US Signals Intention To Rethink Job H-1B Lottery (theregister.com) 135
The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) intend to reevaluate how H-1B visas are issued, according to a regulatory filing. From a report: The notice, filed on Thursday with the US Office of Management and Budget's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), seeks the statutory review of a proposed rule titled "Weighted Selection Process for Registrants and Petitioners Seeking To File Cap-Subject H-1B Petitions."
Once the review is complete, which could be a matter of days or weeks, the text of the rule is expected to be published in the US Federal Register. Based on the rule title, it appears the government intends to change the system for allocating H-1B visas the current lottery to some system that will favor applicants who meet specified criteria, possibly related to skills.
The H-1B visa program, which reached its Fiscal 2026 cap on Friday, allows skilled guest workers to come work in the US. As of 2019, there were about 600,000 H-1B workers in the US, according to USCIS. The foreign worker program is beloved by technology companies, ostensibly to hire talent not readily available from American workers. But H-1B -- along with the Optional Practical Training (OPT) program -- has long been criticized for making it easier to undercut US worker wages, limiting labor rights for immigrants, and for persistent abuse of the rules by outsourcing companies.
Once the review is complete, which could be a matter of days or weeks, the text of the rule is expected to be published in the US Federal Register. Based on the rule title, it appears the government intends to change the system for allocating H-1B visas the current lottery to some system that will favor applicants who meet specified criteria, possibly related to skills.
The H-1B visa program, which reached its Fiscal 2026 cap on Friday, allows skilled guest workers to come work in the US. As of 2019, there were about 600,000 H-1B workers in the US, according to USCIS. The foreign worker program is beloved by technology companies, ostensibly to hire talent not readily available from American workers. But H-1B -- along with the Optional Practical Training (OPT) program -- has long been criticized for making it easier to undercut US worker wages, limiting labor rights for immigrants, and for persistent abuse of the rules by outsourcing companies.
Current US politics... (Score:3)
With Donald Trump playing games, I am sure he will make sure that prostitutes will be able to come in on the visa program and squeeze out actual skilled workers.
Re:Current US politics... (Score:5, Informative)
The only qualified person he ever hired was Stormy Daniels and of course she was paid with company money.
Re:Current US politics... (Score:5, Informative)
We’re all aware of Kamala’s education. Cheeto’s grades are so embarrassing he threatened to sue the school if they were released. https://apnews.com/article/04f... [apnews.com]
But hey keep talking about dicks in mouths with zero amount of projection.
Re:Current US politics... (Score:5, Insightful)
Every single thing this administration does is designed to structure power so that we're that much closer to a dictatorship. That's what project 2025 is about. I've no doubt this is just part of that.
Re:Current US politics... (Score:5, Insightful)
bullshit. Everything 2025 is about actually gives power to people who are accountable to voters, rather to deep state bureaucrats.
Look at the legal wranglings with all these 'independent' agencies and what not. How is having people often appointed by out of power administrations (because the lost elections!) continuing to make administrative law and effect policy the public reject compatible with democracy.
Democrats, are presently papering over this basic reality with a lot of frilly language like "norms", and trying argue for separation of powers where none exists, we have five entities in that regard Constitutionally speaking the legislature, the executive, the judiciary, the States, and the people. There are no others. There CFPB/NLRB/CBP etc does not show up anywhere in the Constitution.
You are not defending 'democracy' you are defending bureaucracy where elections don't matter!
Its really sad, how badly bamboozled you are. Project 2025 is what can save this nation! It is about government by the people not perishing from the earth!
I can't tell if this is satire or you went so far off the end and looped back around.
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Re:Current US politics... (Score:4, Informative)
If you want to change the structure of the CFPB, PASS A FUCKING LAW THROUGH CONGRESS. You know, so that the people's will is represented. You seem to think that is important.
Right now, Wells Fargo and others are celebrating the destruction of the CPFP. And they only had to bribe one guy with a few crypto coins to get that.
Re:Current US politics... (Score:5, Insightful)
How is having people often appointed by out of power administrations (because the lost elections!) continuing to make administrative law and effect policy the public reject compatible with democracy.
Because outside of the cabinet the rest of the government are public employees and it's not good or practical to replace thousands of people every 4 years for no reason other than personal politics. You've just created the most "bureaucratic" administrative nightmare possible.
