With another school year just under way, parents understandably
wonder how well their children are advancing. Perhaps parents’ real
concern should be whether their children are actually falling
behind. From a comparative viewpoint, they clearly are. America
spends the most on education and gets less than virtually any
developed nation. The failure of America’s “lower education” system
bears witness to competition’s absence. Without fundamental reform,
future generations will pay an increasing cost for this
absence.
The National Center for Education Statistics compared 15
year-old public school students in several countries in several
subject areas. Released in 2006, their study of 2003 results (their
latest figures) shows the U.S. below the OECD average in math (483
to 500) and science (491 to 500) and just slightly above average
(495 to 494) in reading. Only five nations scored below the U.S. in
all these categories — Greece, Italy, Portugal, Mexico, and
Turkey.
Perhaps these results would be understandable, if not
acceptable, if the U.S. spent less on education, but the reverse is
true. The U.S. spent $8,900 per pupil. France spent $7,200; the
U.K. $6,800; Japan, $6,800; and Germany, $6,500. As recently as the
last school year, the U.S. spent $9,969 per pupil and $489 billion
nationwide on elementary and secondary public education.
The difference between America’s higher education and “lower
education” — its elementary and secondary systems — is dramatic.
While “lower ed” under-performs other developed countries’,
graduates from those systems flock to America’s higher education
institutions. This may convince some that everything equalizes over
the long-term — what’s lost in the beginning is recouped at the
end. Such thought is as shortsighted as it is wrong.
This is especially true for lower income students. Many such
students begin the education race behind the starting line. It is
little surprise that too many never reach the finish line at all.
This slow start virtually requires additional education will be
needed by those least able to afford it, or its absence. For lower
income families, a self-replicating cycle threatens.
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN America’s primary and secondary public
schools and its higher education system has been noted before;
however, the defining difference of competition is too often
overlooked. The performance gap is instead attributed to other
factors — colleges and universities’ large endowments and that
these institutions attract only the most motivated and talented
students (while public primary and secondary schools take all
comers).
Yet, the fact remains that on a global basis, U.S. higher
education out-performs while U.S. elementary and secondary public
education under-performs. Why? Competition. Competition is not the
result of our higher education excellence, it is the cause.
Students do not simply compete to get in, they do so because
colleges compete with each other.
Competition is the very thing from which our primary and
secondary public schools have so assiduously insulated themselves.
America’s “lower education” is literally locked in place. While
American colleges attract students on a global level, our primary
and secondary public schools trap students at the local level.
Thoroughly unportable, elementary and secondary public school
students are forced to attend where they live — unable to go
across town, let alone across country. College students go wherever
they wish (grades permitting). Because of it, colleges strive to
attract dollars and students wherever they are — locally,
nationally, and internationally. Lower education neither wants nor
needs students from beyond its local area. It defines a monopoly:
many buyers facing a single supplier.
In contrast, the absence of competition drives out resources.
Competition attracts them because, whether money or students, they
know they will be rewarded in a competitive system. Of course
American colleges excel. Students are willing to pay more to go to
the better ones and colleges in turn are willing to make the
investment to attract them — ironically both are able to do so
because federal education aid at the college level is completely
portable.
THE OBVIOUS SOLUTION is to raise our “lower education” system as
much as possible. To do this, our public schools must compete as
much as possible and to do that, federal aid needs to be as
portable as possible. Despite the laudable reforms of No Child Left
Behind, portable federal school aid at the elementary and secondary
level remains the exception, not the rule.
While our “lower education” system may imagine itself insulated
from competition, America itself is not. To compete globally, we
must start at the beginning. One look at the global competition
dynamic explains why. Undeveloped nations compensate for worse
education with lower wage and operating costs. Developed nations
can compete, but only with higher productivity, which requires
greater education. Where then is America’s advantage? If it cannot
compete with undeveloped nations’ lower wages and is falling behind
its developed competitors in the basic educational skills for the
majority of its workforce, it finds itself in a particularly
unattractive position. As the school year begins, perhaps what is
most in need of education is our “lower education” system
itself.
