Education Levels by Country

[ShadowHM]

...maybe there's a bit of resentment over the Teachers' Pension Fund and the fact they own far too much of the Maple Leafs to make me comfortable.

I don't understand. Why does that make you uncomfortable?

The Ontario Teachers Pension Plan has 154,000 current contributors and 89,000 pensioners in it. It is mandated for them......they cannot opt out of it.

Think of it as a giant mutual fund, that has to find reasonable places to park its money and get a return on it.

Would it bother you to have any other Mutual Fund be a part owner of the Leafs? Would you feel better if it was the University of Toronto endowment fund instead?

Or were you happier when that bastion of uprightness, decency and lack of whining called Harold Ballard owned them outright? :unsure:

As investment choices go, it isn't all that bad. It could have been Enron, or even the Ottawa Senators, eh? And, at least the fund is investing in Ontario. :P Heck, some of those people whose money is tied up in that fund might even be Leafs fans.

[Elric of Grans]

Hail Shadow,

I can only comment on Australia, of cause, and I must say, we are so stupid it baffles me! The average High School graduate is barely literate in my experience, and I am constantly shocked by a decreasing intelligence in University students. As a lovely little story, I once met the cream of a University, and ended up hurting with laughter as one student (Engineering) was unable to read the word 'Wednesday' - the whole "Whe-whe-whed-whednes-whednesday" bit tickled my fancy, even if I were disgusted.

Then again, given the level of the Australian Education system, does it really matter? After all, you can always come to University to 'study' surfing, and other such wonderful areas vital to the world. It'll only get worse too, as funding is ever cut from most everything - except the important things, like Law. After all, everyone knows we need more people studying a degree they'll never use (I don't know: do you guys also have a lot of commedians who studied Law for some inexplicable reason?), and those that do have about a 50% chance (please note, 90% of all statistics are made up ;) ) of chosing to make the world a worse place.

As you can probably tell, I think quite highly of our education system: after all, I am sure there are not too many other places where you would have teachers who care so less they don't even teach anything, and make up marks on assignments they did not create, to create the illusion they did something over the year. Now, don't get me wrong: I'm not completely against teachers. Two of my mates are in it, and I had a couple of good teachers in the past: it's just the education system itself I find pathetic. But fear not: we are apparently #7 in the world...gee, that makes me feel all the better about the future.

Roll on the Apocalypse: anything could be an improvement!

[FoxBat]

Any one measure can't possibly touch this topic.

First, one needs to distinguish what is the minimum required level for those who pass, what is the average level of those who pass, and furthermore what recources are available for the upper percent to take advantage of. There are probably more distinctions to be made, but these at least can differ quite widely within the same school, and none of them even touch the issue of the quality of learning itself. How hard it is to pass is not necessarily a measure of the school, but rather a measure of the meaning of the grade or document the school will give you.

Second, I think it is important to distinguish among the various levels of education. The U.S. is likely lagging behind among pre-college education, but the college education is still a lot better than in many other places, because

A) There is more breadth, as opposed to increasing specialization in more places.

B) There is less focus on memorization, and more upon understanding.

While Japanese high school is quite rigorous (arguably too much so), most of their colleges are a joke by American standards. It's quite hard to get in, but not much is expected from you once you're in there.

[Occhidiangela]

Is applied to cost of living, and Bishy, the price of everything here in the US is rather high. Even in lil' ol' South Texas. :)

Why do you think that they made LOTR in New Zealand, besides it being a neat and beautiful place? The cost was less by quite a bit. (one third, I have haerd)

So, multiply your NZ teacher salary by between two and three, and see how it would compare, then re think your "only" question.

[WarBlade]

Why do you think that they made LOTR in New Zealand, besides it being a neat and beautiful place?  The cost was less by quite a bit. (one third, I have haerd)

Cost is only one part of the equation and for Lord of the Rings, hinging an argument on cost alone really doesn't do justice to the equation as a whole, even when the scenery was vauguely taken into account.

