If 25 percent of all serious bicycle accidents involve head injuries, and if 80 percent of those head injuries are fatal, what percent of all serious bicycle accidents result in fatal head injuries?

Stumped? So were nearly half of the American high school seniors who took part recently in an international math and science exam, scoring near the bottom of the 21 participating countries. On par with Russia, Italy and the Czech Republic. Ahead of Cyprus and South Africa. Trailing everyone else.

Try this one. If American students continue to fall behind, and if the number of unfilled high-tech jobs continues to grow beyond the current 300,000, how long until the United States becomes a wholly owned subsidiary of Luxembourg?

The exam not only highlights the growing crisis in this nation’s preparedness for the 21st century economy, it also debunks many of the myths that have become comfortable excuses. The widening gap is not the result of our diverse, multicultural society — American fourth-graders, as diverse and multi-cultural as they come, consistently score near the top. Nor is it the result of Americans testing the full range of students while Europeans siphon off their best students into elite schools and test only their brightest — the tens of thousands who took the test were chosen at random from the entire spectrum of educational institutions. Nor is TV the culprit — a companion survey found the American seniors watched no more tube than their higher-scoring counterparts.

That survey revealed many details that bedevil: Americans study considerably less than the international average (that’s the average, not the best); a much lower percentage take math or science in their senior year; in the lower grades, Americans continue to study arithmetic long after others have moved on to algebra, probability and calculus; nearly half of American high-schoolers study math and science under teachers with no specific training in those fields.

That last point is where Maine Rep. Tom Allen comes in. Within days of the release of those dreadful test scores, Allen introduced one small step in the right direction, the Recruit and Reward Future Math and Science Teachers Act.

This would create a three-year pilot program of 500 $10,000 scholarships and stipends annually for outstanding students enrolled in teacher-training graduate studies in math and science. Recipients then would be obligated to teach for at least three years in math-and-science deficient urban and rural schools, very much like the federal program that gets medical professionals into underserved areas. The proposal immediately gained 18 co-sponsors, including Rep. John Baldacci.

In announcing his plan Friday, Allen recalled the panic attack that struck this country when Sputnik went into orbit, the embarassment and shame Americans felt upon awaking one October morning in 1957 to find the Soviets beeping at us from space. Americans should find these test scores, along with a proposal now working its way through Congress to increase the number of visas for technologically adept foreigners, similarly humiliating.

America responded to Sputnik with a renewed focus upon math and science education, and the result was one large step for mankind. Allen’s legislation won’t have such a dramatic effect — it must be accompanied by tougher standards and more challenging curricula at the the state and local levels — but it could be a valuable addition to a complex formula. It could create an influx of better-trained math and science teachers and it could send an important message to those considering the field that their work is valued and will be rewarded.

Incidentally, the answer to the first puzzler is 20 percent. The answer to the second is still being calculated.