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Decline of teaching and
learning By Martin Gross Excerpts from Martin Gross' new book, "The Conspiracy of Ignorance: The Failure of American Public Schools." American 8th graders from 200 schools were excited about pitting their math skills against youngsters from the United Kingdom, Spain, Ireland and four Canadian provinces. All were given the same 63-question exam, and students were also asked to check "Yes" or "No" to the statement: "I am good at math." . . . . The "self-esteem" which permeates our schoolhouses was apparently ready to pay off. The great majority of American youngsters claimed they were good at math, while only one-fourth the South Korean youngsters believed they were competent. . . . . Many of the test questions were quite simple. One asked: "Here are the ages of five children: 13, 8, 6, 4, 4. What is the average age of these children?" . . . . How did the superconfident Americans kids do on this no-brainer? Sadly, 60 percent of our youngsters got the answer -- 7 --wrong. . . . . When the full results came in, the Americans were shocked. We came in last while the South Koreans won. But paradoxically, the losing Americans did vanquish the Koreans in one category: self-esteem. . . . . The American education establishment is equally self-confident, but their self-esteem is also challenged by the results. In 1998, American students did very poorly in the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS). "U.S. 12th graders performed . . . among the lowest of the 21 TIMSS countries on the assessment of mathematical general knowledge," reported the Department of Education, which pointed out that our high schoolers only outperformed students from Cyprus and South Africa. . . . . Domestically, how well do our kids do in general knowledge? . . . . The federal National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) test results show an appalling ignorance across the academic spectrum. Two out of three 17-year-olds did not know the meaning of the Emancipation Proclamation. Even fewer had heard of the War of 1812, the Marshall Plan that saved Europe, or Lyndon Johnson's Great Society. . . . . In science, the majority could not figure out that a shadow cast by the rising sun would fall to the west. On a map of the world most could not locate Southeast Asia. . . . . But if students are failing, surely teachers can hold their own in the world of knowledge. Correct? . . . . Hardly. Of 1,800 education graduates seeking teachers' licenses in Massachusetts, 59 percent -- three out of five -- flunked the screening test. Results were "painful" and "abysmal," said the state education chief. Many were unable to write a complete sentence and spelling aberrations such as "horibal," "compermise," even "universel," were common. . . . . Surveys show that parents and business are increasingly unhappy about the poor quality of public education, as they should be. Children who fail to achieve a college education will lose some $20,000 a year in income as adults. David Kearns, former CEO of Xerox estimates that poor schooling costs business some $50 billion a year in remedial work. In 1999, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan warned that the weak state of public education -- from kindergarten to senior high -- endangers the continuation of American productivity. . . . . But if our youngsters are failing, how are we able to maintain our high-tech dominance? . . . . Mainly because our technology runs heavily on foreign talent. Overall, some 45 percent of the 13,000 hard science Ph.Ds in America are awarded each year to non-Americans. In computer sciences and engineering, foreign input rises to 50 percent. . . . . It is not because Americans have been stingy in their support of education. That cost has risen twice as fast as inflation over the past 30 years. We have spent billions on smaller classes, on twice the number of teachers, on language labs, computers, Internet hook-ups, magnet schools. We have implemented such new theories as "open classrooms," "team teaching," the "new math," even "teacher empowerment." To attract better teachers, we have increased salaries. Teachers now earn $40,000 on average, and those in New York and New Jersey earn over $50,000, and $55,000 in Connecticut. . . . . What have these trillions wrought? Has public schooling improved? . . . . There have been no significant gains, and under present management there is little hope for the future. No reforms have worked because they have not attacked the core of the problem: the makeup, theories, personnel and operation of the education establishment --some 5 million "professionals," from classroom teachers to state education commissioners. . . . . That Establishment has proven to be an unscholarly, anti-intellectual cabal best described as a conspiracy of ignorance, one determined to maintain and protect its false teaching theories and low academic standards. . . . . (However, it is not a conspiracy of malice. Most educators are well-meaning if undereducated people.) . . . . In 1835, Alexis de Tocqueville explained that Americans had a "middling standard" of education that was effective. Nowhere in the world, he said, were there so few learned people, yet so few ignorant. Today, his comment should be turned on its head. Circa 2000, nowhere in the developed world are there so many ignorant schoolchildren as in America. . . . . Here then is a Bill of Indictment of the Education Establishment, problems which cry out for true reform:
. . . . Martin L. Gross' latest book is "The Conspiracy of Ignorance: The Failure of American Public Schools," to be published by Harper Collins in September. Back to Education
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