There is an article on NBC News website by Heidi Przybyla titled “Schools across U.S. plagued with Third World issues, experts and local officials say.”
This article is about the failing structure in schools and school facilities in regards to the infrastructure debate. It goes on to discuss this problem has been known for decades and goes into the details about inner city schools some and how much money is dedicated to repairing schools in the infrastructure bills and how much is truly needed. And how problems exist throughout the country for school buildings and facilities.
So basically our public education system is declining across the board in quality of education and quality control. On one website called “World’sbesteducationsystems” the U.S. did not make the top twenty for the 1st quarter of 2021; on another website called “thebalance” there is an article from February 2021 subtitled “How it hurts the economy and you” that says the U.S. is falling below the average in math and science scores (and you know I feel that education is more than math and science, but for the modern workforce math and science are important); ironically a website called worldpopulationreview references a ranking from US News and World Report that puts the U.S. second in the world, yet goes on to state the U.S. is 24th in science test scores and 38th in math. The ranking of second is based primarily on about 70 percent of students go on to higher education which if the students don’t do well before higher education then eventually the quality of higher education is going to reflect this decline. So should we be measuring just on number of students in higher education alone? Emphatically no.
Students are struggling to read and write. If you cannot understand the material in front of you, then how does anyone expect these students to do well on standardized tests no matter the subject?
So here we are, no one wants to put the money into schools, no one wants to put the time into the quality of education, no one wants to be held accountable so what do we expect? In Texas we spend tens of millions of dollars for just one high school football stadium, yet we cannot hold these same student athletes to a higher standard in their studies. Too often winning on Friday night is more important than winning on any given Monday through Friday morning.
Don’t get me wrong, I love that our students are given the opportunity for extra curricular activities whether football or band or drama or anything else (to me this is part of an education), but where do we put our priorities? It should be in the classroom first and for decades it hasn’t been.
This is a societal problem and looking at everything going on in our society it shows. People are easily conned, no one has the ability to think critically and common sense is extinct it seems. A good education system brings these qualities out in people. Yes, knowing the subject matter well is important, but if you cannot apply what you learn where are you headed? Apparently nowhere.
So with the ongoing infrastructure debate in Washington headed nowhere what should we do. First of all, we need to pull our heads out of the sandbox and realize education is key to any society achieving greatness so we need to make this a priority. Second we need to stand up and tell our political leadership this is a priority. This is a failure at the local, state and national levels. And it doesn’t matter which party is in power this decline has been happening for decades so both are to blame.
A democracy survives and thrives when the people participate, yet for way too long we have left the decisions up to people who come into and stay in power by pandering to special interests and the small majority of each political party with outsize participation. The majority of the country sits by waiting on someone else to take the lead or having the misconception that these same politicians actually care about them. I wonder if the declining level of education has something to do with this thought, hint hint hint.
Yes, it is way past obvious our education system, both in quality and structures, is suffering. And we need to act, but if the two parties in power now cannot even agree that spending money on the damn building is important, how are we ever going to get the resources and money for what is needed inside the building?
Education and equal opportunity are not just words, they are the foundation to great countries and societies. You do not need to wonder what is going wrong, you need to wonder how we are going to change the path in front of us.
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