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New Education Performance Data Published: Asia Dominates

Posted by Soulskill on from the we're-too-busy-eating-cheeseburgers-to-do-math dept.

jones_supa writes "The latest PISA (Programme for International Assessment) results are out today. Since 2000, the OECD has attempted to evaluate the knowledge and skills of 15-year olds across the world through its PISA test. More than 510,000 students in 65 economies took part in the latest test, which covered math, reading and science, with the main focus on math — which the OECD state is a 'strong predictor of participation in post-secondary education and future success.' Asian countries outperform the rest of the world, according to the OECD, with Shanghai, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, Macau and Japan amongst the top performing countries and economies. Students in Shanghai performed so well in math that the OECD report compares their scoring to the equivalent of nearly three years of schooling above most OECD countries. The study shows also a slight gender cap: in all countries, boys generally perform a bit better than girls, but this applies only to math." Here's a spreadsheet listing each country's results. The U.S. ranked 26th in math (below average), 17th in reading (slightly above average), and 21st in science (slightly below average).

56 of 263 comments (clear)

  1. USA by coinreturn · · Score: 4, Funny

    USA is 36-24-28. Sounds about right - top-heavy.

    1. Re:USA by AioKits · · Score: 4, Funny

      Only if she's 5'3".

      --
      "Quote me as saying I was mis-quoted." -Groucho Marx
    2. Re:USA by lagomorpha2 · · Score: 2

      According to the article they WERE testing 15 year olds.

  2. Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    As Slate pointed out this morning (), the way that this study mixes data from individual urban areas with data from whole countries makes it impossible to perform fair comparisons. Note that 4 out of the 7 asian "countries" that the Slashdot summary refers to (Shanghai, Singapore, Hong Kong, Macau) are either city-states or aren't even countries at all!

    Comparing non-countries (or city-states) with countries biases the results by comparing poorer, less educated rural areas with better educated cities.

    1. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Forgot the URL: http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_world_/2013/12/03/we_need_to_stop_letting_china_cheat_on_international_education_rankings.html

    2. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Maybe the conclusion is flawed (if not all regions are included in the comparison, such as mainland china, maybe asia isn't doing so well) but of course you can compare a city with a rural area, why shouldn't you? If the average american child are worse at math than the average singaporian, of course Singapore deserves a higher ranking, why shouldn't it?

    3. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by rahvin112 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I personally reject the assertion that math scores predict future success (there might be a small relationship in certain nations, but not worldwide), I also reject that cultural bias is being neglected.

      I've met plenty of engineers from cultures where questioning and innovation are highly discouraged and they couldn't innovate their way out of a paper bag. Great at the book learning and can duplicate the solution to any problem they've seen but handling real world problems where the constraints don't match the book? They don't even reach the level of western high school students even when compared against PHD's. There is a real cultural bias, and ultimately that bias is going to handicap the advancement of every culture it infects.

    4. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by Sique · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Comparing non-countries (or city-states) with countries biases the results by comparing poorer, less educated rural areas with better educated cities.

      And this is bad exactly why?

      If it's true that in the U.S., the rural areas lack education and are less wealthy, when compared with urban areas, then it's a fact studies like this are pointing out. It's not that the results are biased. They just reflect reality. Obviously the U.S. misses a strategy to bring enough education to rural areas and less wealthy people.

      --
      .sig: Sique *sigh*
    5. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I'm not sure what you're referring to, but around here in Europe, city centers tend to be expensive, prestigious, and very well equipped with top schools. It's probably the poor suburbians who fare worse.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    6. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Informative

      in Europe, city centers tend to be expensive, prestigious, and very well equipped with top schools. It's probably the poor suburbians who fare worse.

      In America it is exactly the opposite.

      I lived in Shanghai for several years, and my kids attended school there. In American math class they say "show your work". In Chinese math classes they say "do it in your head". Chinese kids have to stand with their hands behind their backs, looking at a list of integers on the whiteboard, and add them up in their head. They do the same with subtraction, multiplication, and division. They drill until they get good at it. As an American, I never learned to do that. So when I need a list of numbers added, I just ask my Chinese educated daughter to do it. That is usually quicker than looking for a calculator.

