Many East Asian countries, such as China and South Korea, continue to climb to the top of the charts of PISA scores, an international high school assessment exam. On the other hand, the United States is ranked 16th in the world in term of student literacy, and even lower in mathematics (and it wasn’t a very close call, either). What can be concluded of these results? It would be much too facile to immediately conclude that these scores directly correlate with actual student intelligence levels. Instead, cultural expectations and high-stakes exams seem to lie parallel to student achievement in higher education.
Every year, a new batch of American high schoolers begin to prepare for their college entrance exams with an amalgam of dread, excitement, apathy, and anxiety. Student typically do not prepare considerably far in advance (at most, a high schooler will start preparing 2 years ahead of the testing date, though the average may be around 6 months), and if an undesirable score is received, students may take it multiple times between fall of their junior year and winter of their senior year. In addition, these exams aren’t the end all, be all of higher education in America. College admissions take a holistic approach, also examining high school grades, extracurriculars, personal essays, and in-person interviews to determine an applicant’s acceptance or rejection. Thought in many East Asian countries, the college entrance exams are seen as the make or break event that will affect the rest of one’s future, and not just academically.
Once school ends in the afternoon, South Korean students rush immediately to hagwons, private test-prep centers that run until 10pm. They’re preparing for the once-annual, multiple choice, 8-hour-long College Scholastic Ability Test, or CSAT. As the test is administered, cars and planes come to a halt to minimize noise and disturbances, and families anxiously wait and furiously pray outside the testing center for their beloved students. If a student receive an undesirable score, he or she will wait an entire year to take the CSAT again, studying daily. According to The Economist, only 2% of graduating high schoolers attend South Korea’s coveted SKY universities, and the CSAT is the main determining factor of admittance. Compare this to the 66% of American graduating high schoolers that attend college (noted by the National Center for Education Statistics). It’s not just the high stakes and low acceptance rates that drive this nearly-overkill work ethic in many East Asian countries, but also the cultural expectation of determining one’s self-worth through a single test score.
In America, it’s not entirely expected for every student to pursue academia. Though perhaps not on an equal level, a sizeable amount of families support students who wish to enter the arts, sports , agriculture, and more. “I’m still a kid! I should have fun and enjoy life while I can!” is the motto for many American high school students. The American system accepts and admires the creative individual. Alternatively, instead of focusing on the present, many East Asian students claim “I’m
nearly an adult! I should prepare to be one!”. Their education level directly correlates to social status, thus the CSAT is seen as the only path to a better, more prosperous life. While many Americans can find personal satisfaction and social acceptance in a wide variety of education levels and careers, East Asians tend to view academia as the only road to success and will go great lengths to shame those who go a different direction.
The overall school environment also lends itself to differing educational pressures between these two regions of the world. American students have room for a variety of non-academic electives, after-school sports, and social extracurriculars. There is flexibility within the curriculum; students are able to advance or hold back as much as they need. For example, during my freshman year of high school, some of my classmates were taking Algebra 1 while others took AP Calculus, without an extreme amount of social stigma or praise for either end of the spectrum. Though in China, all students of the same age are held to the same academic standards, and there is minimal room for any other activities (with the exception of music lessons, though the instruments are not the student’s choice).
Chinese teachers are extremely well-respected, with their own widely-celebrated national holiday, Teachers’ Day and no taxes on their salary. In Vietnam, students even visit their teachers’ homes on every major holiday, showering them with gifts and praise. This admiration dates back to the Confucian education model in ancient times, when scholars were at the top of the social ladder. The American education system, on the other hand, has a much more relaxed environment, taking individual-needs into account and viewing teachers on a much more casual level.
It normalises sweaty women, strips back the layer of perfection which we are taught to maintain at all times in order to be desirable or valued. It encourages women to please themselves, not to live in fear of what others will think.
by CLAIRE TRAN