US teens continue to fail in Math
See this chart from PerrotCharts where US teens chart 10th (!) among industrialized nations and far below world average. PISA 2003 found that just under 20% of 15-year-olds in OECD countries are “reflective, communicative problem solvers” able to tackle difficult tasks. The students who score in the top category (Level 3) are not only able to analyze a situation and make decisions, they are also capable of managing multiple conditions simultaneously. They can think about the underlying relationships in a problem, solve it systematically, check their work and communicate the results. In Japan and Hong Kong over a third of students place within the top level.