Monthly Archives: December 2014

Sentences to Ponder

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ponder

1. International educational attainment: USA fading

“One of the things that ‘everyone knows’ is that the successful economies of the 21st century will be built on high-skilled workers. The U.S. used to lead the world in educating its population, but no longer. Just spending marginally more money on the existing system isn’t likely to be a successful answer. Some deeper rethinking is needed.”

2. What the world values, in one chart

Screen Shot 2014-12-31 at 9.14.29 AM

3.

Remember, these are simple examples. I categorize the responses three ways:

  1. 50% of the people vanish
  2. 25% of the people do the assignment
  3. 25% of the people make shit happen well beyond what the assignment was

The folks who capture my attention and energy going forward are the ones in category 3. The leaders.”

4. 200,000 people applied for a one way trip to mars

“Among the few stipulations: Candidates must be between 5-foot-2 and 6-foot-2, have a ready sense of humor and be ‘Olympians of tolerance.'”

Sentence to Ponder

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ponder

1. Against invulnerability 

“Philosophies like Buddhism, Stoicism, Taoism, and possibly Epicureanism (the ancient philosophy, not its modern association with pleasures of the flesh) offer different ways of achieving such a tranquil state, and so they are tempting. I believe, however, that for most of us they are a false if beguiling path.”

I eventually came to the same conclusion, though I’m not confident that I’m right.

2. The tragedy of the American military 

“In the private report prepared for President Obama more than three years ago, Gary Hart’s working group laid out prescriptions on a range of operational practices, from the need for smaller, more agile combat units to a shift in the national command structure to a different approach toward preventing nuclear proliferation.”

3. Pain connects us

“Or, as Bastian puts it, ‘Pain is a kind of shortcut to mindfulness: it makes us suddenly aware of everything in the environment. It brutally draws us into a virtual sensory awareness of the world, much like meditation.’ The real bonding power of pain, then, may be in the pleasure we feel so acutely in its wake.”

4. You don’t rule the world 

“Expressing values helps them to signal loyalty to like-minded folks, and a commitment to norms their community holds dear. Discussing compromise, in contrast, risks your seeming a traitor to your allies, and lacking firm value principles.”

Many Sentences to Ponder

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ponder

1. Barbic on low expectations in Nashville 

“So, what does it mean when a school ‘isn’t faring that bad’ when fewer than one in four kids can read on grade level? What does it mean when a school ‘isn’t faring that bad’ when the vast majority of kids can’t do simple math equations at a proficient level?”

2. Rage Against the Common Core

“Many teachers like the standards, because they invite creativity in the classroom — instead of memorization, the Common Core emphasizes critical thinking and problem-solving. But they complain that test prep and test-taking eat away weeks of class time that would be better focused on learning.”

How many factual inaccuracies / misleading statements can you count in these two sentences? I count 4.

3. What are aliens like?

“Fifth, advanced aliens should be well adapted in both means and ends. … Advanced aliens will be very patient, but also very selfish regarding their key units of reproduction, and quite risk averse about key correlated threats to their existence.”

I wish humans were similar!

4. Jobs prevent crime for high school students

“Research on the program conducted by the University of Chicago Crime Lab and just published in the journal Science suggests that these summer jobs have actually had such an effect: Students who were randomly assigned to participate in the program had 43 percent fewer violent-crime arrests over 16 months, compared to students in a control group.”

5. 10 things political scientists know that you don’t

“Presidential elections can be forecast with incredible accuracy well before the campaign really begins. In fact, if all you know is the state of the economy, you know pretty well how the incumbent party will do.  If you account for a little bit more, like whether the country is at war, how long the president’s party has held the office, and which candidate is more ideologically moderate, you can do even better.”

6. Zadie Smith on Manhattan

“Finally the greatest thing about Manhattan is the worst thing about Manhattan: self-actualization.”

7. What if Finland’s greatest teacher taught in Indiana?

“Finland is not a fan of standardization in education. However, teacher education in Finland is carefully standardized.  All teachers must earn a master’s degree at one of the country’s research universities. Competition to get into these teacher education programs is tough; only “the best and the brightest” are accepted. As a consequence, teaching is regarded as an esteemed profession, on par with medicine, law or engineering.”

The Tone of One’s Mind

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mind blown

I’m reading Elizabeth Kolbert’s .

In a chapter on different theories of extinction, she relays some words from Charles Darwin. After reading Lyell’s Principles, Darwin wrote:

I have always thought that the great merit of the Principles was that it altered the whole tone of one’s mind.

This got me thinking: what writers / works have altered the whole tone of my mind? Some thoughts below.

The Narrowing of Free Will

The  and other similar books fundamentally changed the tone of my mind, in that they convinced that we don’t have free will, at least not likely in the sense that we perceive.

The Power of Markets, The Power of Market Failures 

While I’m not a libertarian, and I have many questions about the basic foundations of the philosophy, the blogging of Tyler Cowen, Bryan Caplan, Arnold Kling, et al has influenced how I understand the connected workings of government, markets, and citizens. The writings of have been a good counterweight here. All told, I have become a bigger believer in both markets and market failures.

Politics as Biology and Identity 

Jonathan Haidt’s  and Robin Hanson’s “politics is not about policy” blogging have heavily influenced how I understand the political world, which I now view much more through the lenses of biology and sociology rather than policy.

Status as a Driving Force 

Robin Hanson’s writing on status has dramatically increased how much I weigh the desire for status in my attempts to understand human behavior.

Wealth and History

Gregory Clark’s  made me understand what an anomoly the past two hundred years have been in terms of human wealth. For tens of thousands of years we had nothing, and then all of a sudden we had so much.

