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Image via Amanda Ripley/PopTech.

Map demonstrating scores of the Program for International Student Assessment for each state compared to a country that has similar scores.


This is not news: America does pretty badly when it goes up against other countries academically.

This is true even if we take it one state at a time—no single state, no matter how wealthy or small, matches the top scoring countries. And yet, the U.S. spends more per student than many other countries in the world.

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Education

Illinois governor's ‘Office’-themed 'Idiot' commencement speech is actually a lesson in kindness

“Whenever I’m about to do something, I think ‘Would an idiot do that?’ and if they would, I do not do that thing.” – Dwight Schrute

J.B. Pritzker speaking at the Iron Workers Delegate Dinner.

Two-term Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker gave a clever commencement speech at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, on June 12 based on quotes from “The Office.” Pritzker graduated from the Northwestern University School of Law, which was renamed in his honor in 2015.

Coincidentally, "The Office" star Steve Carell was in attendance at the speech because his daughter was among the graduates.

“Today, graduates, I want to invoke a seminal piece of twenty-first-century culture to help send you forward on the right path in life,” Pritzker said. “I am, of course, talking about the Emmy award-winning sitcom known as ‘The Office’—which in its two hundred episode run gave us all the wisdom you need to make your way in this world.”

His speech was based on six quotes from “The Office.” (The last one comes at the speech’s conclusion.)

“PowerPoints are the peacocks of the business world; all show, no meat.” – Dwight Schrute

“Having a baby is exhausting. Having two babies? That’s just mean.” – Jim Halpert

“I knew exactly what to do. But in a much more real sense, I had no idea what to do.” – Michael Scott

“I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.” – Andy Bernard

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Xavier Jones is given his scholarship to Harris-Stowe Stete University in St. Louis.

A story out of St. Louis shows how some students have to overcome many more barriers than others on their road to success. But in this student's case, people in important positions recognized his perseverance and rewarded him in a way that could make his future less of a struggle.

According to a report from KAKE, 14-year-old Xavier Jones had no ride to his 8th-grade graduation ceremony, so he walked six miles to pick up his diploma.

“I was going to tell an adult, but my grandpa’s car was down. So I was just going to walk there,” he told KAKE.

Jones was graduating from Yeatman Middle School, but the ceremony was held at Harris-Stowe State University, a public historically-Black university in St. Louis.

“I looked up Harris-Stowe University on Google Maps and then I saw the walking distance and then I said I could probably make it,” Xavier told KAKE. “I wanted to walk across the stage.”

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This article originally appeared on 09.22.16


Imagine you're working at a school and one of the kids is starting to act up. What do you do?

Traditionally, the answer would be to give the unruly kid detention or suspension.

But in my memory, detention tended to involve staring at walls, bored out of my mind, trying to either surreptitiously talk to the kids around me without getting caught or trying to read a book. If it was designed to make me think about my actions, it didn't really work. It just made everything feel stupid and unfair.

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