Children Left Behind

J: One of the many reasons my contribution had dropped off in recent months was that I had reentered the world of Academia. For a variety of reasons that I won't bore you with here, I just hadn't got around to finishing my degree, and I am now at a point in my life where it makes sense to hit the books again.

It has been a few years since I set foot in a classroom, but thankfully not much has changed. The professors are still occasionally long-winded, and the books are still quite a racket. What is different this time around is the people in the classroom with me. And I don't just mean in a "they're so young" sense.

I am witnessing the results of programs such as No Child Left Behind, and it is absolutely appalling. We as a Nation are raising a generation of automatons. These kids do not ask questions. Well, that's not entirely true- they ask questions, just not the right kind of questions. They don't question whether the professor is factually correct, they don't ask how certain bits of information fit in to the course content. The only question they have is "Will this be on the exam?"

Thanks to standardized testing starting early in Elementary school, and lasting all through High School, we now have teachers that simply "teach to the test", and the students have caught on. If information is On The Test, then it is vitally important, and must be retained at all costs. If it is not, then there is simply no reason to waste the brain space to retain it, no matter how enriching it may be. Critical thinking? Why bother? It won't be On The Test.

I was raised to think about things and ask questions. My first Critical Thinking class was in fifth grade, taught by Sister Mary Hope. I'm certain there's a cheap joke to be made there about a nun teaching that particular course, but I'm not going to make it. My point is, even in Elementary school, I was taught the quote by Plutarch- "The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled." For today's youth, the mind is a card to be punched. Education is apparently no longer about teaching our children, it is instead an industry. The students are no longer expected to be learning how to be productive adults, they are instead treated as a commodity, a cog in the machine, a statistic that has to pass The Test in order for the school district to get its share of Federal tax dollars.

We're not training the next generation of leaders, we're training sheep who will be more than happy to sit in their cubicles and do their menial tasks without complaining.

It's a goddamn embarrassment.