Report: U.S. Schools Not Making The Grade

High-Powered Panel Warns That American Kids Can't Compete With Global Peers

(CBS)  A bipartisan panel is warning that America's students are falling behind those in even some of the poorest countries, CBS News correspondent Thalia Assuras reports.

"I am really worried about where this country is," says ex-Sen. Bill Brock, a former Secretary of Labor. "We've got an information world, we're networked to the rest of the world, it's a global economy and we're not preparing our young people for that world."

Students from Asia to Europe outperform Americans on tests. Thirty years ago, the U.S. boasted 30 percent of the world's college students. That figure is now 14 percent. Meanwhile, most other industrialized nations educate their 16-year olds at a college level.

Neha Sharma is 16. The daughter of a diplomat from India, she's in an advanced college-level program in Virginia, rare in U.S. public high schools.

"I hate to say this, but the education system over here is worse than it is in India," Sharma says.

Emerging giants like India are churning out college graduates who often have more advanced skill sets than American graduates. Many go on to take U.S. jobs.

"That is going to drive the standard of living down in the United States," says Commissioner Mark Tucker.

The commission calls for a radical overhaul to stream all students to college.

Public schools would no longer be run by local districts. Instead, schools could be managed by groups of teachers or private companies. Teachers would need to pass rigorous assessments ... and be paid a lot more. All 4-year-olds and all low-income 3-year-olds would enroll in universal pre-K. Finally, high school students should be prepared to pass college-level board exams by age 16, like Neha Sharma and her classmates.

Do students think they are ready for what's going to be the new globalized world? "Absolutely not, no!," Sharma and her classmates say, laughing.

It's not the answer any parent or teacher in this country wants to hear.

[geoffgw]

Once again, a general report with hand-wringing about our schools comparing us to Finland, etc. I do agree we are starting to fail in Science education. However, if you divided these studies into Top, Middle and Bottom Thirds, the numbers would tell a very different story. I would take our Top 3rd of students over any in the entire world. The problem in America exists in the Bottom Third which dramatically affects any average calculations on tests, grades, etc. We have 35% of our children born out of wedlock in this country, and therefore starting from way behind. These kids, due to their parental mis-management, perform terribly. Let's stop blaming the schools all the time for the problems created by poor parenting. Put 35% illegitimacy with large numbers of single parents in some of these other countries and you would see similar results, I believe.

[sb941]

To Mrs. Katie Couric,

I hope that you would continue this story even more in depth. I'll give you an example of what goes on in my area. I live in Port Charlotte, Florida. Land of Hurricaine Charlie, so you can see where I'm at. I went to my school board to find out if there was any voucher program for my son to go to school some where else beside the public school. One of the school board member over education department told me that all the middle school in this area were getting A grading. But, I asked her if that was the case how come so many of the other students parent in my community didnt believe this to be the case. From my son middle school alone had to have to FCAT session because they were so many students who could pass it. And the local news paper, the "Sun" did an article in the past showing where our district had a high drop out rate for the community. I believe that the teacher only care about the grade from the state than how the student is doing. I would be great if you could look at our area and get questions for concerned parents. These are some reasons why our students will continue to fail. What can parents like me do about it? Thank you if you get to read this.

[dattatra]

We need to exercise some caution comparing the educational systems in the United States and India. The 16-year old from India probably is talking about some of the elite schools there and obviously students there will do better than an average student here.

[mh4cbs1]

Lets see...

We waste $500 BILLION each year on WAR. Providing the Haliburtons the Carlyle group and the other "defense" industry war corporations with massive profits...

The Exxons make over $100 BILLION in PROFITs each year, gouging the American people (as we give them subsidies)...

Tax cuts for the super wealthy cost more Hundreds of Billions.

NOW DO YOU GET IT !

Our nation is ruled by the corporations, the wealthy and the well-connected. Is it any wonder our schools are strugling??

[freezulu]

Our highschools are a joke - still offering classes full of info that you'll NEVER USE in life. When's the last time you used any calculus? It's no wonder our kids are so disengaged. Update the courses offered and expose the kids to potential careers out in the real world thru vocational co-operatives.