There CFPB/NLRB/CBP etc does not show up anywhere in the Constitution.
You should try reading it and then maybe you would know the Constitution is not the actual law, that would be the US Statutory Code [govinfo.gov] and the Constitution is the framework and limiting principles. All those agencies were passed legally through legislation and the USSC had ruled on them therefore Constitutional. We believe in laws around here right?
You are not defending 'democracy' you are defending bureaucracy where elections don't matter!
This argument of "just say bureaucracy" and letting that replace actual thinking is ruinous for brains and the nation. When people make these big broad sweeping generalizations anybody with critical thinking should be extremely suspicious since its all fluff, no examples given, no actual reforms given. This adds nothing.
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You really should be tested for dementia or possibly heavy metal poisoning.
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Wow you really haven't read it have you.
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What does every other court in the country use before it gets to the SC? What is the SC deciding is Constitutional or not? The fucking statues.
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In fact about 98% of the federal government should be the DOD, just about everything else the federal government is doing, should be the responsibility of the individual states. THAT is the fundamental problem.
Your side fought that war 160 years ago, and lost. It's time for you to move on.
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Hey, I heard Pam Blondy will be meeting Ghislaine Maxwell in prison.
Any idea why, when it was already declared the Epstein files are a hoax?
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Maybe she thinks Ghislaine somehow stole that client list off her desk...
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Or she's checking out how many times the name of her boss is in it - I hear he liked to use pseudonyms.
Re:Current US politics... PFFT (Score:2)
Re:Current US Morals. (Score:4, Insightful)
you can just say "i'm a virgin" and save yourself the typing
Lottery (Score:2, Troll)
Charges: what's an H1-B worth? (Score:5, Insightful)
la Presidenta is entirely transactional. He thinks of the fed. gov. as holding something others want, hence they will be required to pay for it. He won't care whether companies or the individual pays, but he'll announce it as though the individual always pays.
Example: la Presidenta announced he would give more arms to Ukraine but then constrained them in two ways. (1) they won't get them before Putin's 60-day limit he told la Presidenta he needed to steal more of Ukraine, and (2) he is making Europe pay for the arms.
So in effect, it will be Europe giving more arms to Ukraine after he's paid off Putin for being his homicidal maniac who is fun to be with. And of course he announced to the corporate press that he's arming Ukraine and they blandly regurgitated that bullshit.
Re:Charges: what's an H1-B worth? (Score:5, Informative)
America has 2 main geopolitical rivals, we voted in the tough guy, the ruthess businessman, the Art of the Deal Master Negotiator and both Xi and Putin have run circles around him, made him and all of us look stupid ("Vladimir Stop!") [pbs.org].
Also 90 deals in 90 days? We are sitting at 0-90. But hey they sent some letters out.
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we voted in the tough guy, the ruthess businessman, the Art of the Deal Master Negotiator
No, we (as a country, not me personally) voted in the weak guy, the failed businessman and the poor negotiator (he didn't even write the book).
and both Xi and Putin have run circles around him, made him and all of us look stupid ("Vladimir Stop!").
Entirely predictable outcome. Anyone with half a brain could see that this would happen, that Trump isn't a businessman, isn't a negotiator. But unfortunately, too many people in the USA don't have half a brain.
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Share some of this conservative media I should be consuming.
Also do share those signed trade agreements we have. Where the Ukraine treaty? Where is the deal with China? Xi outnegotiated Trump by the master tactic of "wait 3 days and don't call". Trump has never made a good negotiation for the US. He sucks at it.
Seriously this is where media literacy is out "Facts and lies are the same, so long as you have the same number of lies to the same number of facts then they balance out!"
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EU doesn't have the obligations to Ukraine that the traitorous Trumpistan has.
Unlike the traitorous Trumpistan, the UK, which has the same obligations, has delivered.
See the difference?
Nah, your lot still believes NATO somehow cheated you out of the Soviet Union.
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we do not owe anything to Ukraine
"You" certainly recognized the borders of Ukraine in 2003.
Your president signed the law himself, here:
http://kremlin.ru/supplement/1... [kremlin.ru]
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Do you even know how much the EU has sent Ukraine? Since 2014? Since 2022? Do you even care? (We know you don't)
For anyone who is questining this altogether stupid talking point (let's just call it a lie. In fact all 3 points are flagrant lies):
EU Assistance to Ukraine (in U.S. Dollars) [europa.eu]
$180B since 2022 and tens of billions more committed this year.
