After a certain point, school becomes useless and repetitive. I think many students would benefit from early graduations followed by further learning in fields of their own choosing.
If we had the internet when I was a kid, I would have begged to be home schooled.
Many teachers these days are useless in and of themselves.
Others are restricted by what they are allowed to teach, the curriculum sucks, or the teachers are trying to horndog the students.
I really feel sorry for students these days.
In Vernon NJ they still taught American history.
I moved to New York and found that they taught primarily Chinese and European history in preference to American history.
Nobody knew about Mr. David Bushnell’s “Turtle” for example.
Charles Murray has a good idea: Qualifying exams!
We could start immediately by awarding an official state high school diploma ( from the local high school) to any child who passes the GED. The child should be allowed to take it at **any** age. ( In my state only those who are older than 18 have “permission” to take this exam.) An official high school diploma makes getting college scholarships and admission to the military far more straight forward.
Qualifying exams could start in the first grade. When a child mastered a specific subject and passed the qualifying exam, he would be immediately promoted to the next level in that specific subject.
Courses could be offered on-line. The course material and, even the exams, could be free to the student if the producers of the material accepted advertising.
Benefits:
Children could begin their life's work sooner and gain more experience and earn more money over a lifetime.
State budgets would be greatly relieved since government schooling is the largest single budget item on all state and local budgets. The more responsibility that a child takes for his own education the leaves the fewer teachers and buildings that would be needed.
Qualifying exams, with Internet courses on-line, would encourage parents and children to take responsibility for their own education. It would also encourage a cottage industry in private tutoring.
Employers would have certifiable evidence that job applicants could read and do basic arithmetic.
By the way.....Unless a child could pass the GED he would not graduate from high school. I would also require that all government teachers take this exam every 3 years. ( Most, today, would likely fail the math portion.)