The Claim: The US fell from 1st to 24th in education since the Department of Education was created in 1979

An Instagram post on November 14 (direct link, archive linetc) uses a meme featuring a picture of former President Jimmy Carter to argue that America’s educational performance has plummeted.

“In 1979 I created the Department of Education,” the screen in the image reads. “Since then, America went from 1st to 24th in education.”

X owner Elon Musk made the same claim in one post on X, formerly Twitter, which was retweeted 98,000 times. The claim also circulated widely Instagram.

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Our rating: False

There is no evidence to support the claim. Although several studies have compared American students to their peers in other countries, none show that they ranked first in 1979, and none say they ranked 24th in 2024.

Tests show mixed results for US students

There is no definitive way to rank a country’s education quality, but several studies show results that run counter to the trend claimed in the post.

Martin Carnoya professor at Stanford’s Graduate School of Education, told USA TODAY that the claim is “completely false.”

“These are very rough comparisons, but it can be said that US middle and high school students have consistently done poorly on international math tests compared to students in other developed countries and have done better in science and reading,” Carnoy said.

Many American adults believe the country is either average or below average in teaching students science, technology, engineering and math, according to a Pew Research Center survey was released in April.

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But that one result of a test measure students’ reading, math and science skills from about 80 countries show more of a mixed bag. Year 2022, the test – called Program for International Student Assessment – found five education systems with higher average reading scores than the US, 25 with higher math scores and nine with higher science scores.

The test has existed since 2000when 32 countries participated. That year, eight countries had higher math scores than the United States and seven countries had higher science scores. American students performed “about as well on average” in reading compared to students in other participating countries.

US News & World Report ranked the US as top country for education in 2024 as part of it “Best countries” rankingwhich are based on an international survey of nearly 17,000 people who were asked “whether a country has a well-developed public education system, whether respondents would consider attending university there, and whether that country has a reputation for high-quality universities.” The news agency has only ranked countries that way for nine years.

American students did not outperform all other countries in 1979

There is no evidence of any widespread decline in student achievement in the United States since 1979, Carnoy said. America’s math scores have been lower than many other countries for decades.

In the mid-1960s, American 13-year-olds were outperformed in mathematics by students in all but one of the 11 other countries participating in the First International Mathematics Study, while American students in their senior year of high school ranked last, according to a National Center for Education Statistics Report was published in 1992.

A similar study of math skills conducted in the early 1980s broke down the results by category and found that the United States was near the bottom in most of them.

A different one Report published by the National Center for Education Statistics in 1993 analyzed two decades of National Assessment of Educational Progress results. It states that “overall trends in science, math, and reading suggest little change in levels of educational achievement.”

National Center for Education Statistics chart of reading and math scores for 9 year olds and 13-year-olds in the United States do not show significant declines since 1979. Rather, math scores have increased since then while reading is about the same, according to the most recent test results from 2022 and 2023.

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The high school graduation the rate in the United States for the 1979-80 school year was 71.5%, well below the 87% reported for academic year 2021–22. The university enrollment rate for those who completed high school has risen from 49.4% in 1979 to 61.4% in 2023according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

It’s important to recognize that the United States doesn’t just have one education system — instead, each state has its own, Carnoy said.

“Student achievement in some states has increased greatly over the last 30 years, and not so much in other states,” he said.

Carter signed the bill which created the Department of Education on October 17, 1979, says the federal government had “for too long failed to play its own supportive role in education as effectively as it could.”

However, it was not the first time that the United States had a Department of Education. In 1867, President Andrew Johnson signed a bill creating the nation’s first Department of Education, but it was demoted to an office in the Department of the Interior about a year later “because of concerns that the department would exercise too much control across local schools,” according to the current Department of Education website.

President-elect Donald Trump has said he supports eliminate the Department of Education, calling it a “bloated and radical bureaucracy.”

USA TODAY reached out to the social media user who shared the post for comment but did not immediately receive a response.

Snopes also refuted the claim.

Our fact-checking sources

• Martin CarnoyNovember 19, Email exchange with USA TODAY

• Pew Research Center, April 24, Most Americans believe US K-12 STEM education isn’t above average, but test scores paint a mixed picture

• National Center for Education Statistics, accessed November 20, International comparisons of performance

• National Center for Education Statistics, accessed November 20, Program for International Student Assessment

• National Center for Education Statistics, accessed November 20, Highlights of the 2000 Program for International Student Assessment

• National Center for Education Statistics, accessed November 20, International Mathematics and Science Assessments: What have we learned?

• National Center for Education Statistics, accessed November 20, 120 Years of American Education: A Statistical Portrait

• National Center for Education Statistics, accessed November 21, Long-term trends in reading and mathematics achievement

• National Assessment of Educational Progress, accessed November 21, Scores decrease again for 13-year-old students in reading and mathematics

• US News & World Report, accessed November 20, Best countries for education

• Bureau of Labor Statistics, April 23, College Enrollment and Work Activity of Recent High School and College Graduates Summary

• Bureau of Labor Statistics, accessed November 21, Current population survey, October supplement

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This article was originally published on USA TODAY: No, American student achievement hasn’t plummeted since 1979 | Fact check