The meteoric rise of feelings-first schooling has ended academic excellence
 
以情感为先的教育方式迅速崛起，已经终结了学术卓越
 
As someone who hadn’t set foot inside a grade school for decades, I knew something was amiss when I visited my former Canadian high school for a craft fair.
 
作为一个几十年没有踏入小学的人，当我回到我以前在加拿大读的高中参加一个工艺品博览会时，我知道有些事情不对劲。
 
“Where did all the photos on the walls of the atrium go of all the top achievers from academics and sports throughout the years?” I wondered, wanting to laugh at my early ’90s-style hairdo. Turns out they were taken down, perhaps around the same time that rainbow and native tribal flags went up beside Canada’s national one.
 
“中庭墙上那些多年来展示的学术和体育顶尖成就者的照片都去哪儿了？”我想知道，顺便还想嘲笑一下我90年代初的发型。结果发现，那些照片被取下来了，或许是在彩虹旗和原住民部落旗帜与加拿大国旗一起挂起来的时候。
 
The high achievers that previously adorned the walls were replaced with evidence of successful collectivist cooperation. Teams seemed to matter, while individual success was boxed up and hauled away from public view. Heaven forbid their mere existence make anyone feel bad about themselves. Personally, I used to love seeing those faces. They were inspirational for someone growing up in a small town and aspiring to do great things outside of it. “We Pursue Excellence” was the school’s longtime motto. But now, on the wall, was the result of a student survey showing that 75% of students felt “uncomfortable” to even use the washroom. One might think that the first step in the pursuit of excellence would involve mastering whatever went down in the toilet stalls.
 
之前装饰在墙上的高成就者被集体合作的成功证据所取代。团队似乎变得重要，而个人成功被装箱打包，从公众视野中移除。天哪，他们的存在可别让任何人觉得自己不好。我个人曾经很喜欢看到那些面孔。对于一个在小镇长大、渴望在外面做大事的人来说，他们是激励人心的。学校的长期座右铭是“我们追求卓越”。但现在，墙上贴的是一份学生调查结果，显示75%的学生甚至对使用洗手间感到“不舒服”。人们可能会认为，追求卓越的第一步应该包括掌握洗手间里发生的一切。
 
The participation trophy generation now has to have a portable safe space in the form of a bubble around them at all times. Everything is seen as a potential threat – especially standards of excellence. Which would explain why the entire province of British Columbia, on Canada’s Left Coast, ditched standardized tests in subjects such as math, physics, chemistry, and languages – which allowed for a form of ranking and comparison among all students in the entire province — in favor of just two types of tests: general literacy and numeracy.
 
参与奖一代现在必须时刻拥有一个便携的安全空间，像一个气泡一样围绕着他们。一切都被视为潜在威胁——尤其是卓越的标准。这就解释了为什么加拿大左海岸的不列颠哥伦比亚省完全放弃了数学、物理、化学和语言等科目的标准化测试——这些测试允许对全省所有学生进行排名和比较——转而只进行两种测试：通用读写能力和数学能力。
 
A sample final high school year literacy test, for example, features an excerpt from ‘The Inconvenient Indian’, suggesting that explorer Christopher Columbus’ contributions are overrated, and asks, “Which type of magazine would most likely feature this descxtion of Columbus’s landing in the Caribbean?” The descxtion: “And let’s not forget all the sunny weather, the sandy beaches, the azure lagoons…” The potential multiple-choice responses? “Chronicles of History,” “Business Ventures,” “Travel World,” or “Living Well.” So are they going to be interpreting Shakespeare’s classics in essays next, or not?
 
例如，一份高三的读写能力测试样本中引用了《不方便的印第安人》中的一段文字，暗示探险家克里斯托弗·哥伦布的贡献被高估了，并问道：“哪种类型的杂志最有可能刊登对哥伦布登陆加勒比海的这种描述？”描述是：“别忘了那里的阳光天气、沙滩和湛蓝的泻湖……”可能的选项有：“历史编年史”、“商业冒险”、“旅行世界”或“生活美好”。那么，他们接下来会在作文中解读莎士比亚的经典作品吗，还是不会？
 
Another question: “Which invention would most likely have caused concern for factory workers?” Choices: the Unimate industrial robot that went to “work at General Motors replacing humans,” MIT’s Kismet emotionally intelligent robot, the Roomba that cleans your floors at home, or Amazon’s virtual assistant Alexa. Oh gee, that’s a tough one! For a seven-year-old, maybe. But surely not for someone heading to university next year, one would hope.
 
另一个问题是：“哪项发明最有可能让工厂工人感到担忧？”选项包括：在通用汽车公司“代替人类工作”的Unimate工业机器人、麻省理工学院的情感智能机器人Kismet、家里清洁地板的Roomba，或亚马逊的虚拟助手Alexa。哦，天哪，这是个难题！也许对一个七岁的小孩来说是。但对于明年要上大学的人来说，肯定不是这样，人们会希望如此。
 
A sample test from two years earlier in the curriculum, the numeracy assessment asks questions like, “The size of this [fish] trap would depend on the size and species of fish that people were trying to catch… Which of the following factors would be most important in designing a cone-shaped fish trap?” One of the answer choices: “the size of fish in the river.” We’re certainly a long way from the mathematical proofs that we were doing 35 years ago at around the same age. The standard seems to be more along the lines of, “Can this kid fill out one line on a tax form for their influencer gig without having a meltdown?” (Likely answer: Probably not. Because government forms are a form of colonialism, you bigot.)
 
