Discopants and Haircuts

(updated) Welcome redditers…

Big Hello to the bigger lebowski. Ben it’s good to hear from you.

I talked to my sister last Sunday. She’s a High School math/computer teacher on Long Island, New York. From what I understand it is a pretty nice school with decent technology, decent students and other wonderful things that make a High School worthy of our children.

As we got to talking the conversation quickly turned to life/schools here versus life/schools there. I asked her if she wanted one of her classes to correspond with one of mine. Turns out it is not so easy.

I thought I would post some of the differences:

Here (Norway) vs. There (Long Island)

1. Here- At school, nothing is blocked on the Internet. (haven’t found anything yet)

1. There -Tons of websites, email blocked. (limited for teachers too. My sister can’t e-mail her husband. ).

2. Here- Students come and go as they please. Like college. If they have a class they are there, if not they can leave. The same goes for me. If I don’t have a class I don’t need to be there.

2. There- Students need hall passes to do anything. Halls and other areas are monitored always. Students must be in school from beginning to end.

3. Here: After a certain age, students here can decide a career path, if they so desire, in which they can study. If you want to be a carpenter, you can go to school for it.

3. There: All students take pretty much the same thing.

4. Here: The drinking age for beer is 18, 21 for hard liquor. Students at 16 drink every weekend because no one really worries about it. Most parents prefer to be around when they drink. Consequently kids don’t look at alcohol as a big deal.

4. There: 21. That’s it that’s all. Any parent allowing people under 21 to drink could get there asses handed to them. Consequently everyone has to hide it from everyone and tend to drink too much often. I speak from experience.

5. Here: Sure there are problems, but students tend to be rather cool about everything.

5. There: Many many problems because there are so many damn rules.

6. Would you see this in an American text book? I doubt it… I scanned this right out of one of the textbooks I use in class. This would cause a national debate in the US. Here, no biggie…

Now, let me make this clear, kids are kids. I realized that a long time ago. We have kids who don’t do homework or seem motivated at all, just like back in the US. We have the occasional fight, theft etc. But there is just a maturity here that is lacking in the US. The kids are given responsibility for themselves. They have been raised that way. They are treated more as adults rather than criminals. Why is it so different? I can’t give you an answer. Why do you think?