Education, part 2

Friday, May5, 2006

I had intended, in my last post, to write about the state of educational standards in our country, before I was sidetracked. As a product of the 50's and 60's education systems in the US northeast...I can see how our standards have deteriorated over the subsequent 40-50 years. Perhaps most important, we have neglected to teach our kids how to properly and effectively communicate. Now...don't get me wrong...I am the first person to embrace idiomatic converstional dialogue...I was never a stranger to slang...but...we always used these techniques to AUGMENT our converstional skills, not to replace them. In today's world, however, we have abandoned any efforts to teach kids those same techniques. For a plethora of reasons...we just give them a free pass. Maybe it is too difficult, maybe the classes are so disruptive that we can't find the time. Or, perhaps, our teachers have already lost those skills and they are just not there to be handed down to the next generation. The home environment is equally to blame...parents who are, themselves, uneducated and who do not encourage their children to aspire to literacy. The number of parents who are not able to read or write is staggering!!

Our education system has been the lowering standards across the board. "College preparatory" falls far short of the academic rigor required when I was in school. These kids are not prepared for college and collegiate courses of study...and that applies to the science and the humanities equally. Bear in mind that my generation was focused on more than just the academic...it was the time of Vietnam and the political activity sometimes overtook the classes. But...our minds were alive, we were thinking, cogitating and we were involved. Today's kids seem to view education from a distance, without the dedication to knowledge and experience that, they will discover, life demands.

Maybe it is the incredible diversity of distraction available in today's world. I have come to understand the concept that "stuff" is the new opiate of the masses. We are deluged with the plethora of "stuff" that we "must" have if we are to be accepted members of society. It is a kind of conditioning that supercedes the drive to become educated. It requires less in the way of participation and more in the way of detached and third person ways of thinking.

Similarly, the art of reading books seems to be less appealing when you can have video game stimulation to replace it...

The dearth of inspiring teachers does not help the situation. Those intrepid classroom pioneers who shaped young minds have, it appears, gone the way of the dinosaur. Today, the emphasis seems to be more on moving them through, factory like, or the totally banal task of babysitting. Certainly, our governments, federal, state and local, are not engaged in what the needs of good education demand. As long as we underpay and undervalue the teaching profession, we will continue to get just what we have paid for...a collection of half interested, unmotivated, unable to motivate glorified babysitters.

It is no wonder this country is falling behind the rest of the modern world when it comes to educating our children!!

trickster108