FAILING PUBLIC SCHOOLS -- Why Little Billy Feels Good About Himself But Can't Read or Write!

Iconoclast.ca ^ | by Hans Zeiger

[BurkesLaw]

"All men by nature desire to know," said Aristotle. Either Aristotle was wrong, or public education is failing to awaken the academic desires of American students.

According to a new Manhattan Institute for Policy Research study funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, only 32 percent of recent high school graduates were qualified to attend a four-year college. In addition, the report showed that the high school graduation rate remains depressingly low at only 70 percent.

For years, American education experts have been alarmed at the growing inability of public school students and graduates to compete academically with peers in other industrialized democratic countries. As Charles Sykes wrote in his revolutionary 1990s book, Dumbing Down our Kids: Why America's Children Feel Good about Themselves but Can't Read, Write, or Add , "When the very best American students -- the top one percent -- are measured against the best students of other countries, America's best and brightest finished at the bottom."

While Sykes may have exaggerated the problem, it is true that America's students are average at best.

According to the most recent academic comparison study by the Program for International Student Assessment, of students in 32 developed countries, 14 countries score higher than the U.S. in reading, 13 have better results in science, and 17 score above America in mathematics.

It isn't as though American students aren't scoring first places any more. A survey by the Princeton Testing Service shows that American students rank highest amongst industrialized democracies for amount of time spent watching videos in class. And William Moloney, chairman of the Washington, D.C. based Education Leaders Council -- a coalition of reform minded political and educational leaders -- writes that American students feel better about their math skills that any other country in the free world, while Korean students (who feel worst about their math skills) outscore everyone else in math.

The characteristics of self-esteem-obsessed, video-watching schools are manifested in the frustrations of America's higher education system. According to the Evergreen Freedom Foundation in Olympia, more than 40 percent of recent Washington State high school graduates attending community college enrolled in remedial courses to prepare them for college-level work. But a public-school system that transfers responsibility for learning basic knowledge to higher education isn't giving taxpayers and parents a return for their money. More damaging, the failure of elementary schools to prepare students for their future hurts America economically, socially, and intellectually.

Over the past century, public education has devolved from the classical approach of character plus basics (reading, writing, arithmetic, respect, and responsibility), to skills, to psychological-social engineering....

[BurkesLaw]

No surprise here.

[GoLightly]

The American education system is about producing more sheeple & that goal has nothing to do with educating our kids.

[Warlord David]

Home schooling is the only answer, if allowed. The churches could help. But right now, their having a crisis already, over what moral. The gay marriage debate.

[plain talk]

"Johnny can't read."

[21st Century Man]

The whole situation has become self-replicating in our culture due the dominance of the entertainment/media conglomerate. The sheeple lead the herd right over the cliff and it's worshipped as "culture" and "art".

Never has there been a more dumbed-down populace hell-bent on self-gratification. I'm afraid to see what will happen in the next 5 years as the economic facade collapses before our eyes...

[jd792]

My sons math teacher in 7th grade,gave him A+ on all his homework .While looking at his A+ work and feeling proud,I found that every problem was incorrect.When the teacher was confronted , she said IT DOES NOT MATTER THAT THE PROBLEMS ARE WRONG,ITS MORE IMPORTANT THAT THE WORK WAS DONE... Teachers Union Logic

[Riverman94610]

I even question the much repeated assertion that today's kids"feel good about themselves"
People who feel good about themselves don't continually try to emotionally,physically and spiritually hurt others in this constant scenario I see everyday in our schools that reminds me of Lord of the Flies with only a veneer of restraint holding back the flood.

[GSWarrior]

Sounds like your son's teacher has better things to do than grade tests.

[dirtbiker]

When my oldest son was in high school, he had a social studies teacher for 10th grade that practially reveled in the number of students that failed his class. When he told me that my son was failing, and the only way he could see my son passing his class was to ace the final exam. I was so pi$$ed off, my son and I spent the next 5 nights reviewing a whole semester's work, answering all the questions in the book at the ends of the chapters. The final consisted of 200 questions; my son missed 2, and passed the class for the year.

This teacher could care less if students learned anything or not, just if the teacher could fail them!

[freemama]

Homeschooling is not the answer for families with two parents working outside the home and it is not the answer for single parents. In a utopian world maybe everyone who had children would be able financially and capable intellectually and emotionally of homeschooling them, but it just isn't reality.


So what's your next best solution?

(BTW, not all of the parochial schools out there are having moral troubles.)

[Eska]

The problems in education are a bigger reflection of America's disintegration as a society. The failure of the American family has a greater effect on education than all the teachers out there; but we will never see parents held accountable.

Typical high school has 40% that don't even want to be in school, 50% that just float through (many eventually getting it together), and 10 % high achievers that know where they are going at 16. That top 10 % are our America's future leaders and why we will survive as a Nation.

[ShadowDancer]

Home schooling is the only answer

No, it's not. My kids go to a great school.

[freemama]

This looks like Outcome Based Education philosophy put into practice.

[Hildy]

that doesn't make sense

[dirtbiker]

that doesn't make sense

Tell me about it! This teacher was practially gloating about the students that didn't pass his class! I taught my son more material in 5 days than he did in 18 weeks!

[vpintheak]

Well we are still the #1 Capitalist nation on the planet, and that isn't going to change any time soon. What was the last invention out of Europe, or any other place for that matter. USA still rocks, we just have to use a heavy hand against "The Enemy Within."

[dawn53]

I homeschooled through 9th grade, then sent my 15 year old to the local college. We have a great program called dual enrollment, and if they can pass the College Entrance, they can take classes for free that count as college and high school credit.

That being said, and on a completely different topic, I think the effect of the "self-esteem" overemphasis in our public education can be seen in TV shows like American Idol.

You have people who absolutely can't sing, and when they're told they can't sing, they refuse to believe it, choosing rather to insult the judges and refute their judgment.

I've pondered this for a couple seasons, and decided it must be the public schools instilling the "feel good about myself" attitude into kids on such a grand scale, that they don't even realize that they aren't talented.

[dalebert]

Americans need to take their local schools to task and parents need to take their childrens education more seriously.Home schooling is good if the parent is up to the task. Not all are. Money will not fix this.

[valkyrieanne]

According to the most recent academic comparison study by the Program for International Student Assessment, of students in 32 developed countries, 14 countries score higher than the U.S. in reading, 13 have better results in science, and 17 score above America in mathematics.

How to lie with statistics. If they're talking about the international exams given at the high school level, the US schools involved make *everyone* take those tests. In other countries (especially the high scoring ones), students are tracked from 6th grade or so on, so that low-performing students are in entirely different tracks that don't take those tests. If you gave the tests to only kids in AP/Honors high school classes, we'd do as well or better than most countries.

[Middle Man]

Wrong tense. Not "failing". Already "failed"!