It's Official: Public Schools are Obsolete

Khan Academy ^ | Vanity (mostly) | Robroy

[RobRoy]

As futurists observe the usage and functionality of the internet, more and more of us have predicted an end to the relevance of Public schools. Well, the Khan Academy site may be the first clear indicator that public schools really are a dead institution walking.

Imagine a future world where, via a home computer, laptop, tablet or even smart phone you can access your own personal curriculum of k-12 level class work complete with lectures, follow up questions and help? Imagine it also covers subjects that public school seldom covers, like the intricacies of how banking works?

Well, a friend of mine sent me a link today to just such a site. My jaw dropped when I saw it. I felt like I had been projected into a future where children can be effectively educated at their own pace, by their own parents, completely separate from the indoctrination of public schools, teachers unions, and other leaders with an “agenda”. In this future, all education curriculums are chosen by the parents and child. It can be worked at any time; it can be augmented by external sources on the internet, public libraries, or even field trips. And the parents control the teaching and “indoctrination” of their own children.

And anyone with a thirst for knowledge will find this a huge opportunity to not only learn about many diverse subjects them self, but also as a springboard to much deeper investigation of whatever subject catches their fancy.

This future has arrived. And I know what you are thinking: this will be shut down by “them” in short order. Well, “they” have already tried and failed. This site has significant backing and anything that happens in this vein will be exposed to the light of day – and the press. And you cannot patent Algebra. Teachers unions teamed with book publishers in some states to get the state legislatures to limit what methods can even be used in classrooms funded with public dollars. But this is privately funded and is a non-profit academy. The NEA and Luddite book publishers are facing their looming obsolescence with great apprehension.

This needs to go VIRAL. It could literally change the future of the US and the world as we know it – and for the good!

[RobRoy]

A quote from the site:

The Khan Academy is an organization on a mission. We're a not-for-profit with the goal of changing education for the better by providing a free world-class education to anyone anywhere. All of the site's resources are available to anyone. It doesn't matter if you are a student, teacher, home-schooler, principal, adult returning to the classroom after 20 years, or a friendly alien just trying to get a leg up in earthly biology. The Khan Academy's materials and resources are available to you completely free of charge.

You have got to go to the link and root around in this thing. My wife and I said that if we were a young couple with school aged children, there is no way we would expose them to a US public school. Well, we're passing this on to all of our children for our grandchildren. This needs to go VIRAL.

Here are a couiple of screen samples from a video and QA section:

[ClearCase_guy]

We will need to drastically cut expenses in many areas (Defense, Health, etc.) Education is certainly one of these areas. Some communities spend $20,000 per pupil each year, and get almost nothing for it.

If citizens start realizing that good quality education can be delivered virtually for free, they will vote to defund government schools. And we will all be better off.

[RWGinger]

At first I thought this was the system owned by Turkish muslims that are teaching hate of our freedoms
but a quick search showed this is a good simple but workable system that does NOT indoctrinate ideologies.

Yes Khan Academy deserves attention

[kickonly88]

Thanks for posting this! Our soon to be 5 year old son starts school this year but our school district only has 767 students. Me and my wife will definitely check this out.

[Puppage]

It's Official: Public Schools are Obsolete

Well, sure...but only for learning.

As for advancing the liberal agenda, nothing beats it.

[wastedyears]

I saw math and a graph and I just died a little bit inside.

Something like this probably would’ve worked for me in the mid-90s. As it stands now, my math skills are pretty substandard.

[13Sisters76]

The American people should have, finally, made the public education system “obsolete” when we fell behind the Slovak Republic in math and science skills. Keeping the American people as dumb as possible is all part of the agenda. A true study of American history creates patriots, and we can’t have that now, can we?

Dewey said it- you can’t make good socialists out of individuals. And you can’t create critically thinking individuals if you mean to create a socialist utopia.

