I’ll admit I don’t really have data for this. But my intuitive guess is that students don’t just need to be able to attend school; they need a personal relationship with a teacher who will inspire them. At least for me, that’s a large part of why I’m in the field that I chose.
It’s possible that I’m being misled by the warm fuzzy feelings I get from helping someone face-to-face, which I don’t get from sending money halfway across the world. But it seems like there’s many things that matter in life that don’t have a price tag.
I’ll admit I don’t really have data for this. But my intuitive guess is that …
Have you made efforts to research it? Either by trawling papers or by doing experiments yourself?
students don’t just need to be able to attend school; they need a personal relationship with a teacher who will inspire them.
Your objection had already been accounted for: $500 to SCI = around 150 people extra attend school for a year. I estimated the number of students that will have a relationship with their teacher as good as the average you provide at around 1:150.
But it seems like there’s many things that matter in life that don’t have a price tag.
That sounds deep, but is obviously false: would you condemn yourself to a year of torture so that you get one unit of the thing that allegedly doesn’t have a price tag (for example a single minute of a conversation with a student where you feel a real connection)? Would you risk a one in a million chance to get punched on the arm in order to get the same unit? If the answer to these questions is [no] and [yes] respectively, as I would expect them to be, those are outer limits on the price range. Getting to the true value is just a matter of convergence.
Perhaps more to the point, though, those people you would help halfway across the world are just as real, and their lives just as filled with “things that don’t have a price tag” as people in your environment. For $3000, one family is not torn apart by a death from malaria. For $3, one child more attends grade school regularly for a year because they are no longer ill from parasitic stomach infections. These are not price tags, these are trades you can actually make. Make the trades, and you set a lower limit. Refuse them, and the maximum price tag you put on a child’s relationship with their teacher is set, period.
It does seem very much like you’re guided by your warm fuzzies.
This is based on my own experience, and on watching my friends progress through school. I believe that the majority of successful people find their life path because someone inspired them. I don’t know where I could even look to find hard numbers on whether that’s true or not, but I’d like to be that person for as many people as I can.
That sounds deep, but is obviously false… It does seem very much like you’re guided by your warm fuzzies.
My emotional brain is still struggling to accept that, and I don’t know why. I’ll see if I can coax a coherent reason from it later. But my rational brain says that you’re right and I was wrong. Thanks.
(Sorry, I didn’t see this until now.)
I’ll admit I don’t really have data for this. But my intuitive guess is that students don’t just need to be able to attend school; they need a personal relationship with a teacher who will inspire them. At least for me, that’s a large part of why I’m in the field that I chose.
It’s possible that I’m being misled by the warm fuzzy feelings I get from helping someone face-to-face, which I don’t get from sending money halfway across the world. But it seems like there’s many things that matter in life that don’t have a price tag.
Have you made efforts to research it? Either by trawling papers or by doing experiments yourself?
Your objection had already been accounted for: $500 to SCI = around 150 people extra attend school for a year. I estimated the number of students that will have a relationship with their teacher as good as the average you provide at around 1:150.
That sounds deep, but is obviously false: would you condemn yourself to a year of torture so that you get one unit of the thing that allegedly doesn’t have a price tag (for example a single minute of a conversation with a student where you feel a real connection)? Would you risk a one in a million chance to get punched on the arm in order to get the same unit? If the answer to these questions is [no] and [yes] respectively, as I would expect them to be, those are outer limits on the price range. Getting to the true value is just a matter of convergence.
Perhaps more to the point, though, those people you would help halfway across the world are just as real, and their lives just as filled with “things that don’t have a price tag” as people in your environment. For $3000, one family is not torn apart by a death from malaria. For $3, one child more attends grade school regularly for a year because they are no longer ill from parasitic stomach infections. These are not price tags, these are trades you can actually make. Make the trades, and you set a lower limit. Refuse them, and the maximum price tag you put on a child’s relationship with their teacher is set, period.
It does seem very much like you’re guided by your warm fuzzies.
This is based on my own experience, and on watching my friends progress through school. I believe that the majority of successful people find their life path because someone inspired them. I don’t know where I could even look to find hard numbers on whether that’s true or not, but I’d like to be that person for as many people as I can.
My emotional brain is still struggling to accept that, and I don’t know why. I’ll see if I can coax a coherent reason from it later. But my rational brain says that you’re right and I was wrong. Thanks.