

US building education system to compete with India, China: Obama - newacc
http://obama.wsj.com/article/055Y7TObV7dHu?q=Obama+AND+(foreign+affairs+OR+foreign+relations+OR+foreign+policy+OR+Israel+OR+Gaza+OR+West+Bank+OR+Iraq+OR+India+OR+Afghanistan+OR+Guantanamo+OR+Pakistan+OR+Nuclear+Weapons+OR+Iran+OR+Energy+security+OR+Diplomacy+OR+Europe+OR+European+OR+Terrorism+OR+Al+Qaeda+OR+Defense+OR+imports+OR+exports+OR+Global+Environment)

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tokenadult
The bad news: once upon a time, not so long ago, it would have been
unimaginable for a United States President to announce that the United States
education system considered India and China its competition.

The good news: once upon a time, even more recently, it would have been
unimaginable for a man socially identified as "black" to become President,
especially after lengthy childhood residence in Indonesia. So there is a
President who understands other countries, and who wants to make sure that the
United States steps up to meet world standards in education. As an American
who has lived overseas myself, I figure it's good that this issue finally is
getting attention.

From the linked Times of India article, the primary source:

"'At the start of my administration I set a goal for America: By 2020, this
nation will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the
world. We used to have that. We're going to have it again,' Obama said amidst
applause from the audience."

What do all of you think about defining the education goal in these terms? Is
having the highest percentage of college graduates really the main issue?

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jdminhbg
I think defining the educational goal in those terms is rhetorical shorthand
for 'employing the most teachers/instructors/professors,' not for 'having the
most educated workforce.'

~~~
tokenadult
_I think defining the educational goal in those terms is rhetorical shorthand
for 'employing the most teachers/instructors/professors,'_

I'm afraid that may be what is really going on.

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ojbyrne
From the CIA World Factbook, Literacy in the 3 countries:

India 60.1%

China 90.9%

USA 99%

Seems like by that benchmark, India at least, isn't really competition.

~~~
tokenadult
The literacy figure for China would be quite doubtful, as well, and definitely
based on a more relaxed standard of "literacy" than in the United States. By
official Chinese government survey,

[http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-03/07/content_5812838...](http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-03/07/content_5812838.htm)

barely more than half of the population in China is even conversant in the
national standard language.

~~~
v3rt
However, all Chinese languages use the same written representation, so any
Chinese person speaking a dialect of Chinese that is literate is as literate
as a Mandarin-speaker.

~~~
tokenadult
This is doubtful as well, because the standard modern written language is
based on the vocabulary and grammatical structures of Mandarin. (I am well
aware of this, as someone who has lived for years in places where Mandarin is
the official language, but the home language of most elementary pupils is a
non-Mandarin Sinitic language.) A fairly detailed response to the claim that
Chinese characters provide common literacy for people who can't understand one
another over the telephone can be found in

[http://www.amazon.com/Chinese-Language-Fantasy-John-
DeFranci...](http://www.amazon.com/Chinese-Language-Fantasy-John-
DeFrancis/dp/0824810686/)

or

[http://www.amazon.com/Ideogram-Chinese-Characters-
Disembodie...](http://www.amazon.com/Ideogram-Chinese-Characters-Disembodied-
Meaning/dp/0824826566/)

For your convenience, I can link a deep look into one of those books through a
focused search on Google Books:

[http://books.google.com/books?id=fRqKreZFVTYC&pg=PA10...](http://books.google.com/books?id=fRqKreZFVTYC&pg=PA10&lpg=PA10&dq=myth+literacy+China&source=bl&ots=1ZWwm_q4Ri&sig=NJWWWeSeHH97b63mX15X-xjToGU&hl=en&ei=NxBeSpjQE9PEmQeMtL1_&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2)