The American people will get what they demand. We SHOULD be demanding that the DOE be abolished immediately, that the fed get the hell out of education, and that the schools be returned to the hands of parents and teachers, controlled locally.

[fieldmarshaldj]

"Knowledge is Good"

[RobRoy]

Get the word out. I would like to see this go as viral as a Lady GaGa video!

And this site will spawn others, and this is really version 1.1 Imagine where this sort of thing will be in just a few short years!

If it is even possible at this point, this is what could save our culture.

[taxcontrol]

I have thought for some time now that it would be very possible to create a system of software that would run on either PCs or game consoles that would load one of the following modules:

Student
Parent
Instructor
Management

The Student module would then load an education module that would then teach a particular subject. For example 1st grade spelling, 5th grade science, US History, Algebra 1, etc. These instruction modules would be available for download from a web page similar to Ebay or Amazon. Students/Parents would be able to review, comment on and purchase the modules that work best for their children. You could even have religious studies or ethics classis as well. Individuals who make greate education videos / modules would then be compensated accordingly.

The Parent Modules would focus on providing help to the parent. Homework drills, study guides, other assistance as needed. Likewise, the free market approach could be used to allow parents the option of purchasing the modules their students needed

The Instructor Module would be targeted to the job currently held by teachers in the classroom. It would allow them to have an electronic grade book, attendance, etc

The Management Module would be targeted to the job performed by the school district for things like maintaining records, hiring, etc

Lastly, to determine where each student was and what education was needed, a test would be taken annual for each student at the start of the school year. The tests would identify the current level for each class and provide guidance for the next level of education to be taken. The tests could be administered by the local school / district or by private firm like Prometric or Silvan.

Individuals transfering from different school districts would not need to worry about their records as they could just take the placemnt tests and start with the appropriate class.

Feds would set the requirements for federal recognition and acceptance of Associate, Bacholers, Masters and PHD degrees for hiring into the Federal government. Colleges are then free to set their entrance requirements. States set the standard for their awarding of the HS Diploma and or equivilant

[Tanniker Smith]

KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!

[RobRoy]

>>Something like this probably would’ve worked for me in the mid-90s. As it stands now, my math skills are pretty substandard.<<

Don’t sell yourself short. This site can change that.

[wastedyears]

Feds would set the requirements for federal recognition and acceptance of Associate, Bacholers, Masters and PHD

I thought we wanted less federal government.

[GladesGuru]

Distance Learning is the Printing Press/12 Thesis on the Cathedral Door for education.

[Pete]

As homeschoolers for the past 11 years, we have found excellent online classes for our older children. For high school, we have found that, for us, homeschool mean home-directed. My 14 year old will take three online classes next year, each one hand picked.

[Sonny M]

Do you know how the finance and economics sections are ?

Is that the traditional liberal marxist/keynesian crap or more classical ?

[wastedyears]

I don’t really even have beer money to spend, so if I can’t illicitly obtain it, then I won’t try to right now.

But I’ll definitely keep it in my back of my mind.

Hey, Rodney Dangerfield kept selling himself short, and look where it got him.

[vikingd00d]

MIT's OpenCourseWare is good too.

[RobRoy]

I can hear it (the graphic). :)

[Netizen]

LOL I saw that math stuff on the screen and laughed. Last summer my cousin’s boy stayed with us and he had classes on computer and he was so frustrated. He had questions, but no teacher to ask. Plus when he took a quiz, or test, he couldn’t retake it if necessary until the instructor gave the ok. He must have taken some of those test/quizes 20 times. He didn’t get the algebra and there wasn’t a teacher to walk him through.

I didn’t like the idea that he could retake quizes/tests over and over. He was just guessing. What good would it be to pass something after having guessed every combination?

His mother used the online system for her other son as well, but he never did the work. She was doing it for him. The computer can’t tell who is at the other end.

School, whether online or public is as good as the student, teacher and parents involved.

Our son went through the public school system and did just fine. You get what you put into it.