation to ensure equal opportunity (at least as much as possible) in education. The goal should be to remove the impediments to achievement, thereby obviating the need for different standards as an adult.

I tend to agree with you. I just don't think it's going to fly, especially in the 'burbs.

Just now, JohnSnowsHair said:

I tend to agree with you. I just don't think it's going to fly, especially in the 'burbs.

Well, since I don't have kids and think this country is irretrievably screwed, I don't really care all that much. And most of the work would have to be done by better parents. But if you're OK with funding schools inadequately, then you're a hypocrite to be against AA.

3 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

I'm not an immigrant, but nice racist assumption. Shockingly, many Asians are natural born US citizens.

Never assumed any such thing.  That's simply the name of the overarching rationale used to gut any mandate aimed at benefiting minorities who need more opportunities.

10 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

Uh...Asians say hello. We do exist. And it was massively biased against us.

I know liberals only like to acknowledge the existence of Asians when they can play a victim narrative for us, but we actually don't cease to exist when it's inconvenient for your narratives.

i acknowledged the existence of large quantities of chicken makhani & navrattan korma at my nepa indian restaurant yesterday....yes, on the 4th of july