Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

"Smarter" Hmmm

Do you mean better educated (exposed to more, retaining more, able to put more into use later? ...)

Do you mean more creative (seeing or creating connections others miss, something else?)?

Do you mean better test takers?

Do you mean better (faster? better retention?) at absorbing new mental skills?

Do you mean better at recognizing and applying patterns?

Do you mean better at manipulating (or adapting to) their environments or other people to accomplish their goals?

A good first step in getting useful answers is thinking carefully about the questions you ask. I'm not sure that "How can we make American students smarter?" has an answer. To me, unless the intent is to uncover a very large multi-dimensional collection of answers, it seems to cast its net too broadly.

Blake
PS: I have met immigrants who tell me that we (North America) definitely should not assume that scores lower than other countries on standardized tests are a sign of getting the bigger picture wrong. Instead they believe that the on the whole, the resources we don't invest in standardized tests get wisely invested in other important activities. That doesn't mean that keeping up with Miss Lohan's comings and goings is a good use of a student's time. It does mean that we have to be careful to not substitute a handy set of measurements (test scores) for wisdom or common sense.

Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

Before getting too upset, take a look at some data:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_Index

Out of about 200 countries, the US is in the top 20 thus top 10% relative to Education Index. Within that measurement though, there is less than 2.5% difference between #1 and #20. Use this as your general education metric, and it would tell you overall, not the best, but not that bad in the grand scheme of things.

http://www.timeshighereducation.co.u...1/top-200.html
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_perce...s_a_PHD_degree
These metrics will hopefully address some of the upper bound education concerns. With only 3% of US population, and 1% of the world having a PHD, It would be fair to say that it is a minority percentage of the population. It is also that same minority that more than likely puts a high value of higher education. Because of the high value, they will likely apply and try to get into the best schools they can get into. As you can see, US schools tend to take up a large portion of the top 200 Universities in the World, and thus will likely attract a lot of outside talent. This is good as many will stay here in the US (really smart motivated people are a good asset to have in your country).

I am not saying that the education system is perfect, just probably not "terrible" or "ridiculous".

If your goal would be to improve the Education Index, then you would be working on the reducing the 3.2% of illiterate, and you canhelp them learn to read. There are a lot of literacy programs you could volunteer with if you are interested. I would also investigate the policies of countries with higher rankings. What are they doing that is working better? Sometimes others are just better at fudging the numbers, but often there are actual things they are doing that get better returns.

If your goal would be for a higher percentage of PHDs, then you would need to talk to the folks that are getting masters degrees, but not continuing on to get PHDs and understand their motivations. I would be one of those folks. Drop me a line sometime (for a singular data point).

I appluad you for looking up the PHD % for foreign vs. domestic (assuming you looked this up somewhere and did not just repeat another figure-heads talking point), but I would caution you to temper that argument. If the goal was to improve that percentage rate, one of the simplest solutions would be to put a cap on the amount of foreign students allowed to get their doctorates in the US. This would likely reduce the number that stay here, reduce the research that they perform here, reduce the cultural diversity at the universities, and likely cause several other negative impacts.

If your goal is to get more folks to go into technical fields, or want to get a higher level of education, then you should assist and inspire young folks to get excited about what they can do with that education. Possibly get involved with a program that is founded on the principles For Inspriation and Recognition of Science and Technology. I have heard there is a Dean Kamen guy working on some sort of program that has gotten thousands of people excited about Tech stuff.

I really like the topic and some of the thoughtful statements and ideas it has brought up.

To see if you are part of the solution, or part of the problem, the test for that would be pretty simple:
Have you inspired others to do better/more? Or have you chased folks away?

Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

If anything the amount of PhDs is enourmously in favor of the US. I haven't checked your numbers but if we make up 45% of engineering PhDs and 55% of all PhDs we have way more PhDs per Capita than the res of the world, considering we make up less than 5% of the population.

Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

Take a little time to think about how briefly the vast majority of current North American family trees have existed, and ask yourself how this nation got to where it is today.

That might motivate you to either retract your rhetorical exclamation/question, or at least rephrase it (or not).

Blake

Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

Honestly I'm getting a little tired of the xenophobia in this thread. Why is it a bad thing that a lot of foreigners are coming to the US to study? Doesn't that mean that our educational system is then superior because of the amount of extra work these students are going through just to start learning? Not to mention overcoming language barriers.

It's also important to understand the benefit for everyone when we involve other cultures. When students work together with those who have a different way of looking at the world, both are able to grow their own interpretation of the world to include an understanding of how others think. Perspective is important, and this thread needs some.

Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

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Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

A college degree isn't everything. In my opinion we should be lowering the numbers of degrees obtained and upping the requirements while providing effective trades training for those with talent in areas besides "intellectual academics." Perhaps even bringing back the idea of craftsmen and artisans.

Additionally we could also mail a degree to everyone in the country. We'd be number one, but no one is any better for it. None of the fear mongering statistics hint at the actual problems in education, and no one is willing to actually change the system away from an industrialist method of running kids through the education factory.

Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

A degree means nothing; it is what the degree holder has learned that is important. Even more important is how he or she used it.

Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

So why are you yelling the sky is falling using that as a metric when you yourself admit that its a pointless metric?

Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

Now, I think the higher education in the US is pretty darn fantastic, but the lower education is highly lacking. Perhaps the whole standard for checking for competent education is set way too low. So every nation's education system can be messed up.

Re: How Can We Make American Students Smarter?
 

Demonstrably false, for better or worse.

The opportunities available to a person with a degree from a prestigious university, but not to someone with a "lesser" (or no) degree are substantial. Degrees are correlated with useful skills—while it's often possible to have those skills and no degree, the degree is a shorthand way of indicating to the world that, according to a particular institution, you have mastered those skills. Without the benefit of a degree system (or some other system performing an equivalent function), the process of finding talented people would be rather less efficient.

The consequence of this is of course that some skilled people, by virtue of not having a degree, are overlooked—and conversely, that some unskilled people who have degrees are promoted beyond their ability. This appears to be inequitable on an individual level, but it is pervasive. Interestingly, it might be closer to optimal on a societal level, because by simplifying the hiring (or similar) process, you can devote more resources to other productive things (even though some individuals suffer). It might even be said—though I'm definitely not willing to go that far myself—that it's roughly optimal on the individual level, because people more quickly find their station in life, without wasting time aspiring to overly lofty things.

In any event, don't dismiss the credential so easily.