Deliberate Dumbing Down of America Public Education

304 partment Secretary’s Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills (SCANS) study originated under Labor Secretary Elizabeth Dole, and eventually led to the School-to-Work Opportunities Act and the dumbing down of American education curriculum for workforce training. With all of this emphasis on “standards” it should be pointed out that NAFTA allows exchanges of all categories of professionals, with those coming from Mexico and Canada having met their own countries’ standards, not necessarily equal to those required in the United States. If this process evolves the way most of these exchange processes have in the past, that disparity will be addressed in one of two ways—by changing U.S. standards to match foreign standards, or by altering both NAFTA nations’ standards to align with international standards like ISO 9000 or ISO 1400 monitored by UNESCO. This should be of concern to professional organizations in the United States.] “S CHOOLROOM S HUFFLE : T RAILING IN E DUCATION FOR Y EARS , K ENTUCKY T RIES R ADICAL Reforms— Grades 1 through 3 Become One Class with No Texts, Desks or Report Cards—Some Parents, Principals Balk” by Suzanne Alexander was published in The Wall Street Journal (A–6) on January 5, 1993. Some excerpts follow: L EXINGTON , K ENTUCKY —Teachers work in teams, using children’s literature to teach spell ing, reading and writing. For math and science, students are taught to analyze instead of memorize. “We’ve turned education topsy-turvy,” says teacher Beverly Dean, gazing around her “We have redefined the basics and challenged every assumption you have about learn ing,” says Faye King, principal of Stanton Elementary School in eastern Kentucky. “It’s radical and its comprehensive. But we can’t do any worse, so why not go for the best.”... In some cases, public schools themselves are resisting change. Longfellow Elementary Center in rural Mayfield, Ky., has postponed combining its kindergarten through third grades while it pleads with state officials not to force it to do so next year. “It’s almost humanly impossible to teach when you put so many age (and ability) levels in one classroom,” says principal Elsie Jones. She adds that without grades, parents won’t know at what level their children are performing, and should the students move away, their new schools may have difficulty placing them in the appropriate grade.... Although its fourth and fifth grades remain traditional, changes in what were the lower grades (in Picadome Elementary) have transformed the atmosphere in those classrooms. “This is my 19th year of teaching, and this is my best year,” says Barbara Evans, trying to keep order within groups of noisy six and seven-year-olds racing to complete math, cursive writing and art assignments with a dinosaur theme. T OTAL Q UALITY FOR S CHOOLS : A S UGGESTION FOR A MERICAN E DUCATION BY J OSEPH C. Fields was published (ASQ Quality Press: Milwaukee, Wis., 1993). This book was given to selected local school boards in districts implementing reform/restructuring. Excerpts follow: Educators must confront this age-old question of whom to serve and resolve this question in favor of the customer and the American culture, political system, and economic system.... (p. 19) classroom at children studying on pillows, a couch and a rocking chair. Indeed, Kentucky has become a giant laboratory for school reform.