Try instead Stephen King's: The Tommyknockers or Cleopatra 2525 for a purely cost focused look at American savings by NZ filming. I think we're making another one of those damn Power Rangers series now too! :blink:

So, multiply your NZ teacher salary by between two and three, and see how it would compare, then re think your "only" question.

You are right though. The cost of living here is considerably less for a comparable standard of life. It's a situation that works well for a country who's primary export is tourism and visitor's dollars can buy a good holiday . . .

An ex-pat Dane visiting from America once looked out the window and said to me, "That's a million dollar view back in the States". I don't know if that was an exaggeration or what, but it does make a noticeable point.

[Occhidiangela]

Had Jackson wanted to make LOTR in America, his interview on the web reflected that the expected it to have cost about three times as much.

I don't think that cost was 'the' driver, but I think the lower cost aspect of filming in NZ allowed him to sell the risk/reward equation in a favorable light so that New Line would put the dough into it. It also, ironically, culled the possible actors down to those who would commit, and "get away from it all" to do the filming. :) Considering also that he needed raw scenic beauty in abundant supply, and a populace that would put up with sword armed nutcases (like Vitgo Mortensen, who reputedly went everywhere with his sword) without panicking, and that he is from NZ himself . . . it looks like the right choice was made for a number of good reasons.

[WarBlade]

Had Jackson wanted to make LOTR in America, his interview on the web reflected that the expected it to have cost about three times as much.

It's usually about twice as much, but considering the nature of this particular beast, three I suppose might be about right.

It also, ironically, culled the possible actors down to those who would commit, and "get away from it all" to do the filming. :)

Actually those are getting quite easy to find when it comes to short term projects like movies. Sample dialogue: "New Zealand? Cool! I always wanted to go there!" :lol: And too many of them realize that local laws allow them to retain properties here, so you get people like Dennis Conner and John Travolta who keep holiday homes.

Considering also that he needed raw scenic beauty in abundant supply, and a populace that would put up with sword armed nutcases (like Vitgo Mortensen, who reputedly went everywhere with his sword) without panicking, and that he is from NZ himself . . . it looks like the right choice was made for a  number of good reasons.

Truth be known, one can't actually wander around anywhere with a sword. I've had to be a little cautious myself at times.

As for reasons, one of the main ones that American directors quickly get surprised by is the crew. In the States everyone has a particular job and they stick to their own field more, because of safety issues and how damage claims work when things go wrong and force of habit etc. etc. Here, everyone is a problem solver with a level of teamwork that must look to outsiders like some kind of hive mind. People help eachother out constantly. A big contributing factor to this is many local film projects are underfunded labours of love and people just get used to making do with what they have - Compare a labour of love against a better-funded industry and patterns begin to emerge.

I've worked in both film and music performance related areas and it's funny hearing some of the stories coming from societal differences when these projects roll into town. ;)

[--Pete]

Hi,

In the States everyone has a particular job and they stick to their own field more, because of safety issues and how damage claims work when things go wrong and force of habit etc. etc. Here, everyone is a problem solver with a level of teamwork that must look to outsiders like some kind of hive mind.

A large factor contributing to the "that's not my job" mentality is the force of the unions. In most cases, a person cannot get a job on a production crew unless they are in a union. And, one way to be blackballed from a union is the willingness to do someone else's work. This, of course, increases the number of people on a project so that at any given time there are more standing idly about waiting to do their bit of work. In addition, union rules often require certain positions to be filled all the time even if the need for those services are only sporadic.

I wonder how different that is in NZ and how much that contributes to the lower cost of filming there.

--Pete

[Naddybear]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned yet, many euro countries have separate academic/vocational tracks. That would explain the absence of countries that might be on this list otherwise, like France and Germany. Also, afaik, in NZ and possibly Australia as well, isnt university almost completely paid for by the govt, so a student who gets in doesnt have to take out $100k+ in loans? If college were free in US i think a lot more ppl would go. If college were free i would never leave, personally.

