Final Inquiry Paper Final Draft

7/30/2019 Final Inquiry Paper Final Draft

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Nick Weigold

Carrie Sippy

ENGL 1102

April 9, 2013

“Final Inquiry Paper”

Competition could be defined to be a contest between two different parties to achieve one

common goal. It would not be unheard of for those involved in any competition to view being

the best as a challenge. Winning a contest involving countries throughout the world would be

considered an even greater task to accomplish.

In this essay, I will be discussing global competition in education. I will be addressing the

following: what it means to be globally competitive within education, how are countries

evaluated in order to measure their level of competitiveness, why countries must be competitive,

and what we, as the United States, must do in order to be better than our competitors.

To start, it is important to define what being globally competitive within education

means. Competitiveness is created when there is a desire to be better than or equal to another

person, organization or country. When applied to education competitiveness is all about who has

the overall best educational system. Specifically, my topic of inquiry is global competition in

education, which means I was interested in how different countries strive to have the best

educational system in the world.

In exploring global competition in education, the question of what criteria is used to

evaluate countries should be considered. It is important to understand how it is determined



whether or not a country is “competitive”. In conducting my primary research through surveys, I

asked the question “How do you think a country is deemed competitive in education or not?” I

got a variety of answers to this question. Some sources believed that being classified as

competitive is all based on a country’s global status in education, according to rankings in

comparison to other countries. Another source stated that a country is deemed competitive based

on the successfulness of educating their students, which could be reflected in how these students

perform their jobs once they complete school.

While searching for secondary sources, I stumbled upon two different articles that were

about international rankings in higher education. Both of these sources agreed that rankings can

measure the successfulness of a country’s higher education system. Ellen Hazelkorn, author of

“Rankings and the Battle for World-Class Excellence: Institutional Strategies and Policy

Choices”, states that rankings create a sense of competition between universities across the globe

because every country wants to look strong, so there is a desire to be at the top of the rankings

(5). The other article, “Constructing National Ranking Methodology: Dilemmas, Choices, and

Decisions”, discusses the areas in which universities across the globe compete, and how this

competition is reflected in rankings (Larionova 76). Essentially, these rankings can determine

whether a country is competitive or not, but they are constantly being criticized because anyone

can create these rankings, and there is no set scale to grade educational systems.

In conducting primary research, I also interviewed my mother, Tracey Weigold, a high

school calculus teacher. I asked her “How do you think a countr y’s educational system is deemed

competitive or not?” Her reply was a short answer, “A countr y’s level of competitiveness would

be based on their measureable success in educating students.” I then asked, “What does it means

to be successful?” Her response was, “In my opinion, being successful in education is based on



the readiness of students to enter their next level of education and/or the workforce. Do they

have the skills to problem solve and apply critical thinking strategies which ultimately will

determine their effectiveness as employees and contributing members to the community”

(Weigold). After hearing this, I thought more about the purpose of education.

In doing research, I found an interesting statement in an article written by William

Mathis. Mathis states “In a democracy, schools are designed to serve more than just a narrow

economic purpose. They are to develop good citizens and good human beings who will

contribute to the health and welfare of their society” (95). This supports my claim that whether

or not a country is competitive is not based solely on how successful they are at ensuring their

citizens are knowledgeable. I say this because in some countries students are not only trying to

obtain content knowledge, but they are also trying to develop their character traits and overall

become a better person. This gave me the idea that whether a country is seen as educationally

competitive or not could be hard to determine because the purpose and focus of education varies

for every country.

For example, education in China serves a strictly economic purpose; their goal is to

create the best workers to later help strengthen their economy. China’s focus in education is on

producing more doctors and engineers, simply because they have more people (Mathis 91). But

here in the United States we do not have as many people, so we do not have the same educational

needs. The goal of our education system is to create great workers that are also citizens that

contribute to the wellbeing of our society. Therefore, China could be seen as not competitive in

our eyes because they do not share these similar goals in their educational system.



From here I began to explore why we must be competitive within education. In short,

being competitive and being successful go hand in hand. For example, if a restaurant is

competitive with other restaurants in the area, they will be bringing in business and generating a

profit, this means they are successful because the whole objective of a restaurant is to bring in

money. This also relates to education, because if we are to have a successful educational system

in our country, we must be competitive within education. As Barack Obama stated in his weekly

address on February 19, 2011, “In order to win the global competition to win new jobs and

industries, we must first win the global competition in education by having an education system

that tops that of our competitors for jo bs and industries”.

