Poll: What level of education have you reached

Thanks. My understanding is that it's hard to compare US secondary education to European-style because in the US there is very little (maybe even no?) differentiation between students and material taught, out of an 'equality' social norm. (from what I hear even people who are mentally not very well developed and would in Europe be send to a 'special' school are mixed together with all other students in the US). Did you feel this difference? I suppose that in the Atheneum you had mostly fair to good students around you, from middle- and upper class families (I'm not familiar with the school itself, just extrapolating from similar ones). That may have been different in a public school in a more urban environment. If you would have gone to a 'beroepsschool' downtown Antwerp, the contrast maybe wouldn't have been so big :)

I'm not sure yet if one system is better than the other though. Empirically, it seems that somehow US universities come out on top in the end after all, considering that the quality and amount of research products is higher in the US than in Europe (even when restricted to EU-12 to account for the historical disadvantage Eastern Europe had and compared on a per-capita basis).

I also have no reason to believe (haven't read any research) that the quality of life or psychological development is better or worse (for any objective measure thereof) for US vs European high school students. 10 years ago when Slashdot had several 3000+ post threads on Jon Katz' essays on bullying of geeks in US high schools (after the Columbine shootings), a popular complaint there was that the US system somehow exacerbated bullying because of this mixing of people that put the future convict in the same class room as the future professor. Reading those stories however didn't seem worse than what my high school (in Belgium) was like.

Sorry for derailing the thread :)

It might not be completely on topic with the thread, but I (personally) don't think it's that far off.

I had a couple of friends from my lagere school (like middle school and elementary wrapped in to one) which I attended at Lagere school Prinsstraat in downtown Antwerp that went to a beroupsschool (like a career college but starting younger during high school years). So I know there was a big difference in their lives both during their school years, and I would even venture to say their current lives. I think the atmosphere of a beroupsschool would be a lot more like the high school I went to in Colorado.

Unfortunately I don't have any experience with universities from either side so I'm not sure how those would compare.

On the note of bullying; My father is American while my mom is Belgian; when I was younger (from age 1 through age 12) we moved around a lot - from country to country and then from state to state. When my parents separated, I moved back to Belgium with my mom and I experienced tons of discrimination for being the "American". When I moved to the States at the age of 14/15, I was discriminated for being the "Belgian". I don't think there was much difference in that aspect at least form my personal experience.

In the end I think the educational system in the US has a lot of room for improvement, and as it was 15 years ago, the material being taught was at least 2 years behind the material I was being taught back in Belgium.