Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey, wasn't it stuff to blow your mind?
Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb and m Julie Douglas. And
Speaker 1: you know, we don't talk a lot about education on here,
Speaker 1: but it's something that's that's always on our minds. I mean,
Speaker 1: you as a parent, uh, me as a scene to
Speaker 1: be parent and uh. And we're ultimately engaged in sharing
Speaker 1: information with the world. We're a curiosity brand. We're about
Speaker 1: discussing the science of of of the world most of
Speaker 1: the time. And we've had the the privilege of working
Speaker 1: with Discovery Education UM here and there to promote educational endeavors.
Speaker 1: That's right. We actually worked with them on a STEM presentation.
Speaker 1: This is Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics and STEM education.
Speaker 1: The US has been on educators and policymakers minds for
Speaker 1: for a while now, and one of the reasons is
Speaker 1: that we've become far less competitive as a nation in
Speaker 1: terms of knowledge based information. Right, that's kind of fallen
Speaker 1: away from our society. Yeah, I mean, it's a it's
Speaker 1: a sad story and one that I think everyone's absorbed
Speaker 1: through the media that we're we're not doing as well
Speaker 1: at all on our on our science and our math
Speaker 1: and our physics, where we're getting pretty good, I guess
Speaker 1: about you know, learning about the science of magical aspects
Speaker 1: of the world and how with the latest pop singers doing.
Speaker 1: But we're not We're not necessarily all that great when
Speaker 1: it comes to science and math, right, And so we're
Speaker 1: not going to try to actually, you know, take this
Speaker 1: hon as a topic of why the United States is
Speaker 1: failing in this area. Instead, we're gonna try to look
Speaker 1: at a model that is working. And it's actually in Finland,
Speaker 1: and uh and it is actually predicated on on this
Speaker 1: idea that all children have a good, solid quality education.
Speaker 1: And it's a very simple idea, right, It's not like, hey,
Speaker 1: let's create superstars here. Let's not you know, get the
Speaker 1: number one rankings the world. But lo and behold, they
Speaker 1: have done that. So um as the United States is
Speaker 1: one of the richest industrialized nations, you kind of have
Speaker 1: to sit back and wonder why would our education system
Speaker 1: lagged so far behind less prosperous countries with far less resources.
Speaker 1: So we're gonna try to, you know, take on Finland,
Speaker 1: see what they're doing, and tease out what what might
Speaker 1: be at the bottom of all of this for the
Speaker 1: United States and really the rest of the world. Now,
Speaker 1: I know what some of you are wondering, and you know,
Speaker 1: no no judgment, but some of you are probably wondering,
Speaker 1: where is Finland exactly and what is it? Well? Uh,
Speaker 1: Finland is a far north European country. It is Scandinavian
Speaker 1: and it borders Russia. So if you can picture the
Speaker 1: I guess you call it the Horn of Scandinavia, then
Speaker 1: Finland is a nice vertical slice of that bordering Russia. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's one of the three fingers of that Nordic area.
Speaker 1: In fact, I always think of it as the quieter
Speaker 1: sister of Norway and Sweden. Yeah. And I have to
Speaker 1: say that I don't know a ton about Norway, but
Speaker 1: I do know it's the home of Nokia. Yes, and
Speaker 1: I do know that Lapland that area of Finland is
Speaker 1: home to Santa Claus Village. Yeah, this is the reindeer
Speaker 1: camp that your your brother keeps trying to get. My
Speaker 1: brother keeps saying like they're they have real reindeers. There's
Speaker 1: a Santa Claus. You take these reindeer rides, and I
Speaker 1: just keep thinking about on their backs. Their backs are
Speaker 1: two weeks. Yeah, and there are elves and all of
Speaker 1: that freaks me. No, but I mean, you know, they
Speaker 1: go to great links to make this look as as
Speaker 1: realistic as possible. That you know where Santa might live, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: well it's also troll country, so I would be very
Speaker 1: concerned about that. I just keep thinking of the movie
Speaker 1: Rare Exports. Yes, that was a finished movie. That was
Speaker 1: a finishing which involves like these evils elves in this
Speaker 1: crampus white creature. So whenever he brings it up, creature,
Speaker 1: but crampus ish, I guess you could you could throw
Speaker 1: some Crampus in there. YEA Crampus is like the anti Santa, right,
Speaker 1: wonderful the scenes with a lot of old man natity
Speaker 1: in it. That's great, great for the whole thing. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So unfortunately that that's sort of like my baseline of Finland,
Speaker 1: you know, in addigit the fact that it is the
Speaker 1: home of like two thousand lakes, right, beautiful and very cold. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess my main you know, I obviously I've never
Speaker 1: been to Finland. Uh. I have a great deal respect
Speaker 1: for their sauna culture. As as sana traditions fell out
Speaker 1: of practice with the most of the rest of Europe,
Speaker 1: Finland held onto it the most and it remains a
Speaker 1: strong part of Finnish culture. If you if you're if
Speaker 1: you live in Finland, if you're finished, you have a sauna,
Speaker 1: or you make sure you have access to a sauna.
