Author Sarah Hoyt seems a bit… down on public education.
Evidently, finding out that an estimated “80% of NYC graduates cannot read and write and are functionally illiterate” will do that to you:
[…] whether it’s from malice or misguided credentialism and do-goodism, what I can tell you is that our system of education is accomplishing the “miracle” of turning out a population MORE illiterate than the poor never-taught people in Tudor England.
Malice or incompetence, it comes to the same. If you have kids in the system, look to their future. If they read by “guessing” (the signs are easy. They’ll think words that start and end with the same letter are the same) stop that right now and teach them to sound it out. They’ll hate you for a month, but the hatred will pass and the literacy will remain.
However remember most parents are too busy living their lives to follow the kids that closely/teach them after the kids get home (it doesn’t take very long. Most of the school day is filled with cr*p. You can teach them the essentials and more in two/three hours after school.), and even more most parents think they’re not qualified to teach the kids. Which leaves us in the mess we’re in.
As a nation founded on the consent of the governed, we can’t afford to have a school system that turns out illiterate peasants. Whether it’s by design or incompetence, it doesn’t matter. We simply can’t afford it.
If we are to survive as a people and a culture (and our “methods” have spread across most of Eastern Europe) SOMETHING else much arise in place of public anti-education.
Local systems, with trustworthy people, known to have succeeded in other fields, would be better, as would practically anything else. It’s time we realize that the Public Education System is designed to do the exact opposite of its stated goal.
I happen to agree with Sarah that most teachers don’t realize that they are working to build Idiocracy; they are, however, in many cases (though of course not all) but useful idiots who spent their college years basting in toxic education theory developed and promoted by those who do have as their goal the project of producing graduates susceptible to propaganda and drawn to dogma, “economic units” incapable of real critical thinking and yet filled with the kind of self-esteem that, once it’s successfully (and intentionally) coupled to perverse inversions of the fundamental ideas supporting liberty — “tolerance” morphs into political correctness or state-sanctioned speech; fairness becomes a measure of outcome and not opportunity; and liberty itself is reimagined as a “right” to negate the natural rights of others, provided you show how their natural rights make you feel uncomfortable — yields the perfect progressive-inclined worker bee.
At least, that’s the theory. Naturally, many children will be able to circumvent an indoctrination system that must, as a matter of survival, try to keep its larger agenda hidden from public scrutiny — if only to maintain plausible deniability and allow for outspoken critics of the system who see its political aspirations for what they truly are to be characterized as paranoiacs or fringe cranks. That is, the surreptitious nature of the endeavor itself creates conditions for a certain intellectual and literate survival rate — a cold comfort, really, but a comfort nonetheless.
Still, many children — perhaps even most, if we believe the NY estimates — will succumb to the rote ways of what has increasingly and purposely become a politically-charged public education system, emerging from their years of conditioning filled with collectivist notions, dubious scientific knowledge, and a willingness to assert their opinions vociferously that is undercut by their ineffectiveness in putting together a coherent argument. What they don’t seem to come away with, however, is literacy.
To many in academia, particularly those leftists who are so influential in the field of educational theory — think Bill Ayers, eg., — this becomes a feature, not a bug.
Until that changes, we can expect similar results.
(h/t Glenn)
I’m forever at a loss to differentiate — to ratio, actually — the willful and the accidental. I currently have it at about 70/30, with at least twice the perpetrators quite aware of their follies and harms as there are mere blind tools. A parallel:
Yup, just make up the rules as you go. Whether you can rationalize them or not depends only on who’s watching. The personal naturally becomes the collective and thus the only difference between them is the magnitude of the damage. The principle is identical, if principle is the right word for it.
Ultimately everything comes down to whether you’re lying or not.
Hoyt: If we are to survive as a people and a culture (and our “methods” have spread across most of Eastern Europe) SOMETHING else mu[st] arise in place of public anti-education.