Beyond that, at the risk of offending a great many ppl... I go to school at Cal Berkeley, and there are many foreign students here. Now i take it the foreign students that are here are sort of, cream of crop types and dont reflect the average high school grad from Germany, etc. On the other hand the student pop at Cal isnt the dregs either, ok we're no Harvard in terms of the student body IQ but we're not retards either. And i just have to say, if you compare the academic background of the euro students vs the american ones here, its downright embarrassing.

[--Pete]

Hi,

And i just have to say, if you compare the academic background of the euro students vs the american ones here, its downright embarrassing.

Which ones are (or should be) embarrassed? Had a "euro" (I think that's a unit of currency, the adjective, I believe, is "European") student written this post instead of you, would I have been more or less able to figure out what the point was?

--Pete

[whyBish]

I guess that depends on what you base your 'market basket' on for CPI. I did a study last year comparing NZ/U.S./Canada for my own personal spending scheme, and N.Z. came out on the bottom (Tax & exchange rates accounted for). I definately wouldn't let my market basket be solely based on film industry ;-) I do admit however that the transportation costs may have influenced my numbers in hindsight, since I get away with the cost of petrol not directly influencing my own CPI (although there would be a slight correlation due to distribution costs of other goods that I use)

For N.Z. CPI figures etc. you can go to http://www.statisticsnz.govt.nz/

[Skandranon]

OISE has NOTHING to do with Teachers.  It is the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto.

OISE is also affliated closely with the University of Toronto's Faculty of Education. I've bloody worked for them, so stop being preachy. I know who and what they are. NOTHING to do with teachers couldn't be farther from the truth. I also know that OISE and the provincial government have a fairly adversarial relationship (or, at least, every OISE staff member I've ever met), and your implication that OISE is somehow a mouthpiece for the Government is totally fallacious. I think I'm not the only one in this thread with biases to overcome.

[Naddybear]

Which ones are (or should be) embarrassed?  Had a "euro" (I think that's a unit of currency, the adjective, I believe, is "European") student written this post instead of you, would I have been more or less able to figure out what the point was?

Umm... I cant figure out if this is a genuine question or you are being catty towards me. Well the correction of "euro" is pretty catty I think. If you want me to spell out the last four letters each time I can, though. Anyway, I dont like to make assumptions so I will take your Q at face value.

I'm saying European students, in my experience, are of a higher academic caliber than their American peers. Not "smarter", mind you. And I explicitly note that students who come here from Europe are likely to be good students rather than poor ones. It comes across not only in the classroom but in everyday socializing. I'm always astounded how just about every European student I've met is so well read in the "canon" and informed about historical and current events.

The point was simply, that a strictly formalistic comparison of educational attainment levels does not reveal very much. Hardly a novel point to be sure. But the rather mundane point was a vehicle to list two examples of why the comparison noted in the original post of this thread is not valid.

[Skandranon]

Forgive me for saying so, but your post reads like that of a man who has no personal involvement with the system.

Well, it depends on what you call personal involvement. Being a fairly recent graduate of that system, I'd say I have had some personal involvement, wouldn't you?

And, I am staggered to hear you say that you know doctors (I will assume Medical Doctors and not Ph.D.'s in History) and lawyers who would love to make $35 K per year. 

You mean, you are staggered to know such a thing?

In raw numbers, sure, it looks like doctors make a lot more. But factor in taxes (typically in the 50%+ range), the clawback (that special doctors' only tax "just because") the wages of clerical staff, maintenance for the office, and the increasingly large costs of malpractice insurance, and that number drops pretty fast.

And as for $35K - that's for teachers with minimum experience, and I'm not talking about doctors with minimum experience. How much does a teacher with 35-40 years' experience get paid?

We have a government in Ontario right now that is both paternalistic and evangelical about 'their' solutions to problems.   So we have a 'funding formula' that assumes that all schools and school boards are the same. 

