US Court: "Detroit Students Have No Right to Access to Literacy"

Access to Literacy is not a Constitutional Right Judge in Detroit rules

Just going to drop these in here. I'm not even sure what to think about my city at this point.

What is the purpose of school then? Clearly it's not teaching according to the judge.

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What is the purpose of school then? Clearly it's not teaching according to the judge.

well it's a good place to score some weed

@mdk No joke. I can legit name (first and last name) 5 people who I went to high school with whom I would bet more money that they knew how to get weed than they would actually charge for it.

Sorry, get back on topic, jeez guys!

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Brainwashing and keeping kids busy long enough for them and their parents to make money for the state that repeatedly robs them through taxes.

As true as that is, we really should re-evaluate the education system. If the left constantly complains about how the education in a homogenous authoritarian state like Singapore or Finland is better, they make the snap decision to have an authoritarian left education system. Perhaps what they're missing (and what Trump is getting right, for once) is that Washington shouldn't meddle with education. Since the education tax money seems to be going to vouchers and libraries instead of corrupt leftist unions and Common Core principles, I think there's a good chance that our education system will actually do something in the long run.

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@catchamber Sure, I can get behind the premise that there isn't a truly 'viable' long-term solution. Just so I can clarify myself, what I said earlier about vouchers and public libraries was that it was the better option, not necessarily the absolute right one. But your suggestion about digital education isn't necessarily what would help. Sure, it would get faster, arguably cheaper degrees- even then we have questions such as 'who verifies the integrity?', 'what happens to old schools?', and 'won't this cost more tax dollars in practice?'. But the real problem I'd see in faster, more accessible postsecondary education is that not every person should go to college. As mean as it sounds, it's what is causing the ridiculous rates of unemployment and underemployment (taking a job in something unrelated to your degree) among young adults. If you ask me, the proper solution to this problem is what is done in some European countries (I want to say Germany/Switzerland but I'm not 100% sure on that...): cut back on most post-secondary institutions, and create scholarships/incentives for prestigious schools on Ivy League tier. That way, we still have qualified, well-educated STEM students, and everyone else can take local classes/trades, ending the question of "what to do with a basket weaving degree".

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There is, and it's called mass archiving, distribution, and examination.

Alright, but at whose command & at whose cost? On the government dime will this be worth the trade-off?

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Integrity is based on public opinion, and measured through public feedback systems on/off-line.

Is it really holistically representative to aggregate 'public opinion'? I'd argue against such a method; leave the validity of textbooks to experts.

The old schools get remodeled or just continue as they are.

...yeah, but into what? Your proposition is more or less suggesting that these institutions are obsolete, thus useless.

It won't cost more if you transfer funds for state subsidies (i.e. GI Bill, vouchers, grants, loans) directly into the system, and force the textbook/tuition price gouging to end.

It'll do quite the contrary. Firstly, by knocking out state education subsidies, you're instantly cutting the cord on student funds (which is fine as long as it's phased out, which it isn't in this scenario). And by spitting all of that money into the system, we inflate the economy. If you throw more funding at colleges, they'll take the surplus and demand more, and the only funding government gets is foreign debt and tax dollars.

That's ridiculous, people would just create new industries and jobs. By the time everyone is unemployed, everyone can literally survive without doing anything.

Yes, new industries and jobs are being created, but are vastly outpaced by the amount of qualified students available- in other words, more demand than supply. And I'm not sure what you mean by "everyone can literally survive without doing anything"- do you mean welfare, which would create a stagnant, detrimental lower class that thrives on taxpayer-funded handouts? Or heavy underemployment, which leads to more young adults graduating with debt and no relevant, decent job to pay it off? Even in practice this is already the case, and letting it be is letting the downward spiral do its thing.

No thank you. I'd like a 21st century education system, not another generic "reform" bill that just adds more scarcity and dissolves the skill base of the economy.

You can't just say 'it's current year and modern' and expect the problems to vanish. By making a university degree worth its buck and making less advanced sectors open for local education, the end product is a more qualified, fitting employee market. "Economic skill base" isn't something you can artificially jack up. If the graduating market is underemployed, meet the standard instead of forcing the square peg in the round hole. Under the status quo there's already a disenfranchised employee market that's far too underemployed and unemployed, and making a degree a click away only furthers that issue.

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What problems don't vanish in the system I've proposed? You can jack up the economic skill base, because that's literally what the internet has done for most of the world, and we just need to archive the data in user friendly formats to maximize skill acquisition, all while bypassing the imposed need for massive student debts that slow economic growth.

Well asking the government to innovate doesn't typically work out, and the priorities are a little out of whack -- how does this help the kids in Chicago who aren't being taught to read? Here's my version:

1. Government no longer backs or subsidizes ANY aspect of college education. Universities radically reform or starve themselves to death. I suspect that reformation will look a lot like Catchamber's pretty-smart streamlining of college, only privately (which makes them accountable and responsible for the quality, rather than a faceless bureaucrat)

2. All that money (all of it) goes to high school infrastructure. Not to teachers, not to unions; kids get the things they need to learn, period.

3. Once every school (k-12) in America is up to date and current and modern and fully equipped, shut down the DoE entirely. It's up to the states to handle; federal taxes go down and states adjust their rates to locally-desired levels. That way Chicago teachers can focus on what matters for their kids, rather than learning common core or satisfying some asinine quota for No Child Left Behind funding.

