[JTN]

"Stupid in America" airs tonight.

[BluH2o]

ABC's GMA did a lead in this AM for tonight's "Stupid in America". They interviewed U.S. teenage high schoolers from NJ and their counterparts in Belgium ... who took the same test. Test scores aside, the NJ teens came up way short, it was interesting the Belgium kids responded to questions asked by the interviewer in flawless English. Which brings up another point, that being, most European kids, aside from their native language, speak at least one foreign language well ... and many have a working knowledge of several more. Contrast this with the typical HS kid in the U.S. who barely speak English well.

[Marie]

btt

[RobbyS]

When the civil rights revolution hit the United States, it was decided to bring black students into the largely white public schools. Wrongly this was proposed to be the way to integrate the black population into American society. But, many years before, Booker T. Washington had realized that only ECONOMIC integration would achieve SOCIAL integration. Because no money was forth coming, blacks got little schooling of any kind. Nonetheless, by the 1950s, there was a small but growing Middle class, in part because. thanks to readers like Randolph, blacks were able to get jobs in defense and other industries and accumulate money. By the 1950s. blacks were are rising class in the USA and demanding the political equality to which they were entitled by the Constitution. The Brown decision ought to have been taken as a largely symbolic victory. Instead, it decided as a social experiment to make the schools an engine of equality. The result has been a dumbing down of the schools, for not only have blacks but even poor white and Hispanic students been brought into the "system" with the aim of imposing a kind of social equality at the expense of academic excellence. All youngsters between 14 and 19 have been "DRAFTED" into what has become increasingly a NATIONAL school. We have seen our national defense community abandon this idea in favor of a volunteer force. At the same time we have pressed all youngsters into "educational" service. The result is a deadening uniformity that rewards mediocrity.

[Matchett-PI]

Providing a link that fits:

Thomas Sowell: "Education: Then and Now"
01/12/06 | Thomas Sowell Posted on 01/12/2006 8:59:45 PM EST by yankeedame
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1557090/posts

[Brian Allen]

For seventy or more years American eighteen-year-olds have been the world's dumbest and its a sad fact - but a fact nonetheless - that a 2005 Yale baccalaureate - or that of any other of our much-vaunted "prestigious" colleges - is the academic equivelent of a 1949 high school diploma.

And our thirty-year-olds by far the world's brightest, most innovative, most creative, most productive and most industrious.

End result is that we win and Belgium's bright brats don't amount to a hill of beans.

[Matchett-PI]

It's worth pointing out that the "stupid in America" got that way and "intelligent design" wasn't even being taught in "science" class, either. LOL

[RockinRight]

Aren't Belgian schools state-run too, though??

[Katya]

"The longer kids stay in American schools, the worse they do in international competition."

That would be expected. What John Stossel isn't telling us, is that Europeans kids are weeded out according to ability after the age of about 11. Some are put on a schooling track to graduate high school, others to graduate high school and then go on to college, and many will leave high school early to attend trade schools or enter an apprenticeship to become tradesmen. Nursing and general business are considered "trades", and would be studied beginning in the high school years.

Thus American kids, ALL who are expected to graduate high school have a curriculum that must be tailored towards the middle.

A better performance test would have tested college students in their fields of choice.

I would actually defend our schooling system. Particularly because it doesn't force 11 and 12 year olds to make decision regarding their future, and allows maturation at different ages.

[SauronOfMordor]

American schools maintain a pace that is geared for the slowest 25% of their student body. Excellence is a swear word

[1903A3]

I am Belgian and the fact is that Belgian schools are going downhill just like everywhere else
This is specially true in the big cities where many kids come from the Muslim immigration
In the rural areas however you still have good schools
The Universities are no more than Socialist brainwasher

[FreeKeys]

And yet another addition to John Stossel's ongoing series of articles based upon his research for "Stupid in America" is here: School Competition Remains "Unproven" (sarcasm)