At my school so many high achievers would use summer school to get ahead that they had to shut it down. Those nerds were causing the actually remediate kids to feel ashamed and othered, so they would all drop out after a week or two. Year after year. I'm salty about it.
Hot take, schools should be geared towards accommodating the smartest kids, not the dumbest. There should still be safety nets like summer school, but the smartest kids should be able to learn as much as they want to
My hot take: schools should be geared to everyone. Have advanced classes, normal classes, and below average classes. The teacher can teach according to each class. Everyone should get an education.
Even calling those students Below Average others them. They probably have other forms of intelligence. Or they just don't learn well in the one exact neurotypical classroom that we offer in the US. Or maybe they have issues at home, economic issues, or social issues that are keeping them from succeeding in school. Kids in other top countries are never asked to worry about these things.
Whatever you want to call it, it won't be the normal class. You have to teach according to ones ability.
As for the other factors: I'm in Canada, and yes we do have to worry about all that.
It takes immense resources and more teachers, which is hardly achievable of you want it across the whole country
... it takes the exact same amount of resources and teachers. You already have multiple classes (unless you are in a tiny school), split them up.
You forget that quantity of "Super clever" pupils is not equal to the quantity of the rest.
...it's not hard to fill out an advanced class. And if the school is tiny, they don't get one. This is pretty standard stuff.
Implying the described behavior is actual learning and not farming for a GPA bump.
Those smartest kids can go test out of everything with AP, take SAT courses privately or for free. Those kids who need more helo have no fucking other chance. Experiences like these tilt them away from education entirely.
My school had two separate classes for that exact reason. Remedial summer school was Tuesday Thursday for a little bit longer, and get ahead summer school was Monday Wednesday Friday
That's interesting. At my school, summer school was only for the remedial students and there was a stigma involved with it. Basically nobody wanted to do summer school and most kids would do anything to avoid it.
Wow. Pandering to the lowest common demoninator? Let me guess, was this in US?
I am not pandering but sincerely discussing a social problem I experienced in my, yes, American high school.
I'm a teacher in training. We had reading "homework" over the summer for our incoming students. Their families were instructed that if their child read every day (15-30 minutes or so), and they kept track of it on a chart we sent them, they would win prizes when they came to school. I think it was something like a pizza party if they read a certain number of days. It wasn't mandatory and there was no punishment for not doing it. I thought it was a great idea.
Who would downvote this? Like I'm genuinely curious who enjoyed homework over the summer. And why?
How do you give homework over summer? Don't you have a different teacher in the fall?
My school moves everyone up after the GCSEs and A-Levels are over, which is in May or June. The holiday starts in July.
As far as I know, we're the only school in Britain that does this.
I don't really get what you mean.
Instead of moving up to the next year (the British term for "grade") in September, we do it after the exams (finals) are over, which is in June.
Oh right, so if you're in year 7, you start year 8 before the summer holidays?
Yeah, but high school starts at year 9 (age 13-14), so:
(Y9 doesn't exist for a bit)
Y9 --> Y10
Y10 --> Y11
Y11 --> (Either leave school or just take a few extra weeks off)
Y12 --> Y13
Y13 --> (Leave school*)
This is done because, after the exams, the Y11s and Y13s have no content left to learn, so there's no point in keeping them at school.
Also, as I said, my school is strange for doing this. Most, if not all, other British high schools are normal.
*Unless you get held back, stay on for another year, or go to university
TL;DR: Yeah, pretty much
Where are you in the UK? High school starts age 11 usually.
North East England. Around here, it goes like this:
then
You are probably used to the two-tier system, with a primary school and a secondary school. Around here, though, we mainly have a three-tier system.