First, in the US I think we need to convince a substantial chunk of the population that it's not religion that will solve our problems, but better education.
Probably you should start by providing evidence of this. Most of the evidence I've seen suggests we are far past the point of diminishing returns on education, and we should have less education rather than more.
Everyone seems to be obsessed with paying more into the education system. Chicago Public Schools have an average teachers salary of around $75,000. This in a city where the average household income is around $43,000. Clearly the money is there and teaching in Chicago isn't some poverty inducing measure.
The outcomes are fairly poor. For students that bother with the ACT the average score is 18, but for Illinois as a whole its 21. 18 is a score that only gets you into the most poorly ranked of colleges. CPS teachers also average 18-19 on the ACT as well. Graduation rate floats are 50% and the powerful Chicago teachers union fights against any performance testing of teachers impossible to implement.
The reality is that we absolutely don't need more education or more education dollars. We need higher quality education. Public sector unions have made sure to make this all about tax dollars, when it should be about teacher performance and student outcomes. This means teachers taking responsibility and administrators firing poor performing teachers. It means a lot of politically difficult things, thus why it doesn't really happen and why anyone with means in Chicago goes to private or charter schools. Or more commonly, white collar professionals move to the suburbs when they have children.
Also the mayor just wrote a op-ed piece against vouchers for private schools. What public school do his kids go to? None. They go to private school in Chicago.
So one important fact is that most of the knowledge taught in school is not directly useful. Combine this with the fact that transfer of learning is almost nonexistent (e.g. http://amzn.to/2hExO6u ) and you discover that most education is wasted.
There is extensive evidence of a sheepskin effect, and most studies of educational effectiveness are consistent with signalling theories and ability bias (more able individuals get educated).
There is likely to be some benefit to education, but it's far less than what politicians currently believe and what current policies are predicated on.
I think what he/she meant is that higher education has become the new high school. What we need is a restoration of secondary school education, not "universal college degrees."
That, and we need to re-value our currency in the same fashion.
Actually I meant that we should probably send fewer people to college and have fewer people graduate high school. Maybe some of them should go to trade school instead, but generally we should just reduce the quantity of education provided.
Most education seems to be wasteful; see Bryan Caplan's writings on the topic, for example.
Why do I get downvoted for offering what is thoughtful criticism? I'm not just some nobody who walked in off the street and I have actual credentials and experience teaching higher education. Furthermore, I am not wishing ill will upon others. I would like to stop the outright fleecing of today's college students, however. It's high time that ended.