Speaker 1: Even if you are in the army or in prison,
Speaker 1: you will have a sauna because it is that important.
Speaker 1: And I love a good sauna. I wish I had
Speaker 1: time for more of them, or the office would finally
Speaker 1: install man Um. I love a good sauna. The fins
Speaker 1: love a good sauna, so I can't help but love
Speaker 1: the Fins on that count. Also the Russo finished productions
Speaker 1: of such films as Jack Frost as they were made
Speaker 1: famous over here by Mry Sentence Fetter three thousand. I'm
Speaker 1: a big fan of those. And then also they have
Speaker 1: a rich folk tradition. You have some monsters such as
Speaker 1: Yoka Heinen vast frost giant formed and primordial times from
Speaker 1: the melting of giant icicles at the edge of the world,
Speaker 1: and he lives in the far North. Um there are
Speaker 1: the Mahas, which were earth dwellers, little people and guardian
Speaker 1: spirits that live in the ground. And then this is
Speaker 1: pretty cool too. There's a tonto, which is a household spirit,
Speaker 1: and the way to get a Tonto was to make
Speaker 1: a pack with the devil at a graveyard, okay, and
Speaker 1: then this invites the Tonto back to your home, where
Speaker 1: you make sure the tonto has access the spirit has
Speaker 1: access to the best accommodations and a really nice seat
Speaker 1: at the dinner table. And in return, the tanto enriches
Speaker 1: your alse, generally at your neighbor's expense. So there you go. Well,
Speaker 1: so that's so much better than living in Sweden and
Speaker 1: just going to Ikea. Yeah, exactly, you can. You can
Speaker 1: go to well, yeah you can. You can go to
Speaker 1: Ikia where you can can here in Atlanta if you want.
Speaker 1: But you know, as Ikeia had its beginnings in Sweden,
Speaker 1: I say, hey, there you go, Sweden, you know, little
Speaker 1: thumb of the knows there. I should also point out
Speaker 1: that Finland is a parliamentary democracy, that's right, and get
Speaker 1: that out. Yeah, And they had emerged to um hite
Speaker 1: succeeds I believe from from from Soviet influence, and I
Speaker 1: guess they're right up there. They're the neighbors, you know, exactly. Hello, Um,
Speaker 1: so they really did try to remake their society, to
Speaker 1: try to to hearken back to their rich folklore, their
Speaker 1: rich tradition. They're rich history. And part of that is
Speaker 1: of course rebuilding with a great education system. So when
Speaker 1: we talk about Finland today and all that it has accomplished,
Speaker 1: we're talking about something that has been in the making since,
Speaker 1: uh the seventies. Really, so what have they done? Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: they have ranked at or near the top in three
Speaker 1: major international education studies since two thousand. We're talking neck
Speaker 1: and neck with superachievers like South Korea and Singapore. So
Speaker 1: the students in Finland have been, you know, in some
Speaker 1: cases sort of outranking these other countries. And yet they're
Speaker 1: not putting in nearly as many hours studying and preparing
Speaker 1: as their counterparts in some Southeast Asian countries. So recently,
Speaker 1: they scored first in science and second in reading in
Speaker 1: math on the standardized test administered by the Program for
Speaker 1: International Student Assessment, and this is conducted among industrial niche
Speaker 1: industrialized nations every three years. And then in contrast, American
Speaker 1: students finished twenty five in math, seventeen in science, and
Speaker 1: twelve in reading on the latest UH PISA assessment. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's such a contrast between like U schools. Increasingly
Speaker 1: it's all about these standardized tests. It's about prepping for
Speaker 1: these tests, and it gets to where it has a
Speaker 1: tendency to suck out a lot of the creativity that
Speaker 1: goes into teaching a classroom. We my mom's a kindergarten teacher.