Replace Sponsorship with Candidate Portal Auction (Score:5, Interesting)
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That kind of defeats the purpose of bringing in people who have specific skills. Furthermore, as a former H1b myself, I know that the salary has to satisfy the Department of Labor's prevailing wage. If you want to make the salary threshold higher, no need to turn it in to an auction, just set the bar higher.
I decided the US wasn't for me after three years and moved overseas. I then worked 1099-MISC for another American company for four years (until it was bought by a company with an international office
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Do you mean the O-1 Visa?
Everyone seems believe H1-B's requirements are that of the O-1. But H1-B
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No. I was replying to somebody who wrote about H1b and I had an H1b in the late 90s. Not sure if anything's changed in the requirements since then, but it wasn't just an any old route in to the US. It was a bit of pain all around. Probably not worth the hassle of the expense and time to apply for one, unless there's no enforcement of the prevailing wage requirements for example and it really is used for undercutting local talent. I was certainly on a fair wage at the time.
Re:Replace Sponsorship with Candidate Portal Aucti (Score:4, Informative)
I recommend reading up on the current situation that's been around for over a decade. Things have changed in the almost 30 years since you used the program.
The majority of H1-B visas are used by have a handful of consulting firms that under pay their staff. Many require managerial kick backs and staff are staying 4-5 if not more to an apartment or condo. H1-B recipients can change jobs why finding a new corporate sponsor. But many are unable to so the choice is keep working and living in the subpar conditions getting low pay, or having to go back home.
Having a program where you can bring in needed talent is a net positive. But there's tons of fraud going on with faking of education and credentials. Initial video calls where someone is sitting in front of the camera and being giving responses on what to say. And that's if the person on the camera is the one who physically shows up.
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The real goal of the H1B Visa program is to encourage immigration of people who bring LOTS of value to the US.
The whole entire program is entire convoluted for no good reaso
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As a side note, I've hired people on H1B - between the government's DOL requirement to pay at least prevailing wage for the job, and the relocation costs, and the lawyer costs, H1B's always costed us more than locals, so we only went down that path when we
A simple fix? (Score:5, Insightful)
consequences exist (Score:3)
America has a long history of bringing immigrants in on the ground floor to lift up the working class beneath them. It has been the main source of class mobility in this country for centuries.
Having native born, and mostly white, Americans do all the shit jobs and never moving up in the world. While skilled immigrants come into live in nice houses and drive nice cars. That's a recipe for civil unrest and far right populism.
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Why would companies bring someone in if they were able to hire two citizens for the same wage?
H1-B is being abused to out source and bring in a bunch of cheap labor. Take away the "cheap" factor and things change.
Besides the increased wage requirement, having every H1-B position require companies to also pay into a system that trains citizens on the needed skills would over time solve the issue that there's no one local with the needed abilities.
pseudo-xenophobic points aside (Score:2)
Why would companies bring someone in if they were able to hire two citizens for the same wage?
If there is an artificial shortage because you can only hire citizens, then you will see wage inflation.
Temporary worker visas are a part of the globalization trend that the Liberals and Neoconservatives sold to use decades ago. We citizens compete in a global market place for jobs. We let our representatives rip the power of unions apart, and we encouraged maximizing middle class retirement funds on the stock market at the expense of screwing the working class.
Difficulty (Score:2)
Problem is that median wage is a useless number. Wages vary all over the country. Wages are higher in San Francisco and lower in Pittsburg.
IMHO a better solution is to make the tax rate something like 60% with no deductions. If you want take-home pay to be $40,000, you have to pay them $100,000.
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Simple fix: award H1-B visas in order of salary to be paid to the visa holder.
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The average is enormous and is more than double the average HOUSEHOLD income. Those are payroll salaries as well, many of the jobs come with equity that the government doesn't track. I've worked with 100s of H1Bs and never heard any of them complain about their pay.
The only real thing that truly sucks is that the visa is owned by the company instead of the person. If it was owned by the person, you'd see pay double. (Because pay is 100% really just about retention.)
How about limiting the number at any one company? (Score:4, Interesting)
It's Peter Griffin Pulled Over (Score:3)
[gov't looks at skin color chart]
The real reason why companies like the H-1B visa (Score:3)
Comes down to American labor laws.
