Re: The kids are getting dumber....

George Graves wrote:
In article <RJmdnYyLQLLkNZreRVn-3Q@xxxxxxxxxxxx>, Buzz <buzz@xxxxxxxx> wrote:


George Graves wrote:



Joe, I can't tell if this guy's trying to be ironic or if he really means whet he posts, but ignoring the fact that public schools in the US DO teach leftism, both because its part of the US academic culture and because it's mandated from the highest levels of school administration, they certainly do a poor jobs of giving the kids the tools they require for a lifetime of learning. The system turn out kids that cannot read (except at a very elemental level), cannot do even simple math (I see this all the time. Teenagers with summer jobs waiting on customers who absolutely cannot even BEGIN to make change.) and who don't know a thing about how their government works, what electricity is, etc. They cannot write a coherent sentence, can't spell, and in short are functional illiterates. This is anecdotal, and as such is just an example, but a friend of mine's daughter just graduated from high-school and is on her way to the University of Colorado at Boulder. The girl went to one of the best schools in the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Gatos High School, had a 3.8 average or some such, yet she meets all the criteria of a full functional illiterate. She can't read, she certainly cannot write. Doesn't know a noun from a pronoun from an adjective, and cannot do even simple sums without a calculator. Yet she is not stupid. When I ask my friend (who agrees that she learned nothing in school) what was she being taught all those years, he says (his voice dripping with scorn) that she was taught "socially significant" things. She knows all about the black struggle for equality, but doesn't know what the Civil War was all about. She's heard of Harriet Tubman but not Thomas Edison, She's never heard of Leonardo DaVinci, but knows about gay rights. Hasn't a clue about who wrote the Constitution, but she sure knows who Susan B. Anthony was. It's just pathetic and I weep for the future.

If your friend knew that this was true, why didn't he do anything about it? She is his daughter. Her education is his responsibility.


Well, it's complicated. Actually, even though my friend calls the girl his 'daughter' (I guess it easier than explaining the whole mess), he's not related to her and even though she lives in his house, he has no legal authority with her. The fantasy is that she is the half-sister of this guy's wife's daughter by a previous marriage. I.E. her ex (who's a drunken, abusive bum) ostensibly had this girl with another woman (also a drunken, self destructive bum) who was always in and out of jail. So my friend's current wife somehow got guardianship of this little girl when she was 5 or 6. The irony is that this kid is not the daughter of the ex-husband at all, but is instead the daughter of a now-deceased Greek guy who was also a "friend" of her drunken mother. Neither my friend nor his wife, nor her daughter are in any way, shape or form related to this girl. Even so, it's his wife who has legal custody of the girl, not him, and being a nut-case liberal herself, would never let my my friend interfere. Complicated enough for you?


Schools are tools that parents use to help educate their children. It is still the parents' responsibility to educate their children.


I agree, but the point of my anecdote is that if one of the most affluent school districts in the country can't turn-out literate graduates, then obviously money is not the problem with our educational system.
Our outlook on education, and outdated teaching methods are the root of the problem. More money being spent on research into more effective teaching methods, as well as pay raises for teachers, would probably cause a dramatic improvement in the quality of education within a decade.



Yes, I have children who are currently in public school. I am actively involved with their education. I know what they are learning.


Let's hope they ARE learning something.
Most students don't give a damn about learning anything more than what's nessesary to get a job.
.

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