Speaker 1: I even hear from her all the time, and you
Speaker 1: generally think of the kindergarten classroom as a pretty open
Speaker 1: and creative environment, but there's she's always talking about. I'll
Speaker 1: ask about, oh, do you still do that thing with
Speaker 1: the with the ublic or with the with this book
Speaker 1: or that book or this art project, And there's so
Speaker 1: many of those things you can't do anymore because they
Speaker 1: have to make room for these tests. UM. I encountered
Speaker 1: it just a little bit when I very briefly taught
Speaker 1: high school. Uh, And you know, it's like a whole
Speaker 1: part of the year ends up being just about prepping
Speaker 1: for these tests, getting ready to take these standardized tests,
Speaker 1: rehearsing for these standardized tests, and it becomes more about
Speaker 1: um preparing yourself for a simulation of knowledge rather than
Speaker 1: an actual understanding of knowledge, which is really specific, and
Speaker 1: it's handed down from policymakers at a national level, which
Speaker 1: is then interpreted at a state level. Some of the
Speaker 1: problems that we continue to have in the system have
Speaker 1: to do with no child left behind because again we're
Speaker 1: talking about the stringent testing. Um, So trying to throw
Speaker 1: off those shackles and again find more room for the
Speaker 1: actual teaching and learning as opposed to as you say,
Speaker 1: preparing is really important here. Well, you know, it comes
Speaker 1: down to a very American way of dealing with problems.
Speaker 1: You first thing you do, you have a meeting about it,
Speaker 1: and then you have another meeting about it, and then uh,
Speaker 1: and then if you reach it the bureaucracy level, then
Speaker 1: you start making some mandates. And that includes all these
Speaker 1: mandated tests. How many mandated tests does Finland have? Uh?
Speaker 1: They have one at age sixteen, you enter at age seven,
Speaker 1: and then at age sixteen you have one one mandatory test.
Speaker 1: So already you can begin to see that this is
Speaker 1: very contrary to what we do here in the United States. Um.
Speaker 1: This is from and you partin in from Atlantic magazine. Uh.
Speaker 1: She had said that when she spoke with Passy Salberg,
Speaker 1: who wrote a book called finishal lessons what the world
Speaker 1: can learn from educational change in Finland? That he said
Speaker 1: that Americans are consistently obsessed with certain questions. How can
Speaker 1: you keep track of a student's performance if you don't
Speaker 1: test them constantly? How can you improve teaching if you
Speaker 1: have no accountability for bad teachers or merit pay for
Speaker 1: good teachers? How do you foster competition and engage the
Speaker 1: private sector? How do you provide school choice? Now, he says,
Speaker 1: for finished educators, none of these questions are relevant, none
Speaker 1: of them. And uh, we should take a quick break,
Speaker 1: and when we get back, we'll get into why they're
Speaker 1: not relevant Finland and and perhaps why this is part
Speaker 1: of the reason they're so successful in academia. All right,
Speaker 1: we're back. Just want to grow a more quick set
Speaker 1: around here before we go into the land of Finland's um.
Speaker 1: The two thousand and nine National Assessment of Educational Progress
Speaker 1: found barely one third of fourth graders in the United
Speaker 1: States were at or above the proficient level of science,
Speaker 1: with those proportions slipping tot in eighth grade, in twenty
Speaker 1: one in twelfth grade. What this means is that we
Speaker 1: have a large population here, some of whom are going
Speaker 1: to college and they're not actually prepared, particularly in the
Speaker 1: area of science. So what does that spell out for
Speaker 1: the future of science brainiacs here in the United States?