Unlike the rest of the world American labor laws are an abomination:
1. No limits on working time. Salaried employees end up volunteering for the company they work for after 40 hours. If they don't work this unpaid overtime, they will be subject to progressive discipline up to and including termination.
2. America uses the "Employment-at-will" doctrine instead of just cause. This means you can be terminated for any reason so long as it isn't an illegal reason. What defines an illegal reason is very lax in all states with some being worse than others (Typically the red states are worse than the blue states). With such an ambiguous definition of what is grounds for termination, you see people fired for ridiculous reasons: For example if the boss doesn't like the color of your shirt when you show up for work, you can be fired and you have no recourse. Most working people in the United States are subject to employment-at-will except those in unions, and of course the top executives at companies. The executives have employment contracts and are typically protected by just cause employment standards (Just like the rest of the world)
3. Binding arbitration clauses. These exclude you from bringing a lawsuit in court against your employer. You have to go through an arbitration organization such as the American Arbitration Association. The judgement by the arbitrators is final, non-appealable, and private. The judgement is taken to a court and recorded after the decision has been made, and can be enforced by further sanctions in the court system. These arbitrators are funded by the companies which use them in their employment paperwork. Given that they receive their operating revenue from the companies, their decisions.
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"1. No limits on working time. Salaried employees end up volunteering for the company they work for after 40 hours. If they don't work this unpaid overtime, they will be subject to progressive discipline up to and including termination."
And termination often isn't a matter of just finding another job but having to go back to country of origin, where jobs are scarce to nonexistent. This makes the threat of termination a huge, career-threatening thing, which tends to promote servitude. Which makes the manag
Whoever applies for an H-1B today is bonkers (Score:3)
might end up in a Salvadorian concentration camp in less time than it takes to say "Oh, what are these armed, masked men surrounding me for?"
Re: Whoever applies for an H-1B today is bonkers (Score:2)
If they are Salvadorians, maybe not so crazy. Or from other countries that already have autocratic regimes.
Same reason asylees would still take their chances in the US. There are better and safer destinations, though.
Easier on the Ice, Ice Baby. (Score:2)
They want to figure out how to pre-deport people, rather than giving them entry status, then revoking it after they've settled in. Saves on the masked ICE raids.
H1b workers are more cost effective (Score:2)
Speaking as someone who's entire department was gradually replaced with H1b workers (not complaining at all, as it led to a better paying job) I observed as the replacement process went on, that the incoming workers tended to work 70 - 80 hour weeks, essentially living in their cubicles, and tended to be more completely under control of their H1b boss. They tended to have no local family, once a year going back to their respective countries to be with family for a few weeks, before coming back for another
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Speaking as someone who's entire department was gradually replaced with H1b workers (not complaining at all, as it led to a better paying job) I observed as the replacement process went on, that the incoming workers tended to work 70 - 80 hour weeks, essentially living in their cubicles, and tended to be more completely under control of their H1b boss. They tended to have no local family, once a year going back to their respective countries to be with family for a few weeks, before coming back for another year of nothing but work and sleep. Essentially mid-salary indentured servitude.
So, if costs go down and productive hours go up, and (I think) overhead goes down, (as, I believe they were contractors rather than full time, so reduced benefits costs (this is speculation as it's outside my visibility)) why wouldn't a company encourage this?
And how does this situation benefit the US work force?
Among other things, Indentured servants who have no power to negotiate will do illegal tasks for their boss or be sent home.
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Speaking as someone who's entire department was gradually replaced with H1b workers (not complaining at all, as it led to a better paying job) I observed as the replacement process went on, that the incoming workers tended to work 70 - 80 hour weeks, essentially living in their cubicles, and tended to be more completely under control of their H1b boss. They tended to have no local family, once a year going back to their respective countries to be with family for a few weeks, before coming back for another year of nothing but work and sleep. Essentially mid-salary indentured servitude.
So, if costs go down and productive hours go up, and (I think) overhead goes down, (as, I believe they were contractors rather than full time, so reduced benefits costs (this is speculation as it's outside my visibility)) why wouldn't a company encourage this?
And how does this situation benefit the US work force?
Among other things, Indentured servants who have no power to negotiate will do illegal tasks for their boss or be sent home.
