Online Education has created this hand-drawn infographic below to illustrate the state of our current educational system and how it compares to the rest of the world. Brace yourself — some of these rankings may come as a shock.
Read it all (Hat tip: Minyanville).
If this is a surprise to you, then I really don’t understand it. For years now the rest of the world has known that the USA is notoriously bad in education, health, social welfare, justice, … actually you name it …
Here it is routinely given an example of what not to do with money in the public (and for that matter private) sector.
What might be more useful would be to take those macro-statistics and break them down a little:
-Public vs Private school results
-Public vs Home School results
-Public [union] vs Public [non-union]
-Public [big city systems] vs Public [small community]
-Uniform Vs. Pluriform demographics.
-nearly universal school attendance.
Though our schools have become social engineering facilities nstead of learning institutions, many kids still get a decent education in spite of them. As many as when the dumb ones and the poor ones had to drop out and get a job.
pretty graphics though
Whoa! Is that Shanghai, France?
I wonder about how the other countries are “ranked.” Are they using the same criteria that we are using? Do other countries attempt to educate the same percentage of the population that the U.S. attempts to educate? How about their “testing?” I’ve heard that Europeans don’t put as much of an emphasis on standardized testing as we do. They probably has its benefits, but what does that say about the accuracy of their ranking? I have no doubt that our school systems are seriously flawed. My wife, mother, sister and father are/were teachers. I am familiar with the many problems of today’s school. But I still wonder about how these other countries are being rated.
A lot of demographics are missing from that, but I trust the summarized numbers. Kids K-12 (and many in college) can probably tell you in detail who Snooky is and what she did last summer. But ask them who George Washington was or how the force of gravity effects them and you’ll just get a lot of blank stares and bad guesses. I’m sure their parents made certain they got to cheerleading, soccer, or basketball practice on time every time. Read a book to them? Too busy.
[i]I’m sure their parents made certain they got to cheerleading, soccer, or basketball practice on time every time. Read a book to them? Too busy[/i]
Take them to church? Not cool. Not my thing. Why?