Yes, but the positive is that it curtails massive waste. I have seen schools spend all their funding on the largest trivialities in order to be able to claim that they needed it all and that their budget can't be reduced. One school near my area built a lavish playground set (swings, jungle gym, the works). Now, that's not what I object to. What I object to is, over the last three years, they tore it down, built a new one, repainted the new one, tore the new one down, trucked in giant boulders (for what earthly reason, I cannot say), then had half the boulders removed and are now constructing their third playground set (this one might be more permanent). At the same time they removed and then replaced their softball diamond.

Now, they may have had perfectly valid reasons for doing all of these things, I don't know, I'm not on their board. But I just don't see any of these things as being critical enough to spend money on, especially when times are tight. Can't it wait?

Yes, we lose a lot, and I share your concern over the slashing of special programmes for ESL, transportation and the like. I am perfectly willing to say that yes, there are a lot of negatives to the funding formula. No approach is perfect. But, and I admit I see this from a econocentric perspective, I see those things as less important right now. I'm not convinced that throwing money at the problem will solve it - especially when we don't have much money to throw.

Basically, it's not that I don't see the problems in the current system. I do. But I'm firmly convinced that there really isn't a better alternative. I'd love to see every school board, everywhere, get all the money it needs now and forever, along with enough teachers to ease the workload, small classroom sizes, etc, etc. Yet reality asks - how are we going to do it? And we answer, we can't do it all, we have to do what we can afford to do. I think the government's being a little stingy, but I'm certainly further toward their side in the conflicting analyses of what we can afford to do.

[Skandranon]

I don't understand.  Why does that make you uncomfortable?

Because it's a pension plan. Because its goal is to make money.

I don't resent it for that. It's a pension plan. It's supposed to make money.

But it's in charge of a hockey team. And a hockey team's goal is to win championships first, make money second. In these days in the NHL, where money spent is increasingly linked to success (the Sens being a happy exception), a profit-motive is a liability.

Would it bother you to have any other Mutual Fund be a part owner of the Leafs?  Would you feel better if it was the University of Toronto endowment fund instead?

Or were you happier when that bastion of uprightness, decency and lack of whining called Harold Ballard owned them outright?   :unsure:

No, no, and an emphatic NO to those three. For an example of what I consider model franchise owners, look at the owners of the Dallas Mavericks and Sacramento Kings of the NBA. They won't shy away from trimming the profit if they're going to win. Heck, they're accepting losses so they can win. (Well, that's going a little far. But the Leafs are $24.5M in the black, they can trim that back a little for a free agent or two...)

As investment choices go, it isn't all that bad.   It could have been Enron, or even the Ottawa Senators, eh?   And, at least the fund is investing in Ontario.  :P   Heck, some of those people whose money is tied up in that fund might even be Leafs fans.

As investment choices go, it's the closest thing to a sure bet as you can find in Ontario. The Leafs are always going to sell out. They will always have people buying their tickets, no matter how outrageous the prices. It's a great investment - but the fact that they look at it as an investment is what makes me uncomfortable.

[Elric of Grans]

Hail Naddybear,

I don't know about the Kiwis (though, I'd not be surprised to hear they have a good deal), but over here I shall have a little bit of debt when I graduate ;) Some students pay up front, but the rest are covered by the government - and they have to pay that back the moment the tax office notes they are earning over some minimum per anum. I did once look what I'll owe when I graduate from my two degrees, but I cannot for the life of me remember; don't particularly care, as I doubt I'll ever earn enough to pay it back either :blink:

Free education? Ha, I wish :lol:

[ShadowHM]

  It's a great investment - but the fact that they look at it as an investment is what makes me uncomfortable.

Thanks for the clarification Skan. :)

I see where you are coming from now.

[ShadowHM]

I am sorry Skandranon.

I don't buy the argument that recently graduating gives you a whole lot of perspective. So you saw first-hand the events at one series of schools. You attended how many School Board meetings? You reviewed how many budgets? You asked how many educators about overall education policy?

