[Craig]
IMHO part of the problem in your debate arises from not
distinguishing between "diverse", "multi-cultural" & "open-minded" societies.
[Arlo]
To be fair all around, these are tricky terms to define. That's why
I've been asking John for more examples of what he means by
"monocultural". So far, all he's supplied is religious diversity, but
even this I have questions about, since those rural Oklahoma towns
I've been pointing to may have twenty different minor variations of
Christianity, but I don't think that matches the religious diversity
of Tokyo (or any metropolitan city, for that matter).
I believe Japan, from my experience, to be a place of much
intellectual diversity (another form of diversity), as is evident
from their world leadership in many academic disciplines. Academic
journals give evidence to the variety in intellectual thought. Its
simply wrong to assume they all "think alike" somehow. It is also a
country of musical diversity, you have everything from classical to
rock to punk to tribal. And simple photos of Tokyo streets
demonstrate as much, at least, diversity among its dwellers in terms
of social appearance (related perhaps to various subcultures) as in NYC or LA.
On top of all this, however, is the evident "ethnic" marker, or
"race" (I suppose, although I don't like that word). A lot of Japan
is like a lot of the USA, very homogenous in its ethnicity. Granted,
there may be areas of the US where there are "more" people from
"more" places across the globe, giving many US cities quite
remarkable ethnic enclaves. But this still does not support John's
(apparent) contention that "monocultural" populations learn better
somehow, as I have pointed out, this would not support why towns in
rural Oklahoma fair worse against the more "multicultural" (or
multi-ethnic) population of Tokyo.
My initial comment about Finland and Japan led to the argument that
"public schools" only work in monocultural settings. I've tried to
show this is false, pointing to US public schools that fail in the
most "homogenous" towns imaginable, whether one assumes
"monocultural" to refer to ethnicity or religion. I can't wrap my
head around the great religions diversity in rural Oklahoma that John
apparently feels dooms its school to failure, nor how these towns are
"more diverse" (in any sense) than metropolitan Tokyo.
And, since he has focused exclusively on religion, it would also
indicate that American religious schools would outperform public
schools in diverse areas of Japan or Finland. This is not the case.
Indeed, if "monoculturality" was the marker for success, we would see
American private and religious schools performing at least as good
as, if not better, than schools in Japan and Finland.
But yes, compared to many public districts, American private and
religious schools fare better. Many studies have examined this, and
across the board one of the major reasons is that parents who send
their kids to these schools are more involved in their kid's
education. Indeed, the success of these kids is identical to the
success of kid's in public schools whose parents' indicate a similar
level of involvement. There are other factors, to be sure, classroom
size, teacher support and agency in the classroom, money for
extracurricular activities, field trips, etc, as well as money for
classroom learning items (computers, books, films, etc.).
But I suspect, based on John's latest post, that this is really not
about that. This is about whether or not taxes should fund public
education, whether or not public or private is better for learning is
not really at issue. Its a different argument, to be sure.
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