Speaker 1: A little dim? Right? Meanwhile, in Finland, children are begin
Speaker 1: setting outerbra geometry and statistics in the first grade. Yes,
Speaker 1: and by age fifteen they tend to speak three languages.
Speaker 1: Though that's not really that uncommon in Europe because you're
Speaker 1: gonna have the local language. You got Russia right next door,
Speaker 1: you got English kicking about so well. In the official
Speaker 1: languages are Finnish and Swedish, so you can't really just
Speaker 1: hang out which is Finnish language if you want to
Speaker 1: hang out with the rest of the world, right, especially culturally. Right.
Speaker 1: So Okay, we talked about this education reform happening in
Speaker 1: the seven in these in the eighties and that finished,
Speaker 1: policymakers wanted to really try to recast their education system
Speaker 1: because they felt like that would bolster the entire country,
Speaker 1: and they would do this by providing equity, by making
Speaker 1: sure that each kid got a fair shot at a
Speaker 1: good education. It was actually a pretty prescient move of them,
Speaker 1: because I think that this put them on a track
Speaker 1: to really compete globally because they realized they didn't have
Speaker 1: much to be competitive with. They couldn't rely on manufacturing
Speaker 1: or natural resources, and they instead had to invest in
Speaker 1: a knowledge based society. Now what does that sound like today?
Speaker 1: Very much like the United States, though we do have
Speaker 1: American exceptionalism, right, don't we have? No? Well, maybe we
Speaker 1: don't have that sometimes that I don't know about that.
Speaker 1: So what does their school system look like? Percent of
Speaker 1: the schools or public. Only a small number of independent
Speaker 1: schools exists in Finland's that's three percent that are independent
Speaker 1: or private, and they are all publicly financed. Finland offers
Speaker 1: all pupil's free school and meals, easy access to healthcare
Speaker 1: which is really important, psychological counseling, and individualized student guidance.
Speaker 1: So it's not just hey, we have a great education system.
Speaker 1: They have everything in place to actually support uh, everything else. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and this family is really telling as well. The people
Speaker 1: in the government agencies running these schools, they're there and
Speaker 1: this goes from national offices to local authorities. They are educators.
Speaker 1: They're not business people. They're not military leaders and not
Speaker 1: career politicians. Um and uh. And every school has the
Speaker 1: same national goals and draw from the same pool of
Speaker 1: university trained educators. Yeah. It really is one of those
Speaker 1: things where it's so homogenized, but it works. Right. The
Speaker 1: homogeny here is quality. So if you have quality across
Speaker 1: the board, then everybody gets the same education. Uh. And
Speaker 1: that is where you began to see these numbers, these
Speaker 1: incredible numbers. Fully of Finns graduate from high school. That's
Speaker 1: seventeen point five points higher than American students. And stick see,
Speaker 1: six percent are accepted to college and that's a higher
Speaker 1: rate than the US in every European nation. And they
Speaker 1: have a zero dropout right right, there's no there is
Speaker 1: no Why would they drop out? Is sort of their idea, Okay,
Speaker 1: because they're moving through this system and they're really learning
Speaker 1: from it now, and all of this with significantly less homework. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's true, that significantly less homework. Actually, don't I think
Speaker 1: they have said that from from most of the reports
Speaker 1: that we read in Smithsonian and Atlantic that at the
Speaker 1: most maybe a half hour of homework. Yeah, because I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm going to sound like you know, twelve year oldier,
Speaker 1: but homework is ridiculous. It's kind of like, I mean, well,
Speaker 1: why you spend all day there and then you have
Speaker 1: to go home to supposedly learn the stuff that you
Speaker 1: were doing during the day. That well, then half the
Speaker 1: people or more aren't gonna do it. So yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The other thing is that, um, through throughout the school day,
Speaker 1: especially for the younger children, they have like forty five
Speaker 1: minutes of school and then fifteen minutes of play. Forty
Speaker 1: five minutes of school, fifteen minutes played throughout today, so
Speaker 1: you do get those mental breaks. And we've talked about
Speaker 1: this before how important it is to be able to
Speaker 1: sort of take that break so that your brain can
Speaker 1: absorb the information. So they're certainly doing it the right way. Um. Okay,
Speaker 1: So some people might say, well, I think this is
Speaker 1: super expensive. Well, okay, here's the big news here. Finland
Speaker 1: spends about thirty percent less per student than the US
Speaker 1: does to achieve which is obviously far superior results. Let's
Speaker 1: talk about the teachers. Who are these who are these
Speaker 1: these cogs in the system that are making making this work,
Speaker 1: because they're more than just cogs for starters, We're talking
Speaker 1: about highly educated people university degrees and then they have
Speaker 1: a remarkable amount of freedom and how they educate their classroom.
