I.

Title Page
Introduction of High School Entrance Exams and
Accommodations
U.S. Federal Government
8/2/15

II. Table of Contents

Abstract: proposal of high school entrance exams, better teachers, the effects to come.....3,4
Introduction: problems of current education system, benefits of proposal..............................5,6
Discussion: a look into how much money on education and our rankings...........................7,8,9
Discussion: changes to teachers, how salaries will be handled...........................................9,10
Discussion: steps of action, motivation and how to achieve it............................................10,11
Discussion: providing opportunities, importance of goals...................................................12.13
Conclusion: effects to be expected, being patient for results, closure................................14,15
Works cited.............................................................................................................................16
Graphs, pictures, etc
Diagram of nations' amount of expenditures on education.......................................................7
International Math and Science rankings..................................................................................8
Teacher salary in past years...................................................................................................10
Graph of SAT scores vs family income....................................................................................11
How to motivate students: picture...........................................................................................12

III. Abstract
I propose that the U.S. changes the way it prepares children to pursue education by
introducing more testing and allocating more money into hiring quality teachers. The amount
of money the U.S. spends on education has not translated into a size of academic
improvement reasonable to justify its expenditures. We spend the most money on education
out of all the countries in the world, yet we still fall behind countries such as Russia, Poland,
Japan, and the U.K. in areas such as cognitive skills and educational attainment. I propose
that we begin ameliorating this disproportion by administering entrance exams for high
schools and putting in more money into hiring quality teachers. Introducing entrance exams
will also mean that high caliber schools will receive more funds than low caliber schools.

This paper will delineate how administering entrance exams will prove to be beneficial
to students, such as encouraging them to be competitive and introducing the experience of
studying for paramount tests, which surely will be helpful for other future important tests in the
future, such as the SAT. It will also go into possible problems that may be created because of
these exams, such as excess stress put upon the students, and will explain the methods that
will be used to prevent these problems as much as possible. The paper will look into how
money actually is being allocated in education and will look to justify changing the way its
being allocated, changes being things like increasing teacher salaries.

As a result of changing the way students are being prepared academically and
reallocating the expenditures being put into education, the U.S. will climb up in countries
academic rankings. The amount of money the U.S. puts into education will be justified as a
result of the climb in academic rankings. Exams may seem excessive, but they will be
effective. The quality of teachers will improve and teachers will have more of an incentive to
teach kids well. It will be apparent that some schools are labeled as for low caliber students
and others are labeled as for high caliber students, but these schools will make them aware
that their lives do not depend on being placed into the best high school and will try their best
to create a positive environment that will encourage them to strive to achieve their dreams.

IV. Introduction
A country's education is pivotal to its productivity. We do not want kids to go to school
simply because they are forced to, but rather because they recognize that education and
knowledge are pivotal to becoming a successful individual. Doing well in school is not an easy
task, some may do poorly at certain subjects while others will excel. We need to identify
which children needs assistance, provide them assistance, while recognizing others who
excel and push them to excel even further. The United States' current primary school system
does not offer an optimal environment to accomplish these goals and therefore should be
changed.
Grouping kids who excel at many subjects with kids who need extra help does not
allow schools to efficiently give these kids what they need to move forward . It is very difficult
to give both types of kids what they need because they need different types of care-the smart
kid takes calculus while another kid of the same age needs to take algebra. The U.S. Has
primarily focused on the kids who need extra help and have disregarded the kids who excel
and have potential to become more. Why are they placed in the same school? If schools
were established to educate specific types of kids and required entrance exams, it would be
much better for the kids and the staff because they would be put in a suiting environment.
This would also help teachers decide what school they want to work for. Do they want to help
kids get back on track and find out what their problems are? Or do they want to help kids who
have shown prowess in academics and want to harness it even further? Teachers would ask
themselves these type of questions and work towards getting a job at a school that allows
them to accomplish these goals.

We also want schools to challenge kids, but we also have to prepare them to be
challenged. Many kids will eventually take tests that won't simply have an effect on their math
class or English class, but will have an effect on their pursuance of higher education. These
tests are tests like the SAT, ACT, and SAT subject tests, which many colleges use when
determining whether to accept or deny a student's application. Kids will want to improve their
scores, and therefore will study arduously in order to achieve the scores they want, but with
the current school system, have kids had to study arduously for any previous test that has a
degree of impact on their lives similar to the SAT and ACT tests? Kids have not previously
experienced rigorous studying for important tests in the past; introducing entrance exams will
give these kids the experience of rigorous studying and sometimes even give some a wake
up call that doing well in school is highly valued in this nation and is important to get what they
want.

