Lily Jenkins
EMS Press
Traverse City East MS
1st Place
Division MS, News Writing
Bylined Opinion Article
Every day here at East, students are bound to hear (or say) words things like “School sucks,” “This is pointless,” and “I don’t want to be here.” However, it is time to consider if these feelings are a result of a broken education system and failing schools, or if it just boils down to young, tired, students who simply resent the idea of school.
Overall, school systems are better than they were hundreds of years ago. Curriculums have expanded and teachers are much more qualified than they used to be. But that does not mean that our schools are perfect.
There seems to be a misguided opinion throughout the United States that we are, and always will be, the best at everything. However, when our test scores on the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) are compared to other countries, they are no more than mediocre. Out of the 34 OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries, America placed 17th in math and reading and 21st in science. Out of the group of top performers on the test, only nine percent came from the U.S. while 55 percent came from Shanghai-China.
More disconcerting yet, one in four US students failed to reach the baseline level two in math on the PISA. A PISA report describes this level as the level where, “students begin to demonstrate the skills that will enable them to participate effectively and productively in life.”
The most appalling statistic may be that even the top U.S. students are way behind students of their age from other countries. In a PISA report of students from Massachusetts, one of the highest achieving states, it showed that those students are still two school years behind the students in Shanghai.
The U.S. spends a significant amount on education, but test scores have not been found to correlate with the amount of money spent. In the PISA, America scores similarly to the Slovak Republic, yet we are paying $62,000 more than them per student.
So, why isn’t our country doing better internationally? Are our students being cheated from getting the same education as students from other countries? Where has our school system gone wrong?
Apart from test scores, it is seen that out of the G-20 countries (a group of 20 countries including Australia, China, Canada, and France) U.S. students tend to start school much later than the others In France, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom, nine out of ten students started receiving formal education as young as three years old, while ninety percent of U.S. students weren’t enrolled until they were six.
So, our education system clearly needs some work. But will we ever discover a perfect way of teaching kids? Most likely not. Yet as today’s students begin to enter the workforce and basically take over the world, we must make sure that they are as prepared as possible, and that we are doing as much as we can to provide an education experience that supports them to flourish, and doesn’t leave anyone without the tools for success.