Years of social promotion, loose academic standards, lack of parental involvement, minimal school choice, glorification of Hollywood culture and a devaluation of learning have finally begun to take its toll on the American populace. It is well known that many high school dropouts can look forward to a life of minimum wage and exploitation due to a lack of higher order thinking, now it seems even today’s college graduates may face the same fate. According to the results of a survey conducted by the American Institutes for Research, approximately ½ of college students can’t comprehend everyday tasks. So what exactly is it that tomorrow’s leaders don’t know how to do?

1. Understand opposing viewpoints in a newspaper editorial
2. Identifying a location on a map
3. Calculating the cost of ordering office supplies
4. Consulting a reference guide to figure out which foods contain a particular vitamin
5. Balancing a checkbook
6. Understanding interest rates

The survey, which evaluated college students across the country, revealed what years of poor performance in math and science has netted: children and young adults devoid of basic reasoning, logic or rudimentary quantitative skills. The survey noted that in one example, the students surveyed could not even ascertain whether their car had enough fuel to reach the next filling station.

Such results are both sobering and frightening. If college students, who supposedly represent the upper echelons of today’s learned Americans, dare we say that our country’s fate may soon be sealed. These are skills which yesterday’s high school students would have been expected to master, now we discover that individuals in their late teens and early 20s still lack the basic life skills necessary to function and prosper in today’s society.

Such news must be quite refreshing for the American left, knowing that future generations will remain dependent upon the government more and more as competency continues to decrease. Sadly there is enough blame to go around. Certainly schools bare some responsibility for loose academic standards and watering down curriculum to allow the lowest common denominators in a class to pass without the requisite hard work. Parents, however, are equally to blame for playing a diminished role in their child’s education, by not demanding hard work for their students and by modeling behavior which diminishes the value and appreciation for commitment to a task and education. Today we see the ongoing result of such diminished standards, while most children eagerly await the next installment of American Idol, they can barely understand basic math or comprehend a book of literature.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2006-01-19-college-tasks_x.htm