> It is thus not likely to be the schools. It is more likely to be culture or (more controversially) genetics. But finns are less smart than say, Asia, most of

> It is thus not likely to be the schools. It is more likely to be culture or (more controversially) genetics. But finns are less smart than say, Asia, most of Europe and North Korea :( (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IQ_and_the_Wealth_of_Nations http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IQ_and_the_Wealth_of_Nations) There is likely a multitude of reasons. And yes, stuff like ethnic diversity do cause problems. But that shit is not unsolveable. In Finland, there are schools & classrooms with very diverse ethnical backgrounds and yes, they rank worse than your average, homogenous classrooms. But the system still manages to achieve significant improvement with the individuals, even though the end-results are sub-average. And we are talking about students that often do not even know any local languages (or English, Swedish, German or French, which are in some rare cases available as teaching languages) and start their primary education years later than their Finnish peers. The shit is, you don't need perfection. You need improvement. Sure, it's theoretically possible that genetics or culture gives you edge on some stuff, but it is about as likely that they don't. In any way, that stance is incredibly counterproductive against any kind of thinkable improvement. It is also pretty bloody likely, that Finns and Chinese have figured out something right and there are lessons to be learned.