    7. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by AthanasiusKircher · · Score: 2

      Comparing non-countries (or city-states) with countries biases the results by comparing poorer, less educated rural areas with better educated cities.

      And this is bad exactly why?

      Because rankings can easily get messed up if there's some sort of confounding variable or factor. If education is generally poorer in rural areas worldwide (which is roughly true), then this ranking system may partially be measuring percentage of urban areas within a given country, rather than a meaningful comparison of educational performance.

      Of course, it's probably more than that, but rigorous statistical comparisons need to take demographics into account to assert causality.

      It's not that the results are biased. They just reflect reality. Obviously the U.S. misses a strategy to bring enough education to rural areas and less wealthy people.

      No one's saying that the U.S. shouldn't invest more in rural education. But it is important to note when doing statistical rankings that countries that are 100% urban may get a "bonus" in the rankings simply for infrastructure reasons in cities, rather than overall quality of education in the entire region. There are plenty of rural regions in Asia where education is probably just as bad as it is in rural areas of the U.S.

      It's not that the comparisons are completely invalid, but one can draw incorrect conclusions by misreading the data. If the lesson you take away is that the U.S. can invest more in rural education, since urban countries do better, that's a reasonable conclusion. But if you instead look at this study and said, "Gee whiz, the U.S. can't teach its kids anything, anywhere compared to Asia! The U.S. educational system as a whole must be flawed!"... well, that conclusion might be unjustified until you take into account demographic data.

    8. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Informative

      The study is flawed because it takes into account the same crappy tests that utterly fail to test for any sort of understanding of the material. This is not "education," unless you consider pure rote memorization to be education.

      Baloney. Have you even looked at the test? Here are some example questions. The questions involve a lot more than "rote memorization".

    9. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by boristhespider · · Score: 2

      Further to that,

      Liechtenstein (8th): 35,000
      Switzerland (9th): 8m
      Estonia (11th): 1.3m
      Finland (12th): 5.4m

      Liechtenstein would be debatable to people who seem to think city states can't be nations, but I'm sure no-one would argue that Switzerland, Estonia and Finland aren't nations. Nations with fairly extensive rural and urban areas, too. Switzerland is roughly requivalent to Hong Kong and Estonia and Finland are rather smaller.

    10. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by boristhespider · · Score: 4, Informative

      This is a totally fair point, so let's remove the Chinese cities and leave only genuinely independent states. City states count as independent states. Then we end up with

      Singapore
      Taiwan
      South Korea
      Japan
      Liechtenstein
      Switzerland
      Netherlands
      Estonia
      Finland
      Canada

      If our pride is still hurt, and I note that Britain, Germany and Norway aren't on the list yet so mine certainly is, we can go further and decide that we won't count city states either (though that's a step that isn't really very well justified at all.) Then we're left with

      Taiwan
      South Korea
      Japan
      Switzerland
      Netherlands
      Estonia
      Finland
      Canada
      Poland
      Belgium

      Alas, I'd have to find another reason to cut out a state before Germany finally popped into the top ten, and I'd have to cut out every single one of these somehow before the UK even came in at number 10. We'd have to lose all those *again* before the USA finally appears in the list.

      The thing that gets me about people's responses to these lists is the air of hurt nationalism. It seems people will say "shitty inner-city areas in the USA are dragging down the average". That's totally true. But the USA is coming in below Slovakia, which has shitty inner-city areas, and Russia, which these days is very little *but* shitty inner-city areas once you're outside of Petersburg and Moscow. Most (indeed all) the European nations have some horrible shitty inner-city areas, too. Unfortunately for humanity, the USA does not hold a monopoly on shitty inner-city schools bringing down the averages.

      The other point is that these tests are indicative, and not much more than that, and in nations with the populations of France, the UK and particularly the USA, you don't *need* an extremely highly-educated workforce to be more than able to keep an edge and keep ahead. You only need enough to fill positions needing high education and high skill, and otherwise people who may not do so well in these tests are more than capable enough to fill in the gaps. (Or, come to that, learn on the job anyway.) So the USA can still more than fill its various three-letter agencies and its universities and its technology firms, as can the UK, as can France. A nation like Liechtenstein, with its 35,000 inhabitants, is less likely to be able to rely on the long tail to do that.

