Need more proof Dr. Al was right in Part I?

[TomCollins]

School cancels spelling bee

[itsmarty]

It sounded to me as if the administrators were using this as an excuse to show how stupid the No Child Left Behind Act is. Without knowing a lot more about the school district than I do it's impossible to say, but it seems to have political overtones.

Martin

[37offsuit]

I like how they put the positive spin on it though. They want to build self esteem in the children so they all can be winners. Of course, what they neglect to point out is that while everyone can, in fact, be winners, when this happens, the winners are also all losers as well.

[ZeeBee]

I'm sorry Tom, you must have missed a link out of your post.

I found the link to the story cancelling a spelling bee - adding one more small peice of anecdotal evidence indicating that US schools are deemphasising competition.

But I missed your link to anything proving the actual point of the article - namely that deemphasising competition in schools damages the competitiveness of the country as a whole.

Perhaps you could repost a link to that evidence?

ZB

[Al Schoonmaker]

Thank you.

Al

[TomCollins]

My point was more that competition was being removed, as many doubted.

But if you think this will somehow make us more competitive, you can keep beleiving it, I won't stop you.

[ZeeBee]

Hmmm,

Of course your point was to provide evidence that competition was being "removed". But the majority of the doubts as to whether this was true were from people saying that Dr Schoonmaker's evidence was only anecdotal and that he needed to provide more statistically sound evidence. He attempted to do this in a later post (although a google search hardle constitutes solid evidence). Your adding one more piece of anecdotal evidence does almost nothing to support the position. I assume I don't need to explain why this is the case.

As to your comment "But if you think this will somehow make us more competitive, you can keep beleiving it, I won't stop you. " you are far too confident in your seemingly common-sense opinions. A simple glance at the league tables of national competitiveness (e.g. GDP produced per working hour) shows that the industrialised nations which score better than the US are those like Norway, Belgium and the Netherlands - nations which tend to stress cooperation and teamwork in their education systems - and which certainly put much less emphasis on competition than the US system. yet these nations are more competitive - much more in some cases.

There has actually been a lot of research into this subject - the majority of it captured by Alfie Kohn in his book "No Contest: The Case Against Competition". Now Kohn is an anti-competition advocate, so you can expect his writing to be biased against competition. But he does compile a very strong case by looking at the actual research evidence - rather than just twisting personal opinion and anecdotes into "proof" as so many other writers do. For example, he examines 122 studies on the question of whether competition or cooperation produces better results: Sixty-five studies found that cooperation promotes higher achievement than competition, eight found the reverse, and 36 found no statistically significant difference.

Now it could be that Kohn is twisting the research to meet his own needs (I personally have not read the original sources). But the fact is that he seems to have really done his homework. I doubt that you have done the same.

So as to your implication that I was burying my head in the sand by refusing to believe that increased competition in schools leads to increased national competitiveness - then if that means reasearching the available evidence to try to come up with a fact-based point of view - then yes, I will continue to do so.

ZB

Anyway, isn't it time we moved on from the first article. The second one is rather better in my opinion.

[BarronVangorToth]

[ QUOTE ]


shows that the industrialised nations which score better than the US are those like Norway, Belgium and the Netherlands - nations which tend to stress cooperation and teamwork in their education systems - and which certainly put much less emphasis on competition than the US system. yet these nations are more competitive - much more in some cases.



[/ QUOTE ]


I won't claim to be an expert on the subject, but giving my two cents as everyone is prone to do, I think it's a dangerous association to think that just because X Countries > America that the cause is due to some illogical cooperative model, rather than many other factors that can be attributed to skewing the results one way or the other.

Certainly it MIGHT be the reason, but so could a myriad of other things.

It's wholly counterintuitive, in my belief, to think anything other than struggle and competition breeds the best possible results whereas cooperation and group-think does nothing but stagnate process and reduce it to the proverbial lowest common denominator.

Barron Vangor Toth
www.BarronVangorToth.com

[ZeeBee]

I would wholeheartedly agree with your point that there may be (in fact surely are) many other factors. However, it's better than basing your assesment on whether competition in schools is good or bad on nothing more than your own inbuilt instinct and biases. I think someone pointed this out in an original reply to Dr Schoonmaker - country competitiveness is due to a whole host of complex factors, not just some oversimplification like "competition" or "cooperation". Hmm, isn't the avoidance of simplifications the main point of this months article?

As to whether its "counterintuitive ... to think anything other than struggle and competition breeds the best possible results whereas cooperation and group-think does nothing but stagnate process and reduce it to the proverbial lowest common denominator" that is a very common perception, but a misperception.

Obviously group-think is a bad thing, but it has nothing to do with cooperation. That's just you labelling cooperation as bad.

But regarding cooperation, a Darwinian would tell you that family, society, the division of labour and other cooperative structures exist precisely because they have survival value. In fact cooperation is one of the key factors which distinguishes humans from lesser species.

But regardles of theories - you have to go on evidence. And the research evidence seems to indicate that increasing cooperation rather than competition leads to higher performance.

Unless you have some better evidence, of course.

ZB

[InfernoLL]

The division of labor is only a cooperative structure in very small "band" or "tribal" societies. In any modern society of any size, the division of labor is achieved entirely through competition.

Referring to "society" as a cooperative structure is also suspect. You haven't defined "society" so this doesn't really mean anything. If you include the economy in your definition of society, then it cannot be a fundamentally "cooperative structure". If you mean "government" then cooperation only plays a partial role; while law makers must work together, they must also represent the competing views of their constituencies.

"In fact cooperation is one of the key factors which distinguishes humans from lesser species."

This is a pretty ridiculous statement. Ever seen a flock of birds or a school of fish or a pride of lions or a bee hive? I think the best example of cooperation on earth is a group of insects like an ant hill or a bee hive or a termite mound, etc. The actual key factor that distinguishes humans from lesser species is intelligence, which happens to manifest itself in things like language, advanced problem solving, and abstract conceptualization.

"And the research evidence seems to indicate that increasing cooperation rather than competition leads to higher performance."

While I don't read psychology journals or anything like that, it would seem that this result you've stated could be very misleading. I would very readily believe that increased cooperation would benefit those in the lower portion of the continuum, and that competition would hurt them. But this doesn't contradict anything anyone's saying. The purpose of competition is to make the best better, and to force others to earn what they get. I don't think it's likely that the smartest kid in the class is going to benefit from a system whereby he is not able to both demonstrate that he is the smartest and be rewarded for it.