When I was a kid, practically everyone in town ended up going to the public school. There was the odd private school – the local Seventh Day Adventist church had one where I attended 2nd and 3rd grades, and I believe there was a Catholic school, but by and large, all the kids went to public school.
In my day, which really wasn’t that long ago, teachers were still authorized to administer capital punishment, and amongst ourselves we would tell tall tales about the principal’s paddle. Some of us imagined that it had lots of holes drilled in it so that it’s swing was not impeded by wind resistance. That it may have been carved from an old oak oar, and weighed 15 pounds. Those with more macabre streaks tried to tell us there was a nail in it as well, but most of us were pretty sure that would have been going too far, even for the principal.
In my town, most of us kids came from families that ranged economically from poverty-stricken to lower middle class. Their were a few kids that were from well-to-do families, but not many, and they didn’t gloat about it, after all, they were in the public school system too.
Most of us also had no dreams about college. The Vietnam war was still ongoing, and the draft was grabbing most able-bodied guys as soon as we graduated. College was something that only rich kids could afford anyway, and where we lived, the only thing available was the local community college, which offered only Associate degrees.
The one thing going for us was that when we graduated from high school, most of us read at a 12th grade or higher level, most of us could do basic math at a high school level, most of us had a basic grasp of American history and world history, some of us could even remember all the states and their capitals. We had the basic knowledge needed for us to go into life as adults. Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, the 3-R’s they were called. A basic education.
Today, we have “No Child Left Behind”, which ends up with teachers who feel they need to teach kids answers to a specific test. We have schools who no longer fail students who don’t measure up because it would damage their ego and make them feel bad.
We have “Charter” schools and vouchers, both of which remove funding from the public school system, so that the kids who can’t get into a charter school, or can’t afford a private school are left in the public school system with an ever dwindling budget.
It seems that our Public School system is turning into nothing more than a place to dump kids during the day. Any education that happens in the building is incidental and accidental.
American Society is failing our kids. A google search of ‘how many high school graduates read at grade level’ returns disturbing results. Half of Florida’s high school graduates cannot read a grade level. Nationwide, one in four high school graduates can’t read at all. High School students, on average, are now reading books intended for fifth graders. Math skills are even worse, and throw in basic geography and history, and you have a bunch of kids coming out of high school that are simply unprepared for life as adults.
We aren’t even talking about advanced skills. My generation put a man on the moon, but I seriously wonder if we could repeat such a feat today without depending on foreign allies.
The United States is ranked 14th in reading skills among the countries of the world, and overall is now rated as “average”. We still have a very highly regarded higher education system, with students coming to U.S. Schools by the thousands, and then taking those educations back to their native countries where they are now outpacing us in nearly every endeavor.
Somewhere, we have made a wrong turn, and we need to get back on track if we expect to stay competitive for jobs and maintaining our standard of living. Education is the root of many of the good things that made America number one.