If school wasn't also an important social benchmark that would make sense. But as it is, there is some benefit to setting a pace.

I do agree that we should encourage students to self pace themselves. Another aspect of school I had to de-program myself on: it's OKAY to repeat courses you are struggling on. Expensive, yes, but sometimes coming in a 2nd time gives you the perspective to start focus on the subtleties while you were struggling with the high level details the first time.

There's nothing keeping age peers from hanging out and being friends, just because they're at different levels in different subjects...

In actuality it's more likely that socialization would improve as kids weren't forced through stress periods where they were not permitted to socialize, grouped arbitrarily and explicitly set against each other in various programs (eg - sports, group assignments, etc)....

And that's without yet raising the fact that the kid who does well in language but not math would end up friends with the kid who does well in math but not language, helping each other and challenging each other to succeed in a positive fashion, rather than ending up pitted against each other by the fundamental structure of the class structure.

>There's nothing keeping age peers from hanging out and being friends, just because they're at different levels in different subjects

Nothing tangible. But your peers you do work with very much influences the kinds of peers that become your friends.

But that's tangential to the real point I was making: socializing around a bunch of different peers your age in a specific nigh mandatory environment helps develop a sense of public etiquette. How to socialize, how to figure out who you do/don't want to hang out with, how to manage arguments or de-escalate tension. Potentially delaying or skipping that can be catastrophic, and you can argue that there's so many people today that feel like they never got that.

This can theoretically be replicated outside of school. But given how few venues of loitering there are these days for adults, I don't have much faith that we'll create such places for minors.

>the kid who does well in language but not math would end up friends with the kid who does well in math but not language, helping each other and challenging each other to succeed in a positive fashion, rather than ending up pitted against each other by the fundamental structure of the class structure.

It's all theoretical. But my experience makes me much less optimistic of that outcome than you.

Applying behaviors borne directly of the current structure on to the outcomes from an entirely different structure is not the way we reason, is it?

It frankly couldn't do worse than what we have, as the current structure ensures suffering and pain for the majority as a result of the social structure established by the norms and systems.

At least under my suggestion those who would excel Could excel and get the hell out before they were irreparably harmed and held back by the fools and willfully stupid as we have now, let alone the fact that the "less capable" would have a real chance at leaving with a modest education rather than being shoved through and ending up in The real world either zero capacity for real thought, understanding and employability.

>Applying behaviors borne directly of the current structure on to the outcomes from an entirely different structure is not the way we reason, is it?

It's an inevitable result of reasoning. I can't know what I don't know. Short of the laws of physics, we can never truly predict the behaviors of a new universal model from scratch.

Regardless, I don't think human nature would change that drastically as a result of students being able to pace their learning. Greed, selfishness, and general malice may be lessened but not eradicated. Social castes would probably still exist as a remnant of various luck and circumstance of the elite established centuries ago.

>It frankly couldn't do worse than what we have

I never really disagreed, I just simply want to point out a less talked about point in the current educational system. It's not simply an institution of acedemia, nor a "glorified day care center" as others cynically put it. There's soft skills you don't really get except by engaging with other people, some you don't like. Some you may even outright hate.

I feel any alternative system that doesn't keep those soft skills in mind may face further issues down the road, even if it may or may not end up better than the current timeline.

You didn't actually apply the known correlaries though.

Kindergarten is about the only part of the current system which could be use as a reference for behavior, as after that all the structural features which _explicitly _ _induce_ the behaviors you reference are Forced on the kids.

So, using K as a reference, what xan we learn about free form education?

who is going to fund that? it's not just education its subsidized day care, and "it gets done when it gets done" is going to either result in a lot of 20 year old Seniors -- who are still on taxpayer funded schooling -- or else the bar gets lowered to push these kids through fast albeit at their own fast pace.

And how is your worst case scenario worse? Because the bar is already as low as it will go and instead of just leaving some behind we are actively holding a whole bunch back.

I could have graduated by 12 if they just let me go at the material, instead they had me drop out, in frustration at being forced to work at the pace of the stupidest and laziest, before returning to do exactly what I describe through an alternative education program which cost the system 5x as much per student as main track... and that without addressing that it would likely be cheaper due to fundamentally fewer teachers required per student as the teacher wouldn't be babysitting study hall like they are now but instead focused exclusively on the acts of teaching and grading.

I'm not sure I agree with your solution but I agree with he problem. No child left behind is idiotic. Some kids are just stupid, put them to work digging ditches or something. No point wasting a ton of manpower and stuff trying to teach them basic algebra, they'll never use it for anything anyway.