School is an ineffective system that needs to be rethought

The first round is for acceptance only. I will argue that the school system is currently a very ineffective system and is a mess. Con will argue against my viewpoint. To whoever accepts this debate, you may want to note that I am 12 and in 7th grade right now. Good luck!

According to Google, the definition of ineffective is "not producing any significant or desired effect". (Let's just go by this definition to make it fair.) Now, I do feel like schools do contain an effective system.
Every school's main goal is for the students to succeed. That's why, first of all, they give us homework and projects. They want to teach us the responsibility that we may have to use in the future.
But not only that, schools provide clubs for the students. Many clubs are open to many opportunities that the student may take. For example, it could be that the student is the president of a certain club or even being a manager. (And I'm pretty sure that some clubs do have competitions locally, regionally, and even nationally. For example, the club of Mathcounts has competitions locally, regionally, and even nationally.)
But most importantly, school systems shouldn't be changed because the teacher and the principal are already doing their job. (Who's really not doing their job is the students who are being lazy.) The teacher's main job is to help the student learn a material that would be useful to the real world. But not only that, teachers are to answer questions that students have questions on. Teachers are for you, such as a guide. Now, teacher go through such as 'teacher's training' to be the most effective teacher they could be. In other words, teachers need to have a Teacher's Certification Degree to teach at a certain school. To learn more about this degree here's a link: https://www.teachercertificationdegrees.com...
Continuing on, one thing that did stand out was "All certification programs are designed to give future teachers the skills needed to write and implement effective lesson plans that deliver the content of the required curricula, manage classroom behavior, assess student progress, and work within a professional framework."
So, teachers are doing their job most likely. They want a desire to make their students effective and more successful. If they don't meet these criteria of being a teacher, then they are not teachers, and they usually get fired, which is the right thing to do. These teachers are fired because students should learn and ask questions in schools. So really, schools are effective in the teacher part.

Now for students, it quite hard to say. There are these students that are lazy and do really bad on several tests because they don't study for it. But not only that, they usually act up in class and don't pay attention to a teacher.
Think about it. Let's say you're a teacher, and imagine that there is a kid named Bob. The teachers does everything he or she can do to make that one person get back on task. But the thing is, as you correct that one person because he is acting up, the other students who want to learn are suffering. You told Bob to stop several days, but he just won't. So, if you were in that teacher's shoes, what would you do? Of course, we would probably send Bob out.
Now, as we send that kid out, it kind of makes the school look bad. But if you didn't send that kid out, the other students who want to learn would suffer. Probably, the best solution is to send Bob out so that the other student could learn.
But because this choice is most likely, it kind of makes the school look bad and its system. But think about it: was the teacher doing her job the best way possible? The answer is yes.
So really, schools have effective systems that shouldn't be changed.

I like how you constructed your argument. I will counter it now because we can’t undo it, but keep in mind the first round wasn’t to debate, it was just for acceptance :P

I’m going to start with your first point:

“Every school's main goal is for the students to succeed. That's why, first of all, they give us homework and projects. They want to teach us the responsibility that we may have to use in the future.”

While this may seem right, it is actually not. Schools have been designed around the premise of preparing us to be in factories. Not to get an elite job, not to be a good employee, but to work in factories. That’s why we sit in straight rows, raise our hands, and are considered to be mischievous and a bad student (talking back) for politely challenging the rules. I was always against modern schooling, and if I suggested to the teacher that maybe there were ways that our school could be better for the students, I would simply receive a detention. No explanation other than challenging the teacher’s authority. It’s been awhile since schools were created, but schools really haven’t changed much since then. Here’s a classroom from today:

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com...

Here’s a classroom from 150 years ago:

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com...

Virtually no change. Do you really think it is okay to update practically nothing relating to school in a timespan of 150 years, especially when back then, they weren’t preparing us for success, but instead, for factory owners to have workers?

About clubs, those don’t kick in until high school, at least for me. And that’s nothing special. That’s simply organizing people together. I don’t need schools to micromanage my social life. I can micromanage my own.

