The hits just keep on coming

To quote Casey Kasem: 'the hits just keep on coming.' Only in this case, the hits aren't so good (at least not for American education).

In case you haven't been keeping track, here's a list of some recent reports that bemoan our schools' inability to prepare globally-competitive citizens. Continuing our country's long-standing tradition, committees, commissions, and task forces have been scrambling over each other to issue the latest update on our schools' ineptitude:

• 2005 - Business RoundTable - Tapping America's Potential: The Education for Innovation Initiative
• 2006 - Committee for Economic Development - Education for Global Leadership: The Importance of International Studies and Foreign Language Education for U.S. Economic and National Security
• 2006 - Council on Competitiveness - Competitiveness Index: Where America Stands
• 2006 - New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce - Tough Choices or Tough Times
• 2006 - Partnership for 21st Century Skills - Are They Really Ready to Work? Employers' Perspectives on the Basic Knowledge and Applied Skills of New Entrants to the 21st Century U.S. Workforce
• 2006 - United States Department of Education - Meeting the Challenge of a Changing World: Strengthening Education for the 21st Century
• 2007 - Committee on Prospering in the Global Economy of the 21st Century - Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future
• 2007 - ETS - America's Perfect Storm: Three Forces Changing Our Nation's Future
• 2007 - Phi Delta Kappa - Education in the Flat World
• 2007 - United States Chamber of Commerce - Leaders and Laggards: A State-by-State Report Card on Educational Effectiveness

This doesn't include magazine articles, speeches, interviews, and other activities along these lines. We might be in danger of losing our global lead on some measures, but I'm guessing we're still ahead of everyone else when it comes to task force and commission reports!

Did I miss any? Are we seeing similar activity in other countries?

Comments

[Doug Johnson]

1.

One comforting thought is that I don't see anyone in education getting fired as a result.

Doug

[Scott McLeod]

2.

Here's a recent survey that may be of interest. The Net Day Speak Up 2006 survey results (from 270,000 students; 21,000 teachers; and 15,000 parents) show that "more than half of parents and teachers who participated in the survey said their schools are not doing a good job of preparing today’s students to compete for jobs and careers of the 21st century."

http://tinyurl.com/2tnx59

[Randy Rodgers]

3.

How could they be satisfied? Most of the world could care less about how a student performs on a standardized test. Legislators care about nothing else. Until the focus shifts to an outcome of greater significance than an acceptable NCLB ranking, teachers and admins will focus on nothing else. It is a rare and precious teacher who manages to take his/her students beyond all of the external pressure and enable them to engage in learning that will make them truly prepared for life outside of school.

[Summer]

4.

Those are frightening figures indeed. We are a global economy and we need people who can handle that. Perhaps if there were a more hands on real life aproach rather than getting everything while sitting behind a desk reading from a bland book we might be able to compete.