[jade881]

I think this is great. I'm 13 and in middle school so if they change it right away i'll be excited but nervous on the side, It might take some getting used to but I really want a good education and better schools. I think the teachers should be getting paid more but they'd have to teach better too some teachers aren't the best because of the school possible, while there at it they should probably come down harder on schools security systems a lot of kids in america do drugs and stupid things at school.

[mikeecee]

There are a number of factors that affect the data when looking at how the students in the US perform. First; socioeconomics. Where students in developing countries have hope that getting an advanced education will increase their standard of living, the poor in our country have resigned to the fact that it most likely will not make a difference if they graduate from high school or not. Second; standardized testing. When the data is taken in aggregated form, we must realize that the scores of students that will NEVER perform at a normal level academically (due to disability or otherwise) are scored with those who are normal achievers. This brings the average scores of standardized tests down. Third; teacher workload. Teachers are no longer able to 'teach' material normally to an 'average' class. Lesson plans must be written for a diverse classroom that includes special education students, English as a second language students, and students who have many other barriers to learning; then these lesson plans must be executed, generally hindering the students who are considered to be in the upper half of classroom performance. Lastly, I believe the view of public schools has changed from a place where our children learn how to be a functional adult to a taxpayer supported daycare.

[jw218389]

Your kidding!? We can't spend 1 TRILLION dollars a year on an oil war and still educate our children?

George W. said it was no child left behind! Maybe he meant just privately schooled children - you know "his type" of folk...

[randalds]

No Child Left Behind is a sick joke. It's ultimate goal is to privatise public schools. If your school doesn't pass standards for 3 years then the school district, by law, must offer parents the paid option of sending their kids to private schools. If your school DOES pass the standards, then the standards are, by law, raised the following years. Eventually to pass the standard, 100% of your students would have to pass 100% of the tests, 100% of the time. An impossibility. So eventually the way this law is designed, all schools would have to offer all students the option of going to private schools. Soon, with all children in private schools and the public schools out of business, the government slashes the pay for those private schools and the only children getting educated are those whose parents can afford to pay for school. Remember, this is not some myth, this is what the law is actually designed to do.

[agnim]

"Report: U.S. Schools Not Making The Grade "

How many reports of underachieving American students are we going to have before we FIX THE FREAKING PROBLEM? Tsk-tsk


When a nation repeatedly 'elect'/allow a certified idiot as its leader, we are sending the CLEAR SIGNAL that education doesn't really matter in American!

Also, a nation of ignorant/uneducated/undereducated idiots is expected to elect one of its own from the 'majority' as its leader.

That's the devilish and destructive democracy at work for you: If *** is in the majority, then there is no hope of advancement for the nation, because *** will be leading the way. LOL

[gdmoore2]

"We have an information world..." is overstated and overhyped. The USA is giving away its manufacturing sector, while creating an over-dependence on information management. We need balance and diversity in the economy and public schools. Aiming for an economy that manages only information flows while manufacturing nothing is a dangerous imbalance, and likewise, aiming for a school system that only creates standardized automatons is not healthy.

Good education is far more than just the grey standards of NCLB. It includes love, appreciation, motivation, art, music, wood shop, metals shop, electronics, science, history, home economics, mathematics, literature, language, church, family, community, and respect for students, all in balance. We will be fine if we focus on the whole fabric of our communities, schools, and economy.

[bellal-2009]

"US Schools Not Making the Grade", Well, duh!! We've only been trying to tell you that for a decade or more. We're too busy trying to teach kids (speaking literally hundreds of different languages) how to speak English. So Amrican kids have the bar set so low they are bored out of their minds. The only solution is to dismantle the entire school system and start over. Also STOP IMPORTING PEOPLE, we have enough.

[bellal-2009]

Dismantle the public school system. If kids want to be educated they will find a way and their parents will find a way. If they don't want to be educated, well that's fine too, as we apparently need 12 million unskilled, uneducated workers from other countries to fill jobs that Americans are too educated to fill.

