Ask any American and they’ll tell you educating young people is extremely important. So why is our current educational system failing in so many respects? People have pointed to a number of causes, but two reasons that most people fail to consider are the importance we place on teaching, and our inability to let children fail.
Many people would argue that budget cuts and drops in per— student spending are making our education system fail, but a recent report released by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development challenges this idea. According to the report, the United States spent over $11,000 per elementary student and over $12,000 per high school student in 2010 alone, which is a larger amount than most other countries spend.
With all of that spending per student however, our students still underperform when compared with other developed countries. The 2009 Program for International Student Assessment report from the National Center on Education and Economy  reported that education achievement in the U.S. had fallen to the middle of the developed nations. The report ranked 15-year-olds in 70 countries, and the U.S. ranked 14th in reading, 17th in science and 25th in math.
Another NCEE report, “Standing on the Shoulders of Giants: An American Agenda for Education Reform,” claims the best way for the U.S. to improve its educational system would be to take the best ideas from each country, implement them and then improve upon them. That is the way the U.S. has done almost everything, so why not do this with education as well?
One thing the United States needs to adopt from other countries is their approach to teaching as a profession. The overused saying in the U.S. is “those who can’t do, teach,” and this mindset permeates the opinions of many Americans and hinders the education of our children.
In Finland, for example, teaching is an extremely respected and prestigious profession, so teachers are driven because it is the equivalent of being something like a lawyer here in the U.S.. According to the NCEE, only one out of every 10 students that apply to teaching programs in Finland are admitted, making it very selective. The NCEE also says the teachers in Finland have a lot of control over their classrooms and lesson plans. This allows for better programs and happier teachers.
If the U.S. were to adopt a similar approach to training, hiring and working with teachers, our teachers would be better equipped to teach our children in the way that works best for both teacher and the student.
The other thing that would help fix the education system in the U.S. would be allowing children to fail. In many aspects of life, our children are not allowed to fail. Many sports teams do not keep score, and few children are “held back” if their performance is inadequate. While this attitude may seem like a way to protect and encourage children, it actually hinders their success. C.S. Lewis said it best: “Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement.”
If we don’t allow our children to be held back, then they will not achieve later in life. A child who is struggling with fourth grade concepts will only continue to struggle with more complex concepts if moved on. The child will then struggle throughout the rest of their academic career and potentially drop out or obtain only a high school degree because they feel they are “stupid.”
Allowing our children to be held back and placing teaching on a higher pedestal will give our children every chance of success in this life. These two things alone would improve — if not entirely fix — our educational system here in the United States.