But can she type?
Remember this one? Lady calls up the radio talk show, upset because she thinks “Deer Crossing” road signs are misleading the deer…
https://leeduigon.com/2016/01/30/do-deer-read-road-signs/
Her whole argument was premised on her belief that deer were reading the signs and coming to a wrong conclusion.
The United States of America spends more money on “education” than any civilization in world history, has “educated” more people than any country ever, and has achieved an adult literacy rate that is the envy of… well, nobody.
But our deer our pretty smart!
Yes, LOL, I remember this one well. I heard it years ago, and thought it compared well with the one the animal lovers’ complaint said, “why must people kill animals for their food, why can’t they just buy it in the grocery store like the rest of us.” The ignorance and idiocy never ceases to amaze.
Schools, these days, teach compliance and fitting in first. If a student is lucky, they might pick up a year or two’s worth of reading and math, but many student come out of school incapable of much more than complying with instructions and a well-grounded fear of defying the frequently arbitrary authority of the school.
I’ve heard the school system described as day prisons for children, and I think that’s somewhat accurate. That was the way it felt when I was in school and if you’ve ever seen children rush out of school at the end of the day, it does resemble someone being released from incarceration.
The schools I attended were well above average, even in their day. I was fortunate to have grown up in a town that was prosperous, although my family was not rich. Because of this, I always had assumed that children received the same things I had, in my school years. We were taught to read and write, we were taught math and introduced to geometry and trigonometry as part of the core course. We even had music theory and, somehow, I actually retained some of that, which actually became quite important later on.
During my school years, my parents moved and the first school I went to was not all that good. It straddled a mix of neighborhoods, including some that were bad news. When I took a math course at that new school, I found out that I was way ahead of my peers, probably because the elementary school math I had taken went beyond the Jr. High math in many schools. (I refuse to use the PC term “Middle School”.)
The final school I went to was in a moderately prosperous, solidly middle class suburb and was an above average school. We had a retired Air Force Colonel that taught both history and aviation. While he was somewhat abrasive and off-putting at times, he taught me some valuable information which I use to this day. There were several other great teachers as well, faces I remember to this day, nearly fifty years later. A few years ago, I looked up one teacher and gave her a call. We ended up having lunch together and I thanked her for what she had taught me. Hers was considered a “soft subject”, but she helped me to prepare for life and I remember it well.
Sadly, education of that quality is not happening in many public schools these days. When I speak to younger people, I am often struck but the shallowness, or quite possibly total absence of their ability to reason. Many seem to revert to platitudes which provide little of substance. I firmly believe that we are in the Last Days, although I don’t claim to have any insights regarding when these will culminate. But I truly shudder to think of what this world could become in the next few decades.
I think the thing I hated most about grade school was the way the principal and some of the teachers would force you into admitting something that you didn’t do, and then punish you for doing it. That taught me a powerful lesson: “Authority” is basically insane, and it will eat you alive if you give it a chance.
The sense of being in control of others is a powerful thing and can be easily abused. There are, certainly, legitimate reasons for authority to exist, but even these legitimate examples are frequently abused. Much of what I saw in the school system was fairly arbitrary authority. When I was in grade school, I was sent to the principal’s office for breaking a microscope. The thing is, I hadn’t broken it. Someone had unscrewed the part that held the three lenses and when I touched it to move to a higher magnification it fell off in my hands. Ok, that was an understandable mistake on the part of the teacher and principal, but not allowing me to explain matters and interrupting me when I tried was inexcusable on their part. The fact that it bothers me over 50 years later testifies to the depth of the effect it had upon me.
Even as a child, I felt that basic education should be done by parents. Perhaps there would be limited duration schools for specialized learning, such as trade schools. I am self educated, almost from the beginning, and think that I am better off for it. The 12 years of my public school education did more to delay the learning process, than anything else. There were some things of value, but they managed to stretch about 2 years worth of learning out into 12 years of confinement. My education began in earnest after high school.
I did eventually go to a trade school and found it stimulating and enjoyable. I passed with top level grades and came away much better for the experience. Had I access to the same material in my early teens, I would have gotten a lot out of it and it would have gotten me off to a better start in life.
Since those years, I have taken numerous classes in specialized areas, many of which amounted to one college semester’s worth of material presented in one week. Virtually every course I’ve taken in the last 25 years has been delivered this way and I’ve learned my current profession thusly; plus the immeasurable value of experience I have gained working in the field.
One of my most vivid memories of fourth grade is the principal screaming at me, “I know your philosophy!” To this day I have no idea what she was talking about.
I was a very timid and easily intimidated child, so I covered through such events. As an adult, I’ve learned to let it roll off of me like water off a duck’s back, but if someone goes too far, they may be treated to a real-time analysis of the flaws in their logic, delivered calmly and without emotion. You can really get ‘em red in the face by exposing their unreasoning, especially if they are trying to humiliate someone in front of others and they find themselves victims of their own scheme.
Mostly, I just shrug it off. Idiots are nourished in their idiocy when they gain attention for their babble.