A return to the UK

[Dastardly]

Finding good schools and getting places at them for your kids is a massive battle in the UK. You have to live in exactly the right place, and do all the very specific preparations. Obviously this kind of "high achiever" schooling only really matters if you want to get your kid into a highly regarded university, or to study medicine etc.. But the inequalities in British education are immense.

[Drewcar]

Finding good schools and getting places at them for your kids is a massive battle in the UK. You have to live in exactly the right place, and do all the very specific preparations. Obviously this kind of "high achiever" schooling only really matters if you want to get your kid into a highly regarded university, or to study medicine etc.. But the inequalities in British education are immense.

Too bad. I pretty much lived in the UK until I was in the 7th grade. Despite not starting school until I was 7, I still managed to skip a grade when I got to the States.

The schools in my area are quite good given that it's relatively rural. We have public charter schools up here and they seem to have set the standard for academic rigor. Since they aren't funded to the extent that the standard public schools are, and rely on parental involvement, they really seem to attract parents that care about their child's education.

[veryhrm]

What, you mean about that socialist Springsteen? I never did like The Boss. I always had a feeling the fix was in somewhere when he appeared on the covers of both Time and Newsweek on the same week out of nowhere in the 70's. Bruce who?

Even with this i'm still not sure what to make of your reference to "Born in the USA". That song really makes me wonder about human rationality and all that stuff. Even though i know what it's about and i know its history of being misinterpreted i still sing along with it and FEEL that it is patriotic (in the celebratory / jingoistic sense). Same w/ "Glory Days" (and probably 20 other songs which i DON'T know about).

Someone should ban these things.

[Dastardly]

To give you an idea, you can get schools 5 miles away from each other. One where students will get an opportunity to do five GCSE's (age 16) and often be limited to a maximum grade of C, due to working from a "foundation tier" syllabus.

In the better schools, the kids will get 10 GCSE's or more, often all A* And if you saw the level of perfection required to get an A in things, let alone a A* you would be shocked.

[Drewcar]

Even with this i'm still not sure what to make of your reference to "Born in the USA". That song really makes me wonder about human rationality and all that stuff. Even though i know what it's about and i know its history of being misinterpreted i still sing along with it and FEEL that it is patriotic (in the celebratory / jingoistic sense). Same w/ "Glory Days" (and probably 20 other songs which i DON'T know about).

Someone should ban these things.

Springsteen might be the single most overrated artist of the past 30-40 years. His lyrics might be good. However, I wouldn't know because he sounds like he's taking a crap while singing.

[Drewcar]

To give you an idea, you can get schools 5 miles away from each other. One where students will get an opportunity to do five GCSE's (age 16) and often be limited to a maximum grade of C, due to working from a "foundation tier" syllabus.

In the better schools, the kids will get 10 GCSE's or more, often all A* And if you saw the level of perfection required to get an A in things, let alone a A* you would be shocked.

I probably speak from ignorance here, but it was always my impression that high school test scores (O-Levels, A-Levels and the like) really lock you into a career pathway much more in the UK than in the US. In the US you can always redeem yourself in junior college, and commence academic ass kicking in a 4-year college afterwards.

[Simma Park]

Finding good schools and getting places at them for your kids is a massive battle in the UK. You have to live in exactly the right place, and do all the very specific preparations. Obviously this kind of "high achiever" schooling only really matters if you want to get your kid into a highly regarded university, or to study medicine etc.. But the inequalities in British education are immense.

You could write the same exact thing about the U.S.

How much property tax you can afford to pay relative to people in other towns in your area has a huge impact on the quality of education your child will receive.

I probably speak from ignorance here, but it was always my impression that high school test scores (O-Levels, A-Levels and the like) really lock you into a career pathway much more in the UK than in the US. In the US you can always redeem yourself in junior college, and commence academic ass kicking in a 4-year college afterwards.

This is somewhat true. But it still takes exceptional people to break out of the "track" into which they have been placed by geographic and socioeconomic circumstances here in the U.S. However, the U.S. is more flexible than, say, East Asia in terms of how important it is to attend a "top" school. The job culture tends to take much more into account than just your grades and which school gave you your degree, whereas in East Asia everything depends on the reputation of your school, and in Europe it's somewhere in between the U.S. and East Asia.

And, although there's some of this everywhere, in the U.S. it's especially common to have "top" schools be very different depending on discipline and educational level. The more specialized you get and the higher the degree, the less strictly "top" programs and mentors are associated with prestigious school brands. A lot of this is about geographic organization; the U.S. is much more scattered and organic about where you find good institutions and pockets of cultural/intellectual fertility. Older countries have a really strong association of excellence in, well, practically everything, with a very few metropolitan centers which have been cultural nexuses for centuries.

This is obviously quite simplified--there are just too many differences with way too many facets to go into in depth here.

But the bottom line is that it's still very uncommon in the U.S. for a kid from a shitty school district to end up with a wonderful education and great job. But you have more options here if you come from decent-to-mediocre public schooling than you would with a similar background in other countries, probably.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Even with this i'm still not sure what to make of your reference to "Born in the USA". That song really makes me wonder about human rationality and all that stuff. Even though i know what it's about and i know its history of being misinterpreted i still sing along with it and FEEL that it is patriotic (in the celebratory / jingoistic sense). Same w/ "Glory Days" (and probably 20 other songs which i DON'T know about).

Someone should ban these things.

Aside from my polite dodge to jon's funning me about US citizenship I was referring to the child he and his own Dearly Beloved are about to have on US soil. Hence the child will be born . . .

The rest about Springsteen being a socialist is simply more of my polite dodgery.

[Drewcar]

Good points. Coming from a lower middle class upbringing, I just feel fortunate to have been somewhat of a wayward student that managed to steadily improve myself through JC, a mediocre 4-year college, and into one of the top grad schools in my profession. This progression has served me well in my professional career.

[B4PJS]

I probably speak from ignorance here, but it was always my impression that high school test scores (O-Levels, A-Levels and the like) really lock you into a career pathway much more in the UK than in the US. In the US you can always redeem yourself in junior college, and commence academic ass kicking in a 4-year college afterwards.

I wouldn;t say that at all. If you are going to degree level, all that seems to matter is that you have a degree, not necassarily what the degree what in. Case point, the Wife did a German Language degree with a year teaching English in Germany. She is now an accountant/Auditor.

And myself, Got a D in IT at GCSE, now a Senior Database Designer.