3.2.1. How to learn faster, what you put in the world, and the value of numerous attempts

I.
“When dreaming, imagine success.
When preparing, imagine failure.
When acting, imagine success.”
II.
“If you do not actively choose a better way, then society, culture, and the general inertia of life will push you into a worse way. The default is distraction, not improvement.”
School closures need to happen

After reports that Chicago Public Schools might need to close up to 100 schools, its board voted in September to impose a moratorium on any such discussion until at least 2027. With that decision, Chicago became the most extreme and high-profile example of a district ignoring its underenrolled schools.
But it’s not just Chicago. Over the last decade, districts have closed fewer and fewer schools. As of 2021-22, the most recent year for which national data is available, districts closed 666 schools — the lowest number in more than 20 years. (Charter school closures are also at historically low levels.)
What will happen to the Department of Education?

Fresh from their November victories, Republican lawmakers and expected appointees to the incoming Trump administration are already working to help the president achieve his campaign promise of abolishing the U.S. Department of Education.
Notable Trump surrogates Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, each promised seats on a proposed commission to eliminate government waste, have publicly endorsed the idea, while Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota filed new legislation to initiate a shutdown process before the new Congress was even seated.
Conducting difficult conversations

e spend most of our time with people who see things largely like we do. They work in similar industries, have similar educations and live in similar places. When confronted with areas of disagreement, we can usually bullshit our way through it and keep the peace. That’s how we normally go through life.
Yet difficult conversations conversations are sometimes unavoidable. There are fundamental differences in values and perspectives as well as issues surrounding identity and status that underlie and shape every professional and personal relationship. At some point these need to be addressed in order to move forward with any ability to function effectively.
Ector County awarded “District of the Year.”

In the past five years, the Texas district’s investments in staffing and high dosage tutoring are paying off.
Five years ago, Texas’ Ector County Independent School District was significantly underperforming, said Scott Muri, the district’s superintendent emeritus. Today, it’s a different story.
When Muri joined as the district’s superintendent in 2019, he said, students were “struggling academically in school,” and “all the metrics were heading in the wrong direction.” That same year, the Texas Education Agency gave Ector County ISD an F accountability rating.
But now, Ector County ISD, with about 34,000 students, is on the upswing. Signs point to significantly improved student achievement, and the district earned its first-ever B rating from TEA in 2022, the most recent year rated.
Implications of Bilingual Education

What Bilingual Education Reveals About Race in the U.S.
Looking back at her youth growing up in Douglas, Arizona — nestled up snugly against its Mexican sister city of Agua Prieta, Sonora — Laura C. Chávez-Moreno wishes she’d had the chance to partake in bilingual education classes.
She has had plenty of opportunities since then, including as a researcher who spent years sitting in on classes and interviewing students and teachers who were part of a dual language program in the Midwest.
It was structured in what some might consider the optimal way to teach language. Starting in elementary school, roughly half of the program’s students would be native Spanish speakers and the other half native English speakers. They would all buddy up while learning to speak, read and write in both languages, and they would graduate bilingual — a necessity for children whose first language was Spanish, and a prized opportunity for children whose first language was English.