Education

Again, I'm struck and intrigued by an article and want to share it with the world (or, the few of you who found my blog). NYTime's Tom Friedman wrote an op-ed piece, "Steal This Movie, Too", which discusses the issues behind the American education system as will be revealed through the upcoming documentary Waiting for Superman.

The United States has long been seen as the super power of the world, right? While I was in China, many of the Chinese people I interacted with still thought of America as the perfect place. But, why is our public education system not helping students? China, too, has problems with their education system because their children are merely test-taking masters; however, during a discussion of school systems, I told the teacher that America is also in need of reform. Then she shot back, "then why are there more nobel prize winners in America than in China?"

China's trying to model its education system to the American system where kids can do creative projects and be more like kids. You know which Chinese-speaking places are doing things right, though, is Taiwan and Hong Kong. Both countries score high in reading, math, and science.

I was very fortunate to have been part of a decent public school. California's not the type of place that has too many private schools like in the East Coast, so, at least in the suburbs, public schools can be worthy. (Although, it may be thanks to the massive amount of Asian kids we have here, too.)

Everyone should be able to get a decent education through a public school system. Teachers should be more valued because they're supposed to be enlightening and guiding the future generation to greatness!

In any case, it would be lovely if we could focus more on the education system and improve the quality of education for our students, lest the US wants to (continue to) be the laughing stock of the developed world.