V. Discussion
Before we propose a solution to a problem and go into its procedures, it is first
necessary to prove that the problem exist. Data about the U.S' ranking in education in
comparison to its amount of money put into it will convince you that something needs to be
changed in the education system. First, let's look at how much the U.S. Spends annually on
education.

This diagram clearly depicts how there is a clear disparity in the amount of total annual
spending on education when comparing the United States with other countries. If we are
spending this much on education, then one would think it would be safe to assume that we
would have good academic results if the money was allocated properly.

However, if we look at mathematics and science rankings we see that America places 35 th in

math and 27th in science out of 64 countries, even when we are a country that spends an
immense amount of money on education. In the diagram for total annual spending, we see
that Japan spends the 2nd most on education out of the 12 countries being compared. Where
do they place? They place 6th in mathematics and 3rd in Science because they allocate their
educational expenditures properly and have a more efficient education system. Even Finland,
the country that spends the least out of the 12 compared countries, is ahead of us by placing
11th in math and 4th in science. Finland spends $10 billion on education while America spends
$800 billion. America spends 80 times as much on education than Finland does, yet we are
still so behind. With these kind of results, it is clear that the education system is not working
and that our money is going places that are not optimal for improving kids' performances in
education. So we need to make change.
We cannot hinder one kid for the sake of another. We need to identify which kids need
extra help and which kids need to be pushed to go above and beyond. Entrance exams will
accomplish this. We will begin this process of establishing specific schools that people will
need to test to get admitted to by rearranging the placement of teachers and at the same time
increasing the requirements needed to become a teacher as well as increasing their salaries.
Quality teachers are pivotal to nurturing successful students, and we need the proper people
for each school. Teachers of a well performing school will not have a significant salary
difference over teachers of a low performing school simply because their students do well.
Instead, salary differences will be based on the improvement of students, because a teacher
who works with lower performing students has to work just as hard as a teacher who works
with high performing students.

The annual salary for teachers in America has been on the rise for the past few years, but the
salary needs to be increased to a range of $57,000-$70,000, as well as increasing the
qualifications. Now we have all these ideas, but let's put them all in order and delineate the
courses of action.
First we must consult the department of education and instruct them to increase the
qualifications for teachers. Teachers need to clearly prove that they are experts at their
subject and have to have several years of training. The increase in qualifications will not
cause a dramatic decrease in the profession because the salary increase will motivate them
to toil through the training. After getting the accordance of the department of education, we
propose the ideas to the states and get them on board. After the voting ends, current teachers
will be rearranged; those who will to help kids who need extra help will go to lower performing
schools while teachers who want to help kids who perform well and need to be pushed further
will go to higher performing schools. The development of the entrance exa ms will be left to
the states because each state has a different performance level in regards to education.
Higher performing schools will inevitably have higher requirements while lower performing
schools will have lower requirements. These tests will be integrated into the system the next
year and will be administered every year near the end of summer break so that students hav
plenty of time to study.

We do not want to create a difference in the allocation of money by giving higher

performing schools more money while giving less performing schools less money, but we will
give more money to schools that have more improvement than others. This improvement will
be measured in performance on tests, graduation rate, and college acceptances. We will look
at if the performance of students on tests is increasing over the years, if the graduation rate is
increasing or decreasing, and if the rate of college bound kids are increasing. Seeking
improvement for all types of kids will increase our rankings in education internationally and
motivate kids to achieve more and more. Improvement is what helps people keep going, and
we want to motivate kids to put in the necessary work to improve by providing appropriate
instructing and tutoring. With the introduction of high school entrance exams, many students
will inevitably want extra help to ensure they do well enough to get in their desired school.
Various tutoring centers should be created specialized to help them with these tests. Study
books will also be created by companies. However, all of these services will not come for free.

Proper studying with assistance will inevitably lead to higher test scores. The more resources

that are available, the more opportunity the student has. One of my main criticisms of
important tests like the SAT is that privileged children will have higher test scores than those
in poverty because they have the money to afford professional tutoring. This graph proves just
that; it is evident that as the family income increases, the scores in all subjects continue to
increase as well. We do not want to leave out those who are less privileged and cannot afford
these types of assistance. The government will give extra funds to schools of less privileged
students and allow kids to apply to obtain extra help by proficient tutors. This will lessen the
gap between the performances of lesser privileged students and privileged students because
we will know from their application that they are interested in doing well.

