AMERICA’S EDUCATED, UNEDUCATER YOUTH

                As a young sailor during the years 1952 through 1956, I made three 6 month cruises to Korea, Japan, China and the Philippians.  Back then all of those countries were struggling to recover from the disastrous effects of World War II and the so called, Korean Conflict.  Now, 54 years later, our America, the world’s foremost superpower, is alarming in debt to South Korea, Japan and China.  What the hell happened?  Carl Sagan in his acclaimed, The Demon-Haunted World, Science AS A Candle In The Dark, offers some insight.

                Other countries, namely Japan, China, South Korea, Germany, Great Britain, Finland and Canada are alarmingly out educating our youth.  Consider the following passage from Chapter 19:

                American school children don’t do enough schoolwork.  There are 180 days in the standard school year in the United States, as compared with 220 in South Korea, about 230 in Germany, and 243 in Japan.  Children in some of these countries go to school on Saturday.  The average American high School student spends 3.5 hours a week on homework.  The total time devoted to studies in and out of the classroom, is about 20 hours a week.  Japanese fifth-graders average 33 hours a week.  Japan with half the population of the United States, produces twice as many scientists and engineers with advanced degrees every year.

                In the United States African American and Hispanic youth are catching up with educated white youths and if the trend continues they will surpass the whites.  Even as American minorities become more and more educated American youth in general lag far behind the Japanese, Chinese, Brits, Germans and Canadians in math and the sciences.  And the economics show it.  It’s a world market and jobs that once made American great are now going across borders and overseas.  We can blame the unions or the corporations, or both, but the real tragedy in all this is that we are not motivating our children to become scientists. 

                From my perspective, what products does the USA specialize or excel in?  It used to be steel and automobiles.  I think our air planes are still superior and probably our ships, especially aircraft carriers.  But where do we get the steel to build the ships and the aluminum to build aircraft – Japan, China?  Where do we get the steel to build tanks?  Pennsylvania was once the world’s greatest steel manufacturer.  It was our industrial might that armed England and Russia, besides ourselves during