Considered a "massive wake up call" by Education Secretary Arne Duncan, the results of an international assessment of students revealed that U.S. students only ranked "average". The U.S. is currently ranked 14th out of 34 OCED countries in this assessment. The assessment, The OECD Programme for International Student Assessment, compared the knowledge and skills of 15-year-olds in 70 countries around the world. On a scale of 1,000, the U.S. scored 500 in reading, 487 in math and 502 in science.
George Miller, the House Education and Labor Chairman, stated that he would currently give our country's education system an F. Miller claims "The difference between the countries at the top of these rankings and the U.S. is that the countries who are outperforming us have made developing the best education system in the world a national goal, they've recognized that the strength of their economy will be inextricably tied to the strength of their education system in the 21st century."
The OCED report also claimed that if the U.S. raised 25 pts. in each academic subject, over the next 20 yrs. there would be a net $41 trillion gain for the U.S. economy.
What are you opinions on the OCED results? Do you guys agree with Miller? And, at this point, what type of reforms do you think could be implemented to improve our educational system?
15 comments:
Personally these results do not surprise me. It is in my opinion a well known fact that the education system in the US is lacking. Like the article says other countries [cough] Asian countries [cough] have made education a priority and it gets a large amount of attention socially and in terms of budget allocation. Compare this to America where education lies in priority maybe on par with what Lady Gaga was wearing yesterday (not today yesterday) and in the budget mostly after Defense and Prisons it is not a big surprise to see we rank "Average"
While our education is somewhat of a problem on the global scale, Miller is overreacting in order to gain political points in my opinion. Last time I checked, an ranking average equated to something along the lines of a C. Let's also not forget that in the Bush era with the NCLB reforms, America has taken strides towards making "developing the best education system in the world a national goal."
Finally, before we get into any fear-mongering attitude, let us not forget that the United States still has the best higher level education available to the world.
I feel that the numbers are an inaccurate reflection of the U.S. education system. The numbers could be skewed towards average I believe because of the diversity of students of both ethnicity, economic standing, and educational level/capabilities.
It's kind of like the situation over at San Mateo High School. There are a lot of educated and competitive students at that school, but because of the well established english as a second language system, they receive a good majority of smuhsd's non native english speakers. Because of this academic disadvantage, test scores are generally not as accurate in depicting the higher end of the academic spectrum. The fact is that as the United States receive new citizens from almost every country, we get left behind as we accommodate for them. And with education budgets being cut up left and right, it becomes an uphill battle that gets steeper as you move on in order to stay "the best".
Forgetting the numbers, the U.S. has probably the most valuable asset it provides for students that most countries don't got and that we sometimes take for granted: a second chance.
For at least most of the countries that I've seen, they don't got as big of a safety net of remedial classes, adult school, or a two-year community college to go to if you mess up in high school. Over there, it's not whether or not you understand the material... its understand the material, do it or else.
Where my parents grew up, you better pass with at least 70% because D's don't cut it. If you don't pass a class, you run the risk of being held back to repeat the class. Period.
Sounds harsh right? Why do you think that we attract so many foreign students to our high schools, colleges, and universities?
In most places in this world, the public education is unaccessible, and private education is not always affordable, especially to those trying to get by. Even with its imperfections, budget cuts, and those OCED numbers telling a different story, our biggest asset of "second chance academics" built into our education system proves how good we actually got it.
My opinion -->"We the best"
-Raymond Lim
I agree with Dan; If the U.S had terrible education then why would people come to obtain an education. The "Asian Countries" that have made education a priority have a significant amount of people not enrolled in school.
"Literacy rate
Age 15 and over can read and write:
* Total population: 90.9% (2000 census)
* Male: 95.1% (2000 census)
* Female: 86.5% (2000 census)
Educational attainment
As of 2000, percentage of population age 15 and over having:
* no schooling and incomplete primary: 15.6%
* completed primary: 35.7%
* some secondary: 34.0%
* complete secondary: 11.1%
* some postsecondary through advanced degree: 3.6%"
^^^^
Facts on China's education system.
Other people in my period are now digging up test statistics to prove some point about the American education system.
To pre-empt them, if I may, is this what really matters? Do we, as a population, really want to be identified as a list of numbers? Do we, as a nation, want our education system to become a machine, manufacturing a legion of perfect test takers?
Maybe there are other ways to define "the best."
As one of the "people" who came to America to obtain an education, I want to testify to the general mindset of people who come for the education. When immigrants come to America, we are here for the higher education, as Dan have mentioned. We come here to go to a great college that will provide future opportunities, not for K-12. In China, people do not apply to college, instead, they take a standardized test (one that is much more difficult than the ACT or SAT). People only get one chance, no retakes. It includes more subjects than just math or language. A score is what determines one's future. It may not be the best educational system, but the academic rigor is unquestionable.
The other day, one of my fifth grade family friends from China was asking me about freshman Algebra, because that is what they're learning at a fifth grade level.
Also, China has the biggest population in the world, and it is less developed in many parts compared to the U.S. The poverty line is lower. But for people who can actually obtain an education, they value it more and the schooling is at a higher level compared to the United States national standards.
