The best educational system?

It is not hard to say that the American high school educational system is bad. While there are some advantages over its European counterparts, for the most part the students who graduate from American high schools know less and do worse on international tests, getting beaten by almost all other developed nations’ students. While this might be partially attributed to the fact that American high schools give the same education to everyone (even those that are not college bound) and thus has the problem of slowing down its most gifted students.

The solution to this problem is relatively simple: reform the public high school system to mirror the public university system. Though the latter has many problems of its own, its functionality is much better than that of the former. In essence, give individual households yearly cash vouchers good at any high school, private or public, and then simply make the cost of public high schools cheaper. The effect should be to make effective public high schools.

Granted, this plan might seem odd, but it has a high chance of success. At the very least, it allows the United States to maintain its systems benefits (flexibility) while reaping some benefits of better educational systems.