I wouldn’t have used the term culture myself (and “as a people” is hardly my concern), but taking that in stride, think this general statement is the question at hand, and has been the question at hand for at least many decades now, whether recognized by the mass or not.
What is the proper alternative? Is there a need to reinvent the wheel, or is education in the liberal arts, conceived as those human makings, which result, when taught, in free men and women, sufficient?
Those old ways have been effectively ground to dust by the modern program. Does that mean that they cannot be revived? Is “method” the question, or is the question better put as a matter of substance?
Just remember, all of this requires massive public schools and public school unions at public expense. This system, however nefarious, starts to fall apart as soon as it cannot pay its bills. Even ultra-libby states like Massachusetts find themselves forced to open things up to charter schools. And charter schools, being seat-of-the-pants organizations, tend to focus on the basics, like making sure the lil’ squirts can read.
Also, Scott Walker demonstrated that you can take the unions on and win, if you’ve the stomach for a hard fight.
It doesn’t have to be this way.
So they’ve effectively divided the country into one vast, illiterate group who produce nothing but votes for the “right” policies, and one exclusive, credentialed club who produce nothing but “right” policies for the vast herds to vote for. I don’t think any of these geniuses ever stopped to think about what happens when you set up a society with zero productive members.
They are destined to rule over nothing but a wasteland. They’d better pray real hard that there is a merciful God.
Paraphrasing a commenter elsewhere under a post on this exact topic:
Any sufficiently advanced stupidity is indistinguishable from malice.
Oh, that’s good, McGehee…
“Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven,” is how Milton framed that observation.
The only education class I took was in 1982, a core class if you wanted to get into the program. Taught by a socialist with reading materials by socialists like Paolo Freire.
I considered myself a liberal back then but, still was shocked when I realized that the 3rd world literacy programs cheered about in class were only sufficient enough help distribute more socialists propaganda.
Today, who needs to read? Propaganda is easily distributed without printed material.
I don’t think any of these geniuses ever stopped to think about what happens when you set up a society with zero productive members.
‘B’ Ark.
Propaganda is easily distributed without printed material.
“There’s an app for that!”
Jeff,
Both of my girls are bright, intelligent beings. The hard part with my oldest is getting her to put DOWN her book long enough to walk somewhere. But here’s a story about my youngest.
She started 2nd grade this year and they gave her a reading test. They expected her to be at a Level 12 and by the end of the year she should be at 28. She tested AT 28 before the school year started in earnest.
Her teacher informed my wife and I (I try to be as involved as I can and show up to the meetings) that there wasn’t a lot she was going to be able to do for my daughter since she couldn’t go outside the curriculum. The same thing was told to us about our eldest, as there was a reading competition and she finished all the books before even the teachers could.
Now, the teachers aren’t bad people. They’ve expressed their frustration with what they’re ‘allowed’ to do and so forth (and, they’ve all pretty much ignored it). We have neighbors who are teachers, and the stories of the chains placed around their necks in regards to teaching kids are appalling.
Still, we applied them to a charter school to which they were accepted. At this school, if you’re in X grade but reading at Y level, they put you in the Y grade reading class. They don’t go by age limits, but the limits of the child.
This doesn’t mean we’re in the clear. We need to continue to pay close attention to their school work (oh, the shit they try to shovel in. Indoctrination starts VERY young), but honestly I look at school as doing a rough job of getting some concepts into their noggins and my wife and I’s responsibility is to refine and hone it. I’d homeschool in a SECOND if it were possible to live off my wife’s part time work, but we can’t.
I think about how both of my girls, at 10 and 7, have a better grasp of economics (ask them about opportunity costs), science, English, and self-reliance than most of the adult US population and part of me weeps for their future, the other part realizes they can *rule* their future.
Is Satch betrothed yet? If not, I think we might have a deal we can cut.
Robb, that sounds like what my kids went through, too. I had them in Montessori pre-school and Kindergarten and then in parochial schools (when we could afford it) and in public school (when we could not.)
