I sat in my cousin’s living room in the Chinese city of Hang Zhou, sipping a chilled Chinese Coke. When asked about his school, perhaps out of a lack of more compelling topics, he replied by bringing out packet after packet of homework, each one seemingly thicker than the last. He was only in the sixth grade, yet his daily dose of homework nearly tripled mine.

He then told me that he had learned physics, chemistry and biology in elementary school and completed four hours of homework each night. The competition is fierce so the life of a “dumb Chinese kid” is painful.

“They post test scores, so everyone knows who has the worst score,” he said. “It’s a kind of public humiliation, but it’s effective.”

I can hear the outcry from Americans worried for their child’s “fragile self-esteem” already.

By contrast, I remember taking a “group quiz” in my freshman English class and thinking, “Wow, I didn’t read the chapter at all and I’m still going to get an A.” There’s absolutely no way something so silly would ever happen in China.

From the Bloomberg News Dec. 7, 2010: “Fifteen-year-olds in the U.S. ranked 25th among peers from 34 countries on a math test and scored in the middle in science and reading, while China’s Shanghai topped the charts, raising concern that the U.S. isn’t prepared to succeed in the global economy.”

As America struggles in its worst economic downturn since the ‘70s, it’s hard not to glance a bit enviously at China, “the country with the fastest growing economy” that’s nipping at our heels (or, as Donald Trump says, “eating our lunch”) like a dreadful threat to our superiority.

Painful as it sounds, we must realize that the American culture of freedom and acceptance comes with hidden downsides. Perhaps the byproduct of freedom is the acceptance of mediocrity, and ultimately, sloth. The term “be who you are” can also be loosely translated into Chinese: “I’m too lazy to change.”

There is this vast cultural divide between America and China on education. In China, the teacher garners much respect and is a powerful authority; parents almost always know the teacher by name.

But in America, teaching, unfortunately and disastrously, has become a fall-back option for some, and this hurts America more than anything. I promise that there’s no such thing as a furlough day in China; in fact, the topic would be laughable.

According to The New York Times, Washington, D.C., teachers rated “highly effective” can receive salary increases of 38 percent, as was the case of Tiffany Johnson, whose salary rose from $50,000 to $87,000 in two years. However, powerful teacher unions often block rewards for excellence for fear of competition instead of collaboration among teachers.

I agree that collaboration is an important tool for teachers. Still, it’s not important enough to eliminate a drive for excellence.

In China, the teachers whose students have the highest test scores can rise in authority and respect. Top students are coveted by teachers and respected by other students—in stark contrast to the American derogatory terms of “nerd” and “has no life.”

Pundits frequently talk about reducing class sizes or implementing expensive technology (perhaps to compensate for poor teachers), but they don’t realize that for a good teacher, class size or student demographics matter little

Here’s my final suggestion. At least for elementary school kids, we need to have one amazing teacher per 40 kids (weed out the bad teachers and pay the good ones more), and then give the kids the same teacher for six years. This may be too radical, but the fact is, our teachers do not possess an influence on their students outside of grades.

A lasting student-teacher relationship is the key to building character, which is infinitely more important than facts and figures.

In truth, the reason that so many fiercely reacted to the tiger mom debate last year is that it touched (or blatantly slapped) at the raw nerve of American doubt: We are falling from the integrity and work ethic of our forefathers that made us a great nation. We need to change the very core of our education system, and “band-aiding” the problem is definitely not the way, never mind cutting education funds.

If America is to prosper and compete with the rest of the world, change starts with finding and rewarding the best teachers.

Tiger teachers? The thought scares me.