Yong Zhao is the brilliant scholar whose ideas challenge the orthodoxy of testing, accountability, ranking, metrics, data-based decision making, and competition.
He knows the secret of Chinese test scores, and he says that if we follow their lead, we will destroy entrepreneurial thinking.
Since I discovered his work, I have been dazzled by his fresh approach to educational issues.
He recently published a book called World Class Learners, explaining why our current education policies are doomed not only to fail but to injure our country.
Read his interview in Education Week by Catharine Gewertz and his accompanying article.
Zhao argues that high test scores may actually hamper creativity. The nations with the highest test scores, he says, do not produce high levels of entrepreneurial activity. American policymakers were shocked and awed when Shanghai took the top place in the latest PISA ranking, and both President Obama and Secretary Duncan spoke about “our generation’s Sputnik moment.” But Zhao says we should not be impressed because the Chinese have mastered the art of test-taking, but not the mindset that promotes creativity.
He writes:
China’s Shanghai took the No. 1 rank in all three areas of the 2009 PISA
, but the scores do not have any bearing on China’s creativity capacity. In 2008, China had only 473 patent filings with or granted by leading patent offices outside China. The United States had 14,399 patent filings in the same year. Anil K. Gupta and Haiyan Wang put those figures in a broader context, writing in The Wall Street Journal last year: “Starkly put, in 2010 China accounted for 20 percent of the world’s population and 9 percent of the world’s GDP, 12 percent of the world’s [research and development] expenditure, but only 1 percent of the patent filings with or patents granted by any of the leading patent offices outside China.” And 50 percent of the China-origin patents, the writers added, were granted to subsidiaries of foreign multinationals.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I agree with Zhao’s assessment of the damage that the current “reform” agenda is producing, but I am not sure I buy his remake featuring entrepreneurship. Again, I wonder if it isn’t narrowing education by hyperfocus on a desired effect at the expense of other less economic based outcomes. I dislike the reliance on business terminology, which in and of itself is narrow-minded.
Zhao’s suggestions for reforming public education certainly has that “pie in the sky” feel which is okay in the sense I like to read and see many different thoughts/ideas being bantered about. And, like 2old2teach I agree with his assessment of the “current ‘reform’ agenda” as being wrongheaded.
But his focus on “entrepreneurship” and having student “produce products” is wrong. Yes, let’s all be good little “widget” producers. Produce, produce, produce, which implies then consume, consume, consume. Produce and consume until we consume the entire earth (we’re doing too good of a job at it now, certainly not sustainable). No, we need to instill in our students a sense of community and sustained stewardship of the resources we currently have so that those in the future may enjoy a life that is ecologically sustainable.
I think that Zhao focuses on entrepreneurship as a deliberate tactic to disarm the “reformers.”
He is saying that if they truly care about innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship–which is what they always say–they should abandon their love of standardization, testing, accountability and punishment.
U.S. GDP per capita: $48,387
China GDP per capita: $8,382
Poverty matters!