It doesn't benefit the US work force at all. Just pointing out the perception that it benefits US companies.
Illegal tasks like cooking data, as just one example.
Combine this with diploma mill issues, and the company can end up with a department ill-equipped to do the job, ill-equipped to communicate results, poor ethics with little accountability, and just generally a way to siphon off funds. But it looks good on paper.
New criteria, eye roll (Score:2)
This administration only knows quid pro quo and personal advantage. Any change to visa distribution under these politics could very well depend on how much you scratch their back.
Proposal: (Score:3)
Any company that lays off workers is ineligible to use H1B to hire workers for a similar job description for 12 months.
Lay off some EEs? No more H1B EEs for you, 12 months!
SWEs, same deal.
Lawyers will need to fine tune the definition of "similar" but you get the idea. Microsoft, Google, Facebook, etc should be ineligible for H1B engineers for a while
The end of salary arbitrage. (Score:2)
I would dump Infosys stock ASAP
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didn't musk say that Americans are too stupid so we need H1B visas?
Re:Falling birthrate (Score:4, Informative)
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Well, I don't know about that, but we certainly aren't the best nation when it comes to educating our kids.
My teachers ejucated me good.
Educating [Re:Falling birthrate] (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, I don't know about that, but we certainly aren't the best nation when it comes to educating our kids.
Oddly enough, though, U.S. Universities are consistently the best in the world. There are a handful of non-US universities in the top ranks-- Oxford and Cambridge always are in the top five, for example-- but overall, yes, at the university level we are the best nation when it comes to educating our kids, at least at the top ranked universities.
Particularly graduate schools.
So, guess what part of U.S. education is most under fire by the current administration.
--
https://www.timeshighereducati... [timeshighereducation.com]
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Well, I don't know about that, but we certainly aren't the best nation when it comes to educating our kids.
Oddly enough, though, U.S. Universities are consistently the best in the world. There are a handful of non-US universities in the top ranks-- Oxford and Cambridge always are in the top five, for example-- but overall, yes, at the university level we are the best nation when it comes to educating our kids, at least at the top ranked universities.
Particularly graduate schools.
So, guess what part of U.S. education is most under fire by the current administration.
-- https://www.timeshighereducati... [timeshighereducation.com]
Yes, and it is sad. At least Model Rocketry is (still) fun...
Re:Falling birthrate (Score:5, Informative)
Cheeto wants to dissolve the department of education and look who he currently has running it. An elderly CEO of a wrestling company who doesn't know artificial intelligence from steak sauce. https://www.usatoday.com/story... [usatoday.com]
Here grandma, read this statement for the media...
Best and brightest and all that.
Kennedy and Nixon warned about DoEd-like ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Cheeto wants to dissolve the department of education ...
The Department of Education was a 1979 experiment ...
... were educated before the Dept of Education existed. The people educated under the guidance of the Dept of Ed gave us social media. :-)
Kennedy and Nixon warned about DoEd-like federal entanglements. Watch the famous 1960s Presidential Debate between the two. It actually brings up federal involvement in education, They both, D & R, were against it. They both warned that money from DC will come with strings from DC. That maybe DC could provide funds for one time events, like construction of a school, but certainly nothing tied to ongoing operations.
Also watch it to see what intelligent and polite debate between two political opponents can be like.
DoEd was a Jimmy Carter experiment. Bless his heart, he meant well, but he surely had a lot of difficulties with unintended consequences. A reward to the teacher's unions for their support. Now ask yourself, has K-12 gotten better since the DoEd was created. Also note that important funding that DoEd performs, like education grants to low income individuals, has been returned to the Dept of Health and Human Services. Which is where such programs used to be before the DofEd was created. Such programs are going back to their original Departments.
The people who landed men on the moon, the people who invented the personal computer, the people who invented the internet,
Re:Falling birthrate Yup (Score:1, Troll)
The U.S. Constintution:
"Look at it, remember it, and keep it in your F!ing brain."
- David Sleeze
Re:Falling birthrate (Score:5, Informative)
I personally see very little use for the Department of Education, so removing it would be fine by me. I think what little good they do could easily be done by the states and that's where it should be done (not by the feds).
