This book does a lot to dispell misconceptions about success, and in a very well thought out, convincing way. Make no mistake, Gladwell's theory about what it takes to be an "Outlier," or someone who succeeds outside what the masses believe is humanly possible, is very sound. Gladwell uses the rise of the Jewish lawyer and the generation that produced Steve Jobs and Bill Gates to make some basic points about what it takes to succeed and, of course, invokes the now often quoted "10,000 Hour" rule. (For those of you who don't know, this rule states that to become above average in anything you must first amass ten thousand hours of practice.) Where this book falls short, however, is in Gladwell's attempts to apply his theory to real-world examples. 
 One example that I believe could have been better explained was the problem of airline pilots being unable to communicate to air traffic controllers or fellow flight crew effectively in order to stave off a crash. The cause of this problem was revealed to be that people's "cultural legacies" matter. This was a perfect example to use, and Gladwell was so excited to use it that he got way too far into the technical aspects of the linguistics and took far too long to relate these cultural mishaps to his broader theme. He became mired in his own enthusiasm and used far too broad of a sample range (I believe he referenced directly five separate crashes)to illustrate his point. But he gets worse from there. 
 Gladwell then tries to relate the virtues of hard work and grit of successful people to education, and here I found many holes in Gladwell's logic. 
 His first mistake was to use a student's proficiency in mathematics and other quantified measurements of students to judge achievement. In earlier chapters of this section Gladwell mentions specifically tests like the TIMSS, a comprehensive math and science test, to measure students efficacy in solving problems, and finds that (view spoiler)[Asian students perform better on tests than most Westerners because their culture encourages them to work longer and harder. (hide spoiler)] Gladwell also states "We should be able to predict which countries are best at Math simply by looking at which national cultures place the highest emphasis on effort and hard work." Later on however, Gladwell continues to reference math through a math and reading skills exam called the California Achievement Test to prove that students who continue to learn over summer vacation through reading and other opportunities continue to improve their skills over the summer, as to kids who do nothing because of their economic condition and net zero learning experience. Because of this, Gladwell leaps to the fact that, and I quote, "Schools work. The only problem with school, for the kids who aren't achieving, is that there isn't enough of it." What?! While it's true that giving students more time to work in school may cause them to lear more and faster in mathematics and reading, those are only two subjects out of at least four core subjects a child will take in school. How can we say that more time in school in general works when it's only been proven for two subjects out of the many offered? In addition, Gladwell completely disregards the "enormous amount of time [sic] spent talking about reducing class size, rewriting curricula... increasing school funding," even though later on in the section he chooses for his example of an ideal school a program which is kept small through lottery admission and receives extra funding outside the realm of public school. 
 In short, Gladwell chooses to use a very complex system known as public education to try and make a specific point, and he made general statements about education without properly understanding the implications of his ignorant statements. In my opinion this book would have been far better if Gladwell did not attempt to dissect an example so large in so specific a way, or at least try not to mistake success in Math and other quantifiable subjects for success in school in general. Without this case, Outliers would have been overall a much better book.