Guy Ciarrocchi: Public education failed our children and our nation

If the Russians or the Chinese Communist Party wanted to take over or weaken America without firing a shot, they could focus on our children to slowly undermine and weaken our society. Then, we couldn’t compete economically, and wouldn’t think America is worth defending. 

A frightening number of our students aren’t proficient in reading, writing or math, with science scores so bad they sometimes aren’t reported. And their knowledge of American history is so demonstrably bad that their ignorance and misunderstanding of our history would be embarrassing even if they were foreigners. Their appreciation of America is even lower than their understanding of our history and Constitution. 

So many students and Gen Z are anxious, easily rattled, and lonely that colleges have “safe spaces,” and even Harvard and the New York Times have studied and written about the rising anxiety among younger Americans.

And a shocking number of Americans under 30 prefer socialism to capitalism — some studies suggest a clear majority.

Through a series of willful policy decisions, text-book selections, library books assigned, teaching methods and curriculum restructuring, the American public education establishment has inflicted this damage. 

“Elite” universities now have to offer remedial math, writing and reading classes, proving what many of us knew instinctively. Far too many college students cannot successfully complete high school level work in math, reading, writing or history. 

Tragically, far too many high school and college students and recent college graduates have little to no understanding of the Constitution — the three branches of government, the election of members of Congress, the role of the judicial branch, or the Bill of Rights. A frightening number do not even understand the basics of the First Amendment.

Far too many have been purposely taught — indoctrinated — to have disdain for our (bigoted, elitist) Founding Fathers, Constitution, and the (ill-gotten) successes of the United States. This is compounded by the abject failure of teaching them the comparative realities of many other nations, or Socialism and Communism. Young Americans throw around the term “Fascism,” apparently thinking it refers to “extremely mean Republicans.” Too many are taught a romanticized version of socialism.

American public schools were created centuries ago to teach reading, writing and arithmetic, and to help prepare and unify our nation’s students — future parents, workers, and leaders — of different religious beliefs and heritages, even languages. Schools were meant to help them to be part of the American experiment and to successfully pass on America to their children.

Much of public education — along with much of higher education — is an utter, abject failure. And each step — each theory, each new curriculum — was done intentionally. At best, with little regard to what should have been obvious, harmful consequences; at worst, intentionally done to tear down a nation “deserving” to be torn down and “needing” to be re-made.

Just as the achievement gap between our students and those in Europe and Asia was growing, the education swamp began not only to de-emphasize academic excellence, but also to spend more time talking about race, gender, and left-wing socio-political agendas. What divides us, not unites us—ever more critical of America, our founding, and our way of life — capitalism included.

Falling test scores. Lowered academic standards. Inflated grades. Division over unity.

Teachers preach about “toxic masculinity,” “white privilege” and “oppressors and victims.” They’ve instructed that it’s okay — if not necessary in some cases — to not trust parents. They’ve counseled students that they may have been born in the “wrong body.” They say that students can pick their gender, over and over — and that there are more than two genders. It’s even okay to be a cat or a “furry.”

Students are lectured that the planet is in crisis — melting (or freezing). And our way of life, our energy, and their parents are to blame. It’s a man-made crisis, whose solutions are easy, painless, and obvious; but their parents, politicians, and our society all refuse to do the right thing. Disaster is coming in their lifetime.

Our students have never been more anxious, lonely, detached, untrusting, and feeling disconnected — from classmates of the opposite sex and different races, and their parents.

Teachers discourage — if not prohibit — practicing faith in school. Some suggesting it’s foolish to pray to God for help.

Then they’re shipped off to college undereducated, mis-educated, anxious, and alone. Told that anyone challenging the professors/academia/legacy media mindsets—especially from a conservative outlook, is either a bigot, a fascist, or a Nazi threatening their “rights.” Someone to scream at or hide from.

For decades, the education swamp — the teachers’ unions, their allies on school boards, and higher education who “prepares” them to teach — has tossed-aside common sense, de-emphasized academics, divided and frightened our children, and taught them to have contempt for America. The “modern” education establishment failed our students and our nation. 

Intentionally at each step. With little to no concern with what it did to our students or our nation — which many of them were taught to dislike, or despise.

If the Soviet Union or Communist Chinese had set-out to ruin America without bloodshed, without firing a shot…this would be a heck of a plan: Destroy us from within.

Guy Ciarrocchi is a Senior Fellow with the Commonwealth Foundation. He writes for Broad + Liberty and RealClear Pennsylvania. Follow Guy at @PaSuburbsGuy.