EDITORIAL: More evidence that U.S. public schools are broken

Those dismal Clark County School District test scores have ramifications far beyond the formative years. Consider the results of a recent global assessment of adult knowledge.

The study, informally known as the Survey of Adult Skills, is “a large-scale international study” of working age men and women “designed to assess and compare adults’ skills in participating countries over a broad range of abilities, from reading simple passages to complex problem-solving skills.”

The findings are not encouraging. Since 2017, the number of American participants performing at the lowest level in literacy increased from 19 to 28 percent. Numeracy scores showed a similar trend, with the number of U.S. test-takers scoring at the lowest level rising from 28 to 34 percent. In addition, the latest assessment reveals that 32 percent of American adults scored at the bottom in terms of adaptive problem solving.

At the other end of the spectrum, the number of Americans performing at the highest level in literacy has fallen from 50 to 44 percent in the past decade. In numeracy, the figure fell from 39 to 38 percent over the same period.

When compared with other countries, the United States ranked 14th in literacy, 15th in adaptive problem solving and 24th in numeracy. Finland, Japan and Sweden were at the top in all three categories.

“There’s a dwindling middle in the United States in terms of skills,” a U.S. Department of Education statistician told The Wall Street Journal. “Over time, we’ve seen more adults clustered at the bottom.”

This is consistent with what many teachers and business owners have said for years. While top students continue to succeed and thrive, more and more kids are falling behind in the classroom and indifferent to the long-term consequences. At the same time, employers often struggle to find applicants who have the skill set to perform even entry-level jobs.

The findings are another black eye for American education practices, but who can be surprised when school districts such as Clark County dumb down academic standards to chase higher graduation rates and politicians protect the hidebound education establishment to keep the union campaign contributions flowing?

The solution isn’t tossing more taxpayer largess into a bottomless pit. The answer must include reforms designed to subject the public schools to competitive pressure while rewarding results and offering families more educational options for their children. Otherwise, these disparities will certainly escalate, exacerbating the very inequities that those who defend the failing status quo typically decry.