Posted on 06/05/2014 8:18:56 AM PDT by Kaslin
Given the numerous studies revealing how American education lags behind instruction in other countries in disciplines once thought to be essential, it should come as no surprise that on the 70th anniversary of D-Day, a lot of people are clueless about central elements of the Allied invasion of the European continent on June 6, 1944.
The American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) has released the results of a survey, which finds only slightly more than half (54 percent) of those who took a multiple choice quiz knew that Dwight D. Eisenhower was the supreme commander of Allied forces on D-Day. Fewer than half knew Franklin Roosevelt was president and 15 percent identified the location of the landing as Pearl Harbor, not beaches named Normandy and Omaha. One in 10 college students were among those giving the wrong answer.
Colleges and universities clearly are not teaching what they once did. That is also apparent in the ACTA survey, which found that 70 percent of recent college graduates knew D-Day occurred during World War II, compared to 98 percent of college graduates 65 and older.
Dr. Michael Poliakoff, ACTA's vice president of policy, says: "We are allowing students to graduate college with the historical knowledge of a twelfth grader. Not a single liberal arts college, except the military academies and only five of the top 50 public universities require even one survey of American history.
Poliakoff continues: "We aren't adequately preparing the next generation for the challenges of career and community with this apathetic approach to our national heritage. These college graduates are unlikely to understand the cost of maintaining our nation's freedom."
While much of this should disgust, especially those parents who are paying more and getting less of an education for their kids, none of it should surprise. Today's young people seem to know and care more about sex, pop stars and the latest cellphones, than wisdom and knowledge from our past and the character of those who fought to preserve our freedoms.
In his classic book, "The Closing of the American Mind: How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today's Students," the late college professor Allan Bloom indicted modern university life: "The university now offers no distinctive visage to the young person. He finds a democracy of the disciplines -- which are there either because they are autochthonous or because they wandered in recently to perform some job that was demanded of the university. This democracy is really an anarchy, because there are no recognized rules for citizenship and no legitimate titles to rule. In short there is no vision, nor is there a set of competing visions, of what an educated human being is. The question has disappeared, for to pose it would be a threat to peace." (p337)
It seems increasing numbers among us don't know what we don't know, and worse, don't care that we don't know it.
The late Steve Allen created the "man on the street" interview for "The Tonight Show." He would ask people general knowledge questions. Their replies were often funny. Jesse Watters of Fox News does the same on Bill O'Reilly's show. While the intent of this feature is to laugh at the ignorance of others, the bits reflect a dumbing-down of the American mind to the point where wisdom and knowledge are no longer regarded as necessary. Emotional satisfaction and feeling good now seem to be the new standards by which all things are now measured.
Someone should ask a question of the aging veterans who are likely visiting Normandy for the last time this weekend. If they could have foreseen what America would become and how little their descendants know, or care, about their sacrifice, would they have done what they did?
They probably would because of their character. I'm not sure the same could be said of too many of their progeny.
LOL. Viva France.
Yes. It was very poorly done and had many factual mistakes. Written and directed by Gen X idiots would be my guess.
I was really disappointed by it.
If the war in the Pacific had dragged on past Aug of 1945, and we lost thousands of more young men there, when the American people found out that Truman had the bomb and didn't use it, he would not only have been impeached... he would have been tarred, feathered and then hung.
Using the A bomb didn't take courage. It was the only choice and in the end saved millions from death.
Dresden doesn’t count because they were the Nazis. Plus they weren’t people of color. The Nazis stopped being friends with the liberals the day they invaded Russia which was, until then, the sole keeper of the Marxist flame.
Do you think that the current administration would want students seeing what happens to a regime built on a cult of personality around a leader? It would also give lie to the liberal line that War never solved anything.
THANK YOU FOR THIS THREAD.
For the troops coming in, it was MORE horrible THAN anything any of us will experience, as is all war.
BRAVE MEN, ALL!
GOD BLESS THE SPIRIT OF 0UR FIGHTING MEN AND WOMEN OF AMERICA.
Ping.
Thanks, potlatch.
.
I like it
God Bless the USA!
Thank you Lucy!
Thanks so much!
Make that a 1950 5th grader.
OwenKellogg, Many thanks for those pics!
On the one with the four pictures of the men
The sign says
“Morality is doing what’s right regardless of what you’re told.
0bama is doing what is told regardless of what is right. “
All y’all, ping to the pics!!!
BTTT
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WE'LL MEET AGAIN