All that does is give states like Kansas a pass to plaster the 10 commandments everywhere and do away with science because it contradicts their beliefs. Funny how that argument stops when you want to display passages from the Quran. Oh you have a problem with pausing class to pray towards Mecca? The country needs minimum standards.
Re:Falling birthrate (Score:5, Funny)
Support the Satanic Temple. Fair is fair, get those Baphomet statues in the schools.
https://thesatanictemple.com/ [thesatanictemple.com]
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As a card holding member of the Satanic Temple, I support this message.
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I personally see very little use for the Department of Education, so removing it would be fine by me. I think what little good they do could easily be done by the states and that's where it should be done (not by the feds).
All that does is give states like Kansas a pass to plaster the 10 commandments everywhere and do away with science because it contradicts their beliefs. Funny how that argument stops when you want to display passages from the Quran. Oh you have a problem with pausing class to pray towards Mecca? The country needs minimum standards.
Sounds like you and Kissinger would be good political comrades.
You both like to send the might of the U.S. Federal Government into regions to keep them from falling into the hands of the people who live there.
"The country needs minimum standards" is inescapably anti-democratic rhetoric, because people who say it always - always - turn out to mean "everyone in the country needs to have my standards".
What the country needs is to implement the will of the people, period. The only legitimacy of a government der
Fine (Score:3)
If Kansas wants to keep its population stupid and poor, it can do so on its own dime.
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Kansas is a welfare state [usafacts.org]. Like other welfare recipients, it is prudent to require it to meet certain criteria.
If Kansas wants to keep its population stupid and poor, it can do so on its own dime.
I am glad to see that we agree completely.
The people of each state shall have the right to choose to establish educational systems and standards in accordance with their wishes, along with the duty to fund it in whatever method and at whatever spending level is in accordance with their wishes. Henceforth, we can dissolve the federal DoEd. If any two or more states wish to form consortia to pool resources and establish common standards among them, the people of each respective state can vote to do so. Or the
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The people of each state shall have the right to choose to establish educational systems and standards in accordance with their wishes, along with the duty to fund it in whatever method and at whatever spending level is in accordance with their wishes.
That is your direct quote.
I would assume at least one of them would, well how many "red" states are there, abolish any sort of local govt edu dept and replace it with a corporate public funded nightmare. You didn't say it, but I thought that is where your technocrat, libertarian hive mind was going. So sue me, doucher.
This preserves a higher level of democracy than central federal control and also encourages more deliberate targeted stewardship of the funds supplied by the people
You understand what you wrote, right? We should get free money and do whatever the fuck we want with it. Fuck the children, this legislator needs a new boat and this
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I personally see very little use for the Department of Education, so removing it would be fine by me. I think what little good they do could easily be done by the states and that's where it should be done (not by the feds).
All that does is give states like Kansas a pass to plaster the 10 commandments everywhere and do away with science because it contradicts their beliefs. Funny how that argument stops when you want to display passages from the Quran. Oh you have a problem with pausing class to pray towards Mecca? The country needs minimum standards.
The people who landed men on the moon, the people who invented the personal computer, the people who invented the internet, ... were educated before the Dept of Education existed. Some even in Kansas. The people educated under the guidance of the Dept of Ed gave us social media. :-)
Before the Department of Education (Score:2)
The people who landed men on the moon, the people who invented the personal computer, the people who invented the internet, ... were educated before the Dept of Education existed.
Well, before it was named the Department of Education, anyway. Before it was a separate named department, it was the federal Office of Education, which dates back to 1867.
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The people who landed men on the moon, the people who invented the personal computer, the people who invented the internet, ... were educated before the Dept of Education existed.
Well, before it was named the Department of Education, anyway. Before it was a separate named department, it was the federal Office of Education, which dates back to 1867.
In the 1950s it was part of the Dept of Health and Human Services. And that is where it is returning to. It's not really gone, its back to its pre-1979 role.
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Exactly, what to put on the classroom wall is a "state's right" issue. If you don't like what they put up, either work with the politicians to do something different or don't live in that state ... or ignore the issue.
OTOH, I don't see science being ignored (done away with) in Kansas. I wouldn't be surprised to find that one of the most common degrees held in Kansas is one in Agronomy, which has quite a bit of science in it.
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Exactly, what to put on the classroom wall is a "state's right" issue. If you don't like what they put up, either work with the politicians to do something different or don't live in that state ... or ignore the issue.
