Magnet schools and the case against them
As you all may know, I attended magnet/gifted schools from middle school to high school. I was quite vocal about that because it changed my life in an incredibly unimaginable way that even my parents couldn’t think of. I am not rubbing it onto my reader’s face because I am so proud that I need to boast about it. I am not proud. I was privileged and could have done better.
I visited NYC a few days ago and just learned that they have the same Magnet school systems as the city I am from. Middle school’s student placement is purely based on the test score (familiar yet?). They have 5 boroughs, each of which has one or share one magnet school with the other. They are pretty much criticized. Just like how they are in Vietnam. Although the arguments against them are a little bit different, they are all based on the intense sense of anti-meritocracy.
In my home city, they say that first, it is a waste of taxpayer’s money. Well, the funding for the school is not that much. Parents still have to bear the financial burdens for all kinds of tuition and fees. VNmese don’t pay so much tax tho. Most of the incomes are quite under the table. Second, they say that the resource is distributed unevenly, only the privileged can attend the school. I am privileged. My parents pay taxes duly. I have the ability to perform better with better peers. How can they call it uneven? Giving the parents who pay no taxes all the attention from the schools? Not to say that the financial heavy lifting is mostly done by the parents, who in general pay more taxes (blue collar workers and SME owners)! Most importantly, and this is the killer argument, most of us are not as priviledged as the top 1%. Without the system, I think I am still the 50%; many of my friends are still the 70%. Third, they say that kids are killing themselves and working too hard. Isn’t that the reality of life? I am rewarded by working hard. It is undeniable. Fourth, they say that the talented are contributing their work to other countries (the US, the EU, Australia, etc.) It is irrelevant because the education system’s broken high education doesn’t mean that the government should degrade the K-12 system to match each other’s quality. The government needs to fix the higher education!
The city of NY also has to face the same questions except that they actually use taxpayer’s money, and US higher education is much better than that of Vietnam. Again, the ability to learn and the tax payment are highly correlated. Kids whose backgrounds are not so privileged but whose parents are determined enough to afford a better education are now able to because of the pure meritocracy. More than 50% of them come from not so well-off family!
Why do people make a fuss? Because they are anti-meritocracy. They are jealous because they are not working hard enough. In the end, the VNmese are learning the wrong thing from the US to fix the VN’s rarely right policy. That’s all. (Miranda Priestly’s tone)
And scene.