When Bush speaks of "No Child Left Behind" he really means that no child left behind in the US, he wants them all in IRAQ, don't worry kids, you'll get your chance to go fight an Arab, Bush won't leave you behind

[m_kotyk]

Bush's 'No Child Left Behind' Act has been an abysmal failure. It has worsened our educational system; not improved it. We now lag behind Europe and Asia in our level of education. By allowing this to happen, we have squanderd and wasted our greatest resource, our children. Our future as a nation looks bleak.

[olebd]

It's only going to get worse as the expense of education gets pushed off more and more on individual states. Parents will also be expected to give more through taxes, fundraiser after fundraiser, etc.

We are being drained by the war mongers and the illegals who no habla and therefore can't teach their own kids to read or write in English.

Our govt need to change it's out of control spending habits, balance the budget, fix the trade imbalance, stop this world trade baloney.

There's so many facets to the problem.

WOO, I'm getting steamed!

[jdweymouth]

Just remember a very samll fraction will actually be presidents, senators, congressmen, other statesmen, naval/army/airforce officers. The same small fraction who do well in public schools, are homeschooled, or go to private schools.

[mjv2944]

Its time that we held our school teachers and administrators totally accountable. Most people who work have certain standards or amount of work that they must do every day or suffer the consequences. Teachers need to choose as to whether they want tenure or a union, they should not have both. When schools negotiate all they worry about is money, well its time to tie the money to performance.

[oleander8]

First, and foremost - I am not a teacher.

Take a look at school administrators, and school board members paychecks -- what do they actually do to earn those big-bucks and would the money be better spent in the classroom?

Take a look at the unfunded mandates forced on public schools by the government - then get rid of them.

Untie the hands of teachers and let them regain control of the chaotic classrooms.

Remove the bureaucratic rules and regulations that stifle creative teaching. Encourage innovation in the classroom.

Protect schools from frivolous litigation by deranged parents as well as students.

As for higher education -- it is imperative that government do SOMETHING about the astronmical costs to the student as well as the parents.

School used to be "free" in this country - now our children begin their lives with 10's of thousands of dollars of debt.

When did we allow education to become a highly profitable industry for financial institutions?

It's criminal.

[rsoxfan1123]

mjv2944-you think it's because the teachers aren't doing their jobs? Ever wonder why our test scores are lowest in low income, poverty/gang/drug infested neighborhoods? The middle class and upper class schools are scoring just fine. If you were a capable college grad would you want to go teach in a poverty stricken neighborhhod if the standardized test scores were going to be compared with the wealthier districts where the parents read to the kids and don't smoke crack as often in front of them? And then if your scores were lower, idiots would come along and point the finger at you and it's your fault?

[agnim]

"Dismantle the public school system. If kids want to be educated they will find a way and their parents will find a way.

Posted by bellaL at 02:06 AM : Dec 15, 2006"

That statement is proof positive that you have been a victim of our mis-educational system. LOL

Whatever brain you may have had has been 'dismantled' by inferior education, hence that obscene statement. LOL

[clestes-2009]

And that loser we have in office wants ANOTHER 100 billion in Feb for his little wars. So much for his "no child left behind", or his "compassionate conservatism".

He is going to leave this country dead broke owing billions, the military in shambles, our children uneducated, millions of seniors without healthcare, New Orleans still in tatters, big business with tax breaks worth billions, the air and water more polluted, global warming ignored.

But, poring money down the black hole of Iraq, now that is OK. Hundreds of thousands dead, OK. A country torn to shreds, OK.

gw is the worse president in US history. That will be his legacy.

