Epidemic of Ignorance - Back-to-school blues.

National Review Online ^ | August 23, 2007 | Victor Davis Hanson

[neverdem]

August 23, 2007, 0:00 a.m.

Epidemic of Ignorance
Back-to-school blues.

By Victor Davis Hanson

Last week I went shopping in our small rural hometown, where my family has attended the same public schools since 1896. Without exception, all six generations of us — whether farmers, housewives, day laborers, business people, writers, lawyers, or educators — were given a good, competitive K-12 education.

But after a haircut, I noticed that the 20-something cashier could not count out change. The next day, at the electronic outlet store, another young clerk could not read — much less explain — the basic English of the buyer’s warranty. At the food market, I listened as a young couple argued over the price of a cut of tri-tip — unable to calculate the meat’s real value from its price per pound.

As another school year is set to get under way, it’s worth pondering where this epidemic of ignorance came from.

Our presidential candidates sense the danger of this dumbing down of American society and are arguing over the dismal status of contemporary education: poor graduation rates, weak test scores, and suspect literacy among the general population. Politicians warn that America’s edge in global research and productivity will disappear, and with it our high standard of living.

Yet the bleak statistics — whether a 70-percent high-school graduation rate as measured in a study a few years ago by the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, or poor math rankings in comparison with other industrial nations — come at a time when our schools inflate grades and often honor multiple valedictorians at high school graduation ceremonies. Aggregate state and federal education budgets are high. Too few A’s, too few top awards, and too little funding apparently don’t seem to be our real problems.

Of course, most critics agree that the root causes for our undereducated youth are not all the schools’ fault. Our present ambition to make every American youth college material — in a way our forefathers would have thought ludicrous — ensures that we will both fail in that utopian goal and lack enough literate Americans with critical vocational skills.

The disintegration of the American nuclear family is also at fault. Too many students don’t have two parents reminding them of the value of both abstract and practical learning.

What then can our elementary and secondary schools do, when many of their students’ problems begin at home or arise from our warped popular culture?

We should first scrap the popular therapeutic curriculum that in the scarce hours of the school day crams in sermons on race, class, gender, drugs, sex, self-esteem, or environmentalism. These are well-intentioned efforts to make a kinder and gentler generation more sensitive to our nation’s supposed past and present sins. But they only squeeze out far more important subjects.

The old approach to education saw things differently than we do. Education (“to lead out” or “to bring up”) was not defined as being “sensitive” to, or “correct” on, particular issues. It was instead the rational ability to make sense of the chaotic present through the abstract wisdom of the past.

So literature, history, math and science gave students plenty of facts, theorems, people, and dates to draw on. Then training in logic, language, and philosophy provided the tools to use and express that accumulated wisdom. Teachers usually did not care where all that training led their students politically — only that their pupils’ ideas and views were supported with facts and argued rationally.

What else can we do to restore such traditional learning before the United States loses it global primacy?

To encourage our best minds to become teachers, we should also change the qualifications for becoming one. Students should be able to pursue careers in teaching either by getting a standard teaching credential or by substituting a master’s degree in an academic subject. That way we will eventually end up with more instructors with real academic knowledge rather than prepped with theories about how to teach.

And once hired, K-12 teachers should accept that tenure has outlived its usefulness. Near-guaranteed lifelong employment has become an archaic institution that shields educators from answerability. And tenure has not ensured ideological diversity and independence. Nearly the exact opposite — a herd mentality — presides within many school faculties. Periodic and renewable contracts — with requirements, goals and incentives — would far better ensure teacher credibility and accountability.

Athletics, counseling and social activism may be desirable in schools. But they are not crucial. Our pay scales should reflect that reality. Our top classroom teachers should earn as much as — if not more than — administrators, bureaucrats, coaches, and advisers.

Liberal education of the type my farming grandfather got was the reason why the United States grew wealthy, free, and stable. But without it, the nation of his great-grandchildren will become poor, docile, and insecure.

© 2007 TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.

[Jersey Republican Biker Chick]

I know...give a kid some odd change and watch them look at you like you are from another planet.

The calculator/computer generation.

[Uncle Ike]

” Our present ambition to make every American youth college material — in a way our forefathers would have thought ludicrous — ensures that we will both fail in that utopian goal and lack enough literate Americans with critical vocational skills. “

Bingo.....

[svcw]

Yea, but they do know the important things...like how to put on a condom, give a BJs and where to get an abortion.

[eraser2005]

Naturally the only touches on the biggest problem in the rest of his diatribe....

Parents...

They’re the ones with the influence to make children believe in education....

They’re the ones who can ensure the kids do homework...

They’re the ones who feel entitled to world class education in a system that pays its teachers abysmal salaries.....

They’re the ones who scream bloody murder if their “baby” gets a B.....

[CatoRenasci]

Naturally the [article?] only touches on the biggest problem in the rest of his diatribe....

Parents...

Worse than that, his solutions (and I'm generally a VDH fan) all smack of spending more on schools, paying teachers more, etc. If we got rid of the teachers' unions, required new teachers to have real academic majors before getting a teaching credential, and gave teachers/principals the ability to expel (or at least warehouse somewhere else) students who are unruly or won't do the work, the education the kids get would improve dramatically without spending a whole lot more.

