I'd say they've done a pretty darn good job of that.
The country is currently so ignorant it won't last long.
I've been attacked even on this site for daring to criticize government or the government schools. wish I could find the post.
Just like the days when democrats made laws that made it illegal to teach slaves to read. It kept the slaves on the plantation.
Public schools are most certainly NOT mediaocre! They have declined way past mediocre. Mediocre doesn’t mean or imply “totally bad” but it means only “so-so.” Who would say that public schools are merely “so-so?” They have not been mediocre for more than 6 decades.
It’s not necessarily that they WANT to dumb down the schools. It’s only that the principles of the left that they apply to the schools are misguided and result in bad outcomes.
The left believes in equality of outcome and that the educational institutions must teach to that level. They really believe (I hope) that as all outcomes equalize, the educational experience will be better for all. Sort of a rising tide lifting all boats.
When it doesn’t happen according to their pet theories, they want to throw more money into the system to fund ever smaller classes and more equipment for the students at the lower end of the educational scale.
The result is that good to exceptional students get turned off or learn less than they could. The bad students reject learning as being for ‘punks’ and don’t try, but the left believes the reason they don’t learn is that they are deprived and oppressed.
Conservatives drive another nail in the country’s coffin every time they send their child to a public school.