School Sucks Because It Is a Game

The class starts by training the eye. Source trail 0:001:02 okay so welcome back to game theory and um as i discussed last class our goal is able to is to use game theory to analyze global events to understand why they're happening as well as make certain predictions about how t...in a way that allows you to be functional in society as well as to be creative right okay so the goals are basically literacy all right which means reading and writing this is the primary purpose of school because in or... Game theory is not yet global events; first it is school, because students already know school from inside. The official mission is clean: school should make a person functional in society and creative. That means literacy, core competencies such as critical thinking and collaboration, and lifelong learning in a world that keeps changing.

Then the mission collapses into its opposite. Schools do not require books, so university professors retreat to paragraphs and videos. Collaboration becomes a zero-sum ranking game. Lifelong learning becomes a ceremony of exhaustion: after the exam, students rip up books and celebrate never wanting to read, test, or learn again Source trail 3:284:34 decreased it's very hard for a professor to give you an hour lecture people lose focus after about five minutes okay so this is one problem another problem is school is supposed to teach you creativity critical thinking...out the pages and you throw it in the sky just to signal your liberation your liberation and you're like i never ever want to read a book again i never ever want to take a test again i never want to learn again i never... .

The autobiography gives the model teeth. In 2008, after Yale, Jiang is hired to build an international program in South China. The students are smart, but the preparation is hollow: regular Chinese classes, note-sticking, tests, SAT word lists, little reading or writing, and Model United Nations as undifferentiated application theater. The reform is practical. Seminars replace passive classes. Books replace word memorization Source trail 7:27 the school okay so first thing i did was i set up a seminar system so rather than change classes i invited these american teachers to come and teach seminars like we have at the school where 10 20 kids are in a room and... . A student coffee house teaches service, collaboration, finance, and entrepreneurship. A daily newspaper makes students report, write, edit, publish, and deliver.

The deeper reform is cultural. Transparency, innovation, and openness mean the curriculum is not perfect from above; it evolves by admitting mistakes and correcting them together Source trail 9:58 i understand game theory and i says okay if you want to make this transition from the old system to the new system you also have to establish a new culture to allow these activities to flourish okay so my three major pr... . That is Jiang's definition of learning in practice. The system becomes effective, students do well, and the program becomes famous. Then the game answers back: he is fired, people are happy to see him go, and he is not allowed to run another program. The successful reformer is remembered not as visionary but as dictator, asshole, the man who insisted on fairness Source trail 12:2713:34 very similar to this, okay, but after that, after four years of doing this and being very successful at this, I was never allowed to set up another program again. No one wanted me to work in management again, okay? Okay...Because I insisted on fairness, okay? I don't care who you are. I don't care who your parents are. I want... I want you to work hard and learn. And as you can imagine, that pissed off a lot of powerful people, because t... .

The mistake was thinking the players wanted the ideal version of their role. Students would love learning. Parents would want independent children. Teachers would love teaching. Government would want innovation. Colleges would want future leaders. That was the official story. The game-theory story is harsher: players want the best possible result with the least possible work Source trail 17:36 Okay? And the easy answer is that in game theory, all the players, what they're motivated in is by achieving the best possible results. By doing the least amount of work possible. Okay? Just remember that. That's a prin... .

A game is built when players agree on the rules and incentives. Jiang came in as an outsider and built a game where students could thrive, but the stakeholders did not want his game because they did not control it. Ranking power matters. Source trail 20:2421:49 again, and objectively think about what the interests and motivations of each player are, and when their interests converge, that's the game they play. All right? So, you have students, parents, teachers, leaders, schoo...Okay? So, the most important are the parents. And you have the teachers. Why? Because the teachers are the ones who are implementing the rules of the game. Okay? The way that teachers behave determines how this game is... Students are numerous but weak. Parents matter because they pay and can make trouble. Teachers matter because they implement the rules. Administrators matter because they manage parent relationships. Government and colleges mostly care that the school does not disturb their own games.

Students are not in school mainly to learn. They are there to make friends, have fun, please parents and teachers, collect grades, and reach college. Lens point education-soul-game Education becomes a soul game when the school rewards pleasing parents, teachers, peers, administrators, colleges, and governments more reliably than learning; students then adapt to the rewarded game until the game helps decide what kind of person they become. education-soul-game Education becomes a soul game when the school rewards pleasing parents, teachers, peers, administrators, colleges, and governments more reliably than learning; students then adapt to the rewarded game until the game helps decide what kind of person they become. Source trail 23:3624:36 All right. So, let's look at students. Students, okay, I mean, they want to be popular. Right? So, most students come to school and actually their priorities are to learn. Their priority is to make friends and to be pop...And then you're like, have fun. Okay? And then get a good college. Okay? All right? So, am I missing anything among the students? All right. So, okay, I'm sure there's more, but let's just keep on going. Okay? Now, pare... Grades therefore become social evidence Source trail 23:36 All right. So, let's look at students. Students, okay, I mean, they want to be popular. Right? So, most students come to school and actually their priorities are to learn. Their priority is to make friends and to be pop... : not proof that learning happened, but proof that the right people were pleased.

Parents want successful children, but success is not the same thing as learning or happiness. Success is face. The child at Brown, Cornell, Dartmouth, or the Ivy League becomes a status object for relatives, friends, and colleagues. International school becomes a luxury product Source trail 24:3625:45 And then you're like, have fun. Okay? And then get a good college. Okay? All right? So, am I missing anything among the students? All right. So, okay, I'm sure there's more, but let's just keep on going. Okay? Now, pare...It's because international schools are more expensive, and most importantly, international schools have white faces. Right? White faces. This is the main marketing tool of international schools, right? They have all the... . Its most important marketing tool is not curriculum but white faces. Ten white teachers are enough to make the school look real Source trail 25:45 It's because international schools are more expensive, and most importantly, international schools have white faces. Right? White faces. This is the main marketing tool of international schools, right? They have all the... , whether or not the teachers are good or the children learn.

