MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Asian countries in top five spots of OECD global schooling performance
The biggest global school rankings have been published, with Asian countries in the top five spots and African countries at the bottom. Singapore heads the table, followed by Hong Kong, with Ghana at the bottom. The UK is in 20th place, among higher achieving European countries, with the US in 28th. Read full article
Comments
Disclaimer & comment rulesCongratulations to all these Asian countries,
May 13th, 2015 - 11:13 am - Link - Report abuse 0Britain down in 20th, shameful, we need get our bloody finger out of our backside and follow these guys...
Argentina at no: 62 out of 76, below Brazil at no: 60 Uruguay at no: 55 and Chile at no: 48, top ranked in Latin America.
May 13th, 2015 - 02:49 pm - Link - Report abuse 0http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-32608772
sure glad someone was below us,
May 13th, 2015 - 06:30 pm - Link - Report abuse 0imagine how embarrassing if the like of Argentina was above us,
she would be screaming sovereignty over intelligence...lol
If you could see the conditions in schools at Uruguay and the constant crap that came down onto the teachers shoulders from Pepe AND the fact kids can leave school at 15 and join their stinking, idle parents in 'The Poor' it's amazing they got to 55.
May 13th, 2015 - 07:14 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Could it be that the kids here are being conned into thinking that “being famous” is the way to success ? Programs such as Big Brother and TOWIE seem to be the passport to wealth requiring nothing more than a vacant mind.
May 13th, 2015 - 08:20 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I remember seeing an interview with one of the leading micro bioligists in the country who was retraining as a plumber because he could make over twice his salary. The young man was a leader in his field of research but could hardly pay his modest mortgage on the money he was receiving. What a scandal and waste of talent.
Engineers and scientists are grossly undervalued in this country as companies do not plough enough into research but chase the quick buck.
@ 5 Clyde15
May 13th, 2015 - 09:12 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Twas always thus.
As the technical director of a GEC company (under Weinstock) my salary was HALF that of the sales director and I had Group responsibilities to the GEC Group Technical Director.
I still regret not moving to the states when I was offered a VP role in a major industrial corporation when I was 38 YO.
The wife didn't want to leave her mother, but I did! :o)
Water under the bridge now.
Big Brother and TOWIE
May 14th, 2015 - 10:27 am - Link - Report abuse 0totally agree,
some of them think great Yarmouth was in another country,
some today don't even know where the UK is on a map.
#5
May 14th, 2015 - 03:02 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I was in fact faced with this same decision myself, I was offered roughly twice my current salary to work on financial modelling.
The UK in particular is quite bad at rewarding scientists and engineers. For science, and academia in particular, I think this is somewhat of a supply and demand issue - there are a huge number of people wanting to be scientists but very few positions. In Astronomy and Cosmology the UK creates approximately 15-20 times as many PhD students as there are new or vacant faculty positions.
@ 6 ChrisR
May 14th, 2015 - 03:21 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Commercially speaking sales is the prime function, for two reasons first it is the only activity which contributes towards profit, everything else contributes towards cost and second until a sale is made nobody else does anything.
That is the theory anyway.
@ 9 Pugol-H
May 14th, 2015 - 05:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Oh, I know the theory, pity the reality is far from what they are supposed to do.
Who, running a large company, has not had to pull out all the stops plus more at a financial penalty to do what the sales promised the customer just to make their life easy?
If you promise the world to a customer who would blame them for accepting?
@10 ChrisR
May 14th, 2015 - 05:26 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Perhaps I should declare I’m a former salesman of many years, however before that and since in production.
I do know what you’re talking about from both sides of the fence.
In fairness sales is seldom easy, it’s very Darwinian in fact, however there is a difference between a salesman, who gets what he wants, and an order taker who just gives things away.
I always said to non-sales critics, put your name to a budget (one you have to get in, not one you have to spend) and come out and play with the big boys and let’s see how long you last.
@ 11 Pugol-H
May 14th, 2015 - 06:27 pm - Link - Report abuse 0“Perhaps I should declare I’m a former salesman”
Yes, I thought you were.
The really bad thing about sales (and it seems this is universal) is how, when they have given their 'sales programme' for manufacturing to ensure the product is available 'as programme' and this same 'programme' doesn't materialise and we have spent the money to produce what they stated they NEEDED, they then get all defensive and claim it was “only an estimate”.
My people never failed to come up with the goods. Pity sales always did.
I was really pleased when I managed to start up for myself. No more accepting excuses from 'sales'.
I am sure you didn't have any such problems! :o)
@12 ChrisR
May 14th, 2015 - 07:25 pm - Link - Report abuse 0As I said, I have seen it from both sides of the fence and could go on about it ad infinitum from both ways.
Ultimately the production side of things is far more within your own control than the sales/market side ever is.
And a lot does depend on how good your salesman is, the good ones get to write their own pay cheques, bad ones quickly go extinct.
I did very well for many years in sales, these days I like driving 10 mins to work and back, doing regular hours, ok less money but I definitely don’t miss the M25 on Friday afternoons.
Plus I get to complain about those dammed sales people.
@ 13 Pugol-H
May 14th, 2015 - 10:17 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Best of luck to you, I imagined you had retired!
It's hard to compare education systems now with 60 + years ago.
May 15th, 2015 - 09:11 am - Link - Report abuse 0I started primary school in 1946. We had slates and chalk as paper was in short supply. We were grounded in arithmetic, English grammar and spelling.
Discipline was hard ! Teachers were in control of the class and by and large, parents would back the teachers in disciplinary matters.
Selection at age 12, for secondary education was based on academic ability at examination.
The top group were “grammar school” material and the bottom group were given “vocational teaching” as the “future hewers of wood and drawers of water”
Not the best way to decide a child's future !
At secondary school, my course was decided for me. Their was almost no choice. English and mathematics was compulsory . I also took physics, chemistry and French. German I took for two years and then dropped as it was only permitted to take 5 subjects to Higher exam level for university entrance qualifications. There were only two results possible in an exam PASS or FAIL !
I f you failed in English, it was almost impossible to obtain admission to university.
Only 15% of the school population were considered suitable for university
courses.
I am sure that the current generation are no better or worse than previous generations in intelligence BUT something has gone badly wrong somewhere.
To me, the obvious thing that has gone wrong is the lack of discipline in schools and parents interfering with teaching methods. Let the teachers teach and get the government off their backs with umpteen tests that only supply meaningless statistics. As far as I can see, schools now skew their tests to get higher up the ratings charts to the detriment of educating the pupils.
Also, the proliferation of “universities” which are no more than jumped up further education colleges.
As the sun is shining, time to stop my rant !
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