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Comment by woud420 | Hacker News Reader

That is pretty sad.

Having gone through the Quebec education system and now reflecting over it, I can relate to that student. It seems to me (of course I'm biased but...) that french and history were always seen as more way more important than math classes and that is very unfortunate.

I was very lucky to be able to skim through french and math for most of high school. I didn't have an interest in french grammar and thought I was just horrible at math so I just skimmed through it and assumed it was normal. It wasn't until my first year of CEGEP where I had a very good math teacher and a great group of friends help me catch up and discover the beauty and usefulness of math. I would've never thought in high school that I would end up becoming an electrical engineer.

I'm sure I'm not the only one from Quebec with a similar story and from your experience, it doesn't seem like things are going in the right way.

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I don't think you went to the right school. It was made very clear to my classes from sec 3 onwards that taking "higher level math" (436, 536) would open a lot more doors in CÉGEP and university.

On the same topic, I firmly believe that CÉGEP offers the best general education in the world for 17 to 19 year olds.

How can you say best education in the world? Have you studied all over the world to have a point of comparison?

I've been to three different cegeps and they all had their share of clueless teachers.

I'm pretty sure he's referring to the model, not the particular implementation.

I agree with you. I have a lot of friends in bot pre-uni (as myself) and in techniques and I find it awesome how a CÉGEP strikes a good balance between general education and specific classes.

> french and history were always seen as more way more important than math classes

Where I went we could chose advanced math classes in the last 3 secondary years.

Most of the students would not take french classes seriously and I think the CEGEP's french standardized exam has a high failure rate.

Oh, the school/program I went to I was forced to take 436 and 536 (which is a good thing). However, just the general atmosphere was history and french is important, math, meh.

It's a bit sad IMO that in our current education culture, we portray the study of math and science as being somehow opposed to the study of history and culture.

I find the them inextricably linked. I'll never forget the human stories of mathematical discoveries from Erastosthenes to Newton, up to the present. And rigorous quantitative and symbolic reasoning is indispensable when discussing socio-cultural phenomena at all scales.

I wish math and science were taught with more historical narrative than they are, and likewise, that the humanities were taught with more mathematical/scientific rigor than they are.

I also think it would open up both to people who would otherwise have a hard time grasping them.

EDIT: added conclusion

I think it's the idea that math and science are the same regardless of their history. You can learn the history of them, but the answers don't change when you do. On the other hand, your answers about historic and cultural questions can change drastically depending on how informed you are.

Also, the level of rote memorization required vs. logic and analytic thinking. You think math and science could be improved via learning their history; I think history and culture can be improved by learning more about the reasoning behind individual things. Less focus on when and what and where; more focus on why and causes.

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