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I have started a new article on History of Education in the United States. It will be much longer than the history section here, and have a useful bibliography. Rjensen 03:37, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
In the last year, the fairly clear descriptive table that was in this article has been replaced with a coloured table that groups years into different educational establishments. It gives each year a grade. The table needs a descriptive key to make it work. Are the abbreviations some form of US standrad nomenclature? If so could someone produce a reference to a definitions page (eg a US government page or ...). (((Meanwhile I have put Freshman/Sophomore/Junior/Senior into the table. These terms are incomprehensible to most non-US folk and must be clearly explained for general discussions about US education to be understood.))) -- SGBailey 20:35, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
In the curriculum issues section, it said that "A majority of people in the United States support evolution, a majority also supports creationism." I am paraphrasing a bit, but it did say that there is a majority of people who advocate evolution, and a majority that advocates creationism. I changed it so that it now says that a majority advocates evolution, but many advocate creationism. I am not sure though what the majority is though. If someone does no which side has more supporters, please change what I wrote. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 74.100.0.150 ( talk) 21:35, 30 April 2007 (UTC).
"The United Nations assigned an Education Index of 99.9 to the United States, ranking it number 1 in the world, a position it shares with about 20 other nations.[1]"
- not true, at least not true according to the link given to support this claim. Education index for the US is 0.97 (which is a good result, but not number 1 in the world).
I remove this statement until valid evidence is provided. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.29.87.54 ( talk) 06:39, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
"In the subject of teaching in the United States, many other countries criticize the fact that American students learn very little about the world outside America. This has long been the subject of a section on Australian ABC comedy The Chasers War on Everything called "Firth in the U.S.A". Charles Firth attempted to pass off well-known historical world landmarks as Australian, such as the Leaning Tower of Pisa and Mount Rushmore. All those interviewed believed him."
I moved this from history to competitiveness. It looks like that's where it was intended to be. I don't think it should be included in the article, though. It says that it is a fact that American students learn very little about the world outside America, then it goes on to give worthless supporting evidence. The evidence given is anecdotal, unscientific and could be easily manipulated by the show's producers. They could simply not include the Americans who knew the correct answers. Also, it looks like a plug for this tv show. It might be worth keeping to describe a belief among non-Americans that Americans are uneducated about the rest of the world, though. 67.168.61.168 18:31, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
This article completely misses the point of the International Baccalaureate, which is obviously (look at the name) not a part of the American educational system.
I am challenging the following edit: [1]. On 30 October 2006, User:Lordmetroid switched the article from what was previously an accurate and very readable table of grades to the predecessor of the very strange grade table in the article. The current table is highly inaccurate and constitutes original research in violation of Wikipedia official policy Wikipedia:No original research. NO ONE in the United States uses the abbreviations given in that table (e.g., H10 for the high school sophomore year). The ONLY grade that is routinely abbreviated to a letter by Americans is kindergarten, which is abbreviated to K as in K-12.
If no one defends the status quo, I'm reverting back to the original table in two weeks. -- Coolcaesar 08:16, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
Could somebody possibly add an explanation of K16 study in the opening section. Presumably the term is obvious to someone in the US but is meaningless to everyone else. I can find no Wiki link for K16. It sounds as though it ought to be a new incarnation of the dog K-9 from Doctor Who! Also I am totally perplexed by the sections on grades and grading scales. You need to explain these concepts more fully bearing in mind that most countries don't use the grade system. Age equivalents would be helpful in the text for non-US readers. (See the article on Educational stages for some examples.) Dahliarose 11:05, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
This section needs some further explanation as it is somewhat baffling for non-US readers. The tables seem to reflect some type of marking scheme but when are children given these marks? Are the grades based on internal school examinations or externally marked examinations or are they based on some form of continuous teacher assessment? Are children given grades every week, every month, every term or just at the end of the school year? Dahliarose 08:49, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
Does this author realize that Kindergarten is just one year in the US? I know that there are some kids who can wait until they are 6, but I've not heard of them waiting until 7 to attend.
Also, there are states where the school system is rigidly age-oriented. The child starts Kindergarten at 5 and can neither be advanced or held-back. It is a belief that it stunts the child socially. These schools offer advanced and remedial instruction by forming classes into smaller groups, thus attempting to provide the child with a challenging, yet not too challenging, education. This was the approach in Louisville, KY.
It is also important to state how many hours per day each grade typically spends in school and with what length of breaks. Our system is totally different than the Germany system, for example. They learn nothing in Kindergarten for 3-4 years. They then go to 1st grade at 6-7 years old. The 1st and 2nd grades last only 4 hours a day. From the 3rd grade on, they are only in school for 5 hours a day. Their new "full-day" schools includes after-school care and school club activities, but no actual increase in instructional time. People here cannot conceive of the idea that we train our kids to function in the work world by sending them for 7-7 1/2 hours per day, after the 6th grade - if this has not changed since my day - and give them 2 15 minute breaks and a 1/2 for lunch.
heatherceana
Shouldn't the second sentence say, "primary and secondary" instead of "elementary and high school"? (because "primary and secondary" includes middle school) Dlkcsmith 00:16, 15 July 2007 (UTC)
Wow you mean to tell me theres no criticism of the American public school system??!!....Yeah riiiight somebody's being TOO neutral if you ask me -- Blackdragon6 18:09, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
This article is about education in the United States yet it makes use of the term "postgraduate" in two instances. I thought that this term was used in Europe and that Americans almost always use "graduate school" to refer to post-tertiary education. Is there a reason why this terminology (postgraduate) is being used in this article? It would seem that being consistently accurate would be more importance than trying to vary word choice. 18.96.6.53 ( talk) 00:05, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
Someone provided a link to the NCES data tables which state - "In millions of dollars (141,322 represents $141,322,000,000). For school years ending in year shown below" Yeah, $141,322,000,000 does not equal 1.14 trillion. It equals 141 Billion. Sloppy. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.118.56.244 ( talk) 22:23, 4 December 2007 (UTC)