Schooled, not educated

When I was a kid, I was a "perfect" student. I never cracked a book, had all A's, teachers loved me. Other kids knew I was in the smart kids group and didn't bother me. All I cared about was getting A's, checking the boxes, moving on. I went to college and was a little shocked to see that I had to study. But really, not much. I did not have all A's, but did well enough to join the Accounting honor society. I graduated, got a "great" job and worked my tail off for a bunch of greedy egoists for 8 or 9 years. I did like my last accounting job away from Arthur Andersen - but must confess never really understood the "product" - financial futures. And really, did any of it matter?

Fast forward to now. I know some grammar, but would really like to understand it all. What is a Subject-Verb Transitive-Direct Object-Object Complement -Adjective anyway? Before this year, I did not know that Socrates was first, then Plato, then Aristotle. And really? The Greeks were around during the Roman times? Didn't that all end when the Jews killed Jesus and St. Peter became the king? And this all happened where? Somewhere not in the world's center of the USA, I think. I'm great at math, though. That HP calculator sure works wonders.

I am so undereducated. And not alone in my feelings, at least according to "The Core".

Schooling is not educating. A University of Michigan school of education professor said "Schools are our most educationally impoverished institutions."

As support, here's a compilation of quotes from "The Core"-

Professionalized instruction has resulted in a large loss of literacy for both strong and dysfunctional familes. The factory has produced the product we asked for - a student who exists in the system and gets by until released from compulsory education. Between 1640 and 1700 the literacy rate for men was around 90% and for women 62%. In 2007, the adult American population had only a 15% rate of literacy proficiency! (And yet school attendance is greater today then ever before!) It's just not true that more years of compulsory school attendance have translated to a more educated populace. The main culprits reducing literacy and our ability to engage in reasonable discourse include the professionalism of education, federal mandates,
edutainment (making everything fun), and the desertion of memorization skills. In general, parents acknowledge that the modern educational system is in crisis, but few believe their own school has real problems. Many parents dismiss the message because their kids are getting A's, enjoy going to school and are learning basic skills like multiplication. In reality, standards of even basic literacy are too low. Too often an A means the curve was lowered, the student behaved and was pleasant to the teacher.

We need to offer our children a classical education. Memorization, preservation of the past and skills in order to be persuasive in expressing truth, beauty and goodness in the future. Not just entertainment and job-training. Parent-led, goal driven, community education must replace government-led, entertainment-driven, centralized education.

I can't summarize the whole book - but you get the gist. A friend and I were talking the other day. We concluded that it is so simple, yet so elusive. Will the system ever change? Probably not. At least we can choose to home-educate and lessen the world of a few more under-educated individuals.