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Should we get our child baptised?

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    #92
    iguana
    Registered Users Posts: 12,916 ✭✭✭✭iguana


    Rev Hellfire wrote: »
    I'm sure through the superior education you will have secured for them they will be able to see the wisdom of not cutting off your nose to spite your face.

    And what makes you think that the education given to the child, through this type of system will be superior? And superior to what exactly?


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    #93
    Rev Hellfire
    Closed Accounts Posts: 7,346 ✭✭✭Rev Hellfire


    iguana wrote: »
    And what makes you think that the education given to the child, through this type of system will be superior? And superior to what exactly?
    Well I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume that most parents will select the school with the best education record that is within a reasonable distance of their home. In many cases this may be the school with the religious patron which gives rise to the (non) dilemma facing the OP.
    Therefore if securing such a school means a bit of water on a head and the excuse for a family get together then so be it.


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    #94
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    Irish (brought up Catholic, hadn't practised in years), friends in London started going to mass again in order to get their kid in the local Catholic school. The reckoned that their kid would receive some education there, rather than the local non religous school, where chaos reigned.

    Can't say I blame them.


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    #95
    iguana
    Registered Users Posts: 12,916 ✭✭✭✭iguana


    Rev Hellfire wrote: »
    Well I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume that most parents will select the school with the best education record that is within a reasonable distance of their home. In many cases this may be the school with the religious patron which gives rise to the (non) dilemma facing the OP.
    Therefore if securing such a school means a bit of water on a head and the excuse for a family get together then so be it.

    Let's be honest, the education system in Ireland isn't that good. I learned quite a lot of things in school which later turned out to be wrong. And not wrong in a "it depends on your perspective" type of way. But just wrong in a somebody did extremely lazy research type way. For example I learned in school that Henry VIII converted to protestantism in order to get a divorce. As an adult I've rooted out my old history book to make sure I didn't just understand it wrong but this is what was being thought to the whole country.

    Then our teacher on being asked why he couldn't just behead her like the rest of his wives, made things even worse by telling us that he couldn't because do that she was foreign royalty and if he beheaded her there would be a war.:mad:


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    #96
    Rev Hellfire
    Closed Accounts Posts: 7,346 ✭✭✭Rev Hellfire


    iguana wrote: »
    Let's be honest, the education system in Ireland isn't that good.
    That explains why our education system is typically ranked within the top 10 to 15 countries in the world.

    http://www.educationalpolicy.org/pdf/Global2005.pdf
    http://archives.cnn.com/2002/EDUCATION/11/26/education.rankings.reut/index.html
    http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/42/8/39700724.pdf

    In the end of the day thats all a side issue.

    The fact is the educational system that we have is not going to change suddenly and as such the pragmatic individual will work it to their advantage.


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    #97
    nesf
    Registered Users Posts: 27,645 ✭✭✭✭nesf


    iguana wrote: »
    Let's be honest, the education system in Ireland isn't that good.

    Versus what? We might not be the best in the world but we certainly don't have a poor education system.


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    #98
    CerebralCortex
    Registered Users Posts: 3,809 ✭✭✭CerebralCortex


    nesf wrote: »
    Versus what? We might not be the best in the world but we certainly don't have a poor education system.

    Supposedly its meant to be highly inflated. Qualification over Education I think. I have nothing to back that up but I'd believe it.


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    #99
    iguana
    Registered Users Posts: 12,916 ✭✭✭✭iguana


    Rev Hellfire wrote: »
    That explains why our education system is typically ranked within the top 10 to 15 countries in the world.

    http://www.educationalpolicy.org/pdf/Global2005.pdf
    http://archives.cnn.com/2002/EDUCATION/11/26/education.rankings.reut/index.html
    http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/42/8/39700724.pdf

    In the end of the day thats all a side issue.

    The fact is the educational system that we have is not going to change suddenly and as such the pragmatic individual will work it to their advantage.

    The first link is a report on the affordability and accessibility of third level education. I don't see how that has anything to do with the quality of our school systems. I'm guessing you typed something along the lines of, education rank Ireland, into google and got this link?

    The second link is an article which contains a table listing what percentage of 15 year olds fall below international benchmarks. It isn't a ranking of the quality of the education system. I'm guessing you got it from the same google search.

    The third link, which you added as an edit, is a link to a table showing the findings of the Pisa Science Scale study of 2006. However you have linked to one table in isolation, without showing what it means. Did you know for example that the Pisa 2006 was only done in 57 participating countries? That is hardly a fair representation of the 193 (194 if you include Taiwan) countries in the world.
    nesf wrote: »
    Versus what? We might not be the best in the world but we certainly don't have a poor education system.

    How we compare to others is irrelevant. Henry VIII remained a catholic all his life, but the national curriculum teaches otherwise. If we are teaching children things which are incorrect then the system has a problem.

