Starting in 2014, NCEE partnered with the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) to facilitate a cohort of 35 members: both state legislators serving as education chairs and senior education committee staff. The group spent two years learning about high performing education systems, how they were designed, and considering the implications of their global study for state policy. This led to NCSL’s report No Time to Lose: How to Build a World-Class Education System State by State.
Since publication, No Time to Lose has become the most widely reprinted and requested publication NCSL has ever produced, in any policy area.
High-performing countries implement policies and practices and build comprehensive systems that look drastically different from those in the United States, leading them to the success that has eluded us.
The good news is, by studying these other high-performing systems, we are discovering what seems to work. Common elements are present in nearly every world-class education system, including a strong early education system, a reimagined and professionalized teacher workforce, robust career and technical education programs, and a comprehensive, aligned system of education.
This report encourages state policymakers to turn around our education system by taking immediate steps to:
- Build an inclusive team and set priorities.
- Study and learn from top performers.
- Create a shared statewide vision.
- Benchmark policies.
- Get started on one piece.
- Work through “messiness.”
- Invest the time.
State legislators can lead this work. Education is first and foremost a state responsibility. Each state can develop its own strategies for building a modern education system that is globally competitive, similar to the approach taken by other high-performing countries.
Both this report and its 2020 follow up, The Time is Now, are deeply grounded in and informed by the synthesis of NCEE’s international education benchmarking and research, NCEE’s Blueprint: Designing Systems that Work.
