Education in the United States varies greatly by state and even by city, or within a city if you’re in a top ten population state like Michigan who has many school districts. Michigan is sixth in the nation as of 2011-2012 for the number of school districts at 869.
But, where does Michigan rank as far as education level, if it were a country?
The website Home Snacks created a map of each state’s educational level and its equivalent to a country.
It turns out we’re way down on the list – number 89 on the education index – Thailand.
In the map, California roughly equals Chile, Oklahoma equals Syria, Texas equals Turkey … also, Connecticut’s education level is the equivalent of that of the USA.
Here’s how they came to this conclusion. Using data from the U.S. Census, they factored in each state’s high school graduation rate, and then compared those numbers to the education index of each country in the world, according to the United Nations Development Programme.
Interesting to note that most of the northeast – considered the ‘smartest’ region in the United States – is very similar to Europe’s education levels. “We’re number 89” isn’t the greatest of chants, and should be a call to do better.
And although there have been recent improvements, Michigan’s four year high school graduation rate is just over 78% – that means that something around 21%+ of Michigan students, or about 1 in 5, do not graduate high school in four years.
If you don’t even have a high school education in today’s economy, your prospects are going to be very limited, to say the least. In Detroit, a recent study showed that 55% of those without a high school education are not in the labor force at all.
Check out the map below to see how Michigan compares with the other U.S. states when it comes to education level.