After thinking about this I reread the responses to the survey I conducted for my primary

research to see what people had to say about why it is important to be competitive within

education. Two sources said that it is important because education is the foundation of a country.

Furthermore, they stated, a country’s success in economics will reflect upon their success in

education. One source also stated that normally countries that have successful education

programs also have strong economies. I would agree with this opinion because without education

how would citizens learn to be effective members of their society? One source agreed with the

others I surveyed that it is important for a country to have a good education system, but then

stated that she did not believe that competition should drive the decisions that are made about

what should and should not happen within an education system.

This initial inquiry was enlightening and sparked a desire to explore what we can do

better in the United States to be more competitive. Author, David Drew, writes in his book,

STEM the Tide: Reforming Science, Technology, Engineering and Math Education in America

that success is dependent upon various aspects such as good teachers, good leadership and



students who are willing to work hard (52). These are all important because they define our

educational system. Teachers can inspire and motivate students to achieve the highest goals

However, even with good teachers a student might still fail to do his/her part to make their

contribution towards obtaining goals that would reflect a globally competitive education system.

For this reason, quality leadership is necessary to help teachers coordinate their efforts to help

students be the best that they can be. Even still there might be students that don’t do their best

but it is important for those involved to never give up and to keep battling to win. A highly

successful student is the most important final outcome because educated students are the ultimate

product that demonstrates the worth of an educational system.

After considering the different opinions and points made by sources, I have some final

thoughts about global competition in education. I believe competitiveness could be supported in

our education system here in the United States because ultimately Americans want to win the

greater competition of being the best country in the world. Education is the base of a country, the

building blocks, without it a country will not be successful. The fact is that strength in education

accompanies strength in economics and strong economics directly contribute to the overall

welfare of a country. Everyone in our country wants us to succeed and be one of the best nations

in the world, so in order to do this we must strongly support education. In supporting education,

the question might be what should we be focused on in order to be globally competitive?

I believe that in order to be competitive we need to do what works best for our country.

We cannot mimic the strategies of another country because we have different resources and goals

than them. In my opinion, there should be a strong focus on Science, Technology and Math

programs because these fields support innovation and new technology. I also believe there needs

to be an increased effort to connect undergraduate students with companies who need their skills



and expertise. Our education system does a good job of producing students that have content

knowledge but these students have too often not had the opportunity prior to completing their

education to apply this knowledge and demonstrate skills that will support economic growth of

the country.

Ultimately, competition in education is all about who can produce the best, most

educated students. This can be rated by the student’s characteristics, and how well they can

perform their jobs and daily tasks. It is important for us to win the global competition in

education so we can move forward as a country and win the competition for new jobs and

industries to boost our economy and overall, make our country stronger. There are many ways

we can improve the effectiveness of our education system, and we are continuing to grow as a

country, but there is still room for improvement. In my opinion, we need to do what works for us

as a country, and focus on our strengths and just continue to build on those. With all these

thoughts it seems that we can win the contest and achieve lofty goals for our country.



Works Cited

Drew, David E. Stem the Tide. Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press, 2011. Print.

Hazelkorn, Ellen. “Rankings and the battle for world-class excellence: Institutional strategies and

policy choices.” Higher Education Management and Policy 21.1 (2009): 1-21. OECD.

Web. 14 Mar. 2013.

Larionova, Marina et al. “Constructing National R anking Methodology: Dilemmas, Choices, and

Decisions.” Problems Education in the 21 st

Century 48 (2012): 62-80. Education

Research Complete. Web. 12 Mar. 2013.

Mathis, William J. “Is Education the Key to Global Economic Competitiveness?” Teacher

Educator 46.2 (2011): 89-97. Education Research Complete. Web. 28 Feb. 2013.

Obama, Barack. “Weekly Address: To Win the Future, America Must Win the Global

Competition in Education.” Hillsboro, OR. 19 Feb. 2011. The White House: Office of the

Press Secretary.

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Final Inquiry Paper Final Draft