[webdepot]

(part 1 of 2)
The education system in America started going downhill 40 years ago.
When I was in grade school in the 50's, each grade/subject was segregated by ability, so, for say 7th grade, there was a 7-1 class, a 7-2 class and a 7-3 class.
The 1's were overachievers, the 2's average students, the 3's slower learners. Any one student could be at a variety of levels in their different subjects. My own situation, I always made the 1 class in math/science, between 1 and 2 in English and a solid 3 performer in history. I hated history, which I considered useless.. Obviously my mind was geared more to scientific endeavors.
The point is, teachers were able to teach to the student's strength and keep them interested and challenged. In the 1 class, when the prescribed curriculum was completed about 2/3 of the way through the year, the teacher kept us challenged with advanced math teaching beyond the prescribed curriculum.
Somewhere in the 60's, some parent b*tched about their child being stigmatized by being placed in the 3 class. Soon the policy changed and students of all abilities were lumped together.
Teachers however, still had a performance requirement to pass/graduated a certain percentage of their class. Result, they were forced to teach to the level of the slowest kid.
The 1 and 2 level students quickly became bored and bored kids don't learn.
So, while most passed their grades,

[olebd]

Too bad most of these inner-city kids have no role models either unless, of course, you consider what they're learning from rap videos and video games. I saw the new Jay-Z video just yesterday....nothing but the typical show of the brothas kickin' it in a Rolls Royce, women gyrating all over the place, money flying around in the air. What they see is fromer crack dealers making it to the big time.....over and over again. It becomes all about image, who wears the best clothes, drives the nicest cars, has the most, etc. In their head, the fastest way to get there is to sell drugs.

[webdepot]

(part 2)
the actual knowledge the 1 and 2 level kids possessed, was considerably less than what it could/should have been.
Education in this country will not improve until a basic realization is made; just as people have differing physical abilities, they also have different mental abilities.. We are not created equal. Until the student is once again given that ability to overachieve and excel in a particular subject, we will continue to turn out mediocre achievers.
%u201CRemedial%u201D courses for incoming freshmen was never even a thought in my college days. Either you could or could not perform at the college level, period. Those that couldn%u2019t keep up, washed out of college. Those that could keep up, went on to become the engineers, doctors, historians, lawyers that kept this nation at the top. Well, those overachievers just aren%u2019t there anymore, at least in the public system.
Quick story, went to grocery to pick up a few things.. Bill came to 14.78. The gal, about 18 to 20 years old, saw me remove a 20 from my wallet and jumped the gun and entered 20.00 as cash tendered. When I then reached in my pocket and handed her 3 cents, she was totally blown away. She looked from her right hand, with the 20, to her left hand, with the pennies, to the register, to me, at least 4 times. She then voided my entire order and re-rung it.. Just how pathetic is that. For *** sake, I could calculate the change in my head by the time I was 9, even if I were given the three pennies.

[olebd]

With No Child Left Behind, the methods of teaching have gotten out of wack too. My 3rd grader is doing division with decimals. He's pretty good at it and it's considered 4th grade level BUT, it takes him a while to solve the problems because he counts on his fingers. It appears they glossed over the importance of making sure he had a full grasp of his times tables first before advancing him. Now, I feel like I'm playing catch up at home.

The teaching method seems to be geared to nothing more than passing tests and moving on in order to pass the next test. Repetition is lost.

[clestes-2009]

bellaL,

you are as far in outer space as your hero, the ever war mongering Shrub! Dismantled the public education system. Oh yeah, that sounds like it will fix the problem.

First off, that won't help most people. In most couples, they both work. Then there are the single mothers, such as myself, who also work. When are we going to find time to educate our kids? And think about all the child care money that will have to be spent if the kids are not in school. Think about the money to be spent on private tutors.

I suppose this is too much to ask for you to think about, but how about putting some federal money that is currently being spent on war into fixing the education problem. Perhaps you did not realize this, but when Shrub was govn of Texas, they rank at the bottom of all states on their education system. He has taken his poor record on education from a state level and moved it to a national level. How great for us!

You know, everytime you open your mouth, you make a bigger fool of yourself than before. But far be it from me to discourage you, I can always use a good laugh and you are so absurd it is *** funny.

[rsoxfan1123]

antoniorego -you, sir, are a moron. no offense, but you truly are. you are talking about things of which you know absolutely nothing.

[hsteacher1]

I am flabbergasted at the lack of knowledge actually put into your publication. Many concerned citizens will hinge their opinions of the public school system on your ill fated report. In this report you forgot to mention the effects of the decline of the American family on the education system. In this you also forgot to mention the tremendous amount of educators time spent buying materials for students and time spent acting as counsolors and mentors to our students.

