What is the quality of education in the USA-?

Question

How does it compare to other countries, both in terms of Universtiy and school levels-

I suspect it to be quite low, but I only really have prejudice to support this.

Chilli...of course the question is broad. But there are international standards used as a yardstick to determine the quality of different services, and education is one of them.

As for your inane comment about prejudice- stating that someone who admits to a prejudice is ignorant is a pretty lazy cricism , and in this case i am attempting to redress this.

Don[t be such a smug little jerk.

Answer 1

University education in the US is pretty much the best in the world (check the THES rankings for confirmation of this), largely because so many higher education institutions are private with large budgets, so they are able to provide top-class facilities and cherry-pick the most talented academics from all over the world.

School education (primary and secondary) is less well regarded, this FT article shows rankings of global education systems - the US is 15th overall, but 42nd for maths and science. Incidentally, the UK is ranked higher for maths and science but MUCH lower for overall quality. It's not the best, but it's not bad either. It's also quite variable - individual states can set their own curricula, and school funding comes for the area immediately around the school - so schools in rich areas have lots of money and tend to achieve better results than schools in poor areas.

If you go to nationmaster (see sources) then you can see tables and graphs of countries based on all sorts of education statistics, it's really interesting to play around with and get a feel for how American education compares.

Answer 2

Well... that's an incredibly broad question that no one person could answer, because no one person has experienced all the education and university systems all round the world. There are huge differences in education standards within one region, let alone one country, so to simply say, "Country X's education is great, but Country Y's is better" would be a gross overgeneralisation. If you were to ask, "What is the quality of education within Biomedicine in universities around the world?" then that would be far easier to answer, because then you could use league tables.

EDIT: Incidentally, prejudice is one of the foremost markers of lack of education.

EDIT#2: Actually, that last comment wasn't aimed at you, since, as you say, you were trying to resolve that issue. But more to the point, are you truly aware of the sheer breadth of your question?

It involves, in its scope, every possible subject taught in every primary and secondary, college, university and institute of learning in the world. Not only that, it involves getting someone with an excellent working knowledge of the backgrounds of all the education systems as a whole to assess which systems are better or worse. Then, you would need to compile comparable lists of every subject taught in each institute, assign each institute an overall score, and once completed, you might just (however many decades down the line) be able to start saying with any degree of certainty, X is better than Y. But, since you have been so good as to raise the question that no individual person can answer, perhaps you would be so good as to point us in the right direction? Alternatively, if you are aware of just how unanswerable the question is, why have you bothered to ask it in the first place?

Answer 3

According to my Aunt, who was a teacher in England for many years but now lives in the states and runs a business helping US kids prep for their SAT's, the levels of attainment in the US system is poorer than their age equivalent in the UK until age 17, when they catch up.

Answer 4

USNEI-Education in the USA Homepage
We are the United States Network for Education Information (USNEI), an ... quality, broad array of opportunities, and attitude of concern for the student. ...ed.gov/about/offices/list/ous/international/usnei/us/edlite-index.html - 14k - Cached - More from this site
Overviews - Education in the US: InfoUSA
... national associations and the ways by which standards and quality are monitored. ... of the USA, this chapter describes the broad contours of U.S. education, ...usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/educ/educover.htm -

Answer 5

C minus for world geography.

Answer 6

Quite low. Look at their leaders.

Answer 7

Can't be that good as most of them are too fat to get into the classroom.