The UK's education system is ranked sixth best in the developed world

[dinkybinky]

The UK's education system is ranked sixth best in the developed world, according to a global league table published by education firm Pearson.

The first and second places are taken by Finland and South Korea.

The rankings combine international test results and data such as graduation rates between 2006 and 2010.

Sir Michael Barber, Pearson's chief education adviser, says successful countries give teachers a high status and have a "culture" of education.

International comparisons in education have become increasingly significant - and this latest league table is based upon a series of global test results combined with measures of education systems, such as how many people go on to university.

This composite picture puts the UK in a stronger position than the influential Pisa tests from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) - which is also one of the tests included in this ranking.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-20498356

@copt - your anecdotal offering is based on rich Chinese kids with drivers and servants who attend your international school. Its like me holding up as an example a pushy mom that has been tutoring her kid since yr 1 in order to pass the 11+ at her super selective North London GS. Neither is typical of their respective countries.

Also, parents send their children to study here partly for snobbery reasons and partly because of the limited places at HK Uni and Poly. Or are you telling me that Metropolitan, Greenwich, South Bank and friends are attracting the Chinese because of their academic excellence?

it's funny how some people readily accept a survey that has us 6th but pooh pooh any survey that has us lowly ranked.

APMF You raised the pushy Hong Kong Parent as a model, based on what apart from stereotype I am not sure, for how we should all be pushing our children more. The anecdotal offering is of the fallout behind the stereotype. Those are the HK parents pushy enough to send their offspring to International Schools because of the widespread disenchantment with the local system amongst parents and employers alike. It is generally acknowledged that the local exam system relies too much on tutoring for rote learned tests of model answers and so is not a test of ability and the education system does not produce pupils with the skills of team working, creativity, debate, in the English Language needed by employers and universities. The HK ED has made changes to address the issues but as always it moves slowly.

It's not snobbery, though a different sort of status is important in HK, being ambitious for your DC in HK equates to getting them a western education and buying the best brand you can access academically and economically, hence the emphasis on Wycombe and Winchester, and Harvard and Yale, but if not the western education brand is attractive generally. The majority of Chinese students in tertiary establishments are of course mainland Chinese.

I wouldn't argue you shouldn't care about your child, just that you should have the empathy to know what will best meet their needs and build their confidence. There is a lot of middle ground between pushing your child to the point of abuse into Wycombe or NLCS and Oxbridge and giving them no challenges or boundaries. When a parent comes on here and says what do I have to do to get my DC into Oxbridge, I will do anything to realize my their dream, then quite rightly a lot of Mumnetters whose DCs have been through the application process, or work there, will say "woah, it is so competitive there is an element of lottery, don't set your DC up to think they failed, there are a lot of good unis out there, be more open minded."

However I agree that all the UKs place in the global education marketplace illustrates is that when the British Education system is at it's best, it is amongst the world's best. It was my point entirely that the problem is the gap between the best, and the students it lets down. I work with a charity that aims to mentor bright children from Jamaican backgrounds in underperforming inner London Schools , to provide them with models and the incentive to push themselves, often in the face of substantial peer pressure. When they get to Oxbridge they get firsts.

My 'model' is based on the HK Chinese that I knew as Uni students and from the 6 months I worked there. My experience has been with 'ordinary' Chinese as opposed to the rich ones that attended your international school. The two aren't the same in the same way that your pushy super selective GS mom is not typical of us Brits.

Your average Chinese kid is not worked to the point of exhaustion although I can understand how some Brit parents may consider 2 hours homework per night as being exhausting work :)

Basically, my point is that the UK working class attitude towards education simply does not exist among the HK working class. If you were to examine the typical WC mom in HK you probably find her similar to Pro Active Mildly Pushy UK GS mom :)

.... you also mention that the HK Chinese lacked creativity, team work-ing skills etc. You obviously haven't met the narrow minded, back stabbing me me me SOBs in my London office :)

I accept that the HK Chinese mentality isn't going to produce authors and poets in the same class as the UK. I guess that they just have to settle for having a general population that is literate in a mechanical way :)

I wonder if we have shot up the world league tables due to the amount of tutoring and parental input our children receive.

