[DeFault User]

Has anbody seen what passes for proficiency tests in High Schools? Students should not be allowed out of elementary schools before passing such exams.

Were children educated before 1963 genetically superior to those now? I don't think so. Too much TV, lack of discipline, too little reading, etc. all contribute to the mix and the mess, but academic standards have been declining over the same time period. What the student should know, in fact must know, is so much greater than the public education he receives that the average student is often a dunce even if he has good grades.

Unfortunately, a whole generation of students who learned too little are now the teachers of the current generation.

One pundit blamed the mess on women's liberation. His argument was that during the first 60 years of the 20th century, the only two professions open to educated women were education and nursing. Think about it. The public schools got the best and brightest teachers because that was one of two professions they could pursue. Certainly,that's no reason to turn back the clock, but it does say something about the quality of teachers then and now.

[The Westerner]

Bump for later reading.

[stoney]

Your post reminds me of an example of how much change their can be from one generation to the next. I was visiting my brother some years backa nd his oldest son was a senior in High School. He was working on a report on the poem, "The Village Smithey". You know, "Under the spreading Chestnut tree, the village smithey stands, the smith a might man is he, with large and sinewy hands,..." Anyway, it dumbfounded me that a senior in High School was doing a report on a poem that I remembered reporting on in the 4th grade.