U.S. near the bottom on schooling/test scores

My parents did discipline me for doing badly in school, but I still did badly all through college. It didn't affect my career at all. I learned more out of school than in it.

 

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um could it be because americans are culturally taught to think of being smart as a bad thing.

 

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in what way?

 

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um really, you need to ask for examples? How bout in the past 2 presidential elections the dems were being said to be talking down to americans when they were using a higher level vocabulary.

 

I think that has more to do with people patronizing you, thinking that they are better than you. Smart equaling bad is very prevalent among blacks and Latinos because if your well educated you're white and a traitor to your own.

 

America has an excellent University system and the huge discrepancy is really seen there. When kids get to college their expected to perform at a certain level that high school did not prepare them for, so colleges have to reteach. Of course the more prestigious the college and the harder it is to get into (excluding some kids of rich parents) you won't find to many people who can't read or write well. When I first got into a prestigious University it was something I realized right away I was no longer the smartest kid in the class.

 

As I came from public schools of West Virginia, to a very selective, special, experimental, 5 year program* at Cornell I expected that would be the case. It was really driven home during an exam, which gave choice of doing any 2 of the 4 derivation and proof problems. I spent the first 10 minutes trying to decide which I might look the least bad on. Then Pete M. got up and turned his exam in! Later, as the professor apologized, we learned that one of the proof problems Pete had quickly aced by showing the professor was wrong! – (Pete gave a counter example where it was not true.) Another, which I did with complex logic of several pages, he did in a few lines on half a page.

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*It meet all the graduation requirements of Cornell's Engineering AND liberal arts colleges. After three or four years new students were no longer accepted into this program as it was too tough. Only half of my class made it thru - Most switched to an easier 4 year engineering program. One, not Pete, did the 5 year program in 4 years! I went from far ahead of all others, including some of my teachers, in high school to near the bottom of my small (~48 students) special Cornell group, but by working like two dogs, I was in the ~24 that made it thru.

 

That is so sad.

 

The public school system in the US, or really anywhere as far as I know, is of poor quality.

And the reason is the lack of competition, and the lack of teacher accountability; because they are "government employees", teachers are just given their post and that is that. They really can't be fired, and bad public schools do not close down.

Competition is what is needed; even in public schools, this is possible. Fire teachers with bad performance, close down schools with bad performance, and reward good performance. And then, of course, private schools.

 

i havent seen this. i can believe it but do you have examples?

 

It is what happens when the state doesn't allow individuals to pursue their self interest.

 

No, it's more a case of what happens when an individual pursues his self-interest in money that his own nation can't afford - we had the same in the UK in the 60s and 70s: US industry could pay more, so the skilled and qualified emigrated.

 

Yes; but the state plays quite a role in damping the market, so the state plays quite a role in the brain drain.

 

Wrong again: how did the state damp the market in the UK?

 

i dont see much evidence of this. the u.s has never had any large populations of british or australians. in fact the best imports from in the 60s and 70s were musicians. i need examples.

 

Why would they have LARGE populations?
It's the specialists that get hired for the highly technical industries.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_drain
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1579345/Biggest-brain-drain-from-UK-in-50-years.html

 

brain drain according to your link is:

"Brain drain or human capital flight is a large emigration of individuals with technical skills or knowledge"

the u.s is doing counties a favor by taking their people in but now there is no room left.

 

A favour?
No, they're outbidding local industries for specialists needed at home.
And the term "large" is relative.
If your country has 50 specialists in a subject and 40 Brits turn up for work next week could that not be considered "large"?
Or if we had 40 specialists and 35 emigrated...