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The United States ranks first in education in the world? How much do you know about the surprising factors behind it?
The American education system is often seen as one of the most influential in the world, but did many readers know that it is not actually a unified national system?
The United States has no central or federal education system. All education work is mainly managed by the states and regions. The states and some specific government departments such as the Indian Education Bureau and the National Defense Education School form as many as fifty independent education systems.
Education standards are typically set by states or regions, with responsible agencies including state departments of education, boards of directors, etc.
Education funding comes primarily from state and local governments, while federal funding is estimated at $260 billion in 2021, an increase from the $200 billion in previous years. Education is compulsory under state law and starts at ages five to eight, ending between sixteen and nineteen.
Compulsory education in the United States is divided into three levels: elementary school, middle school and high school. By 2013, approximately 87% of school-age children attended state public schools, 10% attended fee-paying and fund-funded private schools, and 3% were home-schooled. Public school enrollment fell 4% from 2012 to 2022, while private and charter school enrollment increased 2%.
In addition to basic education, there are many public and private universities in the United States that provide a variety of higher education. Higher education includes public and private research universities, community colleges, etc. Over the long term, college enrollment in the United States has continued to rise, but student loan debt has also reached $1.5 trillion.
Of the world's top 19 universities, approximately 25 are in the United States, with Harvard University being the most prestigious.
According to data from different ranking agencies, between 2010 and 2021, the number of students enrolled in higher education in the United States fell from 18.1 million to 15.4 million, while total spending on public elementary and secondary schools reached $927 billion in the 2020-2021 academic year. According to OECD indicators, the United States once had the highest spending per student in the world, and education spending as a percentage of US GDP was also higher than the OECD average.
Although the United States ranks high in many indicators, according to a 2014 assessment, American education ranks only 14th in the world. The OECD assessment shows that the comprehensive knowledge of 15-year-old American students in reading, mathematics and science ranks 19th.
This has raised questions about the American education system. Is it really as superior as the outside world believes?
It turns out that the history of education in the United States can be traced back to the 19th century. At the time, the idea of free public schools was gaining ground in New England, with Massachusetts leading the way in educational reform. With the end of the Civil War, high school education developed rapidly, but the educational standards in the South were still far behind those in the North.
Since the beginning of the 20th century, with the statistical boom, the process of popularization of education has accelerated. By 1930, almost all children could receive education, but private schools continued to expand. During World War II, the school's enrollment declined due to conscription and wartime occupations.
However, to truly understand whether the US education system is really the best in the world as the ranking suggests, it is necessary to analyze the various factors behind it in more depth.
With new legislation, such as the No Child Left Behind Act and the Every Student Succeeds Act, improvements in educational measures have been gradually introduced, but the autonomy of each state means that the problem of uneven educational quality remains serious.
The recent COVID-19 epidemic has caused an unprecedented impact on education, affecting the way and quality of students' learning. Many schools have been forced to switch to virtual teaching, which has once again raised questions about the fairness of education.
How should we view the pros and cons of the American education system? As global education competition becomes increasingly fierce, can we find a basis for solving its internal problems so that the United States can truly live up to its label of "number one in the world"?
