Are public schools providing most Americans with an adequate education?

[Adaeva]

Fewer than half of Americans can name all three branches of government. And 26 of respondents could not name any of the five freedoms guaranteed under the First Amendment. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/less-half-americans-name-three-143614000.html

Another poll shows that almost half of American cannot name the Vice-President of the USA.

Americans have an abysmal knowledge of the nation’s history and a majority of residents in only one state, Vermont, could pass a citizenship test. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/less-half-americans-name-three-143614000.html

Only 46 percent of Americans know each state has two U. S. senators. Americans may not know the name of any of their representatives in congress, but they know in great detail the life history of movie stars and other celebrities.

[Sixgunsound]

Absolutely not. It is criminal how much graduates of public propaganda mills (I won't dignify them by calling them schools) do not know about life or their rights or the actual history of the country.

[Sixgunsound]

Thanks for MHO

[joeldalton]

No. Modern public schools are nothing more than government indoctrination factories

[KostasKouvalis]

To a certain extent, but if someone has a bad memory and lack of interest in this stuff, that's not the school's fault. You can't force people to be interested in something. One of my professors said that students will only remember about 5% of lecture material.

Though I won't disagree that some teachers teach factual errors. Like on of my professor's said the Speaker of the House has to be from the opposing party of the President. As for the First Amendment, I only remember Speech, Press and Assembly, Religion. I have no clue what the fifth one is, and I forgot there were even that many until you mentioned it.

The Braches I think are Executive, Judicial and Legislative.

See, now that you mentioned it, it's starting to come back to me, but honestly I don't have any interest in this stuff to research further. I honestly don't care. I literally had a New Zealand girl explain to me why the Second Amendment was created. But I'm not ashamed to admit it, because I don't think it's that important or interesting to be honest. Really, I don't care.

I'm still not even sure how the electoral college works or how many Congressmen we have. I know the basics, but I honestly don't care to learn about the little details. I don't care. What use is it to me? I don't even though. I'm interested in ancient ruins and colonial history.

I will agree though the celebrity thing is kind of sad, as there are things that are more important and interesting than celebrity gossip, but I don't think Government stuff is one of them.

I find it more sadder that Americans can't name all 50 states. But what do you expect when the majority of university professors have no knowledge of subjects outside their field.

[NewsReader]

More and more public schools and colleges are focusing more on liberal propaganda than true education. I strongly doubt some of those survey results though. How can half of Americans not know the vice president? Politics and culture war is everywhere these days. Even in food. If you want your kids to be successful, send them to a private school. Of course not all private schools are great. So do your research.

[WindAtMyBack]

The education system is more than adequate. Actually Americans are becoming over educated and it's starting to become a problem.

Far too many people believe that nonsense about how uneducated Americans are. Hint: don't read Yahoo News or any other click bait. Try looking into it yourself and doing your own research.

The US has the highest education attainment in the world. That means they are the most highly education in the world. This is true at every level of education from primary up to graduate college level.

[Adaeva]

The United States having the best-surveyed education system on the globe. However, they are not highly educated. U. S students consistently score lower in math and science than students from many other countries. According to a Business Insider report in 2018, the U. S. ranked 38th in math scores and 24th in science. The U. S. spends more money per student than any other country, yet they rank very low in education attainment. Perhaps, in the U. S. the primary purpose of public schools is not education.

[WindAtMyBack]

First:
"yet they rank very low in education attainment"

No it's the exact opposite. They are highest in the world.

As for standardized test scores, you have to look at it realistically and question what students should know and when. First of all, there are no global standardized tests. But more importantly, test scores at a single point in time are not relevant.

Consider math scores for example. If kids in the 5th grade are lower on math scores, so what? If high schools offer calculus, that is FAR more math than most people need. Realistically most people don't need much more than about grade 7-9 level math. The people who need more usually need a LOT more, which they take in college. There is little demand for in-between levels of math. The average grade five level of math doesn't matter. What matters is that enough people who need different levels of math get it.

Throughout history, educators have debated about the purpose of education, and what children should learn. They are still debating. Whether or not those standardized tests should be used is part of that debate. Standardized tests are good to track changes over time. If it changes, then you can ask why, and ask if it's important. But the absolute scores are not important unless you can answer the question of what kids should know, and when.

Standardized tests are easy to measure, but don't tell the whole picture - not even close. Modern education is mainly about preparing kids to eventually become adults and enter the job market. But that is not easy to measure.

[WindAtMyBack]

If you see a country like the US that does as much medical research as the rest of the world combined, who is a technology leader, who is a financial leader, who is an economic power - obviously the education system is doing a good enough job for those things to happen. It's constantly being evaluated, and constantly being adjusted, because it's dynamic and can always be improved. But it's getting the job done and doing pretty darn good at it. A kid's score in one narrow area at one point in time doesn't tell you much.

[NamerOfStars]

Adequate for WHAT- that's the real question. Even in purely practical matters, the average American struggles with even the basics of buying a house, or performing basic repairs on a car (a necessity in this country, given its size, population density, and lousy state of public transportation), but God help you if you think you're graduating without learning polynomials.

[Sixgunsound]

American schools exist for the convenience, union/contract benefits, and lifelong paychecks for the adults involved. Since there are no realistic consequences for failure to the adults (did your school get shut down because you are an idiotic oaf with no business trying to teach? Another school is hiring in a different city or state-no problem, come on over!) Home economics was canceled for sexism, so generation's of kids of either sex don't know how to do basic household tasks unless their parents fought them. Much of the whitewashed and pro America history they are taught is fake. The LGBTQ+ agenda is more important than what used to be called civics, then social studies, and finally socialist studies. Conformity is far more important in US schools than free thought in an open forum. And forget about diversity; where is the diversity of race, sex, or politics in the primarily white female socialist dominated institutions of lower learning in this country?

[Dieudonné842]

https://www.youtube.com/embed/iTg88w100JA

Public school

[OddBeMe]

I think we’re around Congo in education, and Indonesia in homicides. So no

[Sasahara]

Not if its true that they are forcing critical race theory onto the students

[Nikki1989]

Not even close.

[SnowedIn]

They are not.

[dustybiker]

Not at all.