Education paves the road to our futures

Ayal Meyers

Education is the linchpin of society. It measures how well we take care of each other and forecasts our future with consistent accuracy. And if the same is true for the American education system, it is a hapless indictment of our nation. As someone who has experienced the ebbs and flows of our ever-changing public school system for the past 12 years, I have some suggestions.

First, cancel student debt. In 2018, the researchers leading a study at the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College found that a one-time cancellation of the $1.4 trillion outstanding student debt would translate to an increase of $86 billion to $108 billion a year, on average, to gross domestic product. It would also help close the racial wealth gap and pave a path for rethinking higher education financing. Plus, fixing higher education financing could improve the K-12 system by removing disincentives for continuing to college.

Making education more inclusive and less localized taps into a pattern of diminishing engagement among learners. The education pathway seems designed for one select subgroup of American children. For students who do not fit into this category, attendance drops, and interaction dwindles.

This is one thing the pandemic taught us about institutionalized school: the expected one-size-fits-all education plan has significant limitations that can stifle some students’ success. While some extroverted individuals struggled with the concept of online learning, with overwhelming loneliness taking away from work, others enjoyed not being in a physical school building.

Avoiding social pressure was helpful for reticent students who could better focus on their studies. Students who may have been less likely to participate in a typical school environment may have benefited from the chatbox function and excelled in the small group settings afforded by Zoom breakout rooms.

This is not to say that we should adopt online learning as the new standard. Not at all. Personally, I struggled with the isolated environment. But, it is important that we begin to embed unique learning styles to fit varying needs.

The ambiguity of learning styles among children can be addressed in a number of ways, but it will help if we start by teaching things worth learning. The Association of American Colleges and Universities found that only half of American high school students feel prepared for the real world.

The study raises some interesting questions. Who decided that it is more important for me to learn about King Tut or the Pythagorean theorem instead of how to file my taxes? Why was this decision made? After 12 years of public school, there is no reason why I should have to Google what a W-4 form is but can perfectly recite the differences between baroque and classical art in 1700s Europe. Adding classes for real-world exposure and lessons paired with shaping a new curriculum for students to choose based on their interests will heighten engagement.

In part, fixing the curriculum problem can be as simple as putting education back in the hands of teachers. The politicians should step back and let the people who have dedicated their lives to teaching decide how to do it. Sure, it’s important that there are federal standards that need to be met. Still, for the same reasons we don’t let lawyers perform surgery, we should not give politicians complete jurisdiction over our education system.

Unfortunately, this is one small component in another larger issue: teachers are underpaid, undertrained, and undersupported. Take Finland as a counterexample. According to a survey conducted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the American workforce has some of the weakest problem-solving and mathematical skills in the developed world. Finland, which is in the top ten, has proudly accredited its success to rigorous and selective teacher training programs that have substantial impacts down the road.

In 1979, the Finnish government merged teaching colleges with standard universities. The short-term implications of this decision included an increase in the level of training teachers received and a correlated increase in pay. In the long run, professionalizing the teacher corp raised the value of the profession, establishing prestige.

Today, teaching is the most popular occupation among younger Finns. The competitive programs only look at the top quarter of a high school class and only accept about ten percent of applicants to their eight elite universities that educate teachers.

The United State’s teacher training is appalling by comparison. A report by the National Council on Teacher Quality called American teacher preparation programs “an industry of mediocrity,” deeming only 10 percent of the sample size “high quality.” The report pointed to an underwhelming interest in the occupation as a direct result of the average teachers’ infamously low salary. Beyond waning interest, low wages for teachers have real impacts on the students in their classes. The National Education Association discovered that a ten percent increase in teacher pay is estimated to produce a five to ten percent increase in student performance.

Education is at the root of many larger-scale problems we face, and fixing the education system can offer solutions. We need to give control to talented teachers who have the skills, disposition, and knowledge to prepare students for the real world in a way that suits them.