A review of "The Smartest Kids in The World" by Amanda Ripley

            Book Review: The Smartest Kids in the World, and How They Got that Way

            The Smartest Kids in the World: And How They Got That Way by Amanda Riley is an intriguing look into the American education system as compared to other countries of the world—specifically Finland, Poland, and South Korea.  In the book, Ripley attempts to understand why students in these three countries perform better on the international standardized test known as PISA.  This test is meant to demonstrate how well a student is able to think and be creative.  Since I am studying to become an educator myself, I found this subject particularly interesting.  While I’ve studied various issues related to education in the past, Ripley’s book opened my eyes to the lack of excellence demanded within the education system of America today compared to when I attended grade school and high school in the 1970s and 1980s.

By following exchange students in her three target countries, Ripley does a good job of conveying the student culture within their respective education systems.  I would definitely not want to live in the pressure-cooker environment of South Korea, where students spend the majority of the day in some type of school—be it traditional school or after-school private tutors known as hagwons.  While this system produces students that can do well on standardized tests, it does not seem to be a healthy culture.  It was particularly startling to read the story of the young man, Ji, who stabbed his mother because he was afraid to tell her the results of his standardized test.  Ripley explained that “Ji ranked in the top 1 percent of all high school students in the country,” and yet he still felt so much pressure over his performance that it led him to murder his mother (2013, p. 61).  The education minister, Lee, was not proud of the practices of the South Korean educational system and wanted to overhaul the system, but it seems that it has become too entrenched in the culture. 

Even if it could improve test scores, I would not advocate for a similar system in the United States.  As Ripley mentioned, this high-pressure environment could explain the corresponding high suicide rate in South Korea, which is the highest in the world.  In an article for BBC, Kang-ee Hong, a child psychologist elucidates this connection further when he states, “From the beginning of childhood, the importance of money and achievement are emphasized by their parents, so they feel that unless you are successful in school grades and a good job, good prestigious college, you're not successful, and the parents behave as if 'you're not my child’” (BBC, 2011).  Eric, the exchange student from America, could barely tolerate the less-regimented version of Korean high school that he attended and only remained in the program for six months.

There are a couple of commonalities between the three countries that Ripley investigated.  All three have rigorous standards for teachers, and they all require strenuous exams in order to graduate from high school.  The first ensures high-quality teaching.  As Ripley states, it is difficult to teach a subject if you are not fully competent in the subject yourself.  One example of this is with math teachers in the United States who do not even have to have a math major or minor in order to teach the subject.  The second point—the graduation exam—likely instills more importance on education than in the United States.  If minimum scores were required on the ACTs or SATs in order to graduate high school, it is likely that students would take it more seriously.  When Kim asked her fellow Finland students why they cared so much, they seemed perplexed.  One responded, “How else will I graduate and go to university and get a good job?” (Ripley, 2013, p. 98).  This sentiment is lacking in American students.

            Poland is one country where the effect of reforms could be measured easily, since the reforms occurred after the PISA test was first administered.  Two main changes correlated to the increase in Poland’s test scores.  The first was adopting a more rigorous standard for teachers.  This had the benefits one would expect—teachers who were more capable did a better job educating their students.  The second change was less obvious.  They delayed the separation of students into vocational and academic tracks by one year—so that all students studied academics until age 16, rather than 15.  One fact that surprised me was that students who were moved to the vocational track performed poorly when they retook the PISA.  To me, this demonstrates that students who believe they lack academic potential only perform up to the standards that they are resigned to.

While standardized testing plays an important role in South Korea’s “success,” such tests are not administered in the same fashion as in the United States.  In Korea, the tests determine what colleges a student can be admitted to and what jobs they will be eligible for later in life, so students have a vested interest in their results.  Standardized testing in the United States is not linked to students’ careers or academic progress in the same manner.  First, there is very little incentive for students to actually do well.  Furthermore, rather than aid students who perform poorly on standardized tests, the current system punishes schools and teachers.  The system that is currently in place allocates federal and state spending dollars based on how well students do on standardized testing.  This leads to a culture where performing well on the tests is more important than actually teaching children anything of value. 

