Compared to students from other industrialized countries, American students are, at best, average. Last week the US Department of Education published “First Look at PISA 2012,” sounding the alarm bells. Our 15-year-olds are slowly but surely falling behind 15-year-olds from countries where educational rigor is the standard. For instance, the average score on the mathematics literacy scale is 481 here and 494 for economically developed countries as a whole. In science literacy and reading, American students are also in the middle of the pack.
While we have held our place, some countries such as Japan, South Korea, Finland, and Poland have consistently been getting better PISA scores. Scholars Eric Hanushek, Paul Peterson, and Ludger Woessmann say American students’ mediocre performance isn’t just embarrassing, it’s “endangering prosperity”—the title of their recent book. Only eight percent of American 15-year-olds scored in the one of the two highest levels of the reading literacy scale, and it’s hard to see how a nation that can’t read well can win the global economic race.
This is not a new topic. In fact, it’s a broken record we play over and over again. It seems our current suite of educational reforms is not working. We appear lost in an unimaginative cycle of prescribing policy medicines that are, according to educational achievement indicators, barely keeping us on academic life support. Somehow, we can’t get to the heart of the matter.
That is why it was so refreshing to pick up Amanda Ripley’s recent book, The Smartest Kids in the World and How They Got That Way. While she frames her book in the world of PISA tests, her approach is to understand education through the hopes, fears, dreams, and struggles of students. Real students.
In 2010-11, Ripley followed three American teenagers—Kim, Eric and Tom— as they, in Ripley’s words, experienced smarter countries—Finland, South Korea, and Poland.
This is a book rich in insight, humor and a willingness to think outside the usual policy box. Ripley looks at how culture and schooling shape learning in ways that tell the story behind the statistics. Most books about education are not noted for wit, inviting writing, or compelling stories. Amanda Ripley is both a great storyteller and a clear thinker, making The Smartest Kids in the World a memorable book that should be on every educator’s reading list.
Ripley doesn’t beat you over the head with her findings; she lets them emerge from her research as though in conversation. Here is her basic conclusion about school improvement:
I’d been looking around the world for clues as to what other countries might be doing right, but the important distinctions were not about spending or local control or curriculum; none of that mattered much. Policies mostly worked in the margins. The fundamental difference was a psychological one.
The education superpowers believed in rigor. People in these countries agreed on the purpose of school: Schools existed to help students master complex academic material. Other things mattered too, but nothing mattered as much. That clarity of purpose meant everyone took school more seriously, especially kids. The most important difference I’d seen so far was the drive of students and their families.
In other words, there is no substitute for the desire to learn. This finding should not come as a revelation. Motivation, discipline and persistence will beat laziness, sloppiness, and giving up every time. But what is behind these truisms? Perhaps social science can be useful in unpacking the nature of drive.
Students who have strong internal control and a sense of self efficacy succeed and generally overcome whatever odds are stacked against them. I recently visited City College in New York City. While some middle class students attend City College, most come from homes with few resources. I spent two days on campus interviewing students about their hopes and dreams. Their drive to succeed was inspiring. They work hard and they believe in the power of education. They are tough and resilient.
I asked myself why these bedrock qualities seem to be missing in the psychological makeup of so many other American students and, by extension, their families. Why is it so many of our kids have high self-esteem but a weak will to learn? What do we have to do to get to the essential challenge before us? Is tinkering with governance the solution? More pressure on teachers? More technology? If Ripley is right, the answer to these questions is “Probably not.” We need to start looking elsewhere for real and lasting solutions.
In my next blog, I’ll go out on a limb and suggest a few things we might do to help our kids discover their natural genius.