NYT (Kristoff) Chinese Medicine for American Schools

[Aviation Pro]

Visitors to China are always astonished by the new highways and skyscrapers, and by the endless construction projects that make China's national bird the crane.

But the investments in China's modernization that are most impressive of all are in human capital. The blunt fact is that many young Chinese in cities like Shanghai or Beijing get a better elementary and high school education than Americans do. That's a reality that should embarrass us and stir us to seek lessons from China.

On this trip I brought with me a specialist on American third-grade education — my third-grade daughter. Together we sat in on third-grade classes in urban Shanghai and in a rural village near the Great Wall. In math, science and foreign languages, the Chinese students were far ahead.

http://select.nytimes.com/2006/06/27/opinion/27Kristof.html?pagewanted=print

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For about a decade I've been concerned about the rising tiger/dragon in the East. My first inkling that the Chinese were going to become a formidable competitor (with India coming in a close second) was when I saw that their "steering committee" was comprised of eight engineers. As soon as we toss the know-nothings out of power, our first initiative should be the absolute right to a first class education with a first class set of standards.

[Warpy]

1. The rich are ruining the country to make us stupid and docile

It's not going to work, you know. Some of us will still be curious enough to go out and get knowledge on our own, unsanctioned by those Texas approved, watered down, blandly noncontroversial school books.

It's just sad that the best public educational system in the world has been destroyed by people who didn't want to offend anyone and people who didn't want slow kids to feel slow.

[Aviation Pro]

2. Some members of the wealthy class are righteous....

...think Buffett, think Gates (think of the embarrassment they are causing the "I got mine, so eff you" crowd).

[Warpy]

3. Yes, and there are exceptions to every statistical rule

but what have either of those men actually done about watered down texts, underpaid teachers, decaying buildings, or any of the other indicators of just how much pride we take in our educational system?

Remember, those computers Gates has donated will all run on Windows.