[Pyncho]

This is the soft underbelly of the American economy and geopolitical power: the governmental school system. Students are simply not learning basic skills, let alone anything approaching “advanced education.” And it is not a matter of computers, and calculators and other hardware. It is a matter of a literal motivation crisis.

Go to ANY university in this country and simply look at students in classrooms: 60% don’t want to be there, and an even larger number are barely cognizant, let alone attentive. And this is college. Go to ANY high school, and you’ll see worse. There, however, you’ll also see blatant incompetence by the teaching staff: people teaching math who don’t know the subject, others teaching English or writing who are syntatically challenged themselves, etc.

Bush at least tried to do something here. But the Dems will hardly attempt anything, given their knee-jerk deference to the teachers’ unions. Unless and until these unions are eradicated - from top to bottom - and ALL “education departments” removed from college campuses, so that graduates with real majors can apply for teaching positions, nothing will correct our downward trajectory. Why parents put up with the status quo is beyond me, but they do vote Dem, don’t they?

[GeorgefromGeorgia]

I run into this problem all the time. I get the wrong change frequently. I seem to remember learning basics like giving change as early as the 3rd grade and percentages in the 6th grade. We were taught to do basic calculations in our head. Even in HS we used slide rules in higher math, and that gave us insight into solving the problem. I guess too many easy buttons and not enough real training is the problem.

[lastchance]

“Of course, most critics agree that the root causes for our undereducated youth are not all the schools’ fault. Our present ambition to make every American youth college material — in a way our forefathers would have thought ludicrous — ensures that we will both fail in that utopian goal and lack enough literate Americans with critical vocational skills.”

The money quote if there ever was one.

[taxcontrol]

Here is the facility of those points.

No human being can MAKE any other human being believe in anything they do not want to.

The only way a parent can ENSURE that home work gets done is to do it for them.

Teach pay is what the market will bear for a job that only works 66% of the year.

And about the B ... ok you have a point there.

The UGLY truth is that providing and education is one thing... it deals with opportunity. GETTING an education is something else and requires the student be motivated. There are many things a parent can do to encourage student motivation and facilitate the opportunity to learn. But parents can't MAKE a child learn. And the system needs to be prepared to allow such students to FAIL.

[RC2]

Great article. I graduated in ‘58 from a Los Angeles school. Great education for a high school. Get rid of the teacher unions and go to a pay for performance system. Also get rid of tenure. Who else in industry has tenure?

[Pyncho]

You hit the nail on the head. Universities should be so difficult that many more students fail, and then this should trickle down to high schools and middle schools. The “self-esteem” movement is killing any educational baseline, let alone educational excellence. And there is little parents can do to swim upstream against this torrent. The result, ironically, is that the typical student suffers - because sea level is so level - and intelligent students learn to reign themselves in. Quite sad.

[Mrs.Z]

“and ALL “education departments” removed from college campuses,”

EUREKA!! Dewey, dooodooowey educraps.

My grandfather taught elementary school at age 16 with a HIGH SCHOOL education. That was when a high school diploma was something that only about 25% of the students in this state completed, in other words, when it meant something. Most of his friends didn’t finish because they were just going to work on the family ranch anyway.

Make every grade tough and an accomplishment to get through. When a kid has gone as far as possible, teach him/her a vocation.

[too much time]

“Reform Math” is preventing an entire generation from excelling in science, engineering, architecture, etc.

[Tribune7]

ping

[Let's Roll]

I asked a family member - a teacher - why kids can’t count change backwards - counting up from the cost of the item to the amount you gave them. The reason that is done is so one won’t be short changed as easily. A valuable skill and one that used to be taken for granted.

She said it’s because it’s one of those things that needs to be taught individually. She taught her own kids when they had the odd moments waiting in the dentist office etc.

[dan1123]

Yes, PARENTS, who are forced to have both spouses work to afford a modest home. PARENTS, who have to live far from work to afford a place safe for their children. PARENTS who are getting squeezed from all sides thanks to the huge increase in energy prices and real estate.

Maybe if our workforce was more PROTECTED, then PARENTS could afford to have a single income family and spend more time with their CHILDREN.

[shag377]

Before the homeschool crowd starts up: according to the HSLDA, public school kids outscore the homeschool bunch in math.

Now, I am a public school teacher, I have a Master’s degree in Latin. I teach Latin and English. I am tenured, but I do not want my job tied to the fact that no matter how many ways I present material, modify, scaffold, assist, allow, communicate, beg, and do everything I can to help a student succeed, they still do not make it.

I am, as a teacher, capable of so much before the student must take some responsibility for their learning. It is here that the line falls sharply and the author of the piece gets it.

[khnyny]

Another winner from Hanson.

Currently reading his “An Autumn of War - What America Learned From September 11 and The War on Terrorism” - good stuff.

I wonder how many of our high school “graduates” could actually read it?

[too much time]

Naturally the only touches on the biggest problem in the rest of his diatribe.... Parents...

In rural Georgia, many minority students are asked "where do you stay" rather than "who are your parents," or "where do you live." Very few live at home with both parents. Grandparents and aunts are often the caregivers.

With an entire country dependant on hand-outs, why should anyone work on education at home? Shouldn't grades and degrees simply be "handed out" with the welfare checks and food stamps?