We cannot expect every student to be particularly happy about the introduction of

entrance exams, because after all these kids are still very young, are coming out of middle
school, and often will have very myopic views causing them to automatically disdain any type
of test administration. Therefore, we need to give an incentive for kids to accept this
introduction of testing. Kids need to see the purpose behind doing all this arduous work for
their education. To broaden our students' perspective on education and get them motivated,
we need to hire enthusiastic teachers who are not just monotone and indifferent about their
career. Kids just finishing middle school are not likely to be swayed by statistics that prove
how important education is. Teachers need to show that they clearly care about these
students and their future and need to make their lessons as interesting as possible, relating
their teachings to real world scenarios and perhaps open students' eyes to possible future
lives and give them a reason to want to work hard and encourage them to work together.
Making goals is important to become a successful individual. Having goals in mind
requires one to create a path to make it there. Often times, a student's goal will require doing
well in their student career. Schools should encourage students to create goals for
themselves and those who have a feeling of what they want to do in the future should be
allowed to burgeon that feeling and chase towards that goal. Researches have shown that
there is a correlation between student success and having goals. A professor at Stanford
university states that, In other areas, both laboratory and field studies have consistently
demonstrated that setting specific and challenging goals leads to enhanced performance (2).
In addition to immediate student achievement resulting from setting goals, completing
challenging goals is also closely related to increased self-esteem and self-efficacy (3).
Introducing entrance exams and placing students of similar caliber with each other will
inevitably create competition. Kids may get jealous of each other or feel far behind their
peers.
This is where goals come in. With the words of this professor in mind, encouraging

students to create their own goals and making them yearn for a future career will increase
their self esteem and challenge themselves, allowing them to move forward and be
productive. Schools need to keep the benefits of creating challenging goals in mind and need
to incorporate procedures that accomplish motivating students to creating goals for
themselves. For example, high schools can administer questionnaires about what they see
themselves doing in the future and school staff can have individual talks with students to help
find direction.

VI. Conclusion/recommendation
If students represent our future, then let's make sure our students are able to create a
positive future that they can be proud of. How can we be satisfied with our results with the
current education system considering the amount of money we put into it? It is time we
acknowledge that our education system has problems and that we need to make changes.
Let's start achieving the ranks we should be by introducing entrance exams and providing the
correct supplements to establishing schools with positive and efficient environments. Learning
is hard work. The upcoming changes will definitely require students to toil more, but we will
have the proper teachers and support that will be able to motivate these kids to succeed.
Making these changes will not be easy, and the results may not show right away, but once
everything begins to click, the results will show. The images of each schools will eventually
become more apparent and teachers will work together to find out what strategies would be
most efficient in teaching their kids.
Introducing entrance exams and creating an apparent image are changes that cannot
be done with other changes to accommodate the goal of creating an environment where
students can strive to succeed. Lots of rearranging of people will be necessary and there will
be a lot of people who are skeptical about these ideas, but we have to try something new. It is

clear that the amount of money we put into education does not pay itself off considering our
nations' performance internationally. We need to try something new; can we really afford to be
complacent with an education system that is non-efficient? Other countries will move ahead of
us. We need to try new things, even if it means suffering a few losses. We cannot falter
behind. Let's start catching up and accelerating our catch-up speed by taking risks and
making changes to the education system for the better.

VII. Works cited page

"21 Simple Ideas To Improve Student Motivation." TeachThought. 11 Dec. 2012. Web. 3 Aug.
2015.
"An Overview of the U.S. Department of Education-- Pg 2." An Overview of the U.S.
Department of Education-- Pg 2. 1 Sept. 2010. Web. 3 Aug. 2015.
Chappell, Bill. "U.S. Students Slide In Global Ranking On Math, Reading, Science." NPR.
NPR, 3 Dec. 2013. Web. 3 Aug. 2015.
Edleson, Harriet. "High School Teacher: Salary." High School Teacher Salary Information.
Web. 3 Aug. 2015.
Goldfarb, Zachary. "These Four Charts Show How the SAT Favors Rich, Educated Families."
Washington Post. The Washington Post, 5 Mar. 2014. Web. 3 Aug. 2015.
Fensterwald, John. "California Drops to 49th in School Spending in Annual Ed Week Report."
EdSource. 14 Jan. 2013. Web. 3 Aug. 2015.
"Index of Cognitive Skills and Educational Attainment." Index Ranking. Web. 3 Aug. 2015.
"Qualifications for Being a Teacher." Study.com. Web. 3 Aug. 2015.
"Ranking America." Ranking America. Web. 3 Aug. 2015.
Reis, Rick. "How to Inspire Students to Set and Achieve Goals Which Really Challenge
Them." How to Inspire Students to Set and Achieve Goals Which Really Challenge Them.
The IDEA Center, 2005. Web. 3 Aug. 2015.