K-12: The Conspiracy Against Reading

A century ago, US public school students had achieved almost universal literacy. The Education Establishment took care of that.

 In his 1984 book about American education, Samuel Blumenfeld pointed out that: “Nothing has mystified Americans more than the massive decline of literacy in the United States. Children spend more time at school and the government spends more money on education than ever before. Yet, reading ability keeps declining. What has gone wrong?”

You have probably heard this lament. But here's where it becomes really alarming. Blumenfeld looked back seven decades to the year 1915. That's when the literacy figures for 1910 were published by the US Bureau of Education and quoted in a weekly publication, School and Society, edited by James McCain Cattelll, one of the luminaries in the Progressive education movement. School and Society stated that:

  “Statistics compiled by the Bureau of Education for use at the Panama-Pacific Exposition, show that of children from 10 to 14 years of age there were in 1910 only 22 out of every 1,000 who could neither read nor write….. The following states report only one child in 1,000 between ages of 10 and 14 as illiterate: Connecticut, District of Columbia, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oregon, Utah, and Washington…It is evident that the public schools will in a short time practically eliminate illiteracy.”   (READ MORE)

   

Socialism versus Education

 "A death instinct" in action…

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To understand the failures of public education, we have to understand the dreams of socialism. 

It has always had three main targets it hopes to destroy: family, religion, and private property. These three are the very foundation of civilization for thousands of years. How could you possibly destroy them? Through education, of course. Or perhaps “miseducation” is the proper word.

Control and pervert education, and you can convince the masses that they no longer want what their parents and grandparents wanted so desperately. 

Educated people can reflect on what is being done to them. Ignorant people do not know enough to reflect on much of anything. More and more, American students lack basic skills and fundamental knowledge. How can they understand proposals made by politicians, media, and government?

Igor Shafarevich, a famous Russian mathematician, wrote a 1980 book called “The Socialist Phenomenon.” Shafarevich explained that enforced equality was a constant obsession of socialists. To achieve it, they were willing to adopt extreme and indeed murderous measures. Shafarevich “argues that socialism is essentially nihilistic, unconsciously motivated by a death instinct. He concludes that we have the choice of either pursuing death or life.”

K-12: Inside Job

"When hatred of culture becomes itself a part of culture, the life of the mind loses all meaning.” Alain Finkielkraut

Beware the traitor, we are finding out. History will probably record that high-ranking government officials tried to overturn the election of Donald Trump. History, I suspect, will use the word coup and will call these people traitors. This is unpleasant stuff but also clarifying. A small group of people, well-organized and focused on the same goal, can overturn and destroy much larger organizations.

 John Dewey and his supporters, a century ago, did not think of themselves as traitors, now would they use the word coup. But they organized themselves in exactly that fashion. A few hundred professors of education took control of Columbia’s Teachers College et al with the goal of creating “progressive” teachers who could be sent out to the public schools of America to create a new kind of citizen, more cooperative and pliable.

Laurie Rogers, one of the sharpest critics of our Education Establishment, sees an abundance of betrayal. Her blog was titled “Betrayed — Why Public Education Is Failing.” Her 2011 book is titled “Betrayed: How the Education Establishment has Betrayed America.” 

In 2008 she summed up nearly a century of public school decline: “The dizzying downward spirals of skills in science, technology, engineering and math are jeopardizing students’ futures and the nation’s stability…Many of the people who built this failing education system make money off of it as it crumbles around our ears….Most of the people in the education establishment refuse to engage in this conversation (leaving students and parents to work it out on their own)….Of the rest, most neatly sidestep any blame for the tragedy as they foist blame on parents, teachers, money, legislators, society, hormones (yes, I've actually heard that), and the students themselves….Just a handful will try to warn you of this education apocalypse. Some of those brave souls have been censured, reprimanded or fired.” Rogers does not see accident or fad. She sees active betrayal.

(Read more)

K-12: Parallels with Venezuela

Progressive/Socialist theories promise panaceas; but the People typically end up with pain.

K-12: Parallels with Venezuela

Such a marvelous country. Venezuela is twice the size of California, with a mix of tropical and temperate climates, with 1500 miles of oceanfront and, guess what, more oil reserves than any other country in the world. What could go wrong? Venezuela has everything, unfortunately including a Socialist government.

Barron’s reported (April 8, 2017): “Venezuela is in free fall….Once Latin America’s wealthiest nation and a tourist destination touted in airline ads from the 1950s, Venezuela now faces shortages of food and basic medicines…”

The Washington Post reported (Feb. 12, 2018), “Venezuela’s economy is so bad, parents are leaving their children at orphanages.”

 How could so many blessings be turned into failures? The Panama Post  presented (Dec. 21, 2017) a profound political analysis of Venezuela’s plight. The key weapons used against it, according to this report, are “deception and distraction.” 

Many will see a parallel with our K-12 system:

“For years, the world’s socialists have successfully championed the idea that Venezuela is a somewhat deteriorated democracy but a democracy after all. A democracy where there’s a government that oversteps its limits and has dictatorial aspirations and on the other hand a democratic and moderate opposition that seeks to change the government through democratic elections. And they’ve always been SO close to achieving this goal, but for X or Y they could not: if only they had X percent more support, or if they’d had more volunteers in the polling stations, or more charismatic leaders, or whatever endless amount of mediocre rationalizations devised to hide the truth….(READ MORE)