Education. Why its important. Using Singapore as an example, a tiny island nation with a racially and culturally diverse population that until 1965 was dependent upon Great Britain. Back then, less than fifty years ago, it was a sort of international welfare case with a Gross Domestic Product per capita about one twentieth of the United States. This means that on average, each Singaporean produced less than one twentieth of the economic value that the average American produced. Today, Singapores per capita GDP is slightly higher than that of the United States. What brought about that miracle? Lee Kuan Yew, who served as Singapores first prime minister for thirty years and is still known as the Father of Singapore, stated that it happened because of their education system. How does it differ from education in America? Among other factors, Singapore places a heavy emphasis on objective subjects like mathematics and science as opposed to subjects that have the word studies in their titles. They dont do social studies, earth studies, and environmental studies in Singapore. The country routinely scores at the very top of each years International Mathematics and Science Study while the United States according to recent data, scored at number 23, well behind countries like Thailand, Russia, Slovenia, Hungary, and Belgium. Lest you respond that we must spend more on education, another objective fact tells us that Singapore spends about $2,000 a year per student while in the United States the comparable figure is about $12,000. There is much data that those who care about children should examine. Focusing on objective facts rather than subjective fantasizing would be a good place to start.
Posted on: Wed, 12 Mar 2014 05:44:29 +0000
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