Everyone who focuses mostly on universities is forgetting that you have years of education to go through before getting to the university.

Well, as long as we are speaking in hyperbole, everyone needs to realize that K-12 CS education needs CS teachers, who are disproportionately not those international students who either get cushy jobs in SV or go home.

You're getting at the root of the problem: teaching in the U.S. is a low-paid, low-status position. Teaching in other countries is a decently-paid, high-status position. This directly translates into job desirability and ability to attract qualified candidates.

I had some good teachers growing up, as well as a number of bad ones. The good ones all fell into one of these categories: 1) they were young and idealistic 2) they were doing a sabbatical or gap-two-years before going back to their day job as a children's book author, radio astronomer, or medical student 3) they were an independently-wealthy trust fund kid on a mission to do good. I also had some Google coworkers that taught CS in elementary school; they also fell into the "independently wealthy and semi-retired" category.

I come from a family of 3 generations of teachers, but when my starting salary as a computer programmer was within $3K of my mom's retirement salary as a teacher and I made more in 7 years of programming than she did in 39 years of teaching, it's very difficult to justify entering the profession.

(My mom also has stories about the cultural differences in how people treat teachers. The parents of her Asian students would bring her gifts, always treat her with respect, and effusively compliment her on the difference she was making in their child's lives. The parents of many - not all - of her native-born students would treat her like a glorified babysitter, yell at her, threaten legal action, and generally take a complete disinterest in their children's lives. You get what you value.)

I'm a current teacher (looking to get out), and I can completely agree with the cultural differences in how people treat us. I teach in the rural South, and, for one, there's not a culture of education here. People actively disdain schools, even high school, and don't understand the importance because they (and their parents) were able to get jobs without it; this gets passed on to their kids as well.

When they show up at parent-teacher conferences, they're usually mad that little Johnny is failing...even when little Johnny has literally turned in nothing all year, even classwork you gave them time in class to do. And hasn't retaken that test you've given him three times to do it at home. But it's my fault that I just don't get him a straight passing grade, despite all this. Or, their parents don't come/get mad when the kids cheat and get marked for it, etc. And, of course, often the parents of the best students do come, when they're the ones I need to talk to the least!

But, contrast them with my Hispanic students (particularly the Guatemalan ones, and the Mexican ones; the Puerto Rican ones are different). The Guatemalan students themselves are always so focused and wanting to pay attention, and the two Mexican girls usually are. They get frustrated at the Puerto Ricans, who goof off a lot.

Now, I don't see a lot of their parents, but that's more because they all work night shift (as do my students). However, if I offered (extra) credit for them to email/call, or show up to parent teacher conferences, every single one of them would be there. And usually they contact us, often through their kid since they don't speak much English, if their grades drop asking what the kid can change. It's very different in the attitude they have towards teachers compared to my American students (in general), and I think anyone who deals with a lot of them daily and gets to know them (one class is solely Hispanic students, so I don't have to worry about balancing language issues between them and American ones).

A fourth category of good teachers from my childhood was Biology teachers. All of mine had done research but then found that there were not very many jobs for them other than in teaching.

The best high school science teacher I had was an entomologist. Teaching was the best paying job he could find.

Which countries with decent state-funded universities generally don't have because you've decided that the free market "works" in providing what is basically an essential service for the growth of society.

US colleges used to be affordable before the federal government started pouring money into them with guaranteed loans. It's not a free market, but one distorted by government intervention.

Please don't post like this here. If another comment is wrong, feel free to provide correct information, so we all learn something; or simply don't comment.

Edit: You've posted uncivilly to HN before. If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and follow the rules from now on, we'd appreciate it.

Which countries? Here in Canada our universities are very well funded (relatively speaking) and yet the pensions programs are still screwed from 2008.

Never mind the issues with union staff you can't fire despite their rampant ineffectivity...

It’s not the pension programs, it’s the administration, executives, and luxury accommodations. College should be cheap considering the number of students to professor ratio. Keep admin costs low and pass that on to students. No where seems to do that anymore though.

A story of underfunded pensions coming to a local municipality near all of us.

that's not why tuition costs are out of control

The fact that CS programs / education largely start at a college / university level is I think a bigger problem. A growing set of countries have such courses as required curriculum for all students, starting earlier.