The last 10 years have been a major global educational decline
Despite all the supposed enlightened teaching methods and policies, the Economist reports that the data speaks louder than rhetoric. Even before Covid (and Covid definitely had a negative impact on young people) it is clear whatever policies we have been enacting the last 10 years have been failing our kids. This goes beyond Oregon, that despite record spending, has become a special backwards place as some of the worst schools in the country.
This is a global trend. Test scores in many other first world countries shows gloomy trends. For two decades analysts at the OECD, a club of mostly rich countries, have been asking 15-year-olds in dozens of places to sit comparable exams for what is known as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). In 2018 these tests found that a typical 15-year-old in the OECD countries was no more adept at math, reading, or science than had been the case in the early and mid-2000s. In science and reading, scores had generally risen until 2009 and 2012 respectively, after which they fell back down. In math they largely plateaued.
A lot of Europe is pointing their fingers directly at digital learning and is starting to ban digital learning devices:
Sweden: Dropped compulsory digital tools in preschools, banned tablets for children under two, and invested millions in physical textbooks to reverse declining reading scores.
The Netherlands: Removed phones, smartwatches, and tablets from classrooms, corridors, and cafeterias, with most schools reporting better concentration and behavior.
Denmark: Banned mobile phones and tablets during class hours, returning to physical textbooks after a decade of heavy digital learning.
Spain (Madrid): Planned restrictions to limit computer and tablet use in primary state schools to two hours a week.
Other Nations: Finland and Norway are reintroducing physical books in early education, while France and Italy enforce strict bans or limits on mobile devices.
I suspect it’s a combination of Covid era isolation and social disruption, social media, digital devices, and now provably failing ‘new’ teaching methods.
There’s an amazing preponderance of evidence that social media is causing untold amounts of mental health issues in young folks: anxiety, inability to concentrate or hold attention, and other psychological problems in young people. There’s solid data that now says that learning from digital devices is much worse than simply reading books. Educational methods from 50 years ago are again producing dramatically better results than everything that has come since.
