I am always stunned and somehow sad when I see that good students with an investigative mind are encouraged to follow their dreams in the US, while here the goal of most teachers is to reshape kids to mediocracy.

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/EDUCATION/03/15/science.winners.ap/index.html

Except for Jugend Forscht there are no competitions, no science prizes and no incentives for young people to spend free time on creating robots, investigating their local bird habitats or studying the sociology in the local community. I also experienced that many science teachers shy away from the extra work involved in coaching students for such a competition and discourage them to take part. Some of my high school friends were only able to participate because their parents were researchers and coached them. It seems Swiss teachers are not yet fit for international competition. They are wary of competition, of performance and seeking talent.

Why work your mind, if the teacher only accepts his own answers (literally to the character) anyway? When the teachers attention goes to those who never do their homework or even hardly ever turn up, instead of those who would really profit from the education? Why ask questions if you're punished by teachers for seeming to know more than them (which often happened to me in IT, History, English and German).

There are no scholarships for extraordinary achievents or potential talent. Only the poor get - meagre - scholarships, but as hardly and working class kids go to college anyways in Switzerland these scholarships are not properly used. The prizes for the Swiss Jugend forscht are also peanuts compared to the compensations in the UK or US for scientific projects.

In my high school years I would have hoped for...
1. Competitions with real prizes such as college scholarships or at least a scientific internship etc. - except the Jugend forscht, where German high schoolers are usually much better funded than the Swiss participants and usually also win.
2. School competitions and training grounds such as "Debate club", "Spelling competition", "Science club" etc.
3. We had optional classes in High School, but they were all frontal education, totally boring and unmotivating. I took Russian as an optional course, but it was not fun enough to spend my free time on it.

But enough ranting about the Swiss Educational System.

What can be done to improve it?

• Send the kids to private school is an option that many well earners are now taking, but it's not a solution.
• Where the government fails miserably, private industry can step in. Encourage companies to fund research prizes for kids. The prizes don't have to be big. A good microscope, telescope or a scientific internship for local high schoolers interested in Biotech, a few thousand bucks of scholarship fees for a bright kid is peanuts to most major companies.
• Rate teachers by the top talent they create. Give teachers incentives on the number of students that left their class in High School and were able get a Lehrstelle (professional training seat) or admission to medical or dental college (the only courses currently with numerus clausus) or enrolling for scientific subjects in university.
• Spend more money on good students, instead of draining everything on those who bring no ROI. We are spending millions of francs on kids, who just go from one jobless aid to another, without ever improving their chances to find employment and finally disappearing among the vast number of disability rent receivers. This money is bluntly said wasted. These kids will in most cases never create jobs and in most cases never even have a decent job themselves, in many times also because of their unwillingness to get up early or listen to a boss. Many of them are simply unwilling to work or adapt to any kind of pressure of the work life. The same amount invested in good students would increase their chances in the international market. They would faster finish their degrees with scholarships, get startup money for an own business idea. They would therefore have the potential to create new jobs, high profile jobs as also menial jobs.