why? public education?

Question

Am I the only one who thinks that education is the answer to most of America's problems. If the government would invest more money to educate its population, things would change drastically. Look at Japan, their education system is top notch and it shows. Education is an investment. While it may not be cost effective now, but in 20 years it will pay off. With smarter people we will be able to make better business decisions. We can help those in poorer neighborhoods and give them more job opportunities. We can better pay our teachers and make teaching a more competitive market. Everybody can remember at least one teacher that inspired them, and what a difference that makes. Just imagine what we could accomplish with better education.

Are some of you saying that only rich people deserve a good education?

Answer 1

Well, here is the answer you are looking for.

We are the best. Yes, that is correct. We are the BEST in the world. We educate everyone. The entire world recognizes our degrees and acknowledges our academic superiority. So why do you hear about other countries beating us?

OK, you picked Japan. Good choice. They are racist, discriminatory, sexist, chauvinistic, and all around unfair to their children. How you ask? Every few years they give a minimum performance test. This test determines who will continue in school. If you fail, you are permanently removed from their school. After a few year of that, they have taken out their lowest 50% of their children. Therefore, a Japanese "high school" student would be comperable to our Academic Honors student. In other words, the middle Japanese student would be our 75 percentile student. Therefore, to be fair... compare the average Japanese student to the 75 percentile American student. We have been shown to trounce their scores. The average Japanese (remember they should be 75 pecentile) scores a 66 percentile compared to the US. We pulverize them. What happens to the Japanese students that don't make the cut? They come to the United States for an education.

Consider this... All of the leaders (government and corporate) of Japan have been educated in American schools. Why? As a friend of mine (Japanese) put it... "Americans are a fine people. They are full of love and value all people and differences. They don't receive all of their education from books. They teach each other and thereby make themselves strong."

Welcome to the greatest country in the world... where everyone is valued and educated regardless of finances.

Answer 2

A good education is the most important thing you can give a child - but throwing more money indescriminately at an already broken education system is not the answer. We've been using that tactic for the past 40 years and watching the quality of our public schools deteriorate even more. Do some research on what a good private education costs vs. a poor public school education. Also look up how much the Japanese spend on education. The link below has a good breakdown on education spending worldwide. You'll see that Japan spends about 1/3 the money per child that the U.S. does, yet they see far better results.
Really do some research into what U.S. private schools and Asian schools do differently than U.S. public schools, and I think you'll find some answers to improving public education.

Answer 3

education is not the answer. and let's not get into the whole idea of capitalism and economics. (bottom line of the theory is someone has to be poor..i don't personally agree but it's the way the system is set up for our society to work unfortunately). and smarter people do not always make the best business decisions. how much of white collar crime and embezzlements (sp?) are created by people with top notch degrees and MBA's from Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, etc. it takes much more than education to fix our society. and trust, the gov't doesn't really want it to be fixed. One thing for sure though, teachers are very important and need to be paid and appreciated much more. Without them, no one would have a diploma, BA, MBA, JD, etc....to allow them to get their $100k job, while the teacher who taught them only gets paid $35k. Something is outta wack with that!

Answer 4

Money isn't the answer. They tried that in Cincinatti or St. Louis, and the district went stupid, buying olympic size pools and other such nonsense.

Just look at charter schools. They get 3 times the results with 1/5 of the budget.

The answer is simple: Vouchers. Allowing school choice, and forcing competition for students and the tax $$$ associated with them will force the schools to become better.

There has never been a single instance of breaking up a monopoly and creating competition that has resulted in worse product or service, and higher costs for them. EVERY single time, you get better and cheaper. EVERY SINGLE TIME!!!

There are places in the world that have this, and their average students kick the ever living sh!t out of our gifted and talented students on standardized test.

Answer 5

I remember good teachers as well as I remember the awful ones. I think it will take more than just funneling more money into public schools, but also expanding benefits for private schools and homeschoolers, who deserve support (and credibility) just as much.

Answer 6

i agree. the education system here lacks in the amount of respect teachers get. but i guess that's what private school is for. america doesn't care if you don't have money. it caters to the rich. i will one day buy america and change the name to dodgers.

Answer 7

I agree education is important but i also think that for some people they just aren't academically gifted.

Answer 8

Sounds OK to me. I think you should write a letter to your state governor. Maybe you could also join the local PTA.

Answer 9

It's not just the amount of money, it is the culture that makes the difference.
Japan, in my experience, tries to breed succesful, overacheiving people.
The US is full of people who want to barely squeak by.