      None of this should be taken as an argument for complacence - Lord knows I'd like our education system(s) dramatically improved - but I don't think being "mid-table" (as the UK, the USA and France all are) is a cause for any new concern.

    11. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by St.Creed · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I'm going to quote the reply from ShanghaiBill to a similar comment in the thread above this one:

      Baloney. Have you even looked at the test? Here are some example questions http://www.theguardian.com/education/2013/dec/03/are-you-smarter-than-a-15-year-old-oecd-pisa-questions [the guardian]. The questions involve a lot more than "rote memorization".

      Unless you think solving logical puzzles and doing calculations is just "rote memorization". Because that would mean that all of science is based on that, which would also indicate that they're on to something there if they go for that as well.

      As an aside: rote memorization is an important part of learning anyway, since if you don't *know* when stuff happened, or what the base formulas are for something that took us 2000 years to develop, you're not going to just deduce them from the basics when you need them. You're not even going to know what you don't know. So the basis of learning is knowing what there is - then applying that with skill, intelligence and creativity.

      My in-laws are Chinese. And while their educational system is still geared towards suppressing deviating opinions, right up into university, their students are quite able to keep up with Western students when they come over here to study (we met quite a few over the last years). Here, they find the hard part is not the knowledge - they can learn - but the "intelligent application of learned skills". Once they learn that as well (it's a thing you can learn), they still have the advantage of a huge pool of knowledge they can draw from, as well as the creative bits. And since these students are slowly replacing the teachers in China as well, you can bet the Chinese system will change as well. The Dragon is still just gearing up...

      --
      Therefore, by the (faulty) logic you're using, you're just a cow with a keyboard - osu-neko (2604)
    12. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by NickGnome · · Score: 2
      "No one's saying that the U.S. shouldn't invest more in rural education."
      ...

      I hereby am saying the USA should not expect spending more on education -- whether rural, suburban, city or slum -- to necessarily improve academic results. We already spend horrendous sums in some of the under-performing neighborhoods.

      What works is when the locals value academic achievement, when these individuals and family heads see some pay-back coming to "their people" whom they know well. When the school admins, teachers, students and parents place a high priority on academic achievement, when they see that it is possible and that it pays -- both personally and generally -- higher academic achievement results.

      In big parts of the USA, UK, and Europe that link between effort, academic achievement and proportional rewards, meritocracy on that basis, has been broken and people won't invest more effort when they see other accessible options.

    13. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

      As an American, you were probably allowed only into the better schools.

      I lived in Gubei, which is a nice neighborhood in Puxi (western Shanghai), so the school was probably above average. It was the official public school for our area. There was nothing fancy about it. There was no heat or AC. Shanghai is hot and humid in the summer, and often below freezing in the winter. The kids use gloves with the fingertips removed, so they can keep their hands warm but still write. I have nieces and nephews in other parts of China, and while the facilities vary, the discipline and high expectations do not.

    14. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by Roger+W+Moore · · Score: 2

      I've met plenty of engineers from cultures where questioning and innovation are highly discouraged and they couldn't innovate their way out of a paper bag.

      True and I believe that is why this discrepancy in knowledge has not had any real, noticeable impact yet because at university you have to question if you are going to learn anything. However this is not a static picture - standards in the west are dropping and at some point all the innovation in the world is not going to help us because our kids won't have enough background to be able to ask interesting questions or, to use your analogy, they will find the inside of the paper bag so new and exciting because they have not seen one before that they won't know why anyone would want to innovate their way out of it.

    15. Re:Study is flawed -- compares cities to countries by N1AK · · Score: 2

      The amount of people who dismiss these tests who have absolutely no idea what they are testing, the methods etc really is quite incredible. I actually find it quite comforting that in the UK our coverage of the results has largely been acceptance of the fact our relative performance has fallen and some soul searching about how we deal with that; do we learn from Germany and Poland and how they reform or from places like South Korea with amazing results but extremely unhappy children.

      Countries that dismiss the tests (seemingly a more common response in America) can stick there heads in the sand but the problem won't go away. If they don't make improvements now then they will pay the price 10+ years from now when the kids leaving school can't get into top jobs, universities etc because graduates from other countries that have improved outclass them.

  3. Teach to the test by TheCastro1689 · · Score: 2

    If countries want to score better they should teach to the test like the top countries usually do.

