Weed-out courses; discussion

[Minervabird]

Minervabird, I do see what you are saying, and am still waiting to hear from a Canadian as to whether they do something similar there, if, as was said here, medical school degrees are still considered as undergrad ones there as well.

That said, for your UK set-up, what then is the nature of the UK high school equivalent, that these kids attend in order to get into something like medical school upon graduation from said hs?  Do all UK teenagers get to attend a hs which might lead to med school admission?  (Or probably they do not all go to such a school?)   And at the med school-preparing hs, what is the nature of the school program the students get?  Do they get the sort of comprehensive liberal arts program that most, ahem, 'comprehensive' hs here offer, and is normative for American kids (my hs English teacher told us once that 'high school' is one of the very few experiences that most American adults will have had in common).  What courses, thus, would British students at such a school not get, that Americans would get, in order to give those a-level students enough premedical stuff, which an American doc wannabe would get as an undergrad?

There is not the liberal arts education at university that Americans have. It is specialised from the beginning.
 
There are a variety of secondary schools in the UK...comprehensives, grammar schools, public schools (which here means private, like Eton), academies. Some of these schools better prepare their students than others for entry into medical programmes, but I'd say that is the case for the States too as schools are funded by property tax.

Specialisation in UK schools happens earlier, after GCSEs at age 16. Then comes A-levels to prepare for university in specialist subjects.

 The following I will admit is AI, but it offers a reasonable summary:

The UK education system is structured into primary, secondary, further, and higher education. Compulsory education runs from ages 5 to 16. After age 16, further and higher education options become available, including vocational courses and university degrees.
Here's a more detailed breakdown:

Primary Education:
Begins around age 5 and continues until about age 11.
Involves Key Stage 1 (ages 5-7) and Key Stage 2 (ages 7-11).
Children learn core subjects like English, Maths, and Science.

Secondary Education:
Typically starts around age 11 and lasts until age 16.
Involves Key Stage 3 (ages 11-14) and Key Stage 4 (ages 14-16).
Students take General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) exams at the end of Key Stage 4. Students then choose:

Further Education (FE):
Non-compulsory education beyond age 16.
Can be taken at colleges and institutions, offering vocational courses and alternative qualifications.

OR A-levels at a secondary to prepare them for their "major" at university. Here they would take the foundation course to prepare them for medicine...basic chem, biology, physics, etc.

Higher Education (HE):
Study beyond A-levels or their equivalent.
Primarily takes place in universities and other higher education institutions.
Includes bachelor's degrees and postgraduate qualifications like master's and doctoral degrees.

Key Points:
Education is compulsory in the UK for children between the ages of 5 and 16.
There are various types of schools, including state schools (funded by the taxpayer) and independent schools (also known as public schools).
The National Curriculum sets standards for what should be taught in schools.
There are different standardized assessments and exams at various stages of education, such as SATs in primary school and GCSEs in secondary school.

[kaysixteen]

So the UK kid may, indeed, probably does (in most cases) know more about those specialization courses (roughly equal to a major here) when he enters the equivalent of his university freshman year.  This would not be the case for some alumni of elite American prep schools and a handful of elite pub hss.

But that British kid will simply not have the same equivalent of 'well-rounded' course content that most kids on the 'honors' or 'colllege prep' track at all but the shitey underclass of US hss.   He simply will not.   And the American kid who then goes to get a BA at an elite SLAC, Ivy, etc,-type school will graduate with less overall subject knowledge in  his major subject.... and a whole lot more knowledge than the highly specialized UK undergrad.

[kaysixteen]

I had a hs math teacher who said that stats should replace calc in hss-- I am sure this is not a singular opinion.   Why do we not do that?  Kids like me, who did take hs calc (and actually a semester of college multivariable calc, which is probably almost fully responsible for my not having made summa cum laude).  But classicists and historians do not do stats.  As a result, none for me, and methinks that most American kids might well benefit from the skills in statistical reasoning that such a course (likely?) provides?

I like the rules and rigor thesis-- Latin more or less functions the same way for many kids.

[eigen]

Calc isn't usually required as part of HS math. It's an elective, and some students opt to take stats instead.

[apl68]

The point is, I think there may be essentially two kinds of "academic brain", and what's a bug to one is a feature to the other, and vice versa.

Sounds a lot like the point C.P. Snow was trying to make many years ago.

[Hibush]

As a biologist rather than mathematician, I think stats should be substituted for calculus entirely.
I use stats several times every day, and often discuss statistical assumptions, distributions, sensitivity and other stats with students and colleagues. I have not used calculus once in the last 25 years, and that has not been a handicap. (That short unit on formal logic in

[ciao_yall]

As a biologist rather than mathematician, I think stats should be substituted for calculus entirely.
I use stats several times every day, and often discuss statistical assumptions, distributions, sensitivity and other stats with students and colleagues. I have not used calculus once in the last 25 years, and that has not been a handicap. (That short unit on formal logic in

Except statistics is based on calculus. So while an introductory stats class is helpful, anything beyond that requires an understanding of calculus.

I used to coordinate a business program in which everyone agreed that Accounting was a requirement. But Math was a blocker for a number of students.

