I transferred from a 200 school day per year charter school to a 180 school day per year public high school, and I found that I learned a lot more at the public school, so I have first hand experience with the differences. Also, the charter school's days were about an hour longer than the public school's. I found there were no advantages to going to the charter school for longer days and longer school years.
It's hard to stay alert as a young kid during such a long school day, with class times being so long. When I transferred to public school, I met a lot of very intelligent people my age, and I was surprised to see that. For the first year after transferring, I felt that I was too smart to be there, since I had just transferred from a charter school. It turned out that I had met people who were much smarter than me and just as insightful.
Sure American kids don't do so well on international tests, but maybe that's because they're not taught to take tests, they're taught to learn and apply what they learn. I don't know about you, but I'd rather my kids grow up knowing how to learn new things and broaden their horizons, rather than grow up knowing how to write answers down on a piece of paper.
It's hard to stay alert as a young kid during such a long school day, with class times being so long. When I transferred to public school, I met a lot of very intelligent people my age, and I was surprised to see that. For the first year after transferring, I felt that I was too smart to be there, since I had just transferred from a charter school. It turned out that I had met people who were much smarter than me and just as insightful.
Sure American kids don't do so well on international tests, but maybe that's because they're not taught to take tests, they're taught to learn and apply what they learn. I don't know about you, but I'd rather my kids grow up knowing how to learn new things and broaden their horizons, rather than grow up knowing how to write answers down on a piece of paper.