[rsoxfan1123]

instead of spending $500 billion improving iraq, what about getting class sizes down? my daughter's kindergarten class was slated for 30 kids. instead of cutting teachers, overcrowding classes and eliminating electives to save money, what about expanding schools? Those same neighborhoods in which everyone bellyaches about the teachers not doing their jobs typically have 30-35 kids per class (or even 40) with thugs, rapists and drug dealers mixed into the crowd. then if the class scores poorly, Bush and his no child left behind gestapo blame the teacher and the teacher's unions.

[vthope]

I have been looking for this to happen ever since universal prekindergarten started rearing up from the big business and government purposes of producing better workers and less crime! I told people that Kindergarten would become the new first grade, 4 year old the new Kindergarten, and 3 year old the new preschool. All of this would lead to high schools reducing their grades to be able to move these other grades in! Budgets can not handle both! And the NEA is not willing to let their numbers fall. I had a hard time thinking of 3 and 4 year old in our public school system. Now we want to put 16 year old into college, and train them in jobs we for years would not let them do under the child labor laws. Whatever serves the government best is what we will end up with! It is time for parents to start looking at what is happening to our school! Wake Up!

[hsteacher1]

As far as the students passing college exams at the age of 16 is absurd. When India and other countries test at that age you forgot to mention that the students that did not meet the criteria will be ejected from the public education system. Therefore, are you for leaving slower students behind. What will happen to the students that can not pass those exams. As far as teachers, we can teach on extremely high standards but who can lower down the material for students that are in special education. There are problems with the public education system but most of them will not be fixed with broadcast done on poor performing schools and teachers. You need to target society as a whole before pointing fingers at public education. Did any of the bipartisan committiee step foot into a regular classroom and try to teach high standards??? I am tired of watching your program stomp all over public education and comparing our students to other countries with only part of the facts. Tell the details of recieving these quality educations in other countries. Do the American people want to pay for educating all of our students.

[blstubbs]

I have in public schools as a secondary teacher for 30 years. We have some wonderful young people who strive to do their best and have set high achievement goals. When our students' performance is compared to other countries, Iget get upset because the playing field is not level. 1) They do not try to educate every child. Our public schools beat the bushes trying enforce attendance laws to meet mandates to get federal and state monies tied to attendance. 2)We have a generation of students who bored with school because they been raised with idea that they are to be entertained. We havethe idea to make all students successful for their self esteem, when failure is the best teacher in some cases. 3)Our public schools spend millions to provide for students who are severely mentally and physically disabled to learn what life skills are possible, when in the past, it was the family that did that. 4) As a mathematics teacher, I have seen the skills decline. With the advent of the calculators(which lobbyists for those companies pushed into being a requirement of course curriculums through our legislature), the push has been away the drills on skills to seeing appplications of concepts which the average student is not always prepared to understand without the skills. They do not have an investment in needing to know so many times they don't care to know. We did just fine going to college with the skills and learning the applications for personal fields of interest and study there.

[nadeau4201]

The government wants our kids uneducated. The dumber the better. They don't want people smart enough to figure out what they are doing. And BELLA the only thing that needs to be dismantled is our government i.e rich politicians,lobbyist special interested groups etc..The rich want to rule the world their kids will go to private schools and follow in their foot steps. Until our governemnt is run by the people for the people nothing will ever change.

[marcpcbs]

From the time our kids are able to see a TV screen their minds and thought patterns are molded around 1 second editing and pretty flaky content. This doe's not create good students. Between portions of the entertainment industry, portions of the advertising industry, pedophiles and drug dealers, our kids are under attack 24/7/365. Most of our kids don't have a chance or the time to learn.

My area of Northern California makes over $10,000,000,000.00 a year selling pot illegally, and over 70% of that goes to this nations schools. All this because we were duped into thinking people needed their medicine. We just unleashed drug dealers that don't stop at the front doors of our school system.

Having teachers grade their own students may not be the best idea. Schools get their money from how many graduate and attend, This should change.

Crazy violent entertainment, Play stations to die for, Drug dealers backed by the law and pedophiles, These are the things we allow to access our children.