Your next point was that the teachers and principals are already doing their jobs. YES. They are. Well, sometimes, haha. I’m not disputing that. I’m disputing that it’s the students fault. Uh, can you please explain to me what I’m doing wrong? I’ve corrected incorrect curriculum, talked to teachers about why I disagree with their lessons, and I’ve only been rebuked for my “bad” behavior. I put effort into my classes and maintain straight A’s. However, I truly believe if schools gave me an hour to learn about a specific unit we’re learning in school, I could learn more than I’d learn at school in a month. I pay attention, but only get a consistent stream of useless or incorrect information. Also, I often know the material they’re teaching. You can’t teach an entire class the same things. There are slower kids who need 1 on 1 help, and smarter kids who get bored from the easiness of their classes and want to learn specialized skills. Why do you think so many billionaires hated high school? Teachers who know their students well don’t choose the lesson plans, curriculum creators do. I’m not blaming teachers for my bad experience, I’m blaming the system as a whole.

Also, by the way, bad teachers don’t get fired frequently like you said. Teacher unions make it nearly impossible to fire a bad teacher. There are plenty of AWFUL teachers at my school. One who was particularly bad treated us like we were in the military. That’s not an analogy. He was in the military himself, and showed us videos daily of how people behaved in the military. The first words we heard out of his mouth were him yelling at us because some 6th grade (he teaches 7th grade) teachers said a few students were on bad behavior when they were teaching us. I also learned nothing from the few days I was in his class. He spent 90% of class time yelling, 5% teaching useless information, and 5% sitting back, relaxing, and having us do busy work. I complained to my counselor, and he didn’t get fired. I got moved out of his class, which is pretty unusual. I actually got lucky. However, there are still a few hundred kids a year who are stuck with him (and millions who are stuck with bad teachers). He isn’t the outlier; getting bad teachers fired is really hard.

Now, let’s look at the Bob scenario. Why do you think Bob was acting up? Here’s a few possible causes:

1. He was bored in school by the material and didn’t think he needed to pay attention, so he needed something to do and turned to acting out. In this case, students like him should have ways to learn at a faster pace than other students. Honors classes aren’t cutting it, they’re just sped up or slightly different classes. No, in this scenario, Bob needs curriculum that is made for him, and adapts to how well he does on it. This sounds difficult, but with modern technology, it’s actually not that hard to do.

2. Bob is unsuccessful in school, and doesn’t see a reason to put any effort in if he consistently does poorly. In this case, all we need is better curriculum. When what we’re learning is useful in real life, fun, and is explained in a clear way, students will be much more engaged and learn a lot more. Often, I find that people just need things explained clearly, and need to feel comfortable asking questions. I have a friend who got a C- on a math test and asked for my help. In half an hour, I explained to him a month worth of curriculum. When he retook the test, he got a 97%. I don’t mean to sound arrogant, I know there’s a lot of bright kids out there, but I think a lot of them feel the same way as I do.

3. He is facing social, mental, family, etc. problems. In this case, the teacher needs to sit down with Bob, and ask him straight out why he’s doing what he does. Sending him outside is a terrible punishment; he’d probably enjoy being out there without an adult telling him what to do or being pressured. In most cases, he will probably apologize, and if the teacher helps him get back on track with the material, will start behaving in class.

We should be spending more money on counselors, better curriculum, and lowering student/teacher ratios instead of wasting our budget on fancy sports arenas.

This solidifies my belief that school is currently ineffective.

Best wishes,

Sam

Hey. This is my first time debating 1 to 1, and I"ve go to say, I like the structure of your argument! However, there were some minor problems.

