Do schools kill creativity? | Sir Ken Robinson | TED

> High schools can't really do that, unless they are structured more like universities. That's not true. There's a very large gap between graduating 18 year old's who are only good for box-stacking, making coffee or going to college (with a lot of help in all cases) and actually graduating people who can deliver value to an employer and is culturally ready for society. Take critical thinking as an easy example. Or logic, philosophy, art, music, trades and other important areas that would benefit society if exposed during the K-12 period. I say this both as a parent and an employer. The average high school graduate is useless to me, in almost any capacity. The average college graduate isn't very far from that. This isn't new, it has been discussed here on HN many times in the past. Small to medium companies don't have the time or resources to engage in education after education. This is where this concept of wasting a year of a student's time with coursework nobody cares about is very relevant. As for my own kids, I made sure to heavily supplement their US high school education with learning that made them valuable upon graduation. A simple result from this was landing knowledge-based jobs making more than $35/hr right out of high school, when their peers where struggling with minimum wage work almost throughout their university experience. As a result of that, my oldest had a solid financial footing when he was done with university. All of this was due to education prior to college, in this case, driven my my efforts and those of my wife. Schools could do this. It isn't difficult. And it sure isn't a matter of money, not today. This kind of thing would materially change society and outcomes at all levels. It would increase opportunity at all layers of the population. There is no inherent reason for which lower income households could not have their children receive a solid, useful and marketable education in high school. We just suck at doing it. My personal experience, from many decades ago and in systems of education outside and inside the US, was to walk away from high school with lots of marketable skills. I had no problems at all delivering value to any employers. I did not accumulate any student debt in university in the US because I had solid employment the entire time and was paid very well as I built on the foundation I got in high school. Simple example, I had two years of technical drafting. One of my first jobs was doing exactly that. And then AutoCAD came out. Because I had a position drafting with pencil and paper I was given the opportunity to learn ACAD and a very nice raise. Things evolved from there. And, no I did not attend a trade school. We just had more opportunities to learn things in school than kids have today. High schools don't have to become full-blown university level for this to become a reality. Furthermore, we tend to make the assumption that everyone is, or should be, college-bound. That's a mistake. Not everyone needs to waste time with Calculus, Physics and Chemistry. I say "waste time" because these topic areas are utterly without value for lots of professions. One could easily teach a "general science education" course and move on. One of my very favorite talks on the subject of fitting education to the student is by Sir Ken Robinson: ▶ this video This is important...and we almost completely ignore it and force every child into the same mold. At some level one could say this is abusive.

Lots of interesting elements in your comment. > Even with more resources, as long as we're going to insist on mainstreaming students with behavioral problems or who just don't care about the educational process, outcomes for the other students in the rooms are going to be affected. The insistence on equality at all levels and all things is a problem. I know there are people reading this comment thinking "this guy is a bigot". If you are that person, please stop, calm down and think. Everyone understands that there are people who will never been competitive swimmers, basketball players or good dancers. While I am not terrible at sports, I could not become one of those three, no matter what I do. One of my kids will never be an artists. Just not interested, at all. Another cannot think about anything else. Why is it that we want to shove everyone into the same mold when it comes to intellectual capacity, IQ, etc.? Should I force one of my kids into art class and the other into engineering? No. That would be insane. We don't all have to be engineers. It would be a really sad planet if that were the case. It is not bigoted to suggest we need to allow kids to excel at what really drives them. Expose them to a range of topics, of course. Don't torture them by forcing them into a mold. Should a kid who is an artist not graduate high school if they don't pass algebra, physics and calculus? Why? I love this Ted talk: ▶ this video The whole thing is interesting, however the story that starts about 15 minutes in speaks loudly to this matter of treating all kids as if they were clones of some made-up model of humanity. I won't spoil it for those who might not have seen it. Watch this and think about what we are doing to our kids in school. > who just don't care about the educational process I don't know enough about this. I wish I understood it better. My uninformed thinking is that we damage both groups of kids by forcing them together. One of my kids had to ask to be moved to a desk at the front of the class because the kids in the back were not interested in the class at all and made it impossible to pay attention and learn. The uninterested group should not be discarded. They need a different focus and help. If their families can't support them, perhaps better programs can. I revert back to this idea that not everyone in K-12 is, or should be, college-bound. That's an unnecessary model that might just be causing more damage than good. Of course, this has policy implications that transcend schools. There has to be opportunity outside of college-centric careers for that large percentage of non-college-bound students to be able to access middle-class living. This perspective, if accurate, results in many tentacles affecting wider policy and politics. In other words, it isn't just about schools and the policies that control them. > Education can not fix equity issues: lack of parental support is a powerful disadvantage that we cannot expect a classroom teacher to overcome Maybe I am being naïve. My thinking is, if, a big "if", we could "fix" --whatever that might mean-- the system for one generation, maybe two, the parental problem might self-regulate over time. Sadly, there are kids who are in a really bad environment. Can we address that as a society? Equal outcomes are a fantasy. That does not mean we don't try. I would gladly devote half or more of our war-machine budget towards a better educational system and better outcomes. For that to happen humanity needs to change. None of these things are simple. Easy to throw around grandiose ideas. Hard to make them happen. Also, very easy to throw your hands up and give up when nobody seems to care (as I have done locally). > I've been thinking about teaching a Verilog + microprocessor design class in our high school. I've done tons of work with FPGA's. They are great. My fear, when it comes with using the

Russ Olsen, author of Getting Closure, Eloquent Ruby and Design Patterns with Ruby, telling the story of the moon landing as a conference talk. Inspired me beyond measure and brought tears to my eyes. link —- George Lakoff’s lecture on Moral Politics. Instantaneous understanding of political language and identity politics. Incredibly important, especially today in time of extreme polarization. link —- Sir Ken Robinson: Do Schools Kill Creativity ▶ this video

Bret Victor - Inventing on principle link Alan Kay - Power of Simplicity link Steve Jobs - Marketing (unveiling Think Different) link Robert Cialdini - On Influence link Peter Thiel - On Zero to One (Notes on Starts Ups or How to Build the Future) link Naval Ravikant on Reading, Happiness, Systems for Decision Making, Habits, Honesty and More (Farnam Street podcast) link Josh Wolfe - On "This is who you are up against" podcast link Richard Feynman - Fun to Imagine link Paul Graham - Startup school (2008) link James Burke - Connections (BBC documentary) <No link> Jim Al-Khalili tells the story of the Atom (BBC) link Elon Musk's 2003 Stanford University Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Lecture link Ken Robinson - Do schools kill creativity? ▶ this video Paul Stamets on mycology, bioremediation and fungi- Joe Rogan Experience link

> Among the first talks posted was Sir Ken Robinson’s “Do Schools Kill Creativity?,” which has since become the most viewed TED talk of all time Here's the video: ▶ this video At the 7'15 point, the speaker makes a big joke about Shakespeare "being seven, being in someone's English class" and the audience rolls over with laughter -- the joke being, of course, that it's ludicrous to think anyone ever tried to teach English to the greatest English writer of all time. The speaker continues with the same idea and same joke about Shakespeare's father. But really? Isn't the logical conclusion the opposite? That Shakespeare's English teacher was the best English teacher there ever was, because (he) helped him grow into the author we know now? That his father, or his mother, or someone, probably helped him? Instead we have this idea that Shakespeare, like Jesus, was born perfect and that what he had to do was overcome the stupidity and shortsightedness (and meanness) of everyone around him, until he could explode and really be himself. This idea is a tale for little kids. But it's not just absurd, it's destructive.