    We are a country with massive levels of personal debt. The average individual on the street has a very poor grasp of basic personal economics, this is partly due to a failing in our education system. If we are failing to teach our children the basics of how the financial system works then we have a problem.

    Our education system is not that good. It fails many with learning disabilities, it doesn't challenge those who are extremely bright. It caters to a median and is too rigid in it's structure to work for children who are slightly different. It favours teaching many impractical subjects which most students will never use in the real world over the basics we should all know to get by. And sometimes it is just so lazy it teaches things that are wrong.


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    #100
    Rev Hellfire
    Closed Accounts Posts: 7,346 ✭✭✭Rev Hellfire


    iguana wrote: »
    The first link is a report on the affordability and accessibility of third level education. I don't see how that has anything to do with the quality of our school systems.
    Its relevant because it shows how accessable our education system is, no point having a excellent education system if its not accessable now is there :rolleyes:
    iguana wrote: »
    The second link is an article which contains a table listing what percentage of 15 year olds fall below international benchmarks. It isn't a ranking of the quality of the education system.
    The second shows how successful our system pre-university level education(yes I know 18 might be a better age)
    iguana wrote: »
    The third link, which you added as an edit, is a link to a table showing the findings of the Pisa Science Scale study of 2006.
    The findings are actual also tied to science, but since thats relevant to our service industry which is our dominate industry making it more relevant.

    As for google , yes of course I googled, but I knew what I was looking for.
    You though have failed to provide any proof for your claim that the education system here is failing, when clearly the attractiveness of the country for foreign based service industry (with our education level citied time and time again as a reason for selecting ireland) saying otherwise.


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    #101
    iguana
    Registered Users Posts: 12,916 ✭✭✭✭iguana


    Rev Hellfire wrote: »
    Its relevant because it shows how accessable our education system is, no point having a excellent education system if its not accessable now is there :rolleyes:

    How does accessability prove excellency? It doesn't, furthermore the article is about 3rd level so hardly relevant to a discussion about baptising a child for educational purposes.
    Rev Hellfire wrote: »
    The second shows how successful our system pre-university level education(yes I know 18 might be a better age)

    How does showing how few people fail to meet international benchmarks show how high our standard is? It doesn't as it doesn't show an upper level, it also doesn't tell us what the benchmark is. Is it basic literacy and numerical ability? Or is it more complex? How many children surpassed international averages is also pertinant.
    Rev Hellfire wrote: »
    The findings are actual also tied to science, but since thats relevant to our service industry which is our dominate industry making it more relevant.

    What? I'm not trying to be funny but I don't understand what point you are making.
    Rev Hellfire wrote: »
    As for google , yes of course I googled, but I knew what I was looking for.

    Nothing you linked to supports your point.
    Rev Hellfire wrote: »
    You though have failed to provide any proof for your claim that the education system here is failing,

    The majority of the population fail to understand personal finance, which is certainly an indicator of the paucity of our education system.
    Rev Hellfire wrote: »
    when clearly the attractiveness of the country for foreign based service industry (with our education level citied time and time again as a reason for selecting ireland) saying otherwise.

    Sure that's what they say, because being honest and saying it has far more to do with our low corporation taxes sounds a little insulting.

    I used to believe that Ireland had one of the highest standards of education in the world too. Then I looked into it and found that to be a largely self-propogated myth. Irish people who talk about the wonders of our education system are on par with Americans who tell you their political system is the envy of the world.


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    #102
    Rev Hellfire
    Closed Accounts Posts: 7,346 ✭✭✭Rev Hellfire


    iguana wrote: »
    I used to believe that Ireland had one of the highest standards of education in the world too. Then I looked into it and found that to be a largely self-propogated myth. Irish people who talk about the wonders of our education system are on par with Americans who tell you their political system is the envy of the world.
    Show us something beyond simple opinion to backup your claim. I looked into it as well and concluded we have the absolute best eduction system in the world, no I'm not going to provide any evidence but my gut tell me I'm right :rolleyes:

    Anyway this is totally off topic at this stage, if you want to continue it make a topic in humanities and I'll happily debate your opinion that the Irish education system is dysfunctional there.


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    #103
    nesf
    Registered Users Posts: 27,645 ✭✭✭✭nesf


    CerebralCortex wrote: »
    Supposedly its meant to be highly inflated. Qualification over Education I think. I have nothing to back that up but I'd believe it.

    That's not a problem specific to ourselves though. Most complaints about that are dealing with the tricky issue of what it exactly means to educate a person etc. It's also an issue farther up the school chain and probably best left to another thread. I agree with you though to an extent. I don't think it's as bad as some would like to make it out though.
    iguana wrote: »
    How we compare to others is irrelevant.

    No it isn't. We can learn a lot from other school systems and their mistakes and successes. Similar to our health system, transportation system etc.


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