The Education Gap

Continuing to catch up after the computer glitch. As you might gather, this was first posted in November, following the 2010 election.

     Among the schizophrenic phenomena of the 2010 election, we have widespread calls for the "reform" of education amidst a resurgence of anti-intellectualism. The country with the best-educated workforce will dominate the knowledge-based industries of this century, say countless pundits, while all but one of the Republican gubernatorial candidates either disbelieves there is human-inducted global warming or professes that action can't be taken because the issue is in doubt. In other words, the overwhelming consensus of scientists is being rejected by people who assert that brains are trump in the human capital game.

     Sarah Palin has become something of a saint for those who resent the way ordinary, good-hearted folk are looked down on, supposedly, by "elites." I am putting the word "elites" in quotation marks because a true elite consists of those whose performance excels-the heroes, the leaders, the movers and shakers. But for those who follow the patron saint of grizzly bears, elites are distant and remote types who have lost touch with the American Way of Life, whose restoration is our one true path to greatness.

     Elites like economists, for instance. The generally supported view that the American economy would have slid into a full-scale depression without governmental lending and stimulus spending, and probably the world economy with it, is to be dismissed by references to the family checkbook and having to pay one's bills. It doesn't matter how many studies find that borrowed money invested in infrastructure will help create robust job growth in the future and economic growth that will repay the borrowing. Studies? What are they?

     Here's a study for you: a group calling itself the Council on Competitiveness issued an update in September of its report on the subject, titled "Rising Above the Gathering Storm Revisited: Rapidly Approaching Category 5." It concluded that "in spite of the efforts of both those in government and the private sector, the outlook for America to compete for quality jobs has further deteriorated over the past five years."

     Pulitzer prize-winning New York Times economist-columnist Paul Krugman quoted former Massachusetts Institute of Technology president Charles M. Vest's comments on the report. "Here is a little dose of reality about where we actually rank today," he said: sixth in global innovation-based competitiveness, but 40th in rate of change over the last decade; 11th among industrialized nations in the fraction of 25- to 34-year-olds who have graduated from high school; 16th in college completion rate proportion of college students receiving degrees in science or engineering; 48th in quality of K-12 math and science education; 29th in the number of mobile phones per 100 people; and 22nd in broadband Internet access.

     The consequences are reflected in statistics about national well-being like being 24th in life expectancy at birth (this is among industrialized nations, remember). When the UN Development Programme (UNDP) did its most recent assessment of 182 countries, looking at statistics like life expectancy, literacy, school enrolment and gross domestic product per capita, they concluded that the United States ranks number 13 as a place to live.

     Said Vrest, "This is not a pretty picture, and it cannot be wished away." But any American politician who dares to grant any degree of authority to the United Nations, or who suggests that our reign as The Number One Country in the World might be ending just like the ascendancies of so many countries before it, would have touched the metaphorical "third rail" of our political system and would quickly be voted out of office.

     Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821) wrote in 1811: "Toute nation a le gouvernement qu'elle merite." The statement has become part of American political lore: "Every nation has the government it deserves." We are about to get the government we deserve. The situation brings to mind another piece of wisdom commonly passed around: "Be careful what you wish for, because you might just get it."

     There is a name, a very intellectual name, for the kind of arrogant, spoiled assumption of superiority that so many angry everyday Americans have: exceptionalism. Something happened at the time our Constitution has founded, and has continued through the time of our Manifest Destiny (if the term isn't familiar from history class, you could look it up) and through the challenge of the Great Depression and the Second World War, that makes us the model and ideal for people everywhere-God Bless America. Or so the mind-numbing phrases go. But just as environmental research has made it clear there is no more "away" to which we can simply throw things, so also recent globalization has made it clear there are no exceptions. When it comes to climate, we are all in this together.

     I'll risk a look into the future: I believe that when students of history look back at early 21st century America, climate change denial will be seen as the most significant aspect of this election. The Democrats will be faulted as well, for not asserting themselves and taking bold enough action. Citizens of the future will have nothing but contempt for the way we kept sleepwalking into the future when the planet's greatest crisis was at hand. Disbelief that Hitler was persecuting the Jews will be cited one of the few comparable examples of willful ignorance.

     Enjoy your moment of satisfaction at the expense of the intellectual elite, Tea Partiers. The party will end soon enough.

 

Comments

[Ronald Newton]

The reason we have a gap in education is that some people have more money than others. Some people believe that they should run the lives of others. Me? I'm trying to use what I have to keep what I have.