Education reform urgently needed but ignored

Shane Wade
Opinion Editor

Not to disparage the incoming VCU freshmen, but I’m hoping some of them are from Minnesota.

That may sound like an odd thing to say, but after reading the latest report by the ACT organization, you’ll better understand my concern. According to that report, “Out of the 29 states in which at  least 40 percent of graduates took the ACT, only Minnesota had more than half of its students meet at least three college-readiness benchmarks.”

Because the aptitude benchmarks are based on college-level material, rather than a student’s intelligence or ability, doubts regarding the accuracy and reliability of standardizing testing can be dispelled. Data suggests that only one of the 29 states included in the report has a slight majority of its high school graduates meeting three of four college-readiness benchmarks.

This should alarm you.

The data either suggests that the ACT, and perhaps other forms of standardized testing, has unreasonable expectations concerning a high school student’s performance on college-level material. It’s either that or our educational institutes are doing an appallingly poor job of preparing students for college. Looking at other data – including a breakdown on how much money Americans spend on education, future job outlooks and our educational standing compared with other countries – it appears to be the latter.

Much like we do on health care, the U.S. spends an extraordinary amount of money on education but isn’t nearly as successful as other nations that spend a fraction of that.

According to a 2009 report by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development and the CIA’s World Factbook, we spend $7,743 per student but only rank 24th in math, 21st in science and 15th in literacy internationally. To put that into perspective, Finland, whose educational system is regarded as one of the best in the world, spends $5,653 per student and ranks first in math and science, bested in literacy solely by South Korea.

The truth is that our educational system is needlessly costly and massively inefficient, and very rarely have our politicians brought this much needed discussion to the national table. Instead they hold stagnant debates about fiscal policies and refuse to consider the impact of both their action and inaction on future generations.

Those who value education need to take action to counteract the many Washington legislators that are unwilling to recognize that a low-achieving, uneducated and unemployed youth populace will be the downfall of America.