Let’s get smarter

Let’s face it, America has failed the first semester of the coronavirus pandemic. We have more than 5 million cases of the disease and about 20% of the world’s fatalities, and no political spin can change the facts on the ground. Many factors have led to our county’s failures, but among the most striking is the lack of belief in science, and our vexing inconsistency in following recommendations on social distancing and wearing masks.  In a 2018 video where he tried to clearly show the world is round, famed astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson blamed the rise of the flat-Earth theory on two things: “One, we live in a country that protects free speech,” and “We live in a country with a failed educational system,” he said. In America’s all-out effort to be the greatest nation in the world – to have the best economy, the most advanced society, and freedoms to be the envy of all nations – we seem to have forgotten the smartest people in the room usually win the game. When it comes to our education system – the very backbone of our prosperity and exceptionalism – we’ve fallen from the top to the middle of the pack. When weighed against countries where higher education is highly prioritized, and mostly free, our system is mediocre. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders campaigned for “Free College for Everyone!” as his rallying cry. Free is simply not a feasible model for higher education. But it’s time we start putting greater emphasis on funding higher education. During a Worcester Business Journal webinar on Aug. 11, educators and leaders from local universities – including Paul Reville, the former Mass. secretary of education and now professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education – said the government support for colleges and universities has become woefully inadequate, to the point where a number of institutions might not survive the financial crisis stemming from the coronavirus pandemic. While not every college needs to be saved, especially those with bloated costs who are not offering competitive value for the educational dollar, we do need to provide substantially more support for students, and the industry as a whole. Federal spending on higher education programs is about $75 billion. That federal figure is actually exceeded by the combined spending of the 50 states on their own colleges and universities. More needs to be done, and the obvious place to look for that investment is on the federal level. What good will our military strength do if we are not investing in the best scientists, the best innovators, the best entrepreneurs, the best doctors, the best teachers, the best tradespeople, and the best problem solvers to drive our economic growth? The GI Bill, which helped fund college education for a generation of returning World War II veterans, was transformative, helped expand our middle class, and launch a sustained period of growth and prosperity in our country. Economic success will increasingly rely on the skills and education of our workforce, and the need for more citizens to get associates and bachelor’s degrees is directly related to our ability to compete on the world stage. Another benefit of more Americans achieving a college degree is more of us will understand our history, communicate more effectively, be more likely to trust science, and be able to sort fact from opinion. Those are important skills today, and critical skills for tomorrow if our nation is to maintain its position of leadership.