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The Fault in Our Schools

As Nelson Mandela stated in 2012, education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world. Education is one of the most important aspects of modern human life, and it is what truly brings about change. Therefore, as a human race, we can never cease to strive for education, and, in the formation of policies, concentration must be placed upon it. Where a fault exists, it must be adequately addressed in order to avoid massive detriment to the already-existent society, and to the societys future generations. And, unfortunately, throughout the United States, a great fault exists. Although it may be far too ambitious to attempt a federal policy in order to address said fault, it is not so when discussing the realistic possibility, and obligation, of attempting to address this fault on a local level. On a local level, this problem can be addressed within a scope as large as the entirety of the state of Missouri, or one as small as a single district, or even a single school. The great fault that exists within American schools is a simple one: high school classes are not challenging enough for gifted students. This inadequacy of high school education is a fault within the Columbia Public Schools system that must be addressed in order for the citizens and the community to realize the massive benefits that reform of this system in such a manner would bring. However, before discussing the specifics, the importance of education as a whole must be addressed in order to expand on the importance of addressing high school education. Firstly, education has been found to have economic benefit. As stated within an article in the education magazine Education Next, when the average number of years of schooling in a country becomes higher, the economy grows at a higher annual rate over subsequent decades [as well.]Across the 50 countries [that were assessed], each additional year of average schooling in a country increased the average 40-year growth rate in GDP by about 0.37 percentage points. That may not seem like much, but consider the fact that since World War II, the world economic growth rate has been around 2 to 3 percent GDP annually. Lifting it by 0.37 percentage points is a boost to annual growth rates of more than 10 percent of what would otherwise have occurred.[footnoteRef:1] Education clearly has an incredible benefit to the economy of a nation, however, as the article later goes on to state, one must realize that, in order for these benefits to occur, the education that is provided within these nations that have supposed economic benefits must be of sufficient quality. The same material cannot be repeatedly taught over and over again, nor can the education be so insufficiently challenging that it does not stimulate brain activity within students. [1: Hanushek, Eric A. Dean T. Jamison. Eliot A. Jamison. Ludger Woessmann. Education and Economic Growth. Education Next. Education Next, 2008. Web. 07 April, 2015. ]

However, economic benefits are not the only things that improving education brings. As stated by Adriane Williams and Watson Swail, education is more significantly correlated with civic engagement than any other variable, [which] is supported by the work of Dee (2004). Using the national data sets High School and Beyond and General Social Surveys, Dee found that higher educational attainment positively affects voter participation, group membership, and attitudes towards free speech.[footnoteRef:2] Similarly, a report by the University of California found that education has been found to reduce crime rates (they found that a one year increase in average education levels is estimated to reduce arrest rates by 11%). Likewise to the economic benefits that education brings, the benefits of increased civic engagement and reduced crime only exist when quality education is provided. Clearly, due to the many benefits that education holds, it seems logical that policymakers would attempt to place their concentration on maximizing education and its quality. [2: Williams, Adriane. Watson Swail. Is More Better: The Impact of Postsecondary Education on the Economic and Social Wellbeing of American Society. Education Policy Institute, 2005. Web. 07 April, 2015. ]

And yet, policymakers have failed to realize the simple fact that education is one of the most important things in upholding the welfare of society. They are allowing the existence of a flawed high school education system, which is where the concentration of this issue lies: the fault that exists within our high schools. In general, high school education has been dubbed as being far too easy within the United States, as was illustrated in a report from the Center for American Progress, a Washington think tank, in July of 2012. Gladis Kersaint, a math education professor at the University of South Florida and a board member of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, stated, in response to the report, that, she thought that teachers and policy-makers underestimated students. She states that the push for higher standards, and students willingness to meet those standards, strongly suggests that theyre ready to be more challenged inclasses.[footnoteRef:3] [3: Toppo, Greg. School is Too Easy, Students Report. USA Today. USA Today, 09 July, 2012. Web. 07 April, 2015.]

And yet, despite the data in support of Dr. Kersaints stance, the push for policymakers to make high school education more challenged is non-existent. As stated by an anonymous student, who was quoted in an article in The Oregonian by Betsy Hammond on October 15, 2013, school coursework is not half as challenging enough as it needs to be. Focusing on the slower kids leaves teachers less time to grow and develop the more intelligent kids in society. Programs for specially gifted kids are being phased out or have their budgets slashed. School districts need to also pay attention to more gifted kids.[footnoteRef:4] Schools are failing to challenge their students, which allows them to grow bored, disinterested. This failure to challenge has unique harms towards gifted children, which later comes around to harm the entirety of society. [4: Ibid.]

