I lived in Germany for a number of years, and my son ended up in the German system. They are kinda practical about this. By the end of the 4th grade, they place the kid into one of three categories. They are reasonably sure about the kids who will end up going to university....so they lead them off to a better educational system, which challenges a kid. The second group....are mostly kids who show some abilities, but aren’t as ‘keen’ as the first group. They occasionally forgot homework or just lost attention in class. Then the third group comes up...the kids who show that they don’t have much interest and rarely show any talent at things other than average abilities.
The money and resources are split up. The lesser kids will end up as truck-drivers, clerks, or general skill people.
If you look at this from a practical standpoint....it ends up making sense. Most parents don’t want to hear that junior is a loser by the 4th grade, but the truth is that you only have a certain amount of resources for education. You might as well use them as best as you can.
I’ve often felt a huge amount of effort, time, and money was wasted on Special Education, especially in terms of documentation, but also in the resources. We expend next to nothing on gifted students. This, to me, is backwards. But that’s not something you can say without sounding like a brute.
There is a connection in the fact that supposedly conservatives send their children to public school and that Obama got reelected.
But I know, I know - your public school is good - it’s not like all the others. </sarc>
Faith in the public school system is the single most crippling idiocy in today’s America.
The modern state is the enemy of human society; the school system is the state’s chief weapon against us.