Educators, researchers, and policy types around the world admire (and envy) Finland’s students, who repeatedly demonstrate remarkable academic prowess on international assessments. [Finland, in fact, won the most medals in our recent Education Olympics event .] Unfortunately, though, Finnish students are not immune to the school and university tragedies that have become all too typical in the U.S.  Just yesterday outside Helsinki, a young college student went on a shooting rampage at his small campus, killing nine of his classmates and himself. This follows a school massacre last November, in which an 18-year-old high school student also killed nine of his classmates. Both young men posted disturbing YouTube videos alluding to their violent intentions.

Teams of psychologists and social workers have descended upon the campus. Witnesses tell stories of the gunman firing at helpless students and staff. The Finnish government questions its gun ownership laws. A community tries to deal with the shock. An all too familiar storyline for Americans.

In our zeal to discover, replicate, and bottle the magic and mystery that is the Finnish educational system, let’s not forget one thing:  Even though they are academic superstars, Finnish students are still just kids, dealing with many of the societal devastations that likewise affect their American peers.

They waited until the last second, but the Americans finally won a medal in this year’s games—and a gold, no less. Pandemonium ensued on the set of Education Olympics Today. Get the full story at edolympics.net.

With the most glorious moments of the 2008 Summer Olympics for Team USA now mostly behind us, commentators are finally turning their attention to the slightly less sexy, but surely more significant Education Olympics. Mitchell Landsberg at the Los Angeles Times’s education blog weighed in yesterday.

The Americans didn’t win a medal on the penultimate day of the 2008 Education Olympics, leaving them just one more chance for a top-three finish. A special guest joins us, sort of, to size up their chances. Full coverage at edolympics.net.

Just weeks after the loss of one if its leading literary lights, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Russia took two golds and a silver in three PIRLS reading events. Team USA, meanwhile, has two days left to secure its first medal. Can they pull it out? Stay tuned at edolympics.net.

Today Roy Romer—formerly governor of Colorado and superintendent of Los Angeles Public Schools, and currently chairman of the Ed in ‘08 campaign—joins us to discuss Team USA’s heretofore dismal performance in the 2008 Education Olympics. Also, don’t forget to check out the complete results from today’s events at edolympics.net.

The Education Olympics resume after a weekend hiatus—for some competitors, that is. Students from Finland and Hong Kong were spotted engaging in some last-minute cramming, while the Americans played Nintendo Wii. The outcome was predictable. Complete results at edolympics.net.

Another day, another stirring rendition of the Finnish national anthem, another taste of utter defeat for the Americans. Where did the United States go wrong?

Education Olympics Today tries to answer that question in an EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW. Today, the United States Education Olympics Committee’s very own Deep Throat speaks out.

The education blogosphere is up in arms about America’s poor performance at the Education Olympics. Matthew Tabor can’t believe “we’re losing to a bunch of friggin’ Finns.” The Core Knowledge Blog calls it “a national embarrassment.” Meanwhile, BoardBuzz reminds us that international comparisons are “more than a horse race” (and skoolboy gives us another close look at said horse race).

Michael Phelps might have taken a day off, but we’re here 24-7. (Well, except for weekends, to be honest.)

Oh world, beware ye Finland’s wrath!
For fearless are their bosoms when
A PISA test stands in their path
In reading, science, or in math.

Though sharpened are their Number Twos,
Still sharper are their well-trained minds;
Their foes they flummox and confuse
As Ed Olympics gold accrues!

More at edolympics.net

Or so the post-graduate cram schools in South Korea have been accused. No make-up, no fraternizing with the opposite sex, no iPods, no fun—and classes and studying from 7:30 am to midnight. Sounds a bit extreme, but the ultimate motivation is sound: Korea won’t let these students enter college without being prepared. A look at results from the Education Olympics show that Korea is kicking American tuchus. Maybe we should be taking notes.

Over at the water cube in Beijing, Michael Phelps won his fourth and fifth gold medals, for a record eleven total in his career. Nearby, the American women’s gymnastics team captured a disappointing silver in an event where gold was within reach.

