Setting ourselves up for Success 

In order to compete successfully within our own economic system and internationally we have to set ourselves up for success, especially with mathematics. We need to start by believing everybody can be an excellent mathematician when given the right tools! The tools that we need in order to become successful in the United States are changes to the common core along with a fewer set of standards. The common core needs to be "fewer, higher, deeper”. This means we need to teach the common core with a smaller number of standards with focus on understanding and application. (Common Core Facts) Each state will be composed of different standards, but the number of standards needs to be less.This will give the teachers more time to teach and the students more time for understanding and exploration. With fewer standards our curriculum then needs to be more demanding with higher expectations as well. 

In order to be successful internationally we need to be using the same assessments that the rest of the world are using to excel in math. This type of assessment is called PISA, it is the worlds metric for evaluating learning outcomes at school. (cnn.com) This type of assessment helps set meaningful targets in terms of measurable goals achieved by the worlds educational leaders. We also need to start introducing and teaching material at an earlier age. In middle school the students should be learning algebra and geometry, today in the U.S., we are still learning arithmetic at the elementary age level. 

Today we rank 36th out of 65 countries in mathematics, I believe If we apply all of these different tools we can become one of the top five high performing countries in mathematics. 

http://www.npr.org/blogs/ed/2014/05/27/307755798/the-common-core-faq

http://edition.cnn.com/2013/12/03/opinion/education-rankings-commentary-schleicher/