If we sever federal money from education in America, we drive down cost and corruption. It's irresponsible to do that before we clean up the mess we already made by throwing big bucks at the issue and pretending it was a solution; we can roll oversight into the DOJ to handle any discriminatory practices, but the intent is to get the feds the hell out of this.

Weaknesses: all this is bad for disabled kids, who rely a LOT on federal assistance to make school happen and work. Haven't thought deeply enough about how to keep their interests covered, let's solve that before we burn DeVos's empire to the ground.

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1. Say goodbye to your economy, because you just cut off the main source of the GDP: laborers trained in postsecondary fields. Also, the system I've described isn't just for colleges, as it can work for any grade, field, or job.

Well if it's not just for college, fine. I don't think your analysis tying GDP to college graduation is accurate -- millennials have one of the highest rates of graduation in EVER, and perform the worst. Outside factors sure -- but that's a stretch on your part and I'm calling it.

2. Why not K-12, if not K-PhD? Better yet, why not just K-PhD? Actually, why focus on grades, when we can focus on courses and degrees?

*shrug* In the context of the conversation, literacy should probably come before a conversation about degrees and certs. otherwise, sure why not.

3. The DoE needs to be reformed and reduced, but definitely not axed. I can agree that taxes need to go ASAP, because conventional school revenue sources are volatile. However, the idea that the private market will sort the education industry out on its own is laughable without some sort of federal-to-municipal public education system with cheaper but higher quality services than your average private school today.

Well in the first place private education outperforms state education like 9/10 times, so it's certainly not LAUGHABLE. But that's not actually the suggestion -- the suggestion is to axe the federal contribution and oversight entirely (over probably some kind of staged withdrawal period) and give everything to the states. Not to privatize, only to de-federalize. States can do whatever they want (and we're more likely to find a good answer if we try 50 times, than if we try once).

This is bad for everyone, because the economy will contract as the private education industry will exploit the shit out of the even greater scarcity of their services, essentially draining the economy of its seed capital.

Right, and federal bureaucracies NEVER exploit the scarcity of their services. At least with private schools there's a recourse. Incidentally -- your suggestion (now that I think about it) is basically homeschooling on crack (albeit with state support) -- which (besides that state support) is about as private as it gets, so.....

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You're encouraging participation in that sector, but not growth. If no money can be made (and how could it, if every private institution is competing for the same $5 bill), that makes it a poor investment. Exclusivity is the product (that's why we even have a word for "Ivy League"); I don't know that they're gonna play along. I say that while thinking "This is a great idea," just, ya know, there's probably a reason it hasn't happened yet.

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As if tolerating the status quo, or advocating for even higher scarcity while undermining the foundations of the industry's accountability, are better alternatives.

It is the foundation of the industry's accountability. We have a whole federalized system to enforce it (accreditation). "I graduated from Harvard" is a statement that has economic value because it is not easily accessible; it has value because it means something to employers. PhD means something because of the barriers to achieving one. The change you propose (which, again -- I like!) undermines everything about the field of higher education. More power to ya -- but nobody in that industry (or any industry interested in hiring graduates) wants this. This kills them. Again, I'm okay with that, but don't expect cooperation.

The investment will massively pay itself back in countless ways, because the scarcity will decline if actively combatted, and both efficiency and profits in every sector will improve as a result. Growth is assured, because entry barriers will be removed and demand will be increased.

Rule of thumb: when you, or I, or anyone, says the words "growth is assured," that necessarily means we are talking out of our ass. Notably: enforcing a price ceiling has never once in the history of mankind encouraged growth, and never will. If we enforced this change on secondary educators at gunpoint, what we'd wind up with is a pretty good way of teaching everything we know in 2018, and in 2025 it'd be obsolete with no hope of recovery ever, because your incentives are completely out of whack. "The commons" is a tragedy, not a power ballad.

Who cares if they don't play along? They can just get their subsidies cut, if they want to continue stalling economic growth by draining capital for their short sighted benefit.

I read something once about killing the golden goose. I believe the moral was "Don't." If college education really is the driving force behind economic growth (and I don't think it is, but I gather that's part of your argument) -- you should be careful of the ways in which you fuck with it. Chaining the industry to a low-profit public good drum circle seems wildly irresponsible -- can't you just, you know.... go to a trade school, make six figures as a third-year carpenter, and laugh all the way to the bank? The only capital they're draining is what you give them willingly (and what the DoE gives them with your tax bucks, but that's more what I was talking about in my proposal).

BOILING IT DOWN: I don't believe the feds will ever do a better job of this than University of Phoenix, and everybody sued their pants off for being worthless. I don't think the feds will do a better job of this than YouTube. The private sector is much more capable of doing this job than the government will ever be, and we all already kinda think they suck at it. We're in an exploding-cart-before-the-exploding-horse conversation. I LIKE THE CART! I genuinely do. This is a terrible way of getting it to town.

Completely OOT, but whatever. I'd rather ask than look it up myself. If someone were to have, let's say, a Spanish citizenship, would they be able to work elsewhere in Europe, like the UK?

Asking for a friend.

@Xandrya Yes you can, send your friend over.

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