2 million minutes

Overall, I think american students don't care enough about school. They focus too much on sports and they don't work hard enough. On the other hand, I think there does need to be some balance between academics and life. What I like about the American culture is that students have to push themselves, they are not doing something just because their parents told them to. My dad has always to me to make up my own decision about what I want to do. He has never tried to persuade me or any of my siblings to pursue a particular field or career. My parents have never really forced school on me at all. It used to really bother me. If I came home and told my parents that I got a B on the test I took last week they would say "Oh honey that's great!" My response would be, "WHAT! No it's not! That's horrible, I'm never going to get into college now!". My parents just didn't seem to understand the importance of school. But now I am thankful. If my parents had pushed me, I would have been more likely to rebel and give up on school all together.

In response to For Once Blame the Students, I think that Patrick Welsh is right, especially in a district like Wayzata where we have excellent teachers. I know that there are a lot of inner city schools that suffer due to poor teaching, but many times that is not the case. I think that students just don't care enough. The teacher may be brilliant, but the students wouldn't know because they don't pay attention or they don't bother to do the homework. In my 4X class, kids complained because it was too hard, and they were getting B's and C's on the tests. They also weren't trying. When they got to a problem in the homework that looked even remotely hard, they left it blank and waited for the teacher to explain it the next day. I saw a lot of papers almost completely empty. How can you learn if you don't try. The most common complaint I heard after a test was, "Well I understood it when he explained it on the board". WELL OF COURSE YOU DID! ONCE YOU KNOW THE ANSWER THEN IT MAKES SENSE!!!! If they had tried on their homework and figured out one of the problems on their own, then they would have been able to do it on the test. Being able to comprehend what the teacher says is completely different from actually being able to solve the problem yourself. When I did my homework, I would do every problem to the best of my ability. If I came across a confusing problem, I would at least write it down and try it. If I had worked through it and still couldn't figure it out, I would look online to find a similar example problem. Only after I had done all of that, would I give up and go ask the teacher the next day. But I am not perfect. There were some days where I was tired, and I did leave a few for class. Also, I love math, so I work harder in that class. There have been far too many days where I got home, watched Lost for 4 hours, and then fell asleep in the middle of my APUSH reading. I think a biggest part of American student's problems is that they are afraid of a challenge. They don't take the honors or AP version of a class because they don't want to work hard, they don't want to look stupid, or they don't want to ruin their GPA. If they don't even try, then they might as well just get a job at McDonald's now, so they can become the manager before they are 50.

I had mixed feelings about 2 million minutes. It was definitely very biased. The director chose two less ambitious american students and four ambitious Chinese and Indian students. The American students watched T.V. instead of doing their homework, and they were almost bragging about the fact that they hadn't studied for the test or completed any of the readings. But at the end, it kind of turned around by showing that the American students got into good schools, and they were proud of what they did. On the other hand, the Indian and Chinese kids were not accepted to their schools of choice, and they were disappointed, as were their parents. I think that the big difference between America and India and China is that there are so many more students competing for the same colleges and jobs. If a student wants to succeed, they have to work so much harder to get into the best schools. In America, there are a lot fewer students and a lot less competition, making it easier to get into a good college and having a successful career. This is changing though. More students are going to college, and many of them apply to more than 5 colleges. When you talk to an adult who graduated from college 40 years ago, they will tell you that they probably wouldn't be accepted to their college if they applied today. Its a never ending cycle. As the competition increases, students have to work harder. By working harder, the competition increases even more and the students have to work even more. I feel bad for the students of the future (Assuming the robots haven't taken over and enslaved us by then), because I enjoy spending time with my friends and sometimes doing nothing at all.