American Education from a Russian man's perspective
This is just one small chapter out of the dozens that he has wrote about chronicling his life experiences in the United States over the span of 5 years - I particularly picked this one to translated because he nails practically every point he makes about the education in America - oh man, I'm going to translate the rest of what he says and I'll spread that stuff around like candy cause American people need to have a look at what others think of them and their country and hopefully take a careful look at what they're doing with themselves as well as their country.
I'm a Ukrainian.
here is the translated article.
I'm a Ukrainian.
here is the translated article.
History 2.10 “a little bit about education”
From a Russian student’s perspective
I will be brief: educational systems in the US just don’t exist. I haven’t seen this many uneducated people anywhere else. It is agreeable, there are exceptions. Among the Americans I also encountered very clever and educated people, but their percentage in relationship with the total number of ignoramuses is simply incommensurable. What did you expect? Americans read nothing, travel nowhere, and teach nothing. By the way, when you speak to Americans about traveling, they think you exclusively mean tourism in their own country. The majority of them have never visited a foreign country, nor do they plan to. Therefore the idea of other countries is after all, distorted. I swear, they are simply assured that there is no better country than the one of their own exists, not to mention, their little town let. Less than one tenth of Americans have a foreign passport. Moreover, a third of senators only have them. And these people provide can provide for themselves and allow themselves to travel wherever, conveniently. But in their minds it’s not “required”. It is much simpler to watch a report of the status of Europe on the Discovery channel, and to then make decision about the bombardment of Yugoslavia or the assignment of aid to the Ukraine being oriented exclusively on the globe. As for the schools I can give you a small comparative analysis. The child of my associate attended both the Russian and American schools. So I will say this to you: This was like the sky and the earth. Yes, the child wasn’t pleased attending the Russian school. Because there, they are scolded it, are assigned homework, and are asked to come before the blackboard. But in the third grade the boy could already solve complex calculations of multiplication and division, and in the American school he still sketched the butterflies and puppies.
In the American schools the teacher simply fears children. Children there do not write dictations, do not take tests, and are not asked to the blackboard to show how to solve a problem. And what if suddenly the child did not study and for it the teacher must give an F? It will offend and will develop a feeling of inferiority the child. The simple fact that the child graduates secondary school as a simple moron does not disturb anyone. The basic object in American schools - is gymnastics. I do not argue, it’s wonderful, but nevertheless, the year in which Columbus has set foot on their own country is also necessary to know. There are two forms of schools: public, after the end of which the children do not know how to read and cannot show their state on the map, and private, where education is better, but not considerably, since instructors simply cannot give students F’s as the students will go home and complain to parents, and teachers will be simply fired. Both school and traveling, and everything else in the world for a child in the US substitutes a television set. You can go into any ghetto in Harlem, where instead of the beds there will be mattresses, but a television set will be there no matter what. In my opinion Americans carry out a large part of their conscious life before this box. Television set - this is the basic supplier of both entertainments and information for Americans. If there was no international event being reported on TV it simply means that it does not even exist. Yet American television exclusively illuminates events about USA and Israel, other countries simply do not exist. It’s true, they of course recall Afghanistan, when they begin to bomb it. Or Russia, when a submarine sinks. Educational programs in American television is quiet a sufficient amount, not to mention they are of excellent quality, I, for example, simply adored The History Channel and Discovery.
But Americans practically ignore these channels. But as for me, besides these two channels in American television, there’s simply nothing else to watch. I had 74 channels, and on half of them I saw nothing but soap operas, on the second half, they showed terrible talk shows. Talk shows - this is a whole different thing. For example, the most casual of the participants on the show are a couple who cheat on each other with their best friends, or how about the daddies, who sleep with their daughters, moreover they begin to explain direct relations in real time before the public. Usual participants in a talk show are homosexuals, zoophiles, lesbians, killers, maniacs. The audience applauds and encourages them. A young and stupid American watches the show daily and thinks to himself: “Wow, then it’s indeed normal - to be a faggot or a killer! – there look, they are even on shown on TV!” Yes, I agree, these terrible shows have already made their way here as well. Alas. Unfortunately. A bad example is infectious. To have a higher education in the US is prestigious. It is prestigious, but it is very expensive. It always killed me to know the fact how Americans had the power to know in advance: if I graduate from certain institute, I will then be making 80 thousand dollars per year, while if I graduate from such and such – I will be only making 75. In this case, this system actually exists, without looking at the ability of a man, his mental acuity and mind. If a diploma exists, it means that the wage is not lower than a certain point. So then, if someone tells you that in the US higher education diplomas are not necessary, do not believe! Although generally, not everybody in the US can allow himself a higher education. Just per year, education will bypass into 20-25 thousand dollars depending on the prestige of the university. This is without considering expenditures for textbooks and stay in the campus. And don’t even get me started on scholarships; in essence, they are only obtained by either Negroes or Hindus, or sexual minorities. However, a normal white person with normal inclinations to obtain a scholarship – Oh no, it’s not so easy. In essence, students take out loans for education and when they graduate, they not only have a diploma on their hands, but also a debt into several thousand dollars. All Americans I know where shocked when I told them that I have two magisterial diplomas. Upon hearing that they indeed made calculations in their mind about how much money I poured into my education. I did not want to disappoint them and did not say that it was almost free. By the way, I remember, how I somehow brought one emigrant from the Ukraine to tears. In 1985 he left for the states in order, as he expressed it,” to give to his sons a good education”. He climbed into the debts, lived half-starving, nearly happened to be sentenced to prison for a swindle, but nevertheless gathered the sum necessary for the education of his kiddies. True, the money he made was sufficient only for college, but even that made him happy. And he was happy, up until the exact moment when he met me. Well, as is usual with emigrants, he began to brag about how he succeeded in life and how his sons obtained outstanding education, and he said whom would they be in the Soviet Union, and such. On what I reasonably stated that college - this is the analog of our PTU, and to name it a good education is possible only with a large stretch.
And secondly, in the Ukraine I obtained two free diplomas, free of charge, and “the legalization” of these diplomas in the US for me was simply put on “hurray”. I gave documents to an MBA to the prestigious university UCLA. They opened two very big such reference books, looked for Ukraine in the alphabetical order, found my institute. And they say “No problem”. The man was in shock. It was not just a simple shock, he was in a stupor. I quietly maliciously rejoiced.
