Is our Prime-minister blind or just stupid?
I think it is rather evident that the swedish primary school system kind of blows. Their is no pressure on students what so ever, if you are not mature enough at a reasonable age, you will fall out. This system has been progressing further with our dear socialist government the last 30 years. Even if it is a fair system, where no one is neglected or judged, it leads to a big majority of students graduating with low grades and thus competence. However, if you were mature enough to take responsibility over your own education and learning there is hope when you enter the secondary eduacational school. This is because we have a system of county funded private secondary schools (free-schools) in Sweden. This meaning that schools can operate as a private school, but instead of taking tution they get a certain amount of money allocated to them for each respective student. Why this is a good thing is because it leads to competition. Schools have an incentive to improve the standard of teaching, facilities, teachers, aims etc to attract students, thus income. This system operates side-by-side with the county public schools. These schools have a reputation of being worse in terms of education, however, they often have a lot of students and thus a lot of study opportunitites. My general experience is that people who graduated primary school with good grades and an incentive to further studies, go on to free-schools. Just because the standard is so much higher there. I myself went one year to one of those schools and studies civics. Compared to my friends eduation at the public institution it was amazing. Now to my concern. Our prime-minister announced today some points for county improvement. Among these points were his concern that the fast and vast outspreading of free-schools in Sweden are jepordazing our standardized educational system. Is he completely blind. The free-schools are what makes secondary educational in Sweden comparable to the international standard. Without this our productivity and trade competetiveness would decline to the negative within a decade. We need good and competetive education for those who wants it. Otherwise you create this lump of poorly educated people who only work as a liability to the state. I urge our prime-minister to look over his socialistic utopiotic ideals and realize what actually is best for our country. It is not to late to improve our schools, it just takes the right ambition. So, grow up Persson, leave the education for people who actually is bright enough to benefit from it!!!
posted by Dale @ 2/16/2006 03:25:00 PM
6 Comments:
We had a discussion about this once and I see your point. But I still think that it's not just that simple. I mean, the Finnish comprehensive education has produced the highest scoring students in the world according to the PISA tests. There is no other kind of schooling at comprehensive level in Finland than public, if you exclude Steiner (and maybe a few others of the same kind that I am just not aware of). My point is that it's not about competition between schools and it really should not be at comprehensive level (later on it's more acceptable). But at this point we are trying to guarantee an education for everyone, so that we would all have equal opportunities for further studies. The problem lies within the education system. The Finnish system is far from perfect and I have discussed this several times with my frineds who work at schools. Making schools compete with each other at this point is not the answer. Making the system's methods compete against each other you might find ways in which it could be possible to improve the standard of teaching.
I express myself really badly with this but since we've been through this before, you know what I mean :)
I understand what you mean. But the thing is that I have to see this out from a Swedish perspective, and not the finnish one. In sweden the public school sucks. And the private ones don't. You do not have to pay anything to attend a private one, so basically the only difference is that there are more schools available for the student to choose from. Which also implies that the school can specialize on a certain area, ie my previous school only taught civics and economics. This leads to a more specialized system where the student can choose where to go according to interest and be sure to get the best teachers in that area. Ofcourse the best schools with the best teachers etc, are more selective. But there is not chance that someone would be rejeted secondary education because of low grades or something similar. And especially not because of external factors such as class or financial status. Given than ofcourse that the student have actually passed the elementary school, if not he/she has to attend a catch-up course at the university. My point is that this system allows students to choose where to go and what to study, and when doing so choosing according to individual preferences and needs.
In Finland the public schools are good, the standard is high and people graduate with a good education. The majority of the public schools in Sweden. though, do keep a lower standard of teaching than the private ones. Also students with the same capability and ambition tend to attend similar schools which means that you can study with people with similar interests. The public school in Sweden is beyond saving, due to bad finances, low wages, old systems etc. Ofcourse you could try to save it by further increasing spending and such. But I feel that the private free-school system we have is better. Schools have a financial interest in attracting students, which leads to more efficient spending and better quality in general. They are ran as business with a sense of competition, they cannot count on money from the state everytime they need it, as the public school. This implies that the free-schools constantly has to be aware of the newest techology, newest programs, the best teaching methods etc. Just to attract students and thus money. Most of these schools have been funded by teaching staff at public schools who have been fed up with the management and poor quality. That is why I feel that the free-school system is the best future solution, for Sweden that is.
Still emphasising that I do get your point. Nevertheless, I do wonder how many students know what they would like to specialise in? I for one could not. It's excellent for those who know exactly what they want but the majority are students with some preferences over others but not any clear pattern in their areas of interest.
exactly. and for those the big schools exist, where they offer all 11 programs. but for those who know what they want to do, the free schools exist. it is a win-win system
I'm suspicious.
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