Page Text: Dumb and Dumber (Nos. 38 & 39)
cbradleythompson.substack.com
Dumb and Dumber (Nos. 38 & 39)
Watching the Education Apocalypse in Slow Motion
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I was hoping to have a long form essay for you this past Tuesday, but as I noted last week I’ve been on a weeklong trip to Nevada and Utah and it didn’t get finished. Actually, I had an essay ready to go but I kept writing, writing, and writing, and it just got too long to publish. The good news (for me at least) is that what was once one essay is now two, which I’ll publish this coming week and the one after.
Right now I’m at Snow College in Ephraim, Utah, where I gave two talks and taught a couple of classes. I’ve had a wonderful time at Snow. Great college in a beautiful place that values freedom of thought and speech.
K-12 EDITION
AT A CERTAIN POINT, PARENTS HAVE TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE WELLBEING OF THEIR CHILDREN. If your child is being abused at school, you have a moral responsibility to get them out: “‘ I Get Scared To Go To School’: Uptick In Violence In Baltimore County Schools Has Students Fearful & Parents Concerned .”
AMERICA’S KIDS CAN’T READ, WRITE, OR CALCULATE, BUT THEY SURE DO KNOW WHICH PRONOUNS OR HORMONE BLOCKERS TO USE, NOT TO MENTION KNOWING THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN “cisgender, transgender, nonbinary, and "gender expansive.” “ America’s Kids Earn Disappointing Grades on Nation’s Report Card
Math and reading scores for 9-year-old students in the U.S. are flat since 2012, while those of 13-year-olds declined dramatically – representing the first major drops in the subjects since the National Assessment of Educational Progress began tracking long-term academic achievement trends in the 1970s. . . .
"None of these results are impressive," said Peggy Carr, the associate commissioner in the assessment division of the National Center for Education Statistics, which oversees the administration of the testing and the analysis of results.
"All of these results are concerning, but the math results were particularly daunting, particularly for 13 year-olds," she said. "I asked them to go back and check because I wanted to make sure [the results were accurate]. I've been reporting these results for years – for decades – and I've never reported a slide like that."