两年前课程中的一份数学能力测试样本中，问题像是：“这个[鱼]陷阱的大小取决于人们试图捕捉的鱼的大小和种类……以下哪个因素在设计锥形鱼陷阱时最重要？”答案选项之一是：“河里鱼的大小。”我们显然已经远离了35年前我们在同龄时做的数学证明。标准似乎更像是：“这个孩子能为他们的网红工作填一张税表的一行而不崩溃吗？”（可能的答案：可能不行。因为政府表格是一种殖民主义，你这个偏执狂。）
 
Two years ago, the same province moved away from any and all letter grades for students, up to and including about age 14. Instead of As and Ds, teachers could only assess whether the kid was ‘emerging’, ‘developing’, ‘proficient’ or ‘extending’. The rationale? Apparently they didn’t want to highlight any deficits. Guess that comes later in the real world when he or she gets trolled mercilessly for being a moron at a time when there’s a much larger price to be paid for not having learned earlier to avoid being one.
 
两年前，同一个省取消了14岁及以下学生的所有字母评分制。取而代之的是，老师只能评估学生是“初显”、“发展中”、“熟练”还是“扩展”。理由是什么？显然他们不想突出任何不足。猜猜看，这会在现实世界中晚些时候体现出来，当他或她在网上被无情嘲笑为傻瓜时，因为没有早点学会避免成为傻瓜而付出更大的代价。
 
In France, the attempt to institute a similar post-knowledge educational system has seen middling results. High school math classes were ditched entirely in 2019 under President Emmanuel Macron. But the outcome was such a disaster that it was reversed for the 2023/24 school year.
 
在法国，尝试建立类似的“后知识”教育体系取得了不温不火的结果。在2019年，总统埃马纽埃尔·马克龙取消了高中数学课程。但结果是如此灾难，以至于在2023/24学年恢复了数学课程。
 
This year’s French final standardized exams for high schoolers and middle schoolers, which have just taken place, saw the French media publish a bunch of instructions that were given to the test graders to dummy things down for France’s future Nobel Prize hopefuls. “The first is to not deduct points for spelling or grammar mistakes. What matters is not compliance with the spelling code, but intelligibility,” said France’s RTL.
 
今年的法国高中和初中标准化考试刚刚举行，法国媒体发布了一系列给阅卷者的指导意见，降低了未来诺贝尔奖候选人的评分标准。法国的RTL报道称：“首先，不要因为拼写或语法错误扣分。重要的不是遵守拼写规则，而是可理解性。”
 
Oh, so something like this, you mean? “Shur, whi not rite a sentins like this won, wear awl the wurdz sound rite but luk lyke they flunked owtta speling skool?” Because that fits the stated criteria. Imagine an email from that colleague when he or she gets into your workplace.
 
哦，你的意思是像这样吗？“当然，为什么不写一个像这样的句子，所有的单词听起来是对的，但看起来像是从拼写学校辍学了？”因为这符合规定的标准。想象一下，当你的同事进入你的工作场所时，给你发这样的电子邮件。
 
Apparently, graders were also told not to remove all points when a student is asked to conjugate a verb – and then gets the root of the same verb that was just listed wrong. Maybe the verb they replaced whatever was right in front of their eyes with doesn’t even exist, but the ending is right. Only half the points are taken away for that.
 
显然，阅卷者还被告知，当学生被要求对动词进行变位时，即使他们把刚刚列出的动词词根弄错了，也不要扣除全部分数。也许他们替换的动词根本不存在，但结尾是正确的。对此只扣除一半的分数。
 
The final philosophy exam had to explain the meaning of the word “preponderant,” because it was apparently considered too hard for kids about to head off to university, RTL reports. The media outlet also pointed out that graders of the oral exam, read from a text that the student has 20 minutes to prepare, were only to focus on the student’s performance at the end of the session, to account for nerves.
 
最后的哲学考试不得不解释“preponderant”这个词的含义，因为据RTL报道，这个词对于即将进入大学的学生来说显然太难了。该媒体还指出，口试的阅卷者只需关注学生在20分钟准备后朗读文本的最后表现，以考虑紧张因素。
 
This may or may not have been read off a student’s page:
“Hai, my naym is Sam. I hav two bruthurs and wun sistur. We lyk to play soker togethur. My mum cuks gud fud and my dad lukes to wach mooviz wif us. I lyk drawin and playin vidyo gayms. Thansk for lisnin! Do I pas high skool now?”
 
这可能或可能不是从学生页面上读出来的：
“嗨，我的名字是萨姆。我有两个兄弟和一个姐妹。我们喜欢一起踢足球。我妈妈做很好吃的食物，我爸爸喜欢和我们一起看电影。我喜欢画画和玩电子游戏。谢谢听我说！我现在通过高中了吗？”
 
Every day seems to bring a new revelation about how the West’s Wokémon Academy is doing. In a world where feelings outrank facts and spelling is optional, it’s anyone’s guess what our ‘graduates’ will actually know and be equipped with for real life. But hey, at least their safe spaces are well-furnished.
 
每天似乎都带来关于西方“觉醒学院”如何运作的新启示。在一个情感高于事实、拼写可有可无的世界里，我们的“毕业生”实际上会知道什么、为现实生活准备了什么，谁也猜不准。但嘿，至少他们的安全空间装饰得很不错。