    1. Re:Teach to the test by TWiTfan · · Score: 3, Interesting

      No, you just find clever ways to eliminate all the poor people from your numbers--like defining Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Macau as separate countries so you don't have to count all the illiterate poor people out in the Chinese countryside.

      --
      The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
    2. Re:Teach to the test by Korveck · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Based on my personal experience, students in those top ranking Asia Pacific area are taught at a faster pace and exposed to far more challenging questions in school. When I moved to Canada from Hong Kong, I didn't have to study Math for a year and a half because I learned almost everything already. The Asian students have far more homework. The more anxious parents send their kids to tutors, not necessarily because they are falling behind, but also to get ahead of the class. They don't need to "teach to the test" at all to get far better score. They simply know more and face difficult questions on a regular basis.

  4. Is this any real surprise? by bazmail · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Students nowadays cannot be punished for any misbehavior or disruption, its all illegal. Its common sense that standards are in the toilet. Students who succeed in the US now are succeeding despite our system, not because of it.

    1. Re:Is this any real surprise? by mlts · · Score: 2

      I'm not surprised. At first, I saw people home-schooling, and it was just the RW types. However, I'm seeing the same thing on the left as well, where parents are just getting tired of a broken education system.

      How to fix? I have thought of vouchers as an idea, but my fear that it would trade failed public schools for failed schools owned by a private corporation. A national school system would not fly because of the history of state/local autonomy. Bashing unions are not going to help much, as non-union schools have as many problems as ones with teacher unions.

      Probably the best way is from the ground up... get homeschooling parents to trade off, and form the old "one room schoolhouse" of yore.

    2. Re:Is this any real surprise? by ebno-10db · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I have thought of vouchers as an idea, but my fear that it would trade failed public schools for failed schools owned by a private corporation.

      Why? First, they needn't be owned by for-profit corporations. Traditionally private schools are not. I'd be happy with banning the use of the school vouchers for for-profit schools (if nothing else, the fireworks would be entertaining!). With vouchers you'd have a choice, and schools would have to compete with each other. I'm not a market fundamentalist, or even RW, but I am an empiricist. School vouchers are very popular and successful in an extreme right-wing bastion called Sweden.

      Probably the best way is from the ground up... get homeschooling parents to trade off, and form the old "one room schoolhouse" of yore.

      What makes you think they aren't? My neighbors are home schooling their daughter. Admittedly she's only in the first grade, but amongst other things kids go to some classes that are taught by various parents. BTW, politically they lean to the left a bit (mom's even a vegetarian!).

    3. Re:Is this any real surprise? by the+eric+conspiracy · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I agree - unions have nothing to do with it.

      Finland, for example has an excellent education system. Their teachers are fully unionized. Likewise Massachusetts.

      The US states that don't have unionized teachers are also the states that do the worst on measures of education.

    4. Re:Is this any real surprise? by ebno-10db · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You should put a warning on a comment like that. A sufficiently high level of cognitive dissonance has been known to make heads explode.

  5. At What Cost by EMG+at+MU · · Score: 3, Interesting

    South Korea has the highest suicide rate of any developed nation.

    Japan is on track to experience negative population growth.

    What do all these wonderfully educated youth have to look forward to besides leaving their native country to go find somewhere they can actually live

    1. Re:At What Cost by EMG+at+MU · · Score: 2

      Most people consider Japan's population growth to be an issue compromising their economic future. There is a fear that there will not be enough young workers to pay into the social safety net programs for the old. The growth problems are usually attributed to the pressures of Japanese society. There is a lot of pressure to study, get into a good school, study, get into a good university, study, and then get a good job then work your ass off. Where is there time to develop relationships and social skills? I have heard Japanese people say "There isn't time to have a relationship with someone from the opposite sex, we are working too much."

      Lots of studying seems to pay off in terms of excellent test scores. Does it encourage personal happiness? What are the unintended effects of emphasizing academic performance so much?

    2. Re:At What Cost by fiannaFailMan · · Score: 3, Funny

      They're not teaching them the joy of sex.

      --
      Drill baby drill - on Mars
  6. New country - does China know? by unixisc · · Score: 5, Funny

    From the people who yesterday gave us that Gothenburg is the capital of Sweden, now comes the news that Shanghai is a country.

