Shanghai Tops Education Test

Look into the future: Shanghai whipped the U.S. and several other Western countries in a standardized education test. While China’s overall scores were lower, students from Shanghai led the world in the science, math, and reading sections, with students from Hong Kong and Macao not far behind. “I know skeptics will want to argue with the results, but we consider them to be accurate and reliable, and we have to see them as a challenge to get better,” U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan tells The New York Times. “The United States came in 23rd or 24th in most subjects. We can quibble, or we can face the brutal truth that we’re being out-educated.”