Ingfei Chen from KQED News elaborates on the need to challenge gifted children in her April 2014 article, By Not Challenging Gifted Kids, What Do We Risk Losing?, where she states, When conventional school curricula [fails] to stimulate their hungry young brains, leaving them bored and stymied, these kids may get lost in the system. Some end up with C averages and slip into truancy, and many may never blossom to their full potential. Its a big loss for lots of reasons, including the fact that these precious kids represent a unique pool of talent for generating new ideas and innovations. And because of inadequate policies, we may be losing opportunities to nurture the Henry Fords and Marie Curies of the future.[footnoteRef:5] The lack of challenge allows these gifted students to become bored within classes, which often contributes to their becoming students who seem as though they simply do not care about school, and end up with horrendous GPAs and/or attendance records, and may even feel compelled to drop out of school. And, this is not just a small fraction of students either. Forbes.com states that over 40 percent of high school students reported feeling disengaged in the learning process.[footnoteRef:6] The idea that such a phenomena occurs is elaborated on by Johnson M. Alex, who states that, by overwhelming majorities, students said they would work harder at their studies if more was expected of them.[footnoteRef:7] He later continues to explain further, More than ever before, students set a high bar for themselves and they expect their high schools to meet the same criteriajust as they expect more from themselves, students want their high schools to expect more from them as well.[footnoteRef:8] The loss of these students equals a loss of a great deal of potential for future problem solvers and active, contributing members of society. [5: Chen, Ingfei. By Not Challenging Gifted Kids, What Do We Risk Losing? MindShift. KQED News, 25 April, 2014. Web. 07 April, 2015. ] [6: Brozak, Jennifer. What Bad Habits Are Hurting High School Students? Synonym. Demand Media, n.d. Web. 07 April, 2015. ] [7: Johnson, M. Alex. High School is Just Too Easy, Students Say. NBC News. NBC News, 19 August, 2005. Web. 07 April, 2015.] [8: Ibid.]

As stated by psychology professor David Lubinski of Vanderbilt University, Intellectually talented kids dont get the attention of policymakers, but if youre trying to solve problems in the world like climate change and terrorism and STEM innovation, and transportation and managing our healthcare, you want intellectually precocious youth who have had their intellectual needs met.[footnoteRef:9] He later goes on to describe the estimated 3 million academically gifted K-12 students in the United States as a precious human capital resource.[footnoteRef:10] And by allowing the continued failure of the American high school system to challenge gifted students, they are a human capital resource that the United States is going to lose. [9: Chen, Ingfei. By Not Challenging Gifted Kids, What Do We Risk Losing? MindShift. KQED News, 25 April, 2014. Web. 07 April, 2015.] [10: Ibid]

Education has been empirically shown to have economic benefit, to aid in lowering crime, and to maximize civic engagement. This is what makes it such a vital component of nurturing the next generations to allow society to continue forward, yet policymakers fail to understand this fact. Due to this, American high schools have been allowed to run rampant and fail. In teachers attempts to slow down the curriculum to allow the slower-thinking students to catch up, they have indefinitely caused great harm to the gifted students within their classes. Such failure not only causes personal harm to these students, in the fact that their academic career is severely hindered, but also immense harm to society as a whole. Losing these brilliant minds is lands a severe blow towards the welfare of society, as it prevents these gifted students from reaching their full potential, and then contributing in full back to society. More simply put, high school education is too easy. And the reason that theyre too easy, aside from the curriculum itself, is the simple fact that students arent motivated to work hard because the school system fails to challenge them, leaving them with a sense of boredom. Brilliant minds are suppressed by a lack of motivation that is only extrapolated by the failure of the school system to adequately challenge them and to encourage them and/or provide methods for them to challenge themselves. Therefore, in order to salvage these brilliant minds, improved methods of challenging high school students must be implemented, so that society can realize the many benefits that better-quality and more available education holds: benefits to the economy, increased civic engagement, lower crime rates, and so much more. These methods can range from complex, large-scale policies, such as eliminating Common Core as a whole across the nation, to much smaller, simpler policies, such as implementing more Honors and AP classes, reducing class sizes, or allowing students to test out of classes for which they already know the material. Regardless of what specific policy is proposed or implemented, in order to uphold societal welfare, in order to allow brilliant, gifted thinkers into the work force to contribute to society, some form of action must be taken. 5