    I'm sure the PLA will be thrilled to know this, and can pull out troops in Tibet, or near the Taiwan Straits, and redirect them towards Shanghai!

    Can PISA do an assessment test on /. editors & their geography?

  7. Re:Asia Vs. America by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    In America, you teach that Intelligent Design is valid science.

    In America, belief and opinion is weighed equal to facts and evidence.

    That, in a nutshell, is what it wrong with the US educational system -- it has become a tool of drooling idiots who pass rules about things they don't even remotely understand, and act like their religion actually defines reality.

    In some ways, and in some places, America is little better than the Taliban ever was. You just change the specifics of the religion, but the results are the same.

  8. Massachusetts by the+eric+conspiracy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Results among the states varies a lot. For example Massachusetts is fully competitive with the Asian countries. On the TIMSS exam (generally thought to be more difficult than the PISA test) Massachusetts finished sixth in the world in mathematics, and second in the sciences for it's 8th grade students.

    High levels of achievement ARE attainable in the US. It isn't a matter of cultural problems, or the society we live in. It's a matter of politicians and parents adopting the attitude that it can be done, and sticking to that idea. Effective reform though is not something that can be done overnight. Massachusetts has been at it for 20 years.

    http://boston.com/community/blogs/rock_the_schoolhouse/2012/12/massachusetts_aces_internation.html

    Massachusetts has shown how to do it. Now all it takes is realization of what can be done and applying it elsewhere.

    1. Re:Massachusetts by jandrese · · Score: 2

      It helps when a lot of the parents are MIT grads and engineers as well. There is a cycle of ignorance where parents who are uneducated tend to have children who are uninterested in education. These kids end up squandering their school years and then have their own kids, who perpetuate the cycle.

      I grew up in West Virginia, in a not particularly wealthy or prestigious part of the state. However, we did have a lot of local chemical plants, and thus lots of chemical engineers. When these sorts of tests came around, our local school districts would totally blow the curve for the state because of the local concentration of motivated kids from stable families. Only the elite prep schools tested higher, and then mostly because they were free to reject poorer performing kids. Incidentally, this is also why voucher programs are so pernicious, they suck all of the engaged students out of the system and leave the public schools with nothing but the dregs, causing them to fail and convincing lawmakers that they need to pursue more voucher programs.

      --

      I read the internet for the articles.
  9. Re:Asia Vs. America by phantomfive · · Score: 3, Interesting

    In America they are teaching kids (and their parents) that the American educational system sucks. This helps keep up the funding for the educational-industrial-congressional complex.

    That's an interesting thought. If you tell people that their education system is bad, it may turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy, where the students fail to learn only because they've been told they will fail to learn.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  10. Re:Asia Vs. America by ebno-10db · · Score: 2

    Much as I agree with you, that only affects the science part of the test (and then only the biology part). It has nothing to do with reading and math. I've never heard a fundamentalist preacher say that calculus is evil.

  11. Re:Asia Vs. America by phantomfive · · Score: 2

    Either way, the end problem is that people in America view education as a propaganda system, rather than an education system, right?

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  12. Re:What country is Shanghai? by fiannaFailMan · · Score: 3, Funny

    Students in Shanghai performed so well in math that the OECD report compares their scoring to the equivalent of nearly three years of schooling above most OECD countries.

    Not sure about math, reading and science, but clearly my geography is bad. I had no idea Shanghai was a country.

    Your reading doesn't seem to be up to much either. Nowhere in that sentence does it even imply that Shanghai is a country.

    --
    Drill baby drill - on Mars
  13. Cannot compare a city to a country by Andover+Chick · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You cannot pick-and-choose cities like Shanghai, Hong Kong or Singapore the put them against an entire country like USA. That is categorically absurd and looks the the results are being rigged to make a point instead of statistical validity. Instead compare Shanghai to say Boston.

    1. Re:Cannot compare a city to a country by kamapuaa · · Score: 3, Informative

      More than that, Shanghai's hukou system ensures that the children of poor residents from other parts of China aren't even a part of the Shanghai school system. It's more than half the population, and probably more than that by children (poor people and ethnic minorities either aren't subject to, or ignore, the single-child rule). So this is comparing the wealthiest portion of a single city, the city with the best school system in China, to the population of the US as a whole.

