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I agree. We spend so much money on education yet the schools are producing graduates who are functionally illiterate. Where does all the money go? And if you have an inkling to teach, which I did after retiring from my old job, you have to go back to school for a year or so and then serve a virtual apprenticeship for another year. But the job is desirable Because of the retirement benefits. You have PhDs teaching elementary school. I blame it on the NEA, the AFT, and bloated administrations filled with patronage jobs. The students get the shaft in the form of no education, and we the taxpayers do because we fund these pensions.

We spend so much money on education yet the schools are producing graduates who are functionally illiterate.

Last Friday, I interviewed for an accounting job at an investment management company. I'm retired, but I like staying active, and I'd rather do that than teach.

Their assessment test included a lot of basic math, calculators not allowed. Obviously, that gave me a great advantage over the 20-30 somethings who applied. In fact, the owner told me I scored the highest he'd ever seen.

I'm not expecting to be hired, but it felt good to know I still have it.

It's nearly fifty years since I graduated from HS, when California schools were excellent.

“We spend so much money on education yet the schools are producing graduates who are functionally illiterate. Where does all the money go?”

You ask a question whose answer is too complex to completely answer, but I’ll give it a shot. I retired from teaching 8 years ago. I still sub at the school where I spent most of my career. Semi-rural school, non union.

When I started teaching there, there was 1 teacher for each grade K-8. An art/speech teacher, a coach, a music teacher/aide a librarian, and a special ed teacher. Administration was one superintendent/principal and the school secretary. We had a janitor, three cooks (who actually cooked) and 5 bus drivers. Classes were large—my first class was 35 seventh graders who I taught all day.

Thirty-five years later with smaller enrollment, all but two grades have two teachers each. There is a full-time school nurse, a full time bookkeeper, a superintendent and a principal, a resource officer, a curriculum director, full time music and art teachers, full-time speech teacher, two computer teachers, a counsellor, at least three full-time special ed. teachers and with aides for each, two full-time teachers for at-risk students who don’t qualify for special ed. There are at least two special needs children who require full-time aides to stay with them, maybe three janitors, and the same number of cooks (who now reheat/thaw) and bus drivers. I’m sure I’ve missed some.

And, at the end of the day, the kids now are not getting the quality of education, for the most part, that they did when I started. More kids come to school on their first day broken or severely neglected. Many parents, for whatever reason, are not interested or concerned about their children’s education or future. Asking some to even take care of feeding their kids is apparently asking too much.

It is very frustrating.