You did point out one absolute turkey of a policy that took place - the 'use it or lose it' part of school budgeting. As far as I know, it is still there too, as stupid as it is. However, the example you used could have other reasons, and you are assuming only the one - i.e. you apparently have not asked.

The tear-down and re-build of old school playgrounds has more than one thing driving it.
First question: is it really on school property? There is a city park adjoining my sons' elementary school, and while it looks like it is part of the school, it is emphatically not, for funding and for liability issues.
Second question: Was it built to safety codes in the first place? The contractor himself might have had to pay for the first re-build.
Third question: Were you aware that the entire T.D.S.B. had to tear down a huge number of playgrounds due to changes in the provincial safety codes and the ensuing liability issues? Some of them were re-built with community fund-raising to match funds. And all of them that were re-built were done so after consulting the community (i.e. home and school association committees for design ideas).

As to the 'can't it wait' question: Liability issues cannot wait. The increasingly litigious nature of our society dictates that one. So, once the playground is gone, there is a ground-swell of community outrage. It isn't just the children who attend a school who use a school playground. The entire community does, and they can and do drive the priorizing of spending, especially when they fund-raise to match costs.

Now that I have, I hope, convinced you that you REALLY need to research some more, I want to address your other comments.

But, and I admit I see this from a econocentric perspective, I see those things as less important right now. I'm not convinced that throwing money at the problem will solve it - especially when we don't have much money to throw.

Throwing money at a problem is seldom a good answer. On that we can agree easily. But the system has been plundered, at least in Toronto. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been sucked out of that system. And my property tax certainly did not go down to match it.

Instead I got a $75 cheque to console me for the governments recanting of its policy on trying to make me personally pay something close to the true cost of energy in this province, instead of absorbing it in my income taxes. And they spent $10 million of tax money to send it out via cheques to the whole province just before Christmas instead of saving the $10 million and merely deducting the $75 from my next bill, which arrived only three weeks after Christmas. Do you start to see why I find it hard to believe in the 'we can't afford it' story?

Investing in education, with the caveat that it has to be investing as opposed to throwing money at it, is the most important investment a society can make. We have agreed that there are systemic problems that need addressing. I don't see them being addressed well at all.

The most cynical way you can look at education is that you are preparing the next round of tax-payers for participation in the economy. Taking money away from E.S.L. (for example) is utterly stupid in that light. We have an unprecedented number of immigrants within the T.D.S.B. - not children of immigrants who started within the system, but children who came here and started within the system afterward. We need them to be able to communicate in at least one of our official languages ASAP, and the sooner we do it, the sooner they will thrive within the system instead of dragging on it.

[--Pete]

Hi,

I really couldn't tell from your first post if you thought the American or European students were better prepared. Thanks for clearing that up.

However, I must point out that while you are cautioning others "that a strictly formalistic comparison of educational attainment levels does not reveal very much", you base your opinion on limited personal experience. Consider the students that don't go to college, that go to college out of state, that go to college out of country. Some of where one goes to school is driven by economic necessity, but a lot of it is driven by scholastic ability and performance. In fact, most schools have different (and higher) requirements for non-residents than they have for residents. So, it would not be far fetched to think that the European students whom you've met at UCB *might* just represent the best of their class and not be representative of their native school system.

Again, the singular of "data" is not "anecdote".

--Pete

[Occhidiangela]

Investing in education, with the caveat that it has to be investing as opposed to throwing money at it, is the most important investment a society can make. We have agreed that there are systemic problems that need addressing. I don't see them being addressed well at all.

The most cynical way you can look at education is that you are preparing the next round of tax-payers for participation in the economy. Taking money away from E.S.L. (for example) is utterly stupid in that light. We have an unprecedented number of immigrants within the T.D.S.B. - not children of immigrants who started within the system, but children who came here and started within the system afterward. We need them to be able to communicate in at least one of our official languages ASAP, and the sooner we do it, the sooner they will thrive within the system instead of dragging on it.

That is exactly how I feel, here in South Texas. Exactly. :)

Great minds working alike? :)