Who Will Build the First School for Society Engineers?
The Honest Assessment
After meeting with China's education leaders, I need to be blunt: neither America nor China is training the people we desperately need. Both countries are trapped in test score theater while our infrastructure crumbles and housing costs spiral out of control.
Getting a 5 on AP Physics means you can memorize formulas and pattern match. It doesn't mean you can engineer a bridge, design energy-efficient buildings, or solve the housing crisis. We're celebrating academic performance that has zero correlation with building the future.
The Real Deficit
America has an overabundance of software engineers building SaaS companies because that's where the hype cycle directed them. China has brilliant minds focused on optimizing for standardized tests. Neither country is training people who can engineer the atomic world - the bridges, housing, transportation, and energy systems we actually inhabit.
The software that runs our world is broken. Apple software doesn't work. Building management systems are disasters. Basic infrastructure coordination is a mess. Yet we keep training more people to build more broken software instead of training them to build the physical foundations of civilization.
What Society Engineers Look Like
Society engineers understand elemental realities - not just formulas, but how materials actually behave. They get hands-on training contributing to real construction projects from middle school onward. They think systematically about how digital tools can improve physical infrastructure and human flourishing.
These aren't low-level construction workers. These are people so diversely skilled and constantly upskilling that by graduation, they're genuinely capable of contributing to spacecraft design, future city planning, and next-generation manufacturing. They're inventing the future because they understand how the present actually works.
The Competition Opportunity
Here's the real question: Which superpower will create the first school for society engineers?
Both America and China need this regardless of who goes first. Both education systems are fundamentally broken for this purpose. Both countries face infrastructure crises that test scores will never solve.
This should be a beautiful race. Friendly competition between nations to see who can first create schools that produce people capable of building the future rather than just talking about it.
The Urgency
Housing costs won't decrease until we train smarter engineers of the built world. Climate challenges won't be solved by people who've never touched a solar panel or designed an energy system. The next century belongs to whichever civilization can actually build it.
China has the government coordination, manufacturing expertise, and educational ambition to win this race. The question is whether Chinese leaders will recognize that society engineering schools aren't just educational innovation - they're national infrastructure.
The Challenge
Who among China's education leaders has the vision and resources to build the first school that trains society engineers rather than test-takers? Who will put these builders of the future on a pedestal so every ambitious kid in China aspires to get into such a school?
The world is waiting. Both superpowers need this. But only one can be first.
Who will it be?