Mur links

1. a. Programme for International Student Assessment
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programme_for_International_Student_Assessment
b. Anybody at all
c. This source is just an overall of what PISA is and the study results that they found. Wikipedia is useful in general as a collaboration of information about it all in one spot to be convenient to the reader. In particular though it lends us information as to why our education is being viewed as inferior to some countries through these tests.
d. This source is useful because it visually shows the ranking of United States children compared to other countries. In seeing that the US ranks significantly behind other countries I can now frame arguments around this fact. Even the actual terms of the test are never discussed it doesn’t really matter because most American’s would typically be awed by ever being behind any country that they view as even partially lower than themselves, and with the relatively low ranking US it’s pretty safe to say that there is at least one country that does this.

2. a. Should Kids Be Bribed to Do Well in School
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1978589,00.html
b. Amanda Ripley
c. This source overviews a study conducted by Roland Fryer on ways to improve student results in a few different areas.
d. The use of this article was to show how to allocate the $500 million that Tennessee was given. The results of the study did show that progress was made through a cash reward system. The outlook on this is generally unpopular but it still worked. It was a very cynical way to support Race to the top.

3. a.Want a Higher GPA? Go to a Private College
http://finance.yahoo.com/college-education/article/109339/want-a-higher-gpa-go-to-a-private-college?mod=edu-collegeprep
b. Catherine Rampell
c. This article, at least to being, shows that there has been a study rise in GPA over the last 80 years. The article also touches on many more topics that I didn’t delve into.
d. This source was useful in the factual information that I could take from it. It also leads into many more interesting topics of discussion for the reader, only is if they read it though. The topic could easily expand into more blog posts.