China's Poorest Beat Our Best Pupils By: Sherman

Summary:
British schoolchildren are lagging so far behind their peers in the Far East that even pupils from wealthy backgrounds are now performing worse in exams than the poorest students in China, an international study shows. The children of factory workers and cleaners in parts of the Far East are more than a year ahead of the offspring of British doctors and lawyers. Researchers said the study, which looked at the performance of 15-year-olds in mathematics, showed countries to could overcome traditional social class divides to raise education standards among relatively deprived pupils. The report was published as a senior European Commission politician attacked the standards of British schools and warned that UK politicians must improve the education system before focusing on changing the country’s relationship with the EU. Overall, the UK was ranked just 26th for maths, 23rd for reading and 21st for science while China’s Shanghai district was the top-rated jurisdiction in each subject. The study assessed how students would be able to use their maths knowledge and skills in real life, rather than just repeating facts and figures. As part of the study, children were asked to name their parents’ occupation to determine its effect on pupil performance. Across the world, children whose parents work in professional careers generally outperform those in elementary jobs such as caterers, cleaners, factory workers and labourers. In the United States and the United Kingdom, where professionals are among the highest-paid in the world, students whose parents work as professionals do not perform as well in mathematics as children of professionals in other countries — nor do they perform as we as the children in Shanghai-China and Singapore whose parents work in manual occupations.

Opinion:

In my opinion, I believe that it has to do with the Chinese culture of discipline, hard work and not loosing face that fuels the academic performance of chinese kids. Many Asian children have very strict parents therefore urging them to study even harder. As the typical Chinese parent always says, without good grades, you are never going to be successful. Therefore, I believe that since all children want to be successful in life, they will all then study hard and achieve their goals.