Bay 12 Games Forum

Among the most startling revelations in the wealth data is that while single white women in the prime of their working years (ages 36 to 49) have a median wealth of $42,600 (still only 61 percent of their single white male counterparts), the median wealth for single black women is only $5.

"It’s almost unheard of for a child to show up hungry or homeless. Finland provides three years of maternity leave and subsidized day care to parents, and preschool for all 5-year-olds, where the emphasis is on play and socializing."

"Many schools are small enough so that teachers know every student. If one method fails, teachers consult with colleagues to try something else. They seem to relish the challenges."

"Nearly 30 percent of Finland’s children receive some kind of special help during their first nine years of school. The school where Louhivuori teaches served 240 first through ninth graders last year; and in contrast with Finland’s reputation for ethnic homogeneity, more than half of its 150 elementary-level students are immigrants—from Somalia, Iraq, Russia, Bangladesh, Estonia and Ethiopia, among other nations."

(NOTE: this actually contradicts the BBC article which claimed ethnic homogeneity was the reason they do so well).

"here are no mandated standardized tests in Finland, apart from one exam at the end of students’ senior year in high school. There are no rankings, no comparisons or competition between students, schools or regions. Finland’s schools are publicly funded. The people in the government agencies running them, from national officials to local authorities, are educators, not business people, military leaders or career politicians. Every school has the same national goals and draws from the same pool of university-trained educators. The result is that a Finnish child has a good shot at getting the same quality education no matter whether he or she lives in a rural village or a university town. The differences between weakest and strongest students are the smallest in the world, according to the most recent survey by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). “Equality is the most important word in Finnish education. All political parties on the right and left agree on this,” said Olli Luukkainen, president of Finland’s powerful teachers union."

" “We prepare children to learn how to learn, not how to take a test,” said Pasi Sahlberg, a former math and physics teacher who is now in Finland’s Ministry of Education and Culture. “We are not much interested in PISA. It’s not what we are about.” "

" “Play is important at this age,” Rintola would later say. “We value play.” "

In 2006, Finland's pupils scored the highest average results in science and reading in the whole of the developed world. In the OECD's exams for 15 year-olds, known as PISA, they also came second in maths, beaten only by teenagers in South Korea.
This isn't a one-off: in previous PISA tests Finland also came out top.

The Finnish philosophy with education is that everyone has something to contribute and those who struggle in certain subjects should not be left behind.

A tactic used in virtually every lesson is the provision of an additional teacher who helps those who struggle in a particular subject. But the pupils are all kept in the same classroom, regardless of their ability in that particular subject.

According to the OECD, Finnish children spend the fewest number of hours in the classroom in the developed world.
This reflects another important theme of Finnish education.

Primary and secondary schooling is combined, so the pupils don't have to change schools at age 13. They avoid a potentially disruptive transition from one school to another.

Children in Finland only start main school at age seven. The idea is that before then they learn best when they're playing and by the time they finally get to school they are keen to start learning.

Teaching is a prestigious career in Finland. Teachers are highly valued and teaching standards are high.
The educational system's success in Finland seems to be part cultural. Pupils study in a relaxed and informal atmosphere.

You need the BBC and its news section. A highly pleasing beacon of credability and integrity in an industry full of backstabbing, deviousness and corruption. You can be sure if they say its a spade, then its a spade. They legally HAVE to be politically neutral, which makes for some good reading/viewing. Thier current run on the Conservatives NHS reform is quite enlightening, and highlights the spin bullshit Cameron is spouting over it.

The Smurfs creator, Belgian artist Peyo, told a Flemish paper: 'I disagree with his interpretation. It is between the grotesque and the not serious.'

First off, no. That is a statement of what he has heard, not as statement of fact.

Secondly the very next sentence was saying he does not believe what he heard.

Quote from: Reelya on March 11, 2012, 12:12:29 am

More to the point, Catholic colleges are withholding medicine which was already covered by insurance plans paid for by student's school fees, based on the college administrations ideology.

Love how you phrase that to make it seem like the catholic schools are with holding medicine from dying african children.

No, the reason is that, from what I have heard, the government has started forcing various catholic institutions to pay for various contraceptive medications, i.e. abortion and morning-after pills.

Of course, that sounds like bullshit. If there's anything that people are adamant about, it's respect for religious beliefs, if you're a believer, and containment of religious beliefs, if you aren't. Plus, I doubt you could slip a measure like that past a republican majority congress.