Study in United States

The education system in the United States includes all educational and academic institutions. It is divided into three areas: Elementary (Primary) Schools, Secondary Education and Postsecondary Education.

School System

The school system in the United States is due to the federal form of government is a matter for the states, so there is a wide variety of arrangements. Basic decisions are made locally at the level of the school districts, so that even within each state, for example, the school levels are structured differently from place to place. The American school system owes additional diversity or complexity to the fact that there is a very extensive network of private facilities alongside state schools.

Compulsory education

The regulation of compulsory education is in the United States up to the individual states. It begins at five, six, or seven years, depending on the state, and ends at sixteen, seventeen, or eighteen. The states of Connecticut, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Virginia and the District of Columbia have the longest compulsory education, ranging from five to eighteen years.

Public and private schools

While public schools in the United States are always secular, non-denominational, private schools are divided into secular and denominational schools. The term "denominational" (parochial) is considerably broader than in the context of the confessional landscape in Germany. All three groups - state schools, secular private schools and denominational private schools are represented in all areas of the school system from elementary school to university.

While private schools always raise tuition, public school attendance is basically free. Fees only accrue when a child visits a public school in a school district that is not the school district of the home address.

Elementary School

The children are usually enrolled at the age of five in the kindergarten, which in Germany corresponds approximately to the first grade. Before that, the children have often visited a private or public care program (Day Care, Nursery School, Pre-school), which in Germany corresponds to the actual kindergarten. There is therefore a regular mix-up between the German kindergarten or preschool (called "pre-school" in the USA) and the American "kindergarten" (in Germany: first grade of primary school).

Junior High School and Middle School

The traditional link between Elementary School and High School is junior high school, a school whose departments work more or less independently, as in high school. The development of this concept is attributed to Charles William Eliot, who was President of Harvard University from 1869-1909. Increasingly, junior high schools are replacing middle schools today. The main difference to junior high school is that middle school teachers work closely together and even form interdisciplinary units. Junior High Schools and Middle Schools usually include grades 7 to 9 (6th to 8th grade), occasionally also grades 6 (5th grade) or 10 (9th grade).

Higher Education

There are state and private educational institutions. Unlike the European Bologna system, US university models, degrees, and study durations are not uniform and vary widely between US states and even higher education institutions in the same state. Since there are very large differences in the quality of teaching, in practice the university ranking is considered to be a consistent system of evaluation. For example, according to the long-term average, according to the QS World University Rankings, the elite university Harvard University is found #1 in US universities. In essence, the importance of degrees at universities is considered to be higher than that at colleges.