Dumb And Dumber!
By BARBARA SIMPSON
Believe it or not, there was a time in this country when a child going to school was expected to learn the “3R’s — readin’, writin’, and rithmetic.”
Not only were they expected to learn all that – – they actually did! In case you hadn’t noticed, times have changed.
A perfect — but awful example — is a current lawsuit in Baltimore, Md., by two parents. They are suing the city and the school district, claiming a failure to educate their children.
It stems from a news report earlier this year on WBFF-TV that told of a woman who had been graduated from the Baltimore City Public School System and could not read!
Further reporting showed that 77 percent of high school students in one school were reading at an elementary level while another report revealed that in the past year, 41 percent of Baltimore’s high school students had a grade point average below 1.0 percent!
Essentially that means they have failing grade point averages!
As reported in The Blaze, area resident Jovani Patterson was furious, claiming: “This is just further perpetuating a cycle of poverty, of despair.”
He and his wife decided to file a lawsuit against the city and the school board because they believe parents have no other recourse. The couple is accusing city officials and the school board of failing to educate children but also wasting massive amounts of taxpayer money.
Patterson’s wife, Shawnda, has experience with the school problems. She taught in the system for almost 10 years and her recollection is of low standards and oversized classrooms.
“Most of the time my class size was pushing 40 kids with no assistant. To effectively teach 40 children, that is a challenging task.” She said teachers are not the ones at fault: “It’s just the way that the system is run.”
While this lawsuit is still ongoing, the problems it addresses are rampant across the country. The success of school systems is dreadful, and the trend is not getting better. The fact that college freshmen on average need classes to boost their “basic” skills. The fact that parents have to pay for tutoring in grade and high school not to say what happens if their children do manage to get accepted into college — more tutoring just to get along.
This situation is considered par for the course and parents have no other choice but to accept the status quo. Formal education and tutoring are what is the status quo and, of course, parents pay the bill. The students are the victims of the system.
If you want proof of what has happened to the basic expectations for education, just look at some of the old textbooks that the children used at the turn of the century — – before the year 2000. Grade school texts would be on a par with current high school/college demands for students.
Teachers had standards that had to be met and the children were expected to meet them. The students learned to read and developed good vocabularies that they were able to use in writing as well as orally. There were spelling tests that were made fun. Anyone remember “spelling bees”? They were oral spelling contests among student teams to see which ones were better spellers.
Children were also taught to write, not only the content of the prose but the actual physical “writing.” They started with printing but moved on to cursive writing, just like adults did. One of the classes they had was “penmanship” and they were graded on that on their report cards. And yes, they got report cards that were supposed to be shown to their parents for their signature. It was a way parents could know the academic progress of their children. It was a progress that parents accepted as accurate.
I remember when it was accepted fact that California schools were the best in the country. This was a “fact” that was national. I lived on the East Coast and that was what we were told about California schools. It probably was true at that time, but I will tell you, when I moved to the West Coast, it had changed. And it has only gotten worse since then.
In California, I taught on the college level and was astounded at the low academic skills of so many of my students — even those of supposedly high academic levels. In fact, I ran into some criticism that I was being too tough on the students by requiring them to meet certain educational standards — in other words, get the right answer to the problem! That was one reason why I was not enthusiastic about remaining in that profession.
I’ve also experienced on a daily level the results of the changes in education. One day, I left a note for a young man in his twenties, who was doing some yard work for me. It turned out, he didn’t do what I had requested and I asked him “why?” His answer: “It was in cursive, and I can’t read cursive.”
Thank you, California education.
When you read of differing grade results among students, the usual so-called causes are noted — race, income level, and family education levels. Virtually nothing is noted as to the abilities of the student and the study habits they have — or don’t have. Nor is there any mention of the fact that perhaps they were not trained in good study habits and academic information in their progress to the current grade level.
A trend that is national now is that many, if not most, colleges and universities are eliminating the requirement that the SAT or ACT tests be required for college entrance. The reason given is that only high-income parents can afford the training classes to pass the tests, so that puts their children at a distinct advantage over lower income students who might not be able to pass the tests without the extra training.
That every student who passes the SAT or ACT has had extra tutoring isn’t even an acknowledged fact but the excuse is accepted because it fits the trend to put rich vs. poor, white vs. minority. For these schools, only the students’ high school grades will be evaluated — but given the finessing of grades at that level, who knows what the kids really know.
The ultimately sad result of all this is that when the student gets out of school, high school or college, they find it difficult to adjust to the demands of the “real world” of work. While an employer might want to know their grades, the fact is, what really counts is how well they can understand the job and do it, without problems — and get there on time in the morning! Reality is that grades don’t matter. Common sense and ambition are what works in the real world.
Good luck, kids. You’ll need it.