Eldest is a college grad, cum laude, and employed full-time right out of school. Little brother is a high school sophomore, National Honors Society and all AP classes, plus lettered in two sports. Our biggest problem was keeping them challenged since they were bored to death most of the time. We just kept after them that school was their job and it’s important to be the best at your job no matter what it is.
U al R H8ters.
Robb, Mrs. Darth and I are in the same boat. We have a 1st grader who is off the AT scale; she’s reading at 5th grade level. Finding books that are challenging and at the same time content-appropriate is tough. When they did her evaluation before kindergarten, the teacher was showing her alphabet flash cards. She looked up at her and said, “Um, you do know I can read, right?” She picked up a Curious George and whipped through it, leaving out the pomo analysis showing the incipient homoeroticism and fear of The Other obviously present in it.
Leigh, we did the same thing. Montessori pre-school for both of ours (youngest is still there) and then Catholic schools. Fortunately, we’ve had teachers that supported her and a couple of the other kids that were achieving well ahead and allowing external work.
I wouldn’t put my dog in the local public school, and I don’t like my dog.
When I was in school, they had no problem separating the kids into 3 different reading groups. I guess you cannot do that now because it makes the kids in the slower reading groups feel bad or something.
I used to finish all my work way ahead of the others and then cause disruptions, until I started bringing books to read when I was finished. I probably could have benefited from some more advanced schooling, but I guess it all turned out okay.
If I had kids, I would hope I could find a way to home-school them. Or, alternately, parochial school. Even some private schools teach the touchy-feely crap.
Wife and I, with regret, now realize our youngest would have been far better off homeschooled. He’s bright, but doesn’t learn in the accepted fashion. Alas, he’s graduating this year…
Eldest daughter is married now, and I’m going to do what I can to keep the grandkiddies out of public school.
public education should bring me a diet coke or find another fucking place to live
the detroit union thug model doesn’t allow for special parts.
I sound it out when people are fingerspelling to me and that has fucked me up royally sometimes. It’s just easier to piece together the sounds then try to remember all the things that flashed by. Something so simple as Puh-kHo-enix Arizona or even the word “puh-honics” itself. All those ph words are fuckers phonetically. And so are the St. abbreviations, you know because of the confusion about Street Mother Theresa who lived on Elm Saint and had a Street Bernard. It can seem like a lot of crap until you get to the end and allow your brain to fix everything you just then wrongly sounded out in order to make sense of it.
The first time I read aloud the word “island” I knew they were talking about an island but I said “izland” instead because that’s what they wrote!
After all that decoding, I could not believe the insane betrayal.
The problem with literate people is sooner or later far too many of them end up in places like this.
You say that like it’s a bad thing, BMoe.
No, it’s because most of the kids in the slower reading groups turned out to be native Ebonics speakers. This brought Jesse and Al and the SPLC at the run.
During the 1980s, Alabama tried to introduce a teacher qualification exam. It was absurdly easy; anyone of reasonable literacy could have passed it. When it was administered, most of the education majors passed it at 95%+ of the department with a few glaring exceptions: namely, the Historically Black Colleges, none of whom broke 60%.
You can guess the predictable result: lawsuit, in front of a black Jimmy Carter judge, resulting in the absolute forbidding of any such thing. It was at that point that I became convinced that the only way to reform pubic screwel was with gasoline and a match.
SDN, ages ago I got in an argument with one of my professors in undergrad about this. She was from Brazil and unfamiliar with all the Affirmative Action shenanigans here, although she had gone to Cornell at one point. Anyway, I was trying to explain to her how the SATs, the ACTs, the PSATs and others had been renormed to show better results for historically under-performing groups (E.g., white trash, ghettos dwellers, barrio dwellers) and she stood there with her arms crossed over her chest, shaking her head at me and saying “No. No. No!” Well, guess what, Dr. Ruiz? “Yes. Yes. Yes!”
I offered to let her read my copy of The Bell Curve and she practically batted it out of my hand. Nothing like being open-minded.
Search for the truth, my ass.
Walter Williams thoughts…