Is the U.S. Education System Failing?

This is a pretty big issue. Well suited for discussion here.

The American education system is complicated as there are alot of moving parts. There are 50 states, each with their own standards around education. Over all 50 states is the federal government’s Department of Education. This is apart of the executive branch, which is responsible for enforcing the laws of the country. The president ultimately oversees the executive branch and can make the hiring decisions over who leads each department that the executive branch has.

With that being said, how do we go about assessing whether the American educational system as a whole is failing? We would have to first define some metrics we care about to determine the state of the American education system. I have come up with several metrics that would give us a snapshot of the current education system listed in no particular order.

Here they are:

High School Graduation Rates
College Readiness
Learning Climate
Teacher Pay
Access to Resources
The Extent of Achievement Gaps Between Different Socioeconomic Groups
STEM Proficiency

High School Graduation Rates

The average US graduation rate was 87% in 2019 according to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). That is not bad, but let’s put that into perspective. This means that nearly 9 out of 10 high school students graduate across the country. Could the US do better, certainly yes, especially compared to nations with better education systems. Japan for example according to the NCES has a 96 % graduation rate. The US is behind a number of nations when it comes to graduation rate even though its rate of 87% is not bad.

We can break it down even more if we compare each US state individually. It seems that some US states are in 90s. With Florida, Kentucky, West Virginia, Alabama, Wisconsin, Missouri, Iowa, Tennessee, Indianna, and New Jersey all having a graduation rate of 90% percent or higher.

Map of United States High School Graduation Rates by State (NCSE)

Some states have lower graduation with most states being in the 80 percent range with the lowest graduation rates being in the southwest. As you can see, Texas graduation rates are not available but considering that they are neighbors to the two lowest states in the US, Arizona, and New Mexico, I suspect that their rate will be lower as well. While Illinois is surrounded by states who are doing well, it’s hard to tell but I think Illinois would be at least average. All in all, the US graduation rates merely tell the story of how many of us get high school diploma, but it possible to go through K-12 and totally not be ready for college.

College Readiness

According to the ACT only 1 in 5 high school students in the class of 2023 are ready for college. The average ACT score is 19.5 out of 36. In fact scores have been going down in recent years. Now this is cause for alarm. This could be due to the aftermath of Covid but there are likely also other significant systemic problems. So, although students are graduating high school, they are not ready to continue their education.

More telling is college graduation rates or the amount of people who attend four year colleges who graduate. The average college graduation rate is 52% after four years. It varies by ethnicity with African Americans, Native Americans, and Hispanics well below 52%. This tells two stories, the first is that college preparation is likely a big factor in whether students are able to graduate college. The second story is that college readiness varies greatly by ethnicity, which suggests that education quality is different based upon your skin color in America.

Learning Climate

Learning climate is essentially whether teachers and students feel, respected, supported, safe, and physically comfortable. In America, likely none of these are true at many schools. Mainly focusing on learning climate, teachers are increasingly feeling less safe and sometimes physically comfortable in classrooms. For example, children in this day commonly do not demonstrate appropriate behavior in the classroom and their parents enable the children and admonish the teachers. Sometimes parents can even get irate and unreasonable causing both a safety concern. This also plays to being physically comfortable in the classroom. Sometimes, the kids are violent and cause the teacher safety concerns, I am not talking about high school students. I am talking about elementary schools students. Not to mention problems with school shootings. Therefore, with a clear lack of respect in the US for teachers and classroom decorum, the learning climate at many schools in this country have deteriorated.

Teacher Pay

For all that teachers go through they do not get paid nearly enough in this country. The median teacher salary in the US is $57,947. The starting salary for teachers is often very low, which I feel is the biggest issue. State and local governments do little to try remedy this problem. There would be higher quality teachers and therefore schools if teacher pay was increased by 40,000 dollars across the board. The minimum starting salary for teachers should be $75,000 dollars. This would go a long way into improving schools, and classroom experiences because what is happening is that teachers are leaving the profession for better jobs. I know of some people who have left the profession to do something else. The federal government is spending money all the time, wasting money even. They need to condition federal funding of state government’s education departments, based upon whether they raise teacher salaries by X amount. This ensures that teachers benefit when governments decide to spend more money on students.

Access To Resources

Today, according to the The Century Foundation, the US underfunds its schools by 150 billion dollars. In truth, there is a lot of discrepancies with some school districts being well funded and some districts not being well funded. The truth is schools with high concentrations of students of color, namely black and hispanics, are more likely to be underfunded. What is most ironic is that the states that fund their schools per pupil the least (which is Arizona and New Mexico from above) have the lowest high school graduation rates in the country. There seems to be some direct correlation between the amount of funding on average schools receive and the ultimate graduation rate in the country.

Achievement Gaps

An achievement gap is best described as the as differences in academic performance and on standardized test scores between socioeconomic groups (basically different wealth levels and ethnic groups). Considering a lack of financial support for underrepresented students, it is no wonder why a achievement gap for minorities exists in the first place. One can almost assume that if the students are less funded, less safe, more distracted, and generally have lower quality teachers that there would be a gap. It is not easy to change entire learning environments, and just because you influx a school with cash doesn’t mean it is going to do better. What seems to be true is that if the state invests more in education, it will improve outcomes for students systemically. Some of the merit based funding of schools (you do well on standardized tests you get more money), I remember hearing about when I was growing up is complete junk. If there is a surefire way for better schools, equip teachers, and deter the factors (like uncooperative parents) from destroying the class climate.

STEM Proficiency

Science, technology, engineering, and math is important. This is the area where the US lags behind other nations the most. Science refers to the sciences, biology, physics, and chemistry to name a few. Technology on the other hand mainly refers to coding or computer science, the software that drives the systems of your favorite devices. It also means the result of using science and engineering to create. Engineering, is applied science and it is best described as math, physics, chemistry, and sometimes biology used to solve real world problems. Like how to build an EV that will be sustainable.

An aside, China and other nations are extremely serious about teaching their students STEM. My friend from China, recounted to me his experience in high school of studying math and science all day long. It is a totally different level. Not saying China’s students are well rounded, but a lot of them can do some math and science. It’s ingrained into the learning culture.

What is the state of US STEM education? Well the US is ranked 11th in STEM education worldwide, but more importantly about 74% of US students who graduate with degrees in STEM say that early education in STEM was a barrier to success (according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies). Even I would agree that STEM education early on was limiter for me because I once I was in college, I felt unprepared for science and engineering. The state of US STEM could be said to be so-so because I am sure some are prepared for college in STEM, but most are not and are going to have to get some help like I did.

Is the US Education System Indeed Failing?

My conclusion is that the US education system has many many problems but the above question is not the right question for the US. The problem is that the US education system works for a few and does not for most. Most do not get a great STEM education, some do not have good learning environments, or enough funding. Yet there are some Americans who do not have any problems in any of those areas. The US education system is indeed faltering but it is not failing at least completely. The inequality that exists in America for education is staggering and is the true failure.