OTOH, I don't see science being ignored (done away with) in Kansas. I wouldn't be surprised to find that one of the most common degrees held in Kansas is one in Agronomy, which has quite a bit of science in it.
What if the state is doing something unconstitutional?
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I personally see very little use for the Department of Education, so removing it would be fine by me. I think what little good they do could easily be done by the states and that's where it should be done (not by the feds).
All that does is give states like Kansas a pass to plaster the 10 commandments everywhere and do away with science because it contradicts their beliefs. Funny how that argument stops when you want to display passages from the Quran. Oh you have a problem with pausing class to pray towards Mecca? The country needs minimum standards.
Which will just result in some states becoming a cheap labour class as other states are the only one's producing students to an acceptable level for tertiary education... Which is what the Project2025 overlords want, except they would prefer all states to become a cheap labour class that doesn't have the ability to question them.
It's take 10-20 years to pay dividends, but it'll reach a point where someone from Kansas will just exist to work in the local store whilst companies employ talent from out of st
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The US has a strong K-12 public education system (not the best, but still strong) and an incredibly good showing, the best, in the list of strongest universities in the world.
When you look at most lists of the top countries in the education ranking, they are primarily small, ethnically and culturally homogenous, and wealthy. (And to be clear, not all top educational countries are all of those things!)
If you compare white and asian student achievement in the United States to elsewhere, you're going to see re
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I would counter that it is not so much a racial thing but the nature of the decentralized manner in which we conduct education.
I don't care what the race is a kid growing up and going to school in Massachusetts or New Jersey is probably going to be more prepared than the kid going to school in Oklahoma or New Mexico.
And even then it's more uneven based on locale, you'll find really wide gaps between schools inside the same state. This a result of lot's of factors but school funding is local and in most loc
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I strongly agree with almost everything you wrote. Taking the locale example, and using my own state as an example, most counties have their own school system, and a handful of cities have their own school systems. Even within a single county's school system, the disparities in results between school are very significant. They also track, almost 1:1, with socioeconomic level, and that in terms very closely tracks with race. I'm absolutely not making an argument that race is a cause of educational disparitie
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I also don't really like the homogeneity argument in comparing the USA versus Europe because my educated belief is that one of the huge advantages the USA has had over Europe is the ability to integrate immigrants and cultures into ourselves in a manner that Europe or Asia has been unable to replicate.
race and socioeconomic level are tightly correlated almost everywhere in the United States (and really, the world).
Agree and since we can as a society decide to deal with the economics and material conditions the allusions to race are as I said, a dog whistle at best. You may not mean it that way but that's how many inter
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You may call this a dog whistle, but I don't think it has anything to do with skin color and a whole lot more to do with cultural attitudes regarding education. If your family values education, it will be prioritized. If it does not, then it won't be.
I grew up pretty darn poor, even on welfare for a couple years, but my mother made sure to find time to make sure I was on top of my studies. She also instilled the value of reading to me, which is probably the most useful thing. Much of education is reading an
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When not everyone speaks the same language, it adds challenges. ESL takes up resources we could be using on ALL the students instead of just a small subset of students.
Otherwise, yes I agree with you.
We could also EASILY fix school funding by pooling all the school funding to the state level and then each child gets exact the same amount of money, regardless of where they live in that state.
I'd of course add a voucher program and some regulations along with it. Each student would get a voucher and every sch
Re:Increasing parental influence will fix K-12 (Score:5, Insightful)
Note that underserved communities have some of the highest support for alternatives to their local public K-12 system.
Sure and I suppose one would if your politicians didn't want to deal with those systemic funding and curricula issues even if was to the overall detriment of your local and nationwide school system as charter schools are.
Charter schools are good for one thing: a political tool to use a side-mission to enact the Conservative political mission of choosing not to fund public education. They have always and always will be a scam.
The most successful education K-12 education systems in the world are public. The Founding Fathers disagreed on a lot but they all pretty much agreed freely available public education is the foundation of a successful nation. A good education for a child should not depend on where and to whom a child was born, they don't get to have that choice.
Report: 1 In 3 Michigan Charter Schools Fails [whmi.com]
Janresseger: Doomed to Fail: New Report Examines Educational Instability Due to Charter School Closure Rate/a [colorado.edu]
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To provide competition. To avoid a monopolistic environment. Which will ultimately force K-12 to get their shit together.
