A personal anecote: a man who operates a Lindt candy shop in one of our New Jersey malls wished to hire part-time help, as do many small businesses during the Christmas season. So he hired a recent high school graduate.
As he tried to instruct her in her not-terribly-complicated duties, she interrupted with an objection. “I can’t count nickels.” “What?” “I can’t count nickels.” What she meant was, she couldn’t count by fives: 5-10-15-20-etc. Never learned. She can probably tell you all about Diversity, though. In case anybody comes into the shop looking for that instead of chocolate truffles.
He wrote her a short list of what she had to do. Another objection: “I can’t read that.” Turns out she can’t read cursive writing, never learned how.
What were they doing with her, all those years in school? With all those $100,000-a-year teachers and administrators? With all those tax dollars spent on her, ahem, “education”?
On second thought, I think I’d rather not hear the answer.
My God! These schools are turning our youth into mental invalids.
She probably can’t count dimes or quarters either, or read checks that people write. (Yes, some people still use paper checks.) In fact, if she can’t read cursive, she probably can’t write it either … so how can she sign her name to the various non-online employment forms she may have to fill out?
Her family should sue the “education” system of New Jersey.
It’s very common, now, for young (and not-so-young) people to be unable to read or write cursive script. That started kicking in years ago.
The Fort Smith Public School System that I work for as a Sub is having a problem with truancy. It seems the students (and their parents) have figured out that they will get promoted to the next grade whether they show up much for school or not. The District’s solution is wanting to have the local law agencies enforce the law and make the parents pay a fine – that will teach them, so the say.
The sad state of education today