Uhm…I guess I’ll have to rescind my ire at the remark by one of our state legislators that teachers are feeding at the public trough. Now, bear in mind that the Goldwater Institute is a conservative think tank, and as we all know, it’s pretty easy to slant a survey. But…hevvin help us, take a look at this. After you’ve run your eye down the list of very basic questions the surveyors asked Arizona high school students, go on to page 2 for the eye-popping results.
Don’t believe it? I wouldn’t, either, if I hadn’t asked a roomful of university juniors and seniors to brainstorm a list of important events that happened in the U.S. during the nineteenth century. World War I made the list. What didn’t make it? Emancipation. The Spanish-American War. The Gadsden Purchase. Lewis and Clark’s expedition. The War of 1812. Construction of the Erie Canal. Nat Turner’s revolt. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln. War with Mexico.
None of those. Didn’t happen. Or if they did, we didn’t notice.
Well. Bring up ignoramuses, and they elect ignoramuses to state and federal office. Explains a lot, doesn’t it?
Maybe there’s method in our state legislators’ madness…
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So.. just to be clear… the college juniors and seniors think that WWI happened in 19th century? Not, say, in 1914 when the archduke was assassinated?
Ignoramuses electing ignoramuses? It sounds like Arizona has a problem similar to Utah
In the end, though, you get out what you put in. If you are concerned for your education and want to learn, you will. What we need to do is re-ignite an interest in learning for our children so that they will WANT to know things.
@ Abigail: To be fair, sometimes people get confused and think “19th century” means “1900s.” But it’s true that they wanted to put WWI in a list of things that happened in the 19th century.
What we sow is what we reap. What you are today is the result of what you did in the past. It’s so easy to understand; if you’ve been too complacent of your life in the past, you’re more likely to have a discontenting future. It’s also a way of saying “save some for your future”.