In all seriousness, the program director who represented the employers began lobbying for us to create a class called  "Accounting Without Math."

Yes. We all would make that face at each other when she would propose it.

[eigen]

As a biologist rather than mathematician, I think stats should be substituted for calculus entirely.
I use stats several times every day, and often discuss statistical assumptions, distributions, sensitivity and other stats with students and colleagues. I have not used calculus once in the last 25 years, and that has not been a handicap. (That short unit on formal logic in

I guess it depends what area of biology you're in, but ecology/ev bio uses calculus quite a bit.

Even cell and molecular uses it if you're doing any computational biology work or quantitative analysis.

I think a lot of people forget that if you're looking at analyzing rate data or accumulation data, you're likely using calculus. You might be using shortcuts that someone else came up with, but the concept is calculus. Suggesting that someone doesn't need to understand at least some of the core concepts they're using just because they don't use them everyday seems dangerous.

[kaysixteen]

Random humanist's questions:

1)Back when I was in hs, calc was what all those students who started algebra in 8th grade got, whereas those who did not ended senior year with 'precalculus'(essentially ='d 'trigonometry').  Stats were simply not available for any one to take. I suspect this is not the case there today, largely because, and this is the problem-- advanced math kids may well now be starting algebra in the 7th grade, perhaps some even earlier.  Some will thrive at that, esp some girls, but most 7th graders, heck many 8th graders, for them algebra is just to hard, requires too much maturity.  IOW, those getting elective stats in most hss will still have to take the calc class, and there may also be a calc ii class available, something that used to be very rare in hss. 

2) Is it not possible, thus, to have a stats class in hs that would teach stats of some level that does not require calc knowledge?

3) At dear alma mater, the math dept had of course various levels of stats classes available, though I do not actually know what their own majors had to do.  But all of the various social sciences depts (remember, this does not include history, which, although lumped by the school into the 'Division II' = social sciences, academic distribution requirements division, is not a social science, certainly not in the 'science' aspect economists and sociologists, amongst others, fancy themselves as being), either individually as depts, as econ and poli sci amongst others did, or in combo with another field (say anthro and socilology), offered AND required their majors to take their respective stats class if they did not also have math stats class.  So why did they do this, rather than just shunting their majors into the math dept stats class?  Was the nature of the subject-specific stats that these social sciences offered something really different, and did what the anthropologists get really use calc?

[dismalist]

Somewhere I posted that what looks like a weed-out course is just an example of having standards. Ex ante, not all courses in a given discipline will be equally challenging. Ex post, some of the harder ones will look like "weed out" courses. This is an optical illusion, not a signal of intent.

Anyway, discussion on this thread has [rationally] turned into a discussion of what should be taught or required in High School, e.g. Stats or Calc.

My own conclusion is different: High School should be one hell of a lot shorter! Require two years less. Give the funds for the last two years to parents, not schools. Watch a thousand flowers bloom. And solve the boy problem from another thread at the same time.

[kaysixteen]

That is perhaps the worst idea I have heard someone espouse on these or the prior fora, perhaps ever.  Really, it is.   Random questions in the way of rebuttals, *just off the top of my head*, might well include:

1)****Just exactly how would doing this solve the aforementioned boy problem???!!!***********

2) How would doing this prevent the further dimunition in the overall level of Americans' critical thinking skills, general knoweldge basis, etc?

3) And how would doing this fail to increase,  rather than decrease, the socioeconomic divergence in this country, as well as its overall level of poverty?

[dismalist]

I'm so glad! :-)

[eigen]

So you think we should follow the UK model in shaving off years of highly specialized training for someone to be a physician, but don't think the UK model of two less years of compulsory secondary schooling is a good one? Color me confused.

[kaysixteen]

I am losing patience with your (deliberate?) misreading of what I am saying, and esp with your misinterpretation of my honest questions as though they were instead statements of my already decided-upon opinions.   So let me try to do things easier:

1) There are American med schools already doing 3 year programs.  I do not like this but am interested to know whether I should reevaluate my erstwhile disapproval of this notion, esp in light of what appears to be UK practice.

2) I do favor letting non-MD health professionals do as much as possible, however, esp given that many tasks now restricted to what spork very clearly and rightly called the MD guild here.  These two things should not be mutually exclusive, esp given the vast undersupply of MDs in this country.

3) I am the liberal arts, SLAC guy.   I favor giving virtually everyone who wants to train for any college education-requiring professional field as much wide-ranging and comprehensive liberal arts-style education as possible, esp given the reality that people like docs need not only interpersonal communications skills, but also the critical thinking and linguistic skills that are, quite frankly, ahem, much better acquired through humanities core courses than Calc 101.

[eigen]

I'm losing patience with your random, semi coherent posts coupled with your utter disdain for other posters and fields.

How does the UK having undergraduate degrees in medicine have any bearing on 3 vs 4 year medical degrees in the US?

And how does two less years of high school have any bearing on preparing well rounded doctors or a liberal arts education? A SLAC would be what students go to after high school, it's not a replacement for it. Also, you say you're a "SLAC" guy but I thought I remember that you're currently teaching HS Latin? Am I wrong about that?