For example, http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2010/12/07/education/07education_graph.html?ref=education. This chart shows that Shanghai (a developed city in which kids have access to education) significantly outperforms all of the other countries that participated in the test.
We are here to talk about the education, and thus it is unfair to use the literacy rate of the entire country because many of them do not have access to education.
Also, Cris' stats include people of age 15 and higher, thus it includes the older generations of Chinese people who did not have access to education before. In fact, in 2004, the youth (age to 15-24) literacy rate in China was 98.9% (http://globalis.gvu.unu.edu/indicator_detail.cfm?IndicatorID=41&Country=CN).
That being said, we are generalizing the American education system as well. There are many areas with high performing schools, as well as other areas with less privileged families.
Peter Z. agrees, but wants to add that it would also be unfair to compare China's best statistics with the overall United States statistics. He agrees with LuShuang's comments above.
Our public education system is absolutely terrible. When compared with other countries, our average students are below average. In fact, if you look at the data, the United States has a level 3 proficiency percentage 5% below many of our chief competitors. The science average is actually 1% below the oced average. Level 4 and 5 are also below the average. On the mathematics and reading scales, the United States is also lagging by a significant number of points. If our education system is so great, why are we lagging behind so badly? If we want to improve our economy and our future, we must be competitive in the international market. If our students are less educated by such a significant amount, our status as a world player will decrease significantly.
You can just examine our current situation to understand that our system is terrible. As many of you are aware, many of our middle school teachers very obviously do not know the material they taught us. My sister's middle school math teacher might as well have been a babysitter. When I arrived in California, I myself was surprised by the lackluster quality of the middle schools compared to the east coast. And I'm not even talking about other nations. In addition, remember that in times of crisis, what gets cut first? Education. When politicians show such blatant disregard for our future, it becomes obvious why we are failing so badly internationally.
To respond to posts saying that we cannot generalize the system, we should care about the national average. Just because one school is good doesn't mean that the rest of the district is good. And when the rest of the district is not good, it affects our capabilities as a whole.
To respond to Anthony's comment, test scores are definitely not representative of the capabilities of students because creativity, innovation, and motivation are necessary to succeed. This is why America still leads at the higher education level. Also, we brought up statistics because Cris used a few statistics to represent China's educational attainment level; we just wanted to clear the picture of Chinese education. However, we are not claiming that the Chinese system educational system is comparatively better than that of the United States. That being said, objective test scores still roughly reflect the education attainment levels of students, and there is some concern that American students are significantly behind their counterparts in other nations.
Posted by LuShuang and Peter
This article also does not surprise me; I also feel that the general consensus is that education in America has serious flaws and lots of room for improvement. I can honestly think of a long list of things in American education that I think could be changed for the better, among them the schedule of the schooling year (year-round vs. traditional calendar), the way teachers and staff are paid (tenure), the start of the school day (too early in the morning for teenagers). As a proud American, it is embarrassing that we rank so low in international comparisons of skills in academic areas.
As others have already pointed out, that this ranking only takes 34 countries into account, which still places the US among the top educating schools of the globe. However, the disparity between the US's economic power and its education ranking is great, and there should be reform to make this difference narrower.
I'm interested in how the report came up with the calculation that "if the U.S. raised 25 points in each academic subject over the next twenty years there would be a net $41 trillion gain for the U.S. economy."
I agree with Charlie and Sarah. In my opinion, our government needs a massive shift in priorities if we want to increase our competitiveness in education. Instead of devoting the largest portion of our yearly budget to defense, we should spend more money on education. According to a recent Time magazine issue, the U.S. spends more money on defense than the next 20 highest defense-spending countries combined. This type of money toward defense is just not necessary. If we want to remain a competitive nation in the future, the government needs to focus on educating and preparing our youth for this increasingly competitive and globalized world.
I would strongly disagree with the posts thus far that claim average to be acceptable or even good. The U.S. really doesn't have any excuse to be getting an average score such an assessment of our education system. If so many other countries demonstrate that they have a superior education system than there is a serious problem. The worst part is that the U.S. could fix this problem if money was redirected (out of the Army as I've mentioned before). Even with the best colleges and universities, the government should be striving for more.
I think these OCED results are actually true, which scares me a lot. I think we are suppose to be living the expectations in that other countries think we are very high tech society and that we should be intelligent for being so succesfull. I also agree with Miller that if we raise our education's rankings, we will be a highly prestigious country. But I think it will have its consequences because that would mean more immigration which can add to the rise of our population. But that good side about this is that I also think our economy will be helped out because we will have more intellectuals to do things that will require more knowledge and they will be able to earn more money which will lead to more taxes for our country. I think the biggest way to positively reform our education system is to just give more money to our education budget and have stricter rules in what the kids learn and spend more funds in teaching teachers and proffesors better.
i have read a similar article in the past so this does not surprise me. The American system of education can be flawed at times. We have some of the brightest students in the world and some of the least educated. Compared to Europe the American system is easy. I always hear about my cousin's work who lives in Germany and it is very different and much harder. That is why some economies will be booming in the future, they will have the minds to do it.
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