Speaker 1: I've I've heard it. You know, they're not having to
Speaker 1: worry about about sticking to some sort of rigid, standardized
Speaker 1: curriculum all the time, and they're able to creatively engage
Speaker 1: the students. Right. So, at the the national level level,
Speaker 1: or by UH, I should say, the education ministry, they say, okay,
Speaker 1: when it comes to math, here are ten pages of
Speaker 1: things that we want you guys to cover and make
Speaker 1: sure um kids are learning now that is and start
Speaker 1: contrast to like hundreds of pages that are usually handed
Speaker 1: down by education systems, and by the time it gets
Speaker 1: to that particular school or that teacher, they still are
Speaker 1: allowed to have a bit of interpretation of what that
Speaker 1: means and flexibility and how they teach it. How is
Speaker 1: a really big part of this, right, So you have
Speaker 1: a centralized government that is helping to structure it, but
Speaker 1: they are giving uh teachers that that leeway. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean it also gives them the ability to look at
Speaker 1: the classroom and say, how am I gonna engage this
Speaker 1: group of people, Like, what is what is going to
Speaker 1: engage them? Is it going to be reading the Great Gasbee?
Speaker 1: Probably not? All right? Right? And here's another thing, Um,
Speaker 1: some people might say, oh, they must be getting paid,
Speaker 1: you know, an amount that we just couldn't do here
Speaker 1: in the United States. Well finished teachers starting salaries are
Speaker 1: lower than in the US, but high school teachers with
Speaker 1: fifteen years experience make one two percent of what other
Speaker 1: college graduates make in the US. UH the figure is
Speaker 1: six of that. So eventually, over time, finished teachers are
Speaker 1: paid more than UH United States teachers. But still, um,
Speaker 1: they're not too off in terms of the payment. What
Speaker 1: the big story here is is that teachers in Finland
Speaker 1: are regarded very highly. And um. This is from The Atlantic,
Speaker 1: the article why are Finland Schools so successful? It says
Speaker 1: the critical decision came in ninety nine when reformers required
Speaker 1: that every teacher earned a fifth year master's degree in
Speaker 1: theory and practice at one of the eight state universities,
Speaker 1: which are free, by the way, at state expense. So
Speaker 1: they did at state's expense. From then on, teachers were
Speaker 1: effectively granted equal status with doctors and lawyers, and applicants
Speaker 1: began flooding teaching programs, not because the salaries were so high,
Speaker 1: because we know they aren't, but because autonomy and respect
Speaker 1: made the job attractive. In two thousand and tends some
Speaker 1: sixty applicants vibe for six hundred and sixty primary school
Speaker 1: training slots. So we're talking about here is really passionate
Speaker 1: people who you know, they get to occupy the status
Speaker 1: as molders of um, you know, the future of Finland.
Speaker 1: And I don't mean to disparage any teachers in United States,
Speaker 1: because there's so many wonderful passionate teachers, UM. But there
Speaker 1: are also a lot of people who could also be
Speaker 1: wonderful passionate teachers, but they don't because when you look
Speaker 1: at being a teacher here in the United States, UM,
Speaker 1: it's just not as as highly positioned as other things,
Speaker 1: right correct. Um. You know, Also, when I was looking
Speaker 1: around at various articles and blog posts about this, you
Speaker 1: inevitably encounter somebody talking about, oh, what's it's a socialist system, socialism,
Speaker 1: and especially in the United States that the term socialism
Speaker 1: is often thrown about without any real understanding of what
Speaker 1: it means. But I find it interesting that um Clark
Speaker 1: Howard uh was a local, uh well not a local
Speaker 1: you can hear all over the country, but based in Atlanta.