I think these things could easily destroy a young persons chance at an education.

[c191569]

I absolutely agree with Sharma that these American students will not be ready for the new globalized world. In order for them to be ready they must first be disciplined and American children lack discipline. They have no respect for parents, teachers and authority. Freedom comes with a price and our children are paying the ultimate price in being rewarded even when they are insolent. So why should they excel? Why shoud they not graduate high school with less than an 8th grade education? And you question why the incompetence level is so high in the workplace.

I can definitely relate to Neha's academic pursuance and achievement. I orignate from a third world country. I too graduated high school at 16. It took discipline and preparedness to achieve this but it is more interesting to note that 70% of the graduating class was 16 years old and the other 30% were between 17 & 18 years. At 16 we were mentally prepared to take on global issues which makes the transition into university less difficult.

[pendragon679]

Our public schools have been in trouble for over 40 years. For the record, I graduated high school in 1974, spent 2 years in business school, failed out of a business admin. program in community college, worked 4 years, went back to college, and got a degree in education. When I saw the mess in the public schools, I became so turned off that I never spent day 1 in front of a classroom. When Jimmy Carter made education a cabinet post, I thought it a good idea. Now I see how wrong that was. We need to get government OUT of the business of education & get our families back INTO the business of teaching our children. When parents learn to become parents again & start letting the schools actually TEACH, only then will things begin to change. Meanwhile, we raise another generation of people unable to grasp the simplest concepts & ignorant of their (our) place in the world. We are quickly becoming a third-world nation because our people don't know their own history.

[magister3]

["I am really worried about where this country is," says ex-Sen. Bill Brock, a former Secretary of Labor. "We've got an information world, we're networked to the rest of the world, it's a global economy and we're not preparing our young people for that world."]

This is incredibly platitudinous. What specifically should students know to prepare for this brave new networked world?

[agnim]

"The government wants our kids uneducated. The dumber the better. .....The rich want to rule the world their kids will go to private schools and follow in their foot steps.

Posted by nadeau4201 at 12:33 PM : Dec 15, 2006"

Dam, guy!

You are EXACTLY right on 200%! LOL

[newsjeff-2009]

I think that our GOP political leaders love to say that all young Americans:young working Americans and young teenagers are uneducated and unskilled as a reason to push for a "guest worker program"or a reason to justify employers in America hiring illegal immigrants for cheap wages,or shipping American jobs overseas or giving American jobs to illegal immigrants, or all of what I just said. I am a democrat, but even I said that senator Kerry should appologize for what he said about U.S.Military personel, Kerry may have meant it as a joke or insult toward Bush and the Iraq war, but some people I know do not join the military just to fight a war, many U.S. military personel are people that joined that wanted the pay and benefits and pride that come from serving in the U.S. military, and many are people that are smart,college educated people. I believe that if U.S. employers paid workers better and offered better job security more young people in this country would go to college to become engineers,scientists,mechanics,machinists,computer engineers,etc.

[sailorsgrave]

On the plus side as long as we keep our students practically illiterate we'll have plenty of soldiers to fight our illegal wars. The glass is half full.

[agnim]

"I believe that if U.S. employers paid workers better and offered better job security more young people in this country would go to college to become engineers,scientists,mechanics,machinist
s,computer engineers,etc.

Posted by newsjeff at 04:34 PM : Dec 15, 2006"

Good point.

But how about youngsters and their families seeing to their education so that the graduates can GROW UP AND BEGIN THEIR OWN ENTERPRISE?

See, the pursuit of knowledge is not about others egging you on: It's also about children and their families TAKING RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR OWN SELF DEVELOPMENT!

[olgreyghost]

Abolish the public indocrination system and we can all enjoy the savings by not paying unnecessary taxes. Then the responsibility and control of a child's education is back where it belongs - in the hands of the parents. One thing that leads to the declining efficiency of the public schools is that they have no real competition to force them to prepare and provide a better product and they enjoy a near-monopoly on the market with the force of the law to require their clients to have to go to them.