      --
      Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
  14. Take the test yourself by Guillermito · · Score: 5, Informative

    Here

    http://www.oecd.org/pisa/test/

    You can take a sample test yourself. See how basic the questions are and feel appalled to see the % of students in your country that managed to pass each level.

    For example, only 11% of students in my country (Argentina) were able to reach level 3 (identify the smallest value in a table). Highest rank for that question was Shanghai-China (89%). USA was 48%.

    1. Re:Take the test yourself by lagomorpha2 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      (identify the smallest value in a table). Highest rank for that question was Shanghai-China (89%). USA was 48%.

      Thanks, before I was just disappointed with America, now I'm disappointed in the world!

    2. Re:Take the test yourself by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      As someone who took this test (I believe, if not this exact one it was very similar) when I was in school, I can guarantee you people did. Once we were told it didn't have any impact on our grade, people just started marking down answers and either spent zero time thinking about it or specifically chose the wrong ones just to be defiant.

      Believe it or not, teenagers by and large don't care how statistically valid someone's survey is when they feel like it has no impact on them.

  15. Re:Asia Vs. America by serviscope_minor · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In some ways, and in some places, America is little better than the Taliban ever was.

    Yep, because the Supreme Court will stone you to death if you try to teach the truth rather than creationism.

    --
    SJW n. One who posts facts.
  16. Missing in action. by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 5, Funny
    I did what every Indian (or Indian American) does. First see where India is ranked. Then where Pakistan is. Laugh at Pakistan when it is beaten. If either or both are missing bemoan the loss of another opportunity to laugh at Pakistan. (What if Pakistan wins, you ask? bah! that never happens )

    Well, whole of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan ... Looks like the entire subcontinent is missing. China has a few urban centers represented. Africa is gone. So it falls into the bemoan the ... category.

    --
    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
  17. Re:Asia Vs. America by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    In America, you teach that Intelligent Design is valid science.

    In America, belief and opinion is weighed equal to facts and evidence.

    No. Only in a few small isolated areas, and Texas, and on Fox news. Not in the vast majority of the country.

    That, in a nutshell, is what it wrong with the US educational system -- it has become a tool of drooling idiots who pass rules about things they don't even remotely understand, and act like their religion actually defines reality.

    In some ways, and in some places, America is little better than the Taliban ever was. You just change the specifics of the religion, but the results are the same.

    Yes, because in America we typically leave school board meetings over science policy, and go to the homes of our opponents and murder them. I really don't think you understand anything about the Taliban. Your level of ignorance is actually physically painful. Yes there are problems with people misunderstanding science and religion and trying to combine them. Overall you don't seem to understand the problem any better than they do, and are just as far from helping to solve it.

  18. Re:What country is Shanghai? by oodaloop · · Score: 2

    Good thing you didn't selectively quote, like leaving off 'and economies' from the end. That might have made you look stupid.

    --
    Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
  19. Re:What country is Shanghai? by oodaloop · · Score: 2

    Read it again for yourself. It says 'countries and economies' but the post you quoted left off 'and economies'. We know how to read just fine. You need some work.

    --
    Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
  20. Gender gaps by Samantha+Wright · · Score: 4, Informative

    TFS: "The study shows also a slight gender cap: in all countries, boys generally perform a bit better than girls, but this applies only to math."

    PISA 2012 Overview: "Boys perform better than girls in mathematics in only 37 out of the 65 countries and economies that participated in PISA 2012, and girls outperform boys in five countries." (For the curious, they're Jordan, Qatar, Thailand, Malaysia and Iceland.)

    The Guardian article didn't get this wrong. What the hell, submitter?

    --
    Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
  21. Re:What country is Shanghai? by oodaloop · · Score: 2

    Wow, reading fail again. I never said, nor implied that. I merely stated that the fantastic summary never said that Shanghai was a country.

    I would agree that comparing a city to a country is unfair, but that's not what this conversation started off as.

    --
    Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
  22. Re:Asia Vs. America by rs1n · · Score: 2

    You're right -- but instead of preachers, we have a large number of Americans who proudly wear their mathematical ignorance as a badge of honor.