First of all, most of your sources come from your personal experience, which is wrong. (Some of these personal experiences are anecdotal evidences.) You did mention in your argument "I"ve corrected incorrect curriculum, talked to teachers about why I disagree with their lessons, and I"ve only been rebuked for my "bad" behavior". Yes, this may be true to YOU, but not to everyone. This argument is saying like, "I have met a black person and he or she was mean to me. Due to this conclusion, I say that all black people are mean." And we all know that this argument is wrong Similar this scenario, even if you had bad teachers, that doesn"t mean that all school must have bad teachers. This is also the same to the paragraph when you described about this particular teacher that wasn"t nice. Even if that teacher, you experience, wasn"t nice, doesn"t mean every single teacher isn"t nice. And also doesn"t prove a point that all bad teachers don"t get fired frequently using your personal experience too.

That also brings me to the next point when you said " Teacher unions make it nearly impossible to fire a bad teacher. ". Check out this website:
https://www.washingtonpost.com...

From this website, it talks about how bad teachers are being fired, even in "highly unionized districts".

Eunice Hans says, "What I found is that the facts are the opposite of what people think: that highly unionized districts actually fire more bad teachers."

So, bad teacher are being fired even with teacher unions being in use.

So what does this information lead to? Well, let"s say a teacher was fired. It is most likely that the teacher was fired due to being a bad teacher.

However, if the bad teacher were to still be there, that"s when the First Amendment must come in: freedom of speech. People should speak up saying that this particular teacher was being bad.

Also, it is incorrect for you to say that students are little robots in school. The First Amendments does say that we have the freedom of speech. Freedom of speech may include asking questions, and even correcting the teacher. Also, if a student does not wish to ask a question, that"s also a freedom of speech, too.
Seeing this, schools do have an effective system to make sure that the student get the right education.

Also, this is what you said about clubs: "I don"t need schools to micromanage my social life" But the thing is, clubs are choices, not a mandatory thing. I"m just trying to say that school offer clubs that could lead to many opportunities for and grade level.

Also, some schools did sign up for the "School Meal Programs" in the United States. This program provide free or low cost lunch for the students, that contains neutrally balanced meals. But not only that, this program is in private and public schools. Seeing how some schools are developing their way to provide students free or even low cost meals, that one effective system that schools are trying to make. To support this, here"s the website:
https://www.fns.usda.gov...

Educational wize, there are schools that are free, known as public schools. (That"s another effective system that schools are trying to do.)

Now, I am sure that many schools do offer honor classes, AP classes, high schools classes, and etc. These high degree of classes are first, your choice. You could either take these high classes or not. However, if a teacher believes that a particular student needs to go to a higher class, then the teacher would probably do it (with the permission of the student and that student"s parents). This is another way of how schools are being effective.

I would also like to mention when you said "I"m disputing that it"s the students fault" Whenever you said that, that statement is basically contradicting your 4th paragraph. You said how teachers are the reason schools are ineffective and causing students to get prepared to work in "factories". However, when you brought up that particular statement, it basically contradicts your whole 4th paragraph.

But not only that, what do even mean that schools are preparing students for factories? There"s not enough evidence that proves your point. The only strongest point you made was "That"s why we sit in straight rows, raise our hands, and are considered to be mischievous and a bad student (talking back) for politely challenging the rules." Also, the pictures really didn"t prove a point, too. First of all, the pictures did not have any source with it. And second, what if these pictures were just from a movie and not the actual life?

The next point I do want to make is that there are these "special program" for schools. For example, this may include Gifted and Talented Programs, Magnet Programs, etc. Now, think about it. Schools are dividing each other into smaller categories to help students get challenged by their peers. But not only that, students are learned in DIFFERENT ENVIROMENTS as these student attend different programs for a certain school.

Finally, schools do spend money (from student funds) for the student"s benefit. But schools also use money for the teacher"s and principal's benefit in schools that are not public school. It may be true that SOME schools may emphasize in buying a certain thing, but mostly, all the important stuff that are educational purposes are bought, especially for the students. This website states give a summary:
http://education.findlaw.com...

This also leads me to say that, please prove your claim for when you said: "We should be spending more money on counselors, better curriculum, and lowering student/teacher ratios instead of wasting our budget on fancy sports arenas." (Because I would like to say not ALL school are wasting their budget on fancy sports arena.)

This proves my point that schools are indeed actually effective for students.

Best wishes,

Jason