The takeaway from this depressing headline is that while the US has lost ground to other nations in higher ed and community college ed, it’s not because the US hasn’t improved over the last 20 years. It’s that other countries have improved faster than the US.
However, we need to figure out what factors are slowing our improvements vis a vie other countries. The article below names several possible causes, and clearly the costs of higher education in the US have gone through the roof, and then up, up, and away from there, in the last 20 years.
There’s also the infrequently noted problem with males failing to get degrees while females earning degrees soars. There is obviously a lot to like in female advancement, but the US will have problems if males are failing in higher education, also obviously.
Kudos to Gary for the link.
In Just Two Decades, U.S. Drops From Second To Sixteenth In Percentage of Young Adults With A College Degree