“Disappointing?” said Toby Jenkins of the U.S. Education Olympics team. “We’d gladly take a silver in any event.” Indeed, the American students still have yet to secure a top-three finish in this year’s Education Olympics.

Meanwhile, Finland kept up its feverish pace, winning six golds and a silver today. The East Asian tigers have begun to roar, as well. Read all about it at edolympics.net.

I’m not just following the Education Olympics coverage; I’m also addicted to the regular Olympics as well. And during last night’s broadcast I heard for the first time that Michael Phelps’s mother is a middle school principal. (It appears that I’m the last to know.)

So what do we know about the school? It’s Windsor Mill Middle School in Baltimore County, Maryland—the district’s newest middle school (so new that GreatSchools.net hasn’t found it yet) and one of its STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) academies. And, according to its report card on the Maryland Department of Education website, it didn’t make Adequate Yearly Progress under No Child Left Behind. Its African-American, low-income, and special education students all failed to meet targets in reading and math, as did its students overall. (It appears to be a predominantly African-American school.)

If Debbie Phelps can raise the most decorated gold medal athlete in Olympic history, surely she can turn around Windsor Mill Middle School, too.

We’re three days in to the 2008 Education Olympics, and the Finns are firing on all cylinders. Also making some noise today are Estonia, Macao, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. The Americans, meanwhile, seem to be stuck in neutral. Follow the action at edolympics.net.

The first medals were awarded today, with Nordic countries—Norway, Finland, and Iceland—stealing the show. The United States—winner so far of 9 golds, 3 silvers, and 2 bronzes in the athletic competitions—has yet to take home a medal in the Education Olympics. Find more coverage at edolympics.net.

A clink of the five rings goes out to “Doug” and “Nancy,” who both had some fun with our Education Olympics Games on Eduwonkette yesterday:

First Doug:

E, I think Wise and Fordham are referring to the Average Olympics, a concurrent event taking place in Dalian, China (an average Chinese city of only 5.4 million) where the mediocre athletes of the world go head to head in a battle of the middling. Why would they use an event that pits the top 1/2% of athletes to make a point about mean differences?

Some of my favorite events at the Average Olympics:

the median jump
the roughly parallel bars
almost synchronized swimming
the halfathalon

Then Nancy:

Don’t forget:

The 500 meter Run of the Mill
Pretty BadMinton
Archery, where everyone wants to be in the middle.

That’s pretty good! But skoolboy comes to our rescue today, analyzing PISA results for each country’s top students and concluding that “the fact that the top 5% of U.S. students are getting their butts kicked in math and science is alarming to those who tie U.S. global competitiveness to the academic performance of American youth.”

Indeed it is. Follow all the action at www.edolympics.net.

The world’s greatest athletes kicked off the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in grand style today at the National Stadium in Beijing. Meanwhile, across town, another breed of competitor was celebrating the start of this year’s Education Olympics:

There’s much more at edolympics.net.

Many inquiring minds write in to ask, what exactly is the Education Olympics? To which we say, tune in next week to find out. But in the meantime, here are some suggested events from Henry Olsen, head of the American Enterprise Institute’s National Research Initiative:

The 200m Education Disability Hurdles - teachers compete to overcome the disabling home and social conditions their students bring with them to the classroom to get them to finish line with enough skills to compete in today’s economy.

Education Dressage - self-proclaimed school reforming superintendents compete to move the educational horse of their school districts toward reform without seeming to make a single reform-oriented movement.

Greco-Roman Curriculum Wrestling - advocates of traditional education wrestle with a massive educational bureaucracy to overthrow the textbook culture and re-instate classical learning.

Got some event ideas of your own? Let’s hear about them!

A week from today, America’s team of finely-tuned physical specimens will start piling up medals at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.

Meanwhile, their counterparts in the Education Olympics will face the world’s best in a contest of academic acumen, an arena in which the United States has lost its edge in recent decades. How will they fare in this year’s competition? Will America’s youngsters prove intellectually impotent on the world stage yet again? Or will they recapture the glory of years past?

Find out at EdOlympics.net. The games begin on August 8th.