Quick Response to "Who Holds Responsibility For Ills of the American School System?"

As I've been known to do on this blog, I'm reusing one of my overlong Facebook comments for blog content.

This is my response to a question posted by the Associated Press. "Who do you believe holds the most responsibility for low test scores, poor graduation rates and other ills of the American school system?"
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It's complicated!

1. The dominant American culture doesn't value or use academia enough to make education seem useful or "cool" to children. For one example, there is a huge anti-science movement among many American adults. To really pursue an education might feel disloyal and frightening to the children raised in anti-science American families. (I've actually seen this happen before.)

2. Uninteresting, condescending, boring textbooks are also part of the problem, because they often (unintentionally?) discourage the critical thinking skills that a quality education would need to foster. The book "Lies My Teacher Told Me" critiques American public school textbook content quite well.

3. A lack of interest in the world outside of the United States is another aspect of American adult culture that is very likely to reduce children's interest in academic learning. It encourages by example an attitude of "I only want to know the bare minimum of what I need to get by" and discourages healthy curiosity.

The closest thing I can think of to an easy solution would be to support funding for publicly available, immensely fascinating learning materials that children can find for themselves, without any reliance on adult assistance. Probably through television? I like the way that Mythbusters uses the basic language and methods of hypothesis testing in an accessible way. I like the way Alton Brown describes molecular structure. It would be nice to have similar programming prepared to cover a wider variety of academic subjects, so that viewers could absorb a decent basic education passively. Something that children and adults can enjoy together.

To successfully influence children, we need to influence everyone.