School Reform Based on Bad Comparisons
Last Sunday CNN aired a one hour show featuring reporter Morgan Spurlock as part of the Inside Man series where he attempted to compare the U S public education system to the public system in Finland. Spurlock in this report also attempted to investigate why Finnish students have been judged to be the the top academic performers in the western world as measured by the PISA assessment. His report also attempted to get some ideas that the U S could borrow to improve American student performance in the basic skills.
In Spurock's initial discussions with education leaders in Finland, the show described the huge difference in the emphasis on standardized testing in Finland compared to our country. The Finns have been able to produce superior academic performance of their K-12 students while using almost no standardized testing.Instead they insist emphatically that they trust their school principals to run the schools and the principals trust the teachers to properly instruct the students without the use of
In Spurock's initial discussions with education leaders in Finland, the show described the huge difference in the emphasis on standardized testing in Finland compared to our country. The Finns have been able to produce superior academic performance of their K-12 students while using almost no standardized testing.Instead they insist emphatically that they trust their school principals to run the schools and the principals trust the teachers to properly instruct the students without the use of