APMF My experience of Hong Kong is being married to someone who grew up in Mong Kok, living and working there in the Hong Kong Civil Service and at HKU for three years, completing a Masters in Chinese Studies and now in the process of completing a PhD. I doubt very much you have the slightest idea what the "typical Hong Kong Working Class mother" is like. The majority will be very basically educated immigrants from Guangdong who are pushing barrows around the markets, trading across the border, working in SMEs, or taking whatever economic opportunities arise, living with a family of 5 in 50 sq ft. The children who have emerged from that background, though many would be raised in Guangdong by Grandparents, would struggle to get the bare minimum of homework done just because they share their living space with so many others and a TV, and the expectation would be that they will follow in their parents footsteps following whatever economic opportunities there might be on either side of the border, and hopefully not getting involved with the Triads. They may have a stronger work ethic but academia does not beckon. Also amongst the WC mothers would be the Phillipinos, Nepalese and other immigrants that the Hong Kong provide with no Cantonese language training to enable them to access the education system (despite the considerable contribution they make to the HK economy, especially in the case of the ex Gurkhas) whose children are schooled by whoever has some knowledge, in disused buildings with whatever books they can scavenge. Or perhaps they are fishermen, or islanders, or farm in the New Territories.

I doubt very much you have ever known well someone who wasn't middle class from Hong Kong, and probably most were from the minority who are actually from Hong Kong, and not immigrants from the mainland in the last few decades. As the SARs crisis highlighted even the solidly middle class live in crowded flats that are too small to be healthy (the SARs virus was exceptionally transmitted by being directly sucked out of the soil pipe by decondensing water in the minute showers). It is these families who work all hours to pay for the tutoring etc to get through the local school exams. They do so because competition is intense and if they don't have the economic means to access an International Education or send their children overseas they have to play by the rules of the local education system, a relic of the Imperial examination system, with all the disadvantages I have already highlighted.

My friends who have advanced through the civil service had done so after a life dominated by cramming for exams , and generally were more driven by peer culture, and by the knowledge of what their parents had endured to get them to Hong Kong in the first place, than any pushyness by their proud and loving parents. And they believed that there was a need for change in their education system.

I would be very careful about drawing glib comparisons with a culture you do not fully understand.

It is a glib Daily Mail stereotype that all British working class parents are the feral underclass. I know plenty of working class parents who encourage their children and set firm boundaries for their behaviour, making sure that homework is done etc. The system fails those who do not have parental, and peer support, but it increasingly does not value those who are never going to be academic, those for whom a C in English was something they had to work very hard to achieve, even with parental support, and need opportunities that will enable them to meet their potential

Not unless there has been a radical shift in attitudes towards tutoring since the last set of figures were published.

APMF WTF? I accept that the HK Chinese mentality isn't going to produce authors and poets in the same class as the UK. I guess that they just have to settle for having a general population that is literate in a mechanical way Oh that would be why their film industry is admired the world over and by the greatest western filmmakers. Perhaps you should try reading some of their literature and poetry, and understanding the cultural context, try Eileen Chang to start with, readily available in translation. You probably didn't notice people from around the Chinese diaspora who regard her as the Chinese Jane Austen (but she is so much more) coming to Hong Kong to visit the landmarks she wrote about, in Repulse Bay, the wall in western etc. Try Lust, Caution first. Then make ignorant remarks like that.

@copt - I find it funny that you think that living the expat life and teaching rich Chinese kids at the international school equips you to generalise about working class Chinese. Yet me being working class and having grown up in a working class part of the Midlands is not equipped to generalise about the Brit working class.