[inaparidyne]

Everyone seems to be pointing in differnt directions on this subject.I have three teenagers myself. I would like to fire all the teachers and staff.
But that would not solve a thing.
The way I see it, the way of the world has changed.We have to change our way of thinging or teaching.To keep the students interested enough to learn.It takes a certian type of person to keep things interesting and teach.The cost of books,paper&pencils ect. per student. A laptop is probly cheaper. I guess what I'm saying is we need to change our school structure.to catch up,or surpass the rest of the world.

We are a world leeder lets stay on top

[firststate]

Can we really put education back into the hands of parents? The current crop of parents of children of school age consists of many who are a product of the broken system. Many who did graduate from high school are among those with a diploma and an eighth grade education. As well-intentioned as they might be, they aren't capable of handling their children's educations themselves and many of them readily admit that.

The education system in the US didn't just go to He llovernight and fixes won't be quick, but changes need to start. At this point, it's time to try almost anything. How much harm can be done by any reasoned approach for changing a system in such disrepair? It is approaching the point where further harm is unlikely to result from any genuine attempt at improvement.

I had planned to train new quality control employees for an industrial startup operation a few years ago. I thought I could cover concepts specific to the industry and brush up on some basic statistics. I wound up having to put together a remedial math course, first. Several of the employees who had bachelor's degrees had no concept of fractions, decimals or basic math operations. If the level of math skills among high school graduates is lower then we should be grateful that today's cash registers calculate the change due a customer. Otherwise the fast food and convenience store sectors would crumble under the complexity of making change.

[olgreyghost]

Sylvan does a fine job of helping students catch up on materials they seem to be missing in the public indocrination centers at a reasonable costs for parents. How unfortunate they don't expand to a full course schedule but if we let the free market handle the case a better product would be available than the substandard on we have come to accept from the government near-monopoly on the education industry.

Imagine an apprentice program where children, particularly those who are not so good at "book-learning," earn while they learn and good grades are rewarded with bonuses and pay raises. Imagine some smart entrepreneur developing the Wal-Mart of primary and secondary education that delivers the quality of product the consumer (parent and/or student) wants at the lowest price ("Always"). If they fail to deliver, they go out of business.

What is needed is for the government to get out of the way and drop all these programs of minimums which force teachers to teach to a test and not the subject they are supposed to be teaching. And requiring that teachers are educated in the subjects they teach and not just trained teachers, as if that was enough education in itself, would certainly help.

In just about every subject, the private sector can provide a better product at a lower cost for the end consumer than anything produced by a government monopoly. Imagine how much better the mail would run if UPS and Fed-Ex were allowed to compete with the USPS...

[marcpcbs]

Abolishing the educational system is a terrible idea. Most of the parents in Mendocino who say they are "home schooling" their kids couldn't spell their own name and are really keeping the kids home to help with growing tones of pot, most of which gets sold to school kids across the country and destroys education. It's a downward cycle.

We need to have the teachers in charge, the parents supporting and backing the teachers, the kids in uniforms, sitting quietly and attentively at their desks with no electronic games or cell phones to distract them. The school isn't supposed to be a place with no rules and kids do anything they want. It's supposed to be a place where "students" come to follow the rules for the purpose of getting a education.

When I was in school and the bell rang, you were quietly in your seat with your book open to the proper page and your home work ready to hand in and if you acted up both the teacher and your parent were in your face.

[bellal-2009]

You can throw as much money as conceivably possible at the broken school system and it still won't fix the problem. I've seen homeschool kids literally educate themselves and go onto the best colleges, completely shattering the myth of more money equaling better education. The child has to be inspired to learn and our system is not designed for inspiration nor does it offer support for those teachers who do inspire. I'd like to see it go private and cut high school to two years for those not college bound. Those two years would be the basics math, science, history, English. If the govt. wants to have facilitate an apprentice program that would be nice.

[bellal-2009]

The current system completely ignores the independent creative thinker. And standards based education is dumbing kids down faster than if they had no school at all.

[samthetvcat]

I haven't really studied this issue much with regards to what can be done to achieve lasting gains, but this story makes me feel like this really needs to be a top priority.