Speaker 1: Generally he's about, you know, finding cheap ways to live
Speaker 1: your life for more economically feasible ways to live your life,
Speaker 1: that sort of thing. He's a big fan of the
Speaker 1: Finland system and he actually compares it compares the teacher's
Speaker 1: freedom in the classroom to their approach to the way
Speaker 1: an entrepreneur would treat a business. Lots of ability, you know,
Speaker 1: on the field in the classroom, doing what's best for
Speaker 1: this environment and making it as as you know, great
Speaker 1: a classroom as possible. You know, what's really cool too,
Speaker 1: is that the teachers do individual assessments of the children
Speaker 1: throughout the year. So again there's no big test, but
Speaker 1: what they're doing when they do that is they're looking
Speaker 1: at the strength and the weaknesses of that one child
Speaker 1: and then they're figuring out, well, okay, this kid might
Speaker 1: need more support here in math or reading or so
Speaker 1: on and so forth, and creating a curriculum that is
Speaker 1: geared just for that child. Right, um, so, and now
Speaker 1: away you do have the homogeneous everybody gets a quality,
Speaker 1: high quality education. But at the same time you get
Speaker 1: that everybody gets the support that they need to access
Speaker 1: that information and to learn it, which is really key. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you know a lot of the reason that they
Speaker 1: can do that is that they spend fewer hours at
Speaker 1: school each day, and they spend less time in the
Speaker 1: classrooms than American teachers, and they use the extra time
Speaker 1: to build those curriculums and assess their students. So again
Speaker 1: they're not hamstrung by all of these different uh bits
Speaker 1: of standardized testing that are handed down. That being said,
Speaker 1: American schools, at least you've got good football programs. So
Speaker 1: there's always that now, But the hope here is it's not.
Speaker 1: You know, the whole reason we did the spot podcast
Speaker 1: was not to be a little American education. Um. I mean,
Speaker 1: certainly we're both products of American education. I'm a product
Speaker 1: of public schools, um for better and worse. But but
Speaker 1: but but no, we we want to point out that
Speaker 1: that this is a system that a lot of people
Speaker 1: are looking at and they're saying, there's stuff we can
Speaker 1: learn from here. There's this is not something just some
Speaker 1: sort of a foreign model that doesn't mesh with our
Speaker 1: culture or our system. We could easily adopt some of
Speaker 1: these same principles, apply them to our own educational system,
Speaker 1: and years from now we could be the success story
Speaker 1: that we've had. So many of us feel entitled to
Speaker 1: well that'll be the interesting thing to see Finland in
Speaker 1: twenty years because already, you know, their quality of life
Speaker 1: is pretty high, their economy is doing, you know, fairly well,
Speaker 1: and then they have this education system to boot support
Speaker 1: all of the rest of it. So you know, in
Speaker 1: twenty years will they be a major player. I don't know,
Speaker 1: but some people will look at this and say, well,
Speaker 1: you know, they're a smaller country and it's much more feasible.
Speaker 1: Well so are their counterparts, Norway and Sweden, and they
Speaker 1: still with their system, they best them in terms of,
Speaker 1: you know, how their students are performing. And if you
Speaker 1: look at the United States, most of the school systems
Speaker 1: are stay run and you have at least eighteen states
Speaker 1: that have the same population as Finland. So there are
Speaker 1: certainly opportunities to to test this model out to see
Speaker 1: to what extent it could be used. But of course
Speaker 1: those takeaways aren't that, you know, we need to have
Speaker 1: three years of maternity leave in place in order to
Speaker 1: be successful, which is not as a country going to
Speaker 1: get to that point yet. Right, there are basic things
Speaker 1: that Finland has that we won't. But again, this idea
Speaker 1: of UM raising the profile teachers and having good quality
Speaker 1: for every single child. Well, that's the whole theory of
Speaker 1: you know, when waters rise, all all boats rise, right,
Speaker 1: um and again, and I want to harken back to
Speaker 1: what you said to like, we're not trying to take
Speaker 1: on the American education system. That's a huge, huge topic
Speaker 1: and it's far more complex and nuanced than we've touched
Speaker 1: on here. Um. But I do think that you know,
Speaker 1: a sense of pride in America and um and wanting
Speaker 1: it to be a vital contributor to the rest of
Speaker 1: the World's really important to have an education system in
Speaker 1: place that can make sure that everybody plays together on
Speaker 1: a global scale. Yeah. Now to your point about to
Speaker 1: what extent of Finland may be you know, a major
Speaker 1: player in in the future. It is again worth the
Speaker 1: pointing out that it is apparently home to Santa, who
Speaker 1: was already a major global player. We don't have Santa.