Anyway, going from past experience when faced with a MNetter that feels a need to wheel out their CV before launching a protracted look at all my qualifications so in ya face post, things can only go downhill. So .... [reaches for HIDE button]

Just read your last post. Before I HIDE this thread, it was YOU that went on about how the Chinese that you know lack creativity because they are taught to pass exams. I sarcastically agreed with you and made the sarcastic comment that they just have to settle with being literate in a mechanical way. And now you are going WTF????

As for the HK film industry being much admired, I agree. No one makes a great kung fu movie like the HK Chinese :)

APMF Perhaps an education system that does not help develop people's talents is letting them down? It doesn't mean they will not go on to use their talents. If you think the Hong Kong Film Industry is just King Fu movies try this en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Mood_for_Love for a film that has won world wide acclaim.

And HKU is not an International School, it is Hong Kong University.

But doubtless you will want to hide, lets not get facts get in the way of some comfortable stereotypes.

NulliusInBlurba - "However, the point about the need for a culture that supports learning is actually pretty valid. One of the reasons Germany performs so poorly is that education is widely perceived by teachers and pupils as a play-it-dirty competition to eliminate weaklings and maintain the status quo rather than a genuine opportunity to teach all people as much as they are able to learn."

Interesting comment, that helps me put words on some of the things I feel about the French education system which also seems more concerned with selecting the strong/eliminating the weak (hence maintaining the status quo) than teaching useful skills to all.

This is not unique to France or Germany. It is seen by many countries that the bright should be developed at the expense of others especially where resources are limited. It makes sense that the very able should thrive, it is this group that will eventually inform policy in Government, be key decision makers, the best scientists, doctors, teachers etc. These are the best brains that will bring the most benefit to wider society.

Some children in local schools in singapore are on an accelerated programme - 'gifted' stream. Eventually the very best will have their time at outstanding universities completely funded by the Government. They will have to spend a few years working for the Government in return on graduation. Society benefits etc.

Hamishbear - that is not the issue. Clever, privileged French children are not developed particularly well at all - they are merely siphoned off into educational and professional paths that will ensure they retain power and privilege.

As they are in other countries and I share your concerns. It's about duty to wider society or perhaps the continuation of the system at the expense of the development and enrichment of the individual.

There is a difference, however, between examination systems that try to evaluate achievements in tangible skills and examination systems that are trying to eliminate the less privileged.

The problem with the very wide spread between the quality of the very best schools and teh very worst schools.

If we could improve or close the worst schools the average would rise dramatically. Our very best schools are undoubtedly among the best in the world but I suspect other coutries come higher up the ranking by just being more consistently good across the board but not spectacularly good. The UK education system is extrmely polarised.

I think there is very little chance for many underpriviledged children in the UK of accessing the best available education. Some might be lucky and make it but simply by virtue of finding maybe a teacher that inspires them to do well or a role model, or a huge inner drive to succeed, rather than accessing an institution of excellence. The latter are pretty much the preserve of the wealthy/well off/savvy. These inequalities exist everywhere to a certain extent, but I do think they are pretty exaggerated here in comparison to other countries. I think in the PISA report it indicated that too, ie that the UK was particularly good at segretating children by social class.

The lack of consistency is a huge problem and one most commonly swept under the carpet by defenders, as opposed to supporters, of the system in the uk.

More money is being spent on schools in deprived areas. Their facilities are better and attracting good graduates who want to prove themselves. Ask teachers in the so called mc areas who are actually upset that they cannot offer the same facilities because their children are perceived to be well off. Under performing schools are being associated with the heads of higher achieving schools. Maybe the key differences is role model. Some of the best leas are in deprived areas of London. I fail to see how much more the uk can do at the moment and I thinks these efforts are being reflected in the uk position. I would congratulate some of the teachers in these schools who are getting bright kids into the best universities despite coming from a challenging background. If the system only pushes the already bright kids from age 4 we will be missing a lot of bright and talented kids who start off at a lower level be come back with a vengeance.