There are some pretty interesting facts presented by the author. I was never aware that the US students as a whole have never ranked particularly well, but that the US has a large percentage of top tier students.
In particular:
This plot from the cited article in Nature has some interesting implications.
I’m going to disagree with the article. Innovation and economic growth isn’t the only goal of education. It’s certainly good that the US has a nice peak of high-achieving students, but there’s a slightly more intangible benefit to an informed populace. And that benefit is that when someone gets on their TV and tells them “Evolution Is 'Ridiculous – I Haven’t Seen A Half-Monkey, Half-Person Yet”](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/20/glenn-beck-joins-the-rank_n_770331.html), they’ll know that that person is horrendously, absurdly ignorant. And when a faceless politician says this, you know that that person is lying to you to promote their agenda, and realize that perhaps that person is not the best choice to represent you in government.
Nice article, fresh take on an interesting subject.
Since when can school classes teach people how to do that? In any case there are the same things going on in the cultures and politics of other nations, regardless of their education.
*Interesting perspective. The title is a bit misleading though: a person who has not read the article might presume that the author considers the wider societal effects of substandard education to be unimportant.
According to the article, South Korea ranks #1. They also have much more academic freedom to teach both sides of controversial issues in their schools.
In any case there are the same things going on in the cultures and politics of other nations, regardless of their education.