In what I found to be an otherwise interesting and well written article, the author frequently referred to "my students" and yet at no time seemed inclined to lay any blame on himself, or academia as a whole, which holds a monopoly greater than anything found in commerce or industry on the "teaching" of our youth.

When discipline is non existent, parents (I use the plural out of habit?) are irresponsible or uninvolved, and trial lawyers are only too happy to throw a suit at anyone who even considers punishment of any sort (there is no "looser pays" and school districts tend to settle rather than incur bad press (bait)), how can we expect any change of habits?

While the author points at the students and suggests that their lack of awareness is the reason that practices such as rendition are allowed to continue, I would suggest that it is the voting public which allows the public education system to remain so chronically broken and fails to challenge the absolute power of the teachers unions that is far more culpable. If answering correctly the questions posed in the piece were pre requisites to advancement from 8th to 9th grade, we would be starting to get on track, but we were talking College Freshmen !

Is it reasonable to expect that a child should be passed from grade to grade based not on their ability to learn, absorb and collate knowledge, but rather because "they tried, and felt good about themselves doing it" right up to the point where they enter the workforce with barley the skills to ask "would you like fry's with that?"

If I were a cynic, I might just wonder if growing a generation who are dependent on entitlements and government programs from cradle to grave were part of a bigger scheme?

Even someone who can't find Uzbekistan on a map will feel inclined to take a few minutes away from American Idol to vote for free stuff every 4 years (as long as someone gives them a ride to the polling station and shows them how the machines work!)


It's rarely rocket science, it's usually just math: then again if you can't do the math.......