Teachers and administrators are also playing ordinary life games. They have families, salaries, reputations, and limited energy. The rational move is to do enough, avoid trouble, and give parents what they want. Government's hidden demand is no problems now and compliant students later Source trail 27:57 This is a job for them. They also just want to get by. Okay? They're not trying to build the best school possible. They're not trying to change the world. They're not trying to educate students. They're just trying to g... . Colleges want tuition. Once those incentives converge, the school surface is predictable: white faces, easy grades, a few scholarship students for marketing, lots of cheating, high turnover Source trail 36:1237:37 Okay? Sorry. White faces. And they want successful kids, which means good grades. Okay? Teachers just want to get by and do as little work as possible. Administrators just want to protect relationship with parents. Okay...Just lots of white faces, lots of really nice buildings, lots of fancy activities, great marketing, beautiful website, really motivate admissions officers. Then you have easy grades where everyone gets an A, no matter w... , stressed teachers, unhappy parents, indifferent students.

The student's question matters because it asks how the original mission became this game. Jiang's answer is superstructure: demographics, economy, politics, religion, and the life cycle of societies. Healthy societies have energy, openness, and cohesion Source trail 29:3030:51 Yeah. That's a really good question. When? Yeah. Okay. So what we discussed last class is the idea of superstructure, right? Superstructure. Sorry. Superstructure is just the macro picture of a society. It's demographic...Does that make sense? That's energy. Okay? So openness just means that you want to learn, you want to grow. You're willing to admit you made a mistake and improve on yourself. Okay? And the last thing is cohesion, where... . Energy means focused work. Openness means admitting mistakes and improving. Cohesion means seeing children as the community's future. Put those together and schools can be great; Finland and Jiang's memory of 1980s China become examples.

Decline is not mysterious. Wealth, inequality, and corruption turn cohesion into individual competition: my kid must win even if every other kid loses. They kill openness because any admitted mistake can get an administrator destroyed by parents. They kill energy because good work only creates more demands Source trail 34:03 Get out of here. You're incompetent. Okay? So you can be like the best person in the world, but if you make a mistake, the parents will come and kill you. But you can be the worst person in the world, but you're just hi... . By 2025-2026, Jiang says, wealth can even make school success less necessary: parents can buy apartments and cars, so students become indifferent, and indifferent students make teachers indifferent Source trail 35:02 That's why students work hard. If students work hard, teachers are motivated to teach well. And now you're having a time when, you know, today in 2025, 26, when parents have money. So it doesn't matter if you don't do w... .

The point is not 'schools suck, don't go to school.' The point is to analyze why they are the way they are. Different players form overlapping sets; their convergence point is the game. Reform is possible, but only within some acceptable part of that convergence Source trail 39:50 Okay? Now, what's important for us to understand is that there is actually a lot of room to this convergence point. So, it's possible to do reform, but only within a subset of this convergence point. Okay? So, my proble... . Jiang's 2008 mistake was trying to set up a new universe, make up the rules, and be God Source trail 39:50 Okay? Now, what's important for us to understand is that there is actually a lot of room to this convergence point. So, it's possible to do reform, but only within a subset of this convergence point. Okay? So, my proble... . Whatever new game you offer has to live close enough to the old one that players can accept it.

The final student question asks where stakeholder interests come from. The easy answer is culture and superstructure, but the deeper game-theory answer is multiple games. Parents are family members competing with siblings through money, children, spouse, and lifestyle. They are also colleagues trying to keep their children acceptable inside a network. If a child succeeds in a way that offends the group, the parent risks exile Source trail 42:5143:56 That's a game they're playing. All right? But they have colleagues. You have colleagues. And the game you're trying to play there is to get along with your colleagues because that's what ensures your success in life. Ok...Australization. Okay? Or basically just exile. Where you are no longer part of the group. They kick you out as a player. Okay? That's what people are afraid of. And that's why people are motivated by what they do becaus... .

That is the social psychology of the game: try to beat the others, but do not anger them enough to get thrown out Source trail 43:56 Australization. Okay? Or basically just exile. Where you are no longer part of the group. They kick you out as a player. Okay? That's what people are afraid of. And that's why people are motivated by what they do becaus... . Students learn the same structure. They play the school game, the friendship game, and the parent-pleasing game, and the least important one is actual learning. Game theory here is not about ideals Source trail 47:09 according to the game and, and we are who we are is often determined by the nature of the game. Okay? So you can come into school wanting to learn, being creative and all that, but eventually you recognize that that's n... . It is about what people do when the real reward structure teaches them what kind of person to become Lens point education-soul-game Education becomes a soul game when the school rewards pleasing parents, teachers, peers, administrators, colleges, and governments more reliably than learning; students then adapt to the rewarded game until the game helps decide what kind of person they become. education-soul-game Education becomes a soul game when the school rewards pleasing parents, teachers, peers, administrators, colleges, and governments more reliably than learning; students then adapt to the rewarded game until the game helps decide what kind of person they become. atlas-relation Formation becomes civilizational capacity when the games that train persons either preserve energy, adaptability, practical judgment, and cohesion or reduce them into obedience, test performance, and controlled membership in a larger machine. Source trail 47:09 according to the game and, and we are who we are is often determined by the nature of the game. Okay? So you can come into school wanting to learn, being creative and all that, but eventually you recognize that that's n... .