China vs. United States II

• The United States has produced the most Nobel laureates, dominated in the number of modern-day innovations, and seen the birth of the largest collection of influential entrepreneurs. While the Americans have been lamenting its educational quality, the Chinese have been working hard at emulating it. What has been condemned in the U.S. education system seems to be precisely what the Chinese wish to have. In Chinese schools, students are to receive knowledge rather than creating their own, which takes place increasingly in American schools.
• What the Chinese find valuable in American education is a decentralized, autonomous system that does not have national standards, uses multiple criteria for judging the value of talents, and celebrates individual differences. However, what the Chinese enthusiastically embrace is just what the Americans have been as enthusiastically trying to be rid of. In spite of its faults, American education has not been as good as the Chinese at killing creativity and the entrepreneurial spirit. American students have more play time that does not help master content. It does, however, seem to help them learn to socialize, manage relationships, and become responsible and independent.

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