In March of 2013, it was found that more than 175 Atlanta educators had worked together to cheat on standardized tests.  In an article for The New Yorker, Damany Lewis, a middle-school teacher in Atlanta, admitted to cheating on standardized tests and gives an account of his actions and reasoning (2014).  The main pressure for Lewis was the threat of school closure if the students failed to do well on the exams.  This type of accountability related to standardized testing is completely opposite of what schools in Ripley’s target countries did. For instance, in Finland, schools that performed poorly were given more funds in order to improve students’ education—not threatened with closure.  Lewis and his fellow teachers felt compelled to manually change the answers on students’ exams in order to ensure that the school would remain open.

Another issue that Ripley touches upon is the culture in the United States and its attitude toward math and science.  As Vinton Cerf, an Internet entrepreneur, stated in an article for EducationNext, we do not “emphasize the importance of education and the value of engineering and science” (Peterson, Woessmann, Hanushek, & Lastra-Anadon, 2011).  Ripley mentions that adults do not value math and instill in their children the idea that math is not an important subject to understand in order to do well in adult-hood.  However, while this might have been true for their parents, it is no longer true for children today.  Even factory workers need to understand math, as Ripley demonstrates when she explains, “In Oklahoma, the CEO of the company that makes McDonald’s apple pies told me she had trouble finding enough Americans to handle modern factory jobs—during a recession” (2013, p. 5).  Another factory owner stated “It’s hard to fill these jobs because they require people who are good at math, good with their hands, and willing to work on a factory floor” (Peterson et al, 2011).  Clearly, there are jobs available to our graduates, if only they had the skills required to fulfill them.

The United States has attempted to adopt rigorous standards called Common Core, which Ripley briefly touches upon.  This system is meant to provide a standardized curriculum for students so that they will all be at a comparable level with each other no matter what school they attend.  There are a few problems with Common Core.  First, in regards to math, many parents are staunchly against it for the simple reason that they themselves do not understand it.  I have seen numerous posts on Twitter and Facebook and articles on the web from angry parents proclaiming that the way they were taught math was “just fine,” and the current standards are too confusing for their children.  With this type of attitude, how can we ever hope to improve students’ views on math and science? 

Another problem with Common Core is that it has taken on a political agenda.   For example, a third-grade Common-Core grammar exercise has students rearrange sentences to use possessive pro-nouns.  This sounds like a reasonable assignment, until the sentences themselves are analyzed: “The choices of the president affect everyone.  He makes sure the laws of the country are fair.  The commands of the government officials must be obeyed by all.  The wants of an individual are less important than the well-being of the nation” (Chiaramonte, 2013).  For me, this demonstrates political indoctrination instead of teaching core competencies.

In conclusion, I believe it is possible to overhaul the American educational system, but more standardized testing is not the answer.  First and foremost, we must shift our focus to require excellence within our teachers.  As Ripley states, “We had the same attitude toward teachers: Anyone and everyone could become a teacher, as long as they showed up for class, followed the rules, and had good intentions” (2013, p. 191).  This has to change in order to see true reform.  This makes further sense, since we have so many more teaching candidates graduating from college each year than there are positions available.  Rigorous standards for teachers would ensure that only the best and brightest fill those positions.  If we are to implement more standardized tests, it should be for teachers rather than the students, to ensure teachers are competent in the subjects that they are teaching.  As the examples of Finland and Poland show, change is possible, and requiring higher standards for teachers has a reciprocal effect on the entire system—so much so that drastic changes elsewhere in the system become unnecessary.

References

BBC. (2011, November 7). Tackling South Korea's suicide rates. Retrieved November 15, 2014, from http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-pacific-15331921

Chiaramonte, P. (2013, November 10). Common Core lessons blasted for sneaking politics into elementary classrooms. Retrieved November 10, 2014, from http%3A%2F%2Fwww.foxnews.com%2Fus%2F2013%2F11%2F10%2Fcommon-core-lessons-blasted-for-sneaking-politics-into-elementary-classrooms%2F

K. (2011). Student Suicides in South Korea. Retrieved November 15, 2014, from http://www.voicesofyouth.org/posts/student-suicides-in-south-korea

Peterson, P. E., Woessmann, L., Hanushek, E. A., & Lastra-Anadon, C. X. (2011). Are U.S. students ready to compete? EducationNext, 11(4). Retrieved November 17, 2014, from http://educationnext.org/are-u-s-students-ready-to-compete/

Ripley, A. (2013). The smartest kids in the world: And how they got that way. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks.