Super Bowl versus Science Fair

[Kennah]

"We need to teach our kids that it's not just the winner of the Super Bowl who deserves to be celebrated, but the winner of the Science Fair."

Last year, I helped run my son's elementary school Science Fair, and I had just read Dr. Michio Kaku's "Physics of the Impossible". My closing comments for the Science Fair were an observation that Dr. Kaku won a scholarship to Harvard because of his Science Fair project.

This Friday, I'm running Science Fair by myself, and the President gave me a great closing quote. We'll see if I get "talked to".

[Drale]

1. The problem with school fairs is that the kids

who's parents do the work. I got a first place ribbon I'm 7th grade for the history fair doing it myself but the kids who got to go to state, you could tell they didn't do one once of work on their projects. Sports are one of those things that allow us to take our collective minds off all the craziness in the work around us and focus on a event. I agree that intelligence should be celebrated more, but there are plenty of extremely smart athletes.

[malaise]

2. Obama hosted the Science Fair winners at the WH last year

for the first time ever.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/eop/ostp/pressroom/10182010

Enjoy this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzDWzjqbN1c

Longer version here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcjJUuV0FB0&feature=channel

add

[frazzled]

3. That statement really hit home with a lot of people

If you are or ever have been parent of a nerd (and I say that with great respect), you will have asked yourself many times why the swimming or track teams get all the attention, but when your kid's math team wins the state tournament, nobody even notices. Not even the principal. The computer science team my son was on won second place in the world. I repeat, "world." It was an international competition held in Montreal that year. No pep rally, no high fives in the hallway, no path to homecoming king for that.

When the kids are younger (before sports and "cool" and all that) there is some validation for academic achievement. My daughter won the school spelling bee and went on to the city, regionals, and state. She felt validated for about a week. The science fairs in 6th and 7th grade are made a big deal of. But it all seems to break down after that.

Why is this?

[Johonny]

4. sports are more broadly entertaining

I like science fairs, did them as a student, won ribbons, but ok the school football game was more exciting.

It might not be a good idea to compare educational achievements to athletic achievements and purely entertainment driven ventures with ventures designed to educate etc.
Other societies that value education vastly more than Americans, still love sports. The Chinese for instance are really, really into ping pong. The Germans place a high value on sports and education.

On the other hand I think you'll find at the same age (7th grade) educational achievements start to lag, so does the idea of everyone participating in sports in school.

So probably the cause is the same. Sports as pure entertainment are a business, they generate (or are thought to generate $ value) and thus there becomes a growing interest in driving people out of it that aren't good and pushing and promoting it. High school football in some part of the country is big business. High school science fairs aren't. The older a child becomes the more like the real world there life becomes. In the US we equate generation of $, with value and achievement. So it is probably not a surprise this idea reaches back even into schools.

[Cant trust em]

5. She'll feel validated for the rest of her life with the skills she builds

Most athletes will feel validated only through high school.

[Cant trust em]

6. I'm really going to push science and math on my kids.

I've always leaned more toward the liberal arts, but if I could do it over I'd be a civil engineer or a physicist or something.