Students From Blair International Baccalaureate H.S. in Pasadena with Beijing 181 students in a cultural exchange. Pasadena, CA January, 2008The talk of U.S. exceptionalism is waning in the early hours of the 21st Century. Certain political stripes hold onto it dearly, the neo-cons launched two wars to defend it, but for most the sobering acknowledgement of a more competitive post-colonial, post-Cold War world are here. A G-8 dominated by the U.S. has been enlarged to a G-20 of more independently minded nation states. The backdrop to this story is that the world’s fastest growing developing economies, the BRIC nations of Brazil, Russia, India and China are set to overtake the developed areas of the world (U.S., E.U. and Japan) by 2050.
GDP and profitability of Bric countries will overtake developed areas by 2050
Long-term GDP forecasts for Bric countries show that tomorrow's giants, China and India, seem set to take first and third place on a GDP basis by 2050 (with the US in second place), shifting the centre of gravity of the global economy.
The reaction from the front pages of the New York Times is a renewed emphasis on education reform. The results from Shanghai’s latest PISA exam, the Program for International Student Assessment, are intimidating for a nation like ours, which is struggling to engage its young people in formal education. Arne Duncan is calling it a “wake up call”, and other former government officials refer to this as a Sputnik moment.
The knowledge that our educational system is being outperformed in comparison to other developed economies is well known. Thomas Friedman in his Flat Earth rants is calling for a Teach For America West Point academy to train the best and the brightest to teach in our nation’s schools. He is echoing the refrain from the new generation of education reformers that since the early 1990’s have pushed for data driven reforms, teacher accountability, and school choice.
The challenge to educate all of America’s children to high standards is important enough to be the one of the few issues in contemporary politics that crosses political lines. Although it is anathema to ideologies from either side, Obama Democrats and a new breed of mayors are joining with hedge fund managers and Republican governors to embrace the market and implement innovation in an industry that has been resistant to change. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberger’s $100 million parachute of aid to the city of Newark is the most recent public example. Democrats for Education Reform and The Manhattan Institute are on the same side.
"Rather than expecting new funding from Washington or from the cash-strapped state government, Booker has turned to private foundations and charities for help in enacting his agenda." Steven Malanga, The Next Wave of Urban Reform: Mayors Cory Booker and Dave Bing fight to Save two of America’s Most Distressing Cities, City Journal
For the progressive educators who have worked tirelessly to make a bad system more humane, those committed to the Civil Rights agenda of making public education a true source of social mobility, pace of privatization in the system is scary. Stan Karp, from Rethinking Schools, sees the rush to fund unproven and un-scaleable innovations as dangerous to the public good. They have created an entire website to dispel the myths of the Michelle Rhee, Harlem Children Zone, and the No Excuse for Poverty model.
“The larger goal is to “burst the dam” that has historically protected public education and its $600 billion annual expenditures from unchecked commercial exploitation and privatization.” Stan Karp, Superhero School Reform Heading Your Way, November 29th, 2010
"There’s a backlash against the rich taking on school reform as a cause. Some liberals figure they must have an angle and are scapegoating teachers. But most of the wealthy people underwriting this long-delayed social movement for better performance are on the right track. Like the rest of us, they know that if we don’t fix education, we can kiss our future goodbye." Jonathan Alter, A Case of Senioritis, Newsweek, November 28th, 2010
The battle over education reform is big business! The Unions are big, the Gates Foundation is big, Rupert Murdock is big, but our children’s future is bigger! Fighting to hold onto the industrial model of education that has served our nation’s children so poorly does not make sense to me. Embracing innovation and redesigning the role of the educator and the learner for 21st Century learning is paramount.
We need to be careful to have a real conversation about what this change is going to be and who is going to drive it. Private foundations are pushing the agenda, but who are they accountable to? Data driven reform is reshaping how we teach, but what are these exams really assessing? In the end, can we beat China at their own game?
A 259-page Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development report on the latest Pisa results notes that throughout its history, China has been organized around competitive examinations. “Schools work their students long hours every day, and the work weeks extend into the weekends,” it said.
Top Test Scores From China Stun Educators, New York Times, December 7th, 2010
According to many Middle class parents, probably not… http://www.racetonowhere.com/
Or can we develop an education system that is adaptable enough, supportive enough, and honest enough to do what we have never been able to do… connect our poorest citizens to the people and resource rich environments around them and stop viewing the competition of nation states as a zero sum game. A rising tide lifts all ships and the increasing prosperity of a developing world is not a threat, but a goal we should all responsibly work towards!
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