Our future
There's a pretty frightening report out from a group called America's Promise citing a 50% urban high school dropout rate across the country.
I don't have an absolute number, but imagine the student populations in the public school systems of the big cities, New York, Chicago, LA, Houston, Dallas, Atlanta, etc, etc, and imagine half of those kids going out into the world without a high school diploma.
I'll leave the rant that education rates correlate directly to most societal ills for another day (crime, poverty, health, teen pregnancy, drug use, etc,) but, seriously, what kind of future are we building?
I don't have an absolute number, but imagine the student populations in the public school systems of the big cities, New York, Chicago, LA, Houston, Dallas, Atlanta, etc, etc, and imagine half of those kids going out into the world without a high school diploma.
I'll leave the rant that education rates correlate directly to most societal ills for another day (crime, poverty, health, teen pregnancy, drug use, etc,) but, seriously, what kind of future are we building?
posted by mikevotes at
2:43 PM
6 Comments:
Depressing indeed. There is plenty of blame to go around, too. Broken families, apathetic parents, teacher unions, uncaring administrators, and the celebrity-driven materialist culture all play a part in this dismal outcome. It has now gone on so long that it's compounding on itself.
What kind of future are we building? An ugly one.
By
Patrick, at 3:23 PM
Coming from a long line of educators. It's the parents 100%. Everything starts there.
By
matt, at 3:32 PM
My opinion is that there's several cultural problems.
Relating to the individual children, the parents are a big issue, but I would also include a broad cultural problem.
Our society makes fun of the kids with good grades. That's really messed up. When I was in high school, the smart kids had to try and hide their grades to keep from being made fun of/to fit in.
The culture is messed up when there is a peer disincentive.
I don't know how you fix it, but I know that right now that honor roll bumper sticker is not cool.
By
mikevotes, at 4:15 PM
Hence, the parents are not instilling respect in their children for anything. There's nothing worse than an ignorant nihilist.
By
matt, at 4:30 PM
Very much agreed.
But it's not just parents. It extends further into the culture. Look at how TV and movies portrays the good grades kid.
(I would argue that the media is reflecting/reinforcing.)
By
mikevotes, at 4:39 PM
True, Consumerism has replaced Culture. Culture has always been looked on as a bastion of the effeminate and elitist or pretentious. That's the way it goes in small town Iowa.
Myself, I've found that knowledge is power and ignorance is death. Whether you're an intellectual or not if you're uninformed or purposefully lazy regarding your life and surroundings you have no one but yourself to blame.
By
matt, at 5:05 PM
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