Zoe Valentin

12.2.15
AM Class

Comparing Education Inequality in America and Latin America

When I first heard of this assignment, I immediately thought of the education gap in Latin
America. I grew up hearing about this issue on the news, and I really wanted to delve into this
topic to fully understand what is going on in that area, and the affects it must have on the
children and economy.
I kicked off the assignment by reading an article about the education gap in America. In
order to compare, I needed to educate myself on what is going on in my own homeland. Some of
the statistics that they had thoroughly shocked me, but in the back of my mind, I wasnt too
surprised. After reading the Latin America article, the contrast was evident between the two
places. Both articles I read about addressed dropout rates. I learned that approximately 22.2
million children and adolescents in Latin America are not in school or at risk of dropping out of
school each year. In America, it seems that dropout rates are more focused and dependant on
race. While 89% of adults in America have a high school education, the highest percentage goes
to Chile, with 69%. According to the article, Latin American kids score very poorly in math and
science, critical skills in todays job market. In America, only 1/4 high school students actually
graduate college-ready in the 4 core subjects of English, Reading, Math and Science. So
although we have higher graduation rate, we are sending our students off ill-prepared. Another
thing I learned throughout both articles is that spending on education per student is very different
in the two places. While Latin America countries spend about $3.00 a student in high school, the
US spends about $12.00. In Latin America, they spend about $9.00 on students in college, while
America spends about $30.00. This has a direct impact on economic growth. Both articles agreed
that teacher quality is one of the most significant factors related to student achievement. In
America, 14% of new teachers resign by the end of their first year, 33% leave within their first 3
years, and almost 50% leave by their 5th year. In Latin America, the countries have little or no
selectivity when it comes to the teaching profession, and 1/3 of the teachers barely passed high
school, and 70% of teachers failed the National Teacher Examination.
Learning all of this really opened my eyes to the effects that education inequality causes
in places like Latin America. It also made me realize how many problems we have here in the
United States, but the difference between the two lands are very evident.