1. The nine-month school year. It made some sense back when you needed the kids home all summer to help with the crops. Maybe not so much today. Are there any other industrialized countries where they let their kids forget what they've learned for 1/4 of the year?
2. The classroom format. It'd administrativly convienient to have one person at the front of the room talking to a passive group of 20-30 kids all facing forward in uniform rows, but that's not the best way for most kids to learn. Learning is best fostered in an interactive, individualized environment.
3. Cultural anti-intellectualism in school. When was the last time you heard of a high school holding an awards ceremony for kids with high SAT scores, or a pep rally before a science fair? For many Americans, competition in sports is admirible, but competition and celebration of achievement in academics is elitism.
4. Simple-minded egalatarianism. Again, while we're perfectly fine with the fact that some kids are going to make the basketball team and some aren't, at the same time public opinion holds that you're being unfair or you're going to hurts some kids' self-esteem if you track some for vocational training and some for higher academics.
Really, it comes down to what a society values. Ours often values consumption and pleasure. Americans seem childish to me much of the time: sexaully immature, selfish and self-centered and just not very bright sometimes. But maybe that's just me.
I have no time for lies and fantasy, and neither should you. Enjoy or die.
-John Lydon
™ Version 4.2
