Learning language is not that impressive as a cognitive/educational feat. It is mostly a simple matter of practice. School reform is not going to change this. Case in point, Canada where schools are good and French is mandatory struggles to actually teach anyone how to speak French. For Europeans the standard second language is English which is pretty straightforward as a result of globalization. Adding a third language that is spoke by everyone an hour train ride away is not that much extra.

Europe and United States have nearly equal land area of just shy of 4 million square miles. There are 24 official languages of the European Union and English as the lone, defacto language of the USA.

Why would anything else be expected from the American education system when, for example, you can travel the entirety of the US and most of Canada and not have to worry about finding someone who speaks English. The education system in the US is trash for a few reasons, but only teaching English to all is not one of them, and I say this as someone who lives in the US and speaks a few languages.