That's the lie! We have always had that, those are called private schools.
Hey if we want to emulate the best education systems in the world then I am with you but that involves more centralized control over funding and curricula, no more charter schools. The public system takes absolute priority.
Much like healthcare the USA is the weird outlier in how it does things.
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To provide competition. To avoid a monopolistic environment. Which will ultimately force K-12 to get their shit together.
That's the lie! We have always had that, those are called private schools.
Nope. Private is only part of the competition. Charter is another part of the competition. In particular Charter is part of the public school system, not the private system. Charter schools differ from traditional public schools in that they are more independent and more accountable.
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That's the sell but in practice they end up less accountable, cost more one per student, dover resources from public schools, have more teacher burnout for less pay and also end up racially segregated in many cases.
Also were comparing to public schools which have elected officials at their head.
Also the idea of competition as a solve here is on shaky ground already I'm not about to treat that as a given. School isn't exactly fungible and has natural monopoly issues. It's not a business, it's not a luxury
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That's the sell but in practice they end up less accountable, ...
Nope. They are accountable to what is in the charter. What they are typically not accountable to is the teacher's union, which helps them outperform.
cost more one per student,
? Nope. That is a misrepresentation based on some charter schools being highly specialized, and requiring extra funding for the specialization.
[divert] resources from public schools,
In the sense that money follows the student, meaning a student leaves a traditional public school for a charter public school.
have more teacher burnout for less pay and also end up racially segregated in many cases.
A lack of racial diversity is often a reflection of the community. And still, the poorer and
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The US has a strong K-12 public education system
What are you smoking? The US K-12 is the reason immigrants are now the majority of STEM students in the US universities. It's a disgrace.
The US schools are a good place to spend time if you want to dedicate your life to parties, theatrical performances, or an MBA degree. They are useless if you want to work in STEM.
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What are you smoking? The US K-12 is the reason immigrants are now the majority of STEM students in the US universities. It's a disgrace.
What metric would you use to compare K-12 public education systems around the world?
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The US is below the average while spending more than average per student.
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I agree PISA is a reasonable standard.
So, in the context of STEM that you raised, the US scored 14 points above average, #16 in Science placement. That seems strong to me.
Math is slightly below average (-4 points), number 34. Weak.
Reading, US placed #9, seems strong again.
You mentioned immigrants being the majority of STEM students. I don't know if that is true, but, using the metric you picked of PISA scores, some of the countries that send the most immigrants to the US in STEM .... have no data available.
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So, in the context of STEM that you raised, the US scored 14 points above average, #16 in Science placement. That seems strong to me.
It's mostly an artifact of the way the Science proficiency is tested, the questions are mostly the logic-type deduction questions and require little if any specific knowledge. If you look at physics in particular, the US is far behind China.
Nothing for China, India, Pakistan, etc. India seems to have scored exceedingly poorly the last time they participated.
China is not a member of the OECD, but they did unofficial scoring for the Beijing-Shanghai area, and they came out in the top 3 countries.
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It's mostly an artifact of the way the Science proficiency is tested, the questions are mostly the logic-type deduction questions and require little if any specific knowledge. If you look at physics in particular, the US is far behind China.
Hey, I asked you your metric, I wasn't planning on nitpicking it!
China is not a member of the OECD, but they did unofficial scoring for the Beijing-Shanghai area, and they came out in the top 3 countries.
Sure, just like micro-regions, individual demographic groups in the US, etc., score higher.
IMHO, US public education is amongst the very best in the world at the high end and pretty bad at the low end. The real confounding factor is that demographics are hard to escape.
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If you have engaged parents like the stereotypical Asian "tiger moms" then you can get good results with adva
Re: Falling birthrate (Score:2)
I just saw a YouTube video were a young lady thought the octane numbers on the gas pump represented the year the fuel was extracted from the ground.
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White people are terrified they might become a minority.
Is there a problem with how minorities are treated or something?
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That's going to happen anyway. Non-white births will surpassed white births. It's only a matter of time until we really are a nation of minorities. That's really not what divides us. Wealth is and that's not going to change.
Re: Falling birthrate (Score:2)
Failing that, end the right to abortion, to foster more unwanted pregnancies.
Probably not gonna work, though, unless they also make contraception illegal.