Speaker 1: What are we gonna do for me? You know, we
Speaker 1: don't have Lapland And if holding them back, it's just
Speaker 1: probably that that massive troll problem they have exactly that.
Speaker 1: And um, well I depression because of those extremely long
Speaker 1: days of darkness. Yeah, but you know, you just buy
Speaker 1: a lamp, then you're good, that's true. Lamp At. A
Speaker 1: study by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, which was highlighted
Speaker 1: by John Metca for Atlantic Cities, points out that there
Speaker 1: are a couple of barriers the decent STEM education in
Speaker 1: the US. I just want to take them off real quick,
Speaker 1: something for us all to ponder. The first is a
Speaker 1: persistent reluctance to embrace the theory of evolution. In states
Speaker 1: like Ury and Tennessee, learning about Darwin's theory of natural
Speaker 1: selection is still voluntary in schools um And recently there
Speaker 1: was a news item, by the way, that came out
Speaker 1: about UM kids who were taught to creationism and they're
Speaker 1: really poor science UM skills. Well that's not surprising at all, right,
Speaker 1: uh So, and uh let me said a cath says,
Speaker 1: says many standards also in events, a remarkable vagueness in
Speaker 1: the goals that they hope to achieve. And math instruction
Speaker 1: is lacking in many jurisdictions, and teachers don't have enough
Speaker 1: guidance when it comes to building science instruction into their
Speaker 1: lesson plans. So again, the support system isn't quite there,
Speaker 1: all right, So there you have it. Uh again, we
Speaker 1: just wanted to provide some information about this finished system
Speaker 1: that a lot of people were talking about. UM. Certainly,
Speaker 1: do some Google searches, you'll find most of these the
Speaker 1: documents we're talking about. There are a lot of news
Speaker 1: stories without there a lot of blogs discussing the various
Speaker 1: aspects of this that could be applied to the U
Speaker 1: S system. Uh. In the meantime, we would love to
Speaker 1: hear from any teachers out there. Uh. You could be
Speaker 1: American teachers, maybe your Finish teachers, anyone who has actual
Speaker 1: firsthand experience with the Finnish system. That would be great
Speaker 1: to hear from you to get your two cents on
Speaker 1: all this. Uh. Oh, and I did want to just
Speaker 1: just to underline it, um, my cat and lamp solution
Speaker 1: to depression. I'm only talking about seasonal effective disorder, and
Speaker 1: I'm doing so right kind of flippantly. Uh, But not
Speaker 1: to get into the much deeper subject of depression, which
Speaker 1: we may may discussed in the future podcast. Indeed, that
Speaker 1: is for another topic. And UM, yeah, we would love
Speaker 1: to hear from you guys. And I also would love
Speaker 1: to hear any success stories as a student or a teacher, um,
Speaker 1: And what sort of models you may have experience that
Speaker 1: works for because I think this is really honestly a
Speaker 1: fascinating topic. You can't say that we're not all interested
Speaker 1: in some level. We all support good education, right yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it would be madness, not too so. How
Speaker 1: you can how you can find us, how you can
Speaker 1: get in touch with us, How you can see what
Speaker 1: we're up to, various blogs, podcasts, eos, holograms, whatever we're
Speaker 1: doing in the weeks ahead. You can find us at
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Speaker 1: free to drop a line. You can do so at
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