The US education system isn't as good as Russia's(source: http://thelearningcurve.pearson.com/index/index-ranking) and its only going to get worse with the lowering of standards due to "common core"; just take a look at some actual questions on a common core test http://www.nationalreview.com/article/373840/ten-dumbest-com....

There is multiple articles from various view points on the fact that education in the US is declining.

"American students are continuously proving to know less in subjects like history." "A 2010 study by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) showed the U.S. history testing scores are "stagnant," with only 9 percent of fourth graders correctly identifying a photograph of Abraham Lincoln and stating two reasons for his importance."(Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/11/public-education-10...)

"The United States invests more in K-12 public education than many other developed countries, yet U.S. students remain poorly prepared to compete with global peers."(Source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesmarshallcrotty/2012/03/26/7...)

"There’s a delightful and true saying, often attributed to Joseph Sobran, that in a hundred years, we’ve gone from teaching Latin and Greek in high school to teaching remedial English in college." (Source: http://www.thefederalistpapers.org/education-2/middle-school...)