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Thursday, August 09, 2012

That damned Expert

What's Mallard raving about today?

Education

Fair enough, so...what's your solution? And what's the basis for believing your solution will work?

Easy to point out things that are sub-optimal, but if you stop there, then all you are is a whiny little ass-hat.

(BTW, Mallard, care to have a conversation about spending per capita versus outcomes about our for-profit healthcare system?)

13 comments:

Kip W said...

The link takes me to a web page for USC Rossier. It says nothing about teacher salaries in the USA or elsewhere. It's just an ad for their program.

What are the odds that it's the exact same page as three to six weeks ago, when Tin Eye scribbled this illegible little note in for that little crack-hit of credibility, not meant to last much beyond the moment of being inhaled by the credulous?

CW in LA said...

Now, if you point out that the US already has the most people and highest percentage in prison in the world as a way of suggesting that harsh sentencing isn't the answer, you'll still be told never mind, there needs to be even more people behind bars and even more prisons built.

But then, the right always has been quicker to see prisons as the answer more than education.

Anonymous said...

Tinsley unfortunately himself a product of the over-priced, under-performing American public educational system, I'm afraid.

Anonymous said...

It is so easy to lie with the statistics about per capita spending. Do his include just salaries, or total spending, and how are the different currency rates and gross national product and whatever included in the calculations? Does it include for-profit, private schools?

Not to deny that US students are doing poorly. Parents' attitudes, our entertainment-obsessed culture (and the wrong-wing culture in particular) is leading to a dumbing-down in education.
DW

Anonymous said...

BTW, I can never read the web links in MF. Seem to be deliberately obscured.
DW

Raynfala said...

Furthermore, I expect Tinsley to publish a scathing indictment of Louisana's recent attempt to divert education dollars to religious schools, which have curriculums that should be self-immolating from white-hot embarrassment.

Oh, who am I kidding?

Frank Stone said...

Doonesbury is doing a much better series on the subject of educational finances this week, and it includes statistics that are not in the form of illegibly scribbled footnotes, but are part of the dialogue. You know, like a real cartoonist would do it.

Kip W said...

mat.usc.edu

Iron Dragon said...

Hmm, well how is he getting his total for spending per student? Are we looking at only public schools for one and for another are we looking at it in terms of salaries, or amount spent on books and resources? Is he remembering to average for areas, where for example some people will get very little due to low property values or the money being spent on things like a new gym, new uniforms etc. instead of say on books or teaching materials?

The point may well be valid but the better question is what the solution is, and for that matter what the SOURCE of the problem is.

Bill the Splut said...

Yeah, whev, Bruce. But of course the only way to fix the economy is to throw more money at billionaires.

Kip W said...

Bill, sounds like you've been reading Popeye!

Tog said...

Also, TheOnion's "Kelly" knocks one out of the ballpark on the subject. (Be sure to watch the accompanying "Behind the Pen" video!)

rewinn said...

One solution: send kids to private schools that cost more and don't work!