[screwperman]

We teach people to be the status quo, we don't encourage them to excel.

Asians rarely value individuality. Doesn't the American system do better in teaching kids to be different from the norm?

[sketerpot]

My sample consists almost entirely of engineers, so I'm disregarding most of humanity, but within that limited sample I believe the answer is a definite yes. That's one of the few saving graces of the American educational system.

Of course, our educational system still sucks at it. I can't tell you how incredibly soul-crushing all my math classes were until about the time I got to trigonometry. And English classes generally suck royally. And don't get me started on biology classes taught by young earth creationists. Or the culture that looks down on learning. Fuck.

I think maybe it's getting better?

[tokenadult]

Asians rarely value individuality.

Evidence for this? (How much time have you spent in Asia, and how recently? As a reply above said, Europe has several different countries, and so does Asia, so what specific places are you talking about?)

[screwperman]

I'm in India right now and I've spent a total of 14 years here. The places I'm referring to are the ones the article seems to talk about: China, India, Japan and Korea.

A few months ago, there was a discussion on this right here on HN: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=482257