Edgukayshun
February 21st, 2010What? The title is spelled wrong? And you noticed! You must have gone to an expensive private school.
The state of education is like the weather. Everyone talks about it but no one has any idea how to fix it. But it is too important to ignore.
I’ve been more than a spectator but less than an expert. I’ve been taught by unforgettable teachers in grade and high schools; I’ve graduated from an Ivy League college and an even better medical school. My children have ranged from college dropout to law school, all of them doing well with no correlation to their academic status. My oldest grandson is a freshman in college, I hope for education and not indoctrination.
I read recently that a school superintendent somewhere (?North Carolina?) decided that American History should be taught henceforth starting after the Civil War. In that spirit, let’s drop the first two years of medical school and law school. Wanna learn to fly? Skip ground school – just take the keys and try it out. Is this the dumbest idea you’ve heard in a while? Or do you agree with the lady that nothing important happened in America before 1865? Or is it just that our children would be too stressed out having to learn what happened before then, or why America is exceptional, or what the Constitution and Declaration say or mean?
An impertinent reporter recently toured the campus of Berkeley asking random students who their favorite president was and why. Lincoln was first (but no one could say why) followed by
Obama and Benjamin Franklin (who was never president); the actual winner was “I can’t think of anyone.” Half of the freshmen entering elite schools like Berkeley require remedial English and math. Spelling is no longer considered important; to correct one’s spelling might damage his or her self-esteem, you see.
My practice has been impacted directly by the sad state of our education system in the San Fernando Valley, which is part of the sprawling and underperforming LA Unified School District. Those families with the means choose private or parochial schools, which generally turn out a far better “product” at less cost. For most families those options are out of reach. Over the years I’ve seen hundreds of families move to the outer valleys with better schools, or even go back home to places with frigid winters and muggy summers, just to get their kids out of LA. But more and more have opted for home-schooling, including some of my largest and highest-achieving families. It’s a wonderful choice for those parents who can handle it. But it is not without its critics, who as far as I can see care more about teachers’ unions and bureaucratic jobs than about our kids.
We usually describe special interest groups such as unions and government employees as “liberal” because that’s usually how they vote, but they are the true reactionaries in our society, standing in the way of innovation and free choice and leaving our kids short-changed and less able to compete in the global economy. Indeed the only “choice” these folks usually support is abortion; everything else is to be decided by “experts”. The most outrageous example I can think of is the betrayal of a popular school voucher program for the poor, almost 100% black kids in D.C. by the Obama administration.
There are many reasons why some kids fail. In our minority cultures, education is often derided as “turning white” or some such rubbish. I’m very proud of a young Latino friend who has become an engineer despite his family’s efforts to dissuade him. A protegé of mine, a young black pediatrician whom I’ve known since she was 11, thrived at Stanford and UCLA because she is super-bright and committed – but she also had the wind at her back because everyone in her family expected great things from her. And she had more than that – an intact, devout family that would have been typical of American blacks through most of their history until the sixties.
In the last two generations we have seen chaotic changes in our society, largely attributable to government’s clumsy attempts to address social problems that are not part of their constitutional mandate. One of the greatest of these failures has been the teaching of our children. Liberal programs generally sound good on paper but rarely work out that way, nor are they even looked at critically. Head Start, which seems to exist largely to employ thousands of busybodies to make nonsensical rules like “every 3-year-old needs a TB test”, has been evaluated recently and found to be an abject failure; by second or third grade there is no difference between their graduates and other children who didn’t participate. We have been inhaling diesel exhaust by the ton for 40 years so kids can be bussed all over town to achieve absolutely nothing. Basic skill classes, tough subjects that make stronger minds, classic works of literature are too often set aside so that the ever-present “self-esteem” merchants can peddle their psychobabble and our munchkins can learn about all the “-isms” and go on to major in pseudo-sciences like Diversity, Ethnic Studies, Gay-Lesbian-Transgender-Whatever Studies, or pursue the phantom of man-made global warming.
Over a hundred years ago my grandparents, teenagers without means, bravely came to America to escape persecution and to enjoy the blessings of freedom. My generation of Jewish kids excelled in school because we were expected to! The Asian immigrants of today are so like us. So are many of the Latino and African children, but their climb is harder.
Last week a proud father brought in his 12-year-old son, just arrived from Ecuador, for his first visit. His father had come here a couple of years ago and worked to make it happen. He said without irony, “My son is here to live the American dream.” And he teared up.
That dream didn’t start in 1865, and I hope it never ends. Do our parents of today know what their children are not learning? I don’t know who first said it but I love this quotation: “To know nothing of what happened before you were born is to remain ever a child.” Indeed.