  23. Re:Former ESL teacher in Shanghai... by the+eric+conspiracy · · Score: 2

    Watch out. The US is losing ground in areas like scientific papers.

    http://www.theguardian.com/science/2011/mar/28/china-us-publisher-scientific-papers

    In fact China may surpass the US this year.

  24. Re:That's great! by unixisc · · Score: 2

    Education just makes poverty more expensive, since there are no guarantees that it will land you a job. Just ask the gazillions of people who post describing their degrees & experience, and how they are turned down for jobs they're perfectly qualified for, since they are pricier as well. Yeah, primary education is certainly valueable, but beyond a point, those degrees - be it a Bachelors or an MBA - hardly do much, other than sink one financially

  25. Re:Asia Vs. America by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 2

    we have a large number of Americans who proudly wear their mathematical ignorance as a badge of honor.

    And we have at least an equally large number who proudly wear their illiteracy as a badge of honor.

    Many here on /.

    How many people don't know the difference between loose/lose, there/they're/their, wait/weight (no, this one's not from /., saw it elsewhere on the web this AM), etc.?

    --

    "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
  26. Perspective from a Chinese American by Taco+Cowboy · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I was from China, and I am a naturalized citizen of the United States of America.

    Regarding education - back when I escaped from China (that was some 40 odd years ago) the schools in East Asia (countries which were/are heavily influenced by the Confucianism school of thought such as China, Korea, Japan, Singapore ) were pretty much based on the top-down rote-learning mode - whereby the students have no say, and they must do EVERYTHING their teachers told them to do.

    It operated that way because the basic tenet of the Confucianism teaching is that the young uns are SLAVES to their elders (it's pretty much based on the blind obedience mode).

    When I reached the West I was totally astounded when my classmate actually questioned the teachers !

    That was a super NO-NO in Asia.

    Back then, even if the student asked a totally legitimate question to the teacher in class that student will be summoned to the headmaster and/or discipline master's office for punishment.

    That was how the Asian school had operated back then.

    Now ... except for Korea, which is still practicing strict Confucianism as what it has been doing for the past 2,000 years ... many schools in the East Asian countries (those populated by yellow-skin folks) have drastically improved their teaching method.

    Nowadays students are encouraged to solve problems, rather than to remember the facts laid out by their teachers.

    From Singapore to Tokyo to Hong Kong to Taiwan, everywhere I go I see great improvements.

    As for the other East Asian countries, those which are being populated by the brown skin folks such as Indonesia or the Philippines or Thailand, their schools are still as sucks as 50 years ago.

    I see that there are people here trying to justify their own country's failing by saying that the "comparison is not fair", that the comparison is comparing "cities to countries".

    For those folks, what I see is nothing much but sour grapes.

    Yes, comparing schools in Hong Kong or Singapore to schools in the United States of America is comparing schools in CITIES to a LARGE COUNTRY --- but so what ?

    If the schools in the United States of America sux, it's STILL SUX, no matter if it's in the city of Detroit or if it's in the city of Little Rock.

    How many of my fellow Americans have been to the public schools ? How many of you have seen the effect of gangsterism in the public schools in America ?

    I have.

    I have 2 friends who were teachers in public schools in America who were MURDERED by their students.

    On the other hand, I have a lot of friends who teach in schools in Asia, and so far, none of them have been killed by their students yet.

    When I asked my teacher friends in Asia about a recent news of a math teacher in Boston who got her throat slit by her student. all of them were horrified by that news.

    But when I post that same news to my friends who used to teach (and some are STILL teaching) in American public schools, they just shrug.

    This reflects how bad the American school system has become.

    You guys may want to deny it as much as you can, but for one who was from afar (I am not a product of the American high school system), the American school system has failed.

    --
    Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
  27. Re:What country is Shanghai? by ebno-10db · · Score: 2

    Perhaps you meant sarcasm

    Perhaps you don't understand that irony is the device most commonly used in sarcasm, and that they're not entirely separate concepts. The distinction is a matter of tone, with sarcasm being very sharp or bitter. Hence the OP is not sarcastic. Despite being a product of the American public schools that are being so sharply criticized here, I learned such advanced literary and rhetorical concepts in an advanced setting call the 8th grade. Now that's sarcasm. See the difference?