Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, October 5, 1995 TAG: 9510050079
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-13 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RAY L. GARLAND
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
As children of the Depression, few of whose parents had gone to college, we believed with all our hearts that doing well in school probably meant doing well in life. As poorly paid as our teachers undoubtedly were, those mainly maiden ladies seemed the embodiment of conservatism, upholding a vision of American greatness that depended upon our playing a proper role of diligent, moral and loyal citizen.
It's because most of us have strong memories of our school days we feel entitled to speak as experts on education. But the truth of American education escapes us because our personal knowledge is always inadequate to so vast a subject.
We read about test scores and shake our heads. But they don't mean much unless we know the degree of difficulty in the tests.
Beginning in 1990, Virginia has tested all sixth-grade students for reading, writing and math. The chairman of the State Board of Education, former state Sen. James Jones of Abingdon, has said those standards are minimal. But this year's testing of 80,000 students found 34.4 percent unable to read, write or calculate even at this minimal level.
It is the wide variation in scores that catch the eye. The highest was achieved in rural Patrick County, where 91.3 percent won the Literacy Passport. The lowest was 26.7 percent in also rural Cumberland County. Per-pupil expenditures were about the same in both. Pass rates among selected cities were 35.8 percent in Richmond, 59.4 percent in Roanoke and 44.3 percent in Norfolk.
On its own initiative, the state has now given this test for six years, and a clear trend has emerged: Some years slightly better or worse but no overall improvement. We might conclude from this exercise that after spending, on average, about $40,000 to educate our young people through the sixth grade, close to half haven't mastered much more than the rudiments of basic skills. If true, it would seem a great social, political and economic disaster in the making.
Is it possible that a similar test given 50 years ago would have shown the same or even worse results? If not, what difference has it made? From the dentist chair to the auto-repair shop, we see Americans employing higher skills and better technology than ever before.
More, perhaps, than a triumph of superior intellect, such progress may represent a triumph of superior organization. Instead of relying upon people who understand and can do many things well, American enterprise now breaks its work down into so many small, simple tasks that truly well-educated people aren't much needed.
Famous British academies and universities created the model that Americans followed in the early 1800s. That model emphasized mastery of language, literature, rhetoric and history. It was designed to produce the small numbers of lawyers, clergy, government officials and teachers the society of that time required. We might see its success in the progression of great English and American literary figures, which may have run its course in our time. Now, we produce first-rate technicians and second-rate novelists.
With so many private endeavors prospering nicely despite the poorly educated raw material they must ingest, the most powerful effect of ignorance and confusion is likely to be felt in our public life. Those early British schoolmasters knew their charges would soon be off running great estates or the country. For them, confidence in the superiority of their class and culture was deemed essential.
But a democracy means almost everyone has some say in running the country, which might suggest these old subjects are still worth teaching. The problem is we haven't any clear idea of how sound education ordains sound public policy. Germany in 1933 was by any standard a better-educated country than America, but that didn't prevent Hitler.
If you look away from test scores for a moment, this is the best-educated generation in American history. The census tells us that as recently as 1970, only 48 percent of Virginians had completed high school and just 12 percent had four years of college. For 1990, it reported 76 percent of our people completing high school and 26 percent with four years of college. And 80 percent of Virginia high-school graduates in 1994 went on to some form of higher education.
Alone among the world's industrialized nations, however, there's always less to American education than meets the eye. In the invention of bogus academic titles and honors, America indisputably leads the world. But it also leads in those that have real meaning, as the great influx of foreign students surely attests.
When the schools were mainly run by local property owners and the teachers were politically weak, they reflected an establishment view of what was proper. But it was inevitable that activist teachers would drift into the orbit of liberal politics. For one thing, it seemed to offer higher wages and benefits. An unfortunate result of that has been to create sharp political differences on school issues.
With the Virginia Education Association now seen as a wholly owned subsidiary of the Democratic Party (or the other way around), there's little incentive for Republicans to be sincere advocates of doing more for public schools.
The air is thick with talk of alternatives. But the state board chairman is right about one thing. "It's no secret," Jones said, "that many have become discouraged with our public schools. The fact is, however, it is likely [they] are going to remain as the primary vehicle for education in our society."
We are left to conclude that money has done most of what it can do and better schools must await better people going to them. That's another way of saying, "Why make a fuss?"
Ray L. Garland is a Roanoke Times columnist.
by CNB