The Real Threat of Existential Risks

Nick Bostrom’s forced me to consider that humanity may very well be eliminated in the next couple hundred years. I wish we were doing more to mitigate these risks.

The Limits of Meritocracy 

I’m really not sure who to attribute this to, but over the past couple years I’ve become keenly aware that meritocracy, at its best, is simply a machine that sorts people by genetic and environmental factors. It is not as just as I once suspected. This belief has radically increased my support for for fairly high levels of taxation.

The Likelihood of Conscious Machines

Ray Kurzweil’s  opened my mind to the idea that, at some point (be it 30 or 300 or 3,000 years), artificial intelligence will likely achieve conscious status.

Data and Pragmatism

Members of NSNO’s management team and board constantly forced me to shelve ideology and theory in favor of data and pragmatism. This evolution took many years, but I now (to a greater extent, at least) approach problems through data and pragmatism rather than grand theories.

In Sum

If I had to identify a unifying theme in these learnings, it would be this: our knowledge, volition, and durability are minuscule.

One Last Note: On Schooling 

In my twenty years or so of schooling, I never took a single class that predominantly focused on any of these issues. Reading East of Eden in 9th grade did somewhat hit on free will (I wrote my term paper on the word “timshel”), and some law school classes touched on markets and regulation. But most of the ideas that have changed the tone of my mind have come from readings I undertook outside of the classroom.

What readings our conversations have changed the tone of your mind? I’d love to hear.

Experts, Thought Leaders, Consultants

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consulting

Paul Graham on how to become an expert in changing the world:

The winds of change originate in the unconscious minds of domain experts. If you’re sufficiently expert in a field, any weird idea or apparently irrelevant question that occurs to you is ipso facto worth exploring.

David Brooks on Thought Leaders:

The Thought Leader is sort of a highflying, good-doing yacht-to-yacht concept peddler. Each year, he gets to speak at the Clinton Global Initiative, where successful people gather to express compassion for those not invited. Month after month, he gets to be a discussion facilitator at think tank dinners where guests talk about what it’s like to live in poverty while the wait staff glides through the room thinking bitter thoughts.

The difference between changing the world and being a thought leader has something to do with being an expert in a specific field. In most fields, I think this probably also includes applying this expertise to real world problems in some form or another.

Between the ages of 20 and 26, I undertook a lot activism without possessing any expertise. The pinnacle of this was when, in law school, I helped lead a team that sued the state of Connecticut for underfunding public schools. It never occurred to me that Connecticut was amongst the highest education spenders in the nation, and that while there were inequities in the funding formula, funding itself was not the prime culprit for poor academic performance across the state.

Between the ages of 27 and 34, I worked in education reform New Orleans. In doing this work, I gained some level of expertise in urban education.

Now, as a consultant, I find myself in an in-between world. On one hand, I hope to use any expertise I possess to help other cities. On the other hand, I’m cognizant that any expertise I possess could expire in short order.

To avoid declining expertise, I try to do the following: (1) read very widely (2) blog (3) talk incessantly with up and coming content experts (4) take on work in areas that develop new skills.

Despite these efforts, I remain worried about losing expertise and declining into the world of the Thought Leader.

Why Aren’t Defenders of Traditional School Districts Applauding the Performance of Ohio’s Urban Charter Schools?

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Recently, CREDO published a rigorous study on Ohio charter school performance. Here is what they found for Ohio’s biggest cities:

Screen Shot 2014-12-18 at 11.47.39 PM

In sum, charter schools in Ohio’s major cities are doing roughly the same as traditional schools.

Most reform advocates, including myself, view these results as incredibly weak. Generally speaking, I’m not enthusiastic about a charter sector until I see results over .05 effect size that are ideally trending toward .1 to .2 effect sizes.

That being said, if you take the position that traditional school districts are doing a pretty good job, then, to be consistent, I think you also need to give the Ohio charter sector a pat on the back. After all, they’re basically keeping up with the traditional system.

So how come the defenders of traditional systems aren’t applauding the performance of Ohio’s urban charter schools?

Build for the Tribe

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hippy school

Speaking to the tribe entails using the language of your audience’s tribe when trying to influence them.

Here’s a related idea: build for the tribe. If you want someone to adopt your policy stance, make sure the policy delivers what their tribe wants.

Consider these two articles:

Micro Schools

“In the 2030s, when these kids are graduating, they’re going to have to be highly independent, very dynamic, able to know themselves and get from the world what they need to be happy and successful. They need to start exercising that muscle in preschool.”

“The Flatiron School is an example of what can be done with a blank slate. They have figured out how to give students highly relevant and valuable skills at a cost that is both affordable and recoupable very quickly. Adam, Avi, Sara and the entire team has created a model that should be an inspiration for others.”

What’s the commonality?

My guess: it is these types of schools that could pave the way for broad based voucher programs (though I don’t expect this to happen in the very near future).

Personalization and career tech school models are in high demand by the left. Yet, right now, the push for vouchers is intimately tied up in the expansion of religious schooling, which does speak to / appeal to the left.

Uber is proving, albeit painfully, the demand can induce deregulation.

Voucher proponents would do well to heed this lesson.

The left deeply desires school models that deemphasize testing and deliver a more “progressive” education.

Voucher demand may increase from the left if there are more private schools that offer such an education at a price roughly akin to what public schools spend.

Or to put it another way: the path to vouchers is not through God, it’s through Montessori.

One last thought: I’ve seen enough poorly designed voucher programs that I approach the issue with some pragmatic skepticism. That being said, I do think vouchers with sound regulation could deliver great, innovative options for kids, and I’d be happy to work with any folks who are trying to get such a program off the ground.