I grew up in a cultural and educational bubble where every one of my elementary, intermediate, and high school teachers were graduates of Brigham Young University's Department of Education. Being kicked out of that cultural prison because I was a gay 16 year-old and considered a "deviant" or "pervert" or "whatever" threat my parents and their elders considered I must be (they ALL were certain I was headed for Hell and worshipping Satan) didn't mean my world view and general opinion of who I was would change much during the subsequent 40+ years as well as recognizing who the real assholes were.
When I could finally attend university I elected English as my major. Everyone except other English majors would snidely ask, "What are you going to do when you graduate? Teach?" Practically no one, even my good friends at the time, encouraged me in any way. In the 60s there was a general sentiment that we could not trust anyone, especially the majority of university academics because education had become a sham. And in a way it was. It had been pretty much been co-opted by the US Military Complex for its own uses and none of those uses were for spreading peace or creating a better world.
I discovered that undergrad school was relatively easy --- if I studied. It was certainly better than a nine-to-five job working for The Man. After five and a half years (I paid my own way and worked through what should have taken four years of college), imagine my glee to discover that all five graduate schools I applied to offered me full-ride scholarships. My only regret is that I decided upon The University of Texas, Austin. But I made it through four years of grad school in the sweltering heat of the Texas Hill Country watching as one by one my classmates would earn too many Bs, then a fateful C would cause them to be kicked out of the graduate program. By some stroke of luck I survived to eventually defend my graduate thesis.
But it is true what the OP broached about 'Mericuhn students being generally dull and unmotivated when it comes to an education. By simply knowing how to write well enough to create short sets of instructions (a trick one learns concocting exams) I ended up as the head of my class, even though I know fully well most of my colleagues were (and still are) leap years ahead of me in native intelligence. When a little software company that now pretty much dominates the PC world was interviewing for people to be technical writers with experience in anthropology, linguistics and theories regarding human acquisition of knowledge I was just who they were looking for. And even though they paid damn well, they still may make shitty software and a operating system embedded with legacy flaws. Still, I thank them for all of those pay checks and stock options I cashed in after 10+ years.
At 59 I'm not exactly an anarchist, but I still have a world view that hasn't changed that much since I was 17. I'm just a bit less optimistic and less prone to having high expectations of my fellow human beings. After all, I KNEW mormons were a fucked up cult by the time I was 12 years-old. As I grew older my knowledge of how many other religions, political beliefs, and whacko cults there are simply expanded beyond the one I grew up in in Ewetaw.
However, if anyone posting to this thread (or on this? in this? -- choose your prepositions wisely) is really interested in changing things, look into the adult literacy projects in your geographical area of the USA. Hand them $50 or whatever they request for a couple of weekends of training so you have a modest tool chest of the fundamentals about how different people learn to read. Then volunteer as a tutor, meeting one hour three days a week for at least six months with an 18 year-old who may just have graduated from high school but cannot read despite his or her High School diploma. Or maybe you'll luck out and be assigned someone 75 years-old who has always wanted to learn to read, but for some reason fell through the educational cracks.
And just so there is no confusion among the neo conservative fringe evangelical christian right, or those who believe Obama is a racist, I'm suggesting you volunteer to teach a low-income to possibly middle class Anglo. Leave the people migrating to the USA (legally or illegally) to us professionals.
There are as many excuses for being illiterate in the USA as there are people who cannot read. And they all are not based upon whether a person attended a private school or a public school or if they are in the USA illegally. More often than not, the illegal alien in the USA is completely literate in his or her own language -- but not English.
Supposedly, the USA has a 97% literacy rate. But that number is just a bunch of smoke and mirrors. According to the government, if you can recognize a stop sign the US Department of Education claims you can read. Never mind if that's the only word you might know. At least you can read Stop! There are no State laws that require an individual to be able to read to pass a driving test and receive a driver's license. Shocking, but true. Just go to your Department of Motor Vehicles driver's license division and see how many professional long-haul truckers are taking the driving examination using the audio-visual testing machines rather than checking off answers with a pencil on the shorter written exams.
Compare this to getting a driver's license in Spain, France, Belgium, Holland, Greece, and Germany. You cannot get a driver's license in any of those countries unless you can read the written test. Even more dramatic is Argentina. After you've successfully answered 85% of the written questions you then meet with a psychologist who spends a couple of hours administering psychological tests that rate your potential for explosive anger and general ability at deductive reasoning.
Yup, the USA is so free we are free to be as uneducated as we want to be.
. This really isn't a matter in which opinion can have much of an influence, especially when their statements regarding education and the value thereof are often very straightforward.
