Failing Education

THE LIST was rather lengthy, impressive in a tragic sort of way, humorous at best, extremely alarming at worst. Listed were basic facts, facts which one would think would be known by any and all grade schoolers, but aren't. One fact given is that slightly less than fifty percent of the American people can read on a sixth grade level. that alarmed me, because when I was in grade school, we were told that newspapers are written on an eigth grade level, because at that time, in the nineteen sixties, most Americans were considered to be possessed of a middle school or junior high level vocabulary. I don't know whether or when the printed press has made the dumbed down adjustment; one is almost afraid to find out. I remember my third grade teacher, in 1963, teaching the class the difference between the three verions of to, too, and two. My classmates and I found this hard to believe...(it was true then, and its true now. (Another example of vocabulary confusion is "there, their, and they're.")... Then came more facts on the list of intellectual ignominy: Frty six percent of the American people cannot locate the Pacific Ocean on a map. (This is especially hard to believe, considering the sheer size of it). Only about twenty five percent of American people are aware that the United States fought a war with Mexico, won it, and thereby greatly expanded the U.S. by "acquiring" (stealing) the northern half of Mexico. This might have the unintended advantage that, if more Americans were aware of this, a clamor to rename the Gulf of Mexico the "Gulf of America" would have predated Trump. A signifcant number of Americans believe that the sun orbits the Earth. It is true that technically Earth and sun orbit each other, but that's not to excuse ignorance of basic astronomical science. We are left to hope and pray that today's Bible readers, unlike its writers, are aware that stars and planets are something more than glass trinkets dangling from the dome of heaven, or pin prick holes in it, through which the light of heaven comes streaming through. Both explanations are given in the Word of God. A majority of us are not aware that Samual Clemmons and Mark Twain were, and still are, the same person. Most do not know the difference between Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The list goes on. Both Paul Bunyon and Davy Crockett are ficticious characters, or, maybe its the other way around. Maybe they both existed. A similar confusion exists concerning Herbert and J. Edgar Hoover, both of whom, at least as of now, nearly half of all Americans suspect of actually having existed. This is, if nothing else, somewhat comforting. I recall my sixth grade teacher jokingly asking: "Who's buried in Grant's tomb? And, what color was Napoleon's white horse? As far as I know, everyone in the class knew the answer, had the joke figured out. Are today's sixth graders able to answer? I know exactly how I could find out, but, I must admit, am afraid to try. Aside from any attempt to denigrate the intelligence of the American people, we can agree that democracy, which demands citizen governance, cannot, as Madison and Jefferson knew well, function efectively with an ignorant population, but that authoritarian fascism can and does. I can remember a time when I firmly believed that when it rains, concrete melts. My excuse is that I was five years old, and I did not attend kindergarten. The best excuse available now might be that we are living in the era of Trump, when windmills cause cancer and the Department of Education is being systematically dismantled.