There is also the college prep angle. I don't recall if this is the case in high school, but college classes (and later the workforce) stick you in a group with other people and give you enough work that going it alone is problematic, by sheer volume. So, if you have teamed up with people that don't understand the course material in the way that you do, it is in your interests to help them understand because your grade depends on their understanding.

When I was given two or three weeks to tackle a large programming project with 4 other students, there was simply no way for me to do all of the work (by design). If I was able to explain the salient points to my group-mates, this was a net time saver and gave me a good grade. This is often relevant to me now in grad school. Given that I have a good number of years on a lot of the people I get paired up with, I often take lead on group projects, dole out roles, and email them third-party links containing tutorials or supplemental information to the lectures/reading.

Like it or not, fair or unfair, their performance affects my grade. I consider myself fortunate to have developed an ability to help people understand difficult concepts. Without that skill, I wouldn't be in striking distance of graduating the master's program with a 4.0.

__________________
"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

The business angle is relevant. There might be a way around it in requiring a set time of community service in every FAFSA package, or possibly giving a small scholarship to people who volunteer to fill the holes in the system when they get out of college, after a couple years in the work force to make sure they are qualified. It throws a monkey wrench into industry that way though... I'd have to give it more thought. Maybe allow graduates to work under retirees who are teaching as some sort of assistant/apprentice (for a nominal salary just above the poverty line), in order to gain a positive mark on their resume for both community service and experience simultaniously?

As far as the retirees go, perhaps an option for either a regular salary or some sort of deferred or permanent tax break for those who volunteer a few years of their time to the betterment of their community would do the trick? That way, they could keep more of their money when the went back to consulting. It would have to be subject to a performance review, but it's workable I think. It could work as both incentive to teach and as a more or less permanent economic stimulus.

The system you describe in the final paragraph is somewhat similar to what I know of the Japanese educational system. It seems to work for the most part, so I wouldn't object too strenuously to that.

Anyhow... IDEAS!

__________________

He's come to save the day!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVFdAJRVm94

Sure, that is also an option. Of course, applied as a general principle in the current public education system, I see two logistical problems with this:

(1) You're letting students (or their parents) arbitrarily decide how to pace their education. So, you will have a situation where a handful of the slow kids are taught and the majority of the adolescents are trusted to "read ahead" on their own. Come evaluation time, you have 20 different kids studying 10 different areas of the book (estimating generously, 10 of them probably play video games on their cell phones by way of "moving on").

(2) If you put 50 people in the room and ask them to raise their hands if they believe that they're smarter than at least half of the people in the room, you'll probably see 40 hands raised. If you ask them the same question about their children, all 50 hands will go up. So, if children are allowed to "move on" because they learn more quickly, every parent is likely to be sitting in the parent-teacher conference, demanding that their child be allowed to move on.

These are just logistical issues as I see them with that idea. I don't have any vested interest in the functioning of the public school system. I only have the matter of perspective of someone who went through it and was consistently and relentlessly under-stimulated by it. If you can find some way for your son to learn at a pace that suits him well, more power to you. He'll be a fortunate child.

__________________
"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

It kind of works that way, sometimes, but most of the time not so much. Individual assignments were still the norm when I was in school, and I doubt it has changed. Occasionally, you do get group assignments, but even then, by and large they are so easy that you don't actually need help. And group assignments as such only come in science and liberal arts type classes, never in mathematics, which is problematic for a subject so few people seem to be naturally skilled at.

__________________

He's come to save the day!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVFdAJRVm94

Most of the math courses I took 300 level (propositional logic, combinatorics/game theory, advanced calculus, numerical theory, etc) and up gave out major assignments in groups (with some minor individual assignments). Ditto engineering coursework. I suppose this could vary from school to school, but I have experience with two institutions in these types of courses, and colleagues in similar programs have confirmed this experience.

If you're talking about Calc 101, or College Algebra or something, I could see it. Serious math lends itself to group work - not always my cup of tea, but attacking the problem sets from multiple perspective often led to a hybrid approach that could address individual shortcomings.

Thinking back on my grad school program, I'm not sure that I have taken a single class where it wasn't at least an option to form a group (I did opt a few times to do projects on my own).

__________________
"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

I understand what you are saying... however... as a parent, it is my job to see to it that my son is doing the absolute best and learning everything he can at this stage. At this age, kids are like sponges (well... most are) and it is important to teach them as much as they can handle. If he is smart enough to read on a 6th grade level and do pre-algebra, then I feel that is the level that he should be learning on. If he needs help in a specific area, it is also my job as a parent to help him in that way as well. I would NEVER expect the more intelligent kids in class to be held back until my son understood.

But, that is just me. I guess maybe I expect too much from the "public" educational system. But, for now, that is the only option that I have.

I believe that kids should be learning things they don't know. It keeps them interested. When the teacher goes over and over and over and over the same things in class the kids that understand get bored and lose interest. Which, to me, is a complete waste of talent and intelligence.

And I really do understand the entire teamwork concept, but let's work on the kids' reading comprehension and mathematical skills first. They have plenty of time to work on team building concepts.

Of course fifteen year olds are reading Dr. Seuss. Most of them are reading it to their children.

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During the journey we commonly forget its goal. Almost every profession is chosen as a means to an end but continued as an end in itself. Forgetting our objectives is the most frequent act of stupidity.
-Friedrich Nietzsche, The Wanderer and his Shadow

All good socialists have villas in Southern France. That's not the point.
-Eurosocialist

Oh snap!

By the time I was fifteen, the school system had pretty much illustrated itself to me as a complete joke. This is, of course, coming from a person who continually got put in remedial classes and dropped out until I was eighteen and they let me test out for my diploma (a four month process which took me two weeks) with the information I learned going to private school up to grade six.

Essentially, the only thing high school taught me was that I could do a much better job of educating myself, which I promptly did.

__________________
During the journey we commonly forget its goal. Almost every profession is chosen as a means to an end but continued as an end in itself. Forgetting our objectives is the most frequent act of stupidity.
-Friedrich Nietzsche, The Wanderer and his Shadow

All good socialists have villas in Southern France. That's not the point.
-Eurosocialist

Why do the poor people think rich schools are better? Less crime, better activites, better grades, etc.

__________________
"To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his father has acquired too much, in order to spare to others who (or whose fathers) have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, "to guarantee to everyone a free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it."

-Thomas Jefferson

I know there are plenty of schools, but it doesnt even have to be rich people. Why dont middle class neighborhoods start their own schools so they dont have to send their kids to crappy public schools?

__________________
"To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his father has acquired too much, in order to spare to others who (or whose fathers) have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, "to guarantee to everyone a free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it."

-Thomas Jefferson

Likely because they can't afford to pay for 2 school systems.
The majority of property taxes pay for education. The average cost to send a kid to school is, what $8,000? So we take out kids out of public school and fork over another 8 grand to educate them in our community school. If you're doing very well, you can afford that, but a family making 50K/year, can't spare another 8 large.
Don't be telling me that if enough kids were taken out of the public schools that taxes would come down. The libs would find somewhere to spend the extra money.
What we need is a voucher system where you get rebated a large portion of your property taxes if you opt out of public education. Better yet, privatize all education. Why should I be paying to send your kids to school?

Because the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer is better than the rich getting richer and the poor getting illiterate.

__________________
During the journey we commonly forget its goal. Almost every profession is chosen as a means to an end but continued as an end in itself. Forgetting our objectives is the most frequent act of stupidity.
-Friedrich Nietzsche, The Wanderer and his Shadow

All good socialists have villas in Southern France. That's not the point.
-Eurosocialist

Me getting richer is better than anything. What everyone else does is their own problem. I know. Freedom. Wacky idea.

__________________
"To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his father has acquired too much, in order to spare to others who (or whose fathers) have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, "to guarantee to everyone a free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it."

-Thomas Jefferson

Any society which does not allow the poor to advance is not a free society. How is it you don't understand this?

__________________
During the journey we commonly forget its goal. Almost every profession is chosen as a means to an end but continued as an end in itself. Forgetting our objectives is the most frequent act of stupidity.
-Friedrich Nietzsche, The Wanderer and his Shadow

All good socialists have villas in Southern France. That's not the point.
-Eurosocialist