The Smartest Kids In The World, Ripley - B +

                                               This book has received a vast amount of mainstream attention.  The fact that it is a topic I doubt I've ever read a word about yet it crossed my radar is proof enough. I've always thought that the key to a successful childhood education is parents who insisted on effort, achievement and accountability. Results would be even better in a school system that focuses on the same.  I've also believed that the great detractor from success in America is distraction - tv for most of my life and now, video games and social media.  The author sets out to find the answer to the question of why so many countries do better on international testing than the US.  Her methodology is fascinating: she analyzes the experiences of American exchange students in S. Korea, Finland and Poland. Each country is more successful than the US for similar, but different, reasons.  The South Koreans school day is  twice as long as the rest of the world's.  After the high school day is over, just about everyone goes to the cram schools that teach preparation for a nationwide test. Korean kids go to these 'hagwons' until 10:pm. The system works, but everyone deplores its intensity and emotional drain on all concerned. As for the Poles, they jump started their entry into the free world by decentralizing, educating their teachers, and emphasizing that school was critical to survive in a post-communist Europe. It is the Finns, though, that the author holds up as the best. The Finns concluded that the way to improve their country's prospects was to hire the best and the brightest to teach their children. It is as hard for a Finn to enter one of their teacher prep colleges as it is for an American to enter an Ivy League school. Respect for the profession is high and the result is one of the best educated populaces in the world. Ripley sums up by emphasizing rigor - you must work, because it's important. There must be accountability, and she takes a well-deserved shot at America's focus on children's self-esteem that leads to social promotions and a refusal to let 'Johnny' know there are consequences to indifferent effort and results.  She points out that in the adult world there are unending consequences to middling performances.  As the oldest child of a woman who today would be called a 'Tiger Mom', notwithstanding the fact she was no more Asian than she was a Yale Law professor, I am thankful for being held accountable for my actions. Good parenting knows no time, racial, or economic limits.  I am certain that the post-war NYC Catholic school system was not terribly different than the day to day life of all of my Jewish friends in NYC's public schools. I would further surmise that the public school lives of my Protestant friends in rural Texas or Indiana also emphasized rigor, accountability, and responsibility.  I suspect today's educators probably aren't interested in turning the clock back 50 years, but there might be some lessons to be learned there.