General State of Public Education

The following posting is not driven by specific students’ idiocy for a change; rather, this is a rant about the current state of public education. This has been spurred on by the comment below posted by a fellow teacher (woohoo, I have a reader!) as well as various conversations I’ve had with people over this fine Memorial Day Weekend.

The comment posted by the fellow teacher is an all too apt satirical comment based on the current educational trends. Yes, our department head has recently been urging us to come up with “new, original, unique” types of final exams—as always she claims this directive is “coming down the pipeline from central office.” Think back to your last English exam. What was it like? A few short answer questions. Probably an essay or two based on what you read during the semester. Perhaps you even had to remember main characters names and some key plot points. God forbid you may have had to synthesize information from a variety of readings and write a well-organized and coherent argument based on your semester course work. Shit…that sounds like some sort of exam that tests you on everything you were supposed to have learned (a final?!). Well, rather than continue this logical trend—you know, testing students on what they learned throughout the semester—our department looking for the “new, original, unique” manner of testing. What could this be? Sadly, interpretive dance, yoga, or some other “what are you feeling” bullshit will likely be the answer. We have been overtly forbidden to ask specific questions about books on the final exam. I don’t mean questions like “what is the third word on page 203,” but things like “what are the main characters’ names in To Kill a Mockingbird.” After all, that might require that students study the material prior to taking the FINAL EXAM; also, it would unjustly hold them accountable for the work they should have been completing all semester long. Besides, it’s not like we want to prepare them for college or anything. The two ten-fifteen page papers I wrote as finals for my two graduate courses recently required me to re-read course material, conduct background research, compose a lucid and intelligent argument, and most of all THINK! Perhaps my graduate professors are just behind the times and don’t realize that they should want to hear about (literally hear or possibly watch me perform) how I felt about Moby-Dick and Paradise Lost and what does Ishmael’s character mean to me.

What’s wrong with public education? We say we want to “increase the rigor” and “raise the standards,” yet bullshit like proves the opposite to be true. The real problem with public education lies in the word P-U-B-L-I-C. The “public” is largely constituted by morons, retards, and assholes. Go to Wal*Mart anytime after 8PM to see for your self (warning: don’t look at any one person for too long or you might go blind). Stupid parents who do not value education have stupid kids who don’t give a shit either. Everyone has the potential to rise above his/her poor circumstances in life, but most people just don’t want to. It would be too hard and require too much work. Work—a word that is becoming foreign to most quick-fix, don’t-give-a-shit Americans. Yes, everyone deserves a free education. Yes, everyone deserves the opportunity to succeed. However, success only comes from hard work and real effort. The kids who are completely unwilling to put forth any effort deserve to fail. You can’t shin shit, and people do have a right to refuse opportunity. Sadly, those are the same people that will have five kids by the time they are twenty. Those kids will likely follow in their parents’ pathetic footsteps, and the vicious cycle will continue.

So what’s the solution? A fellow teacher had the best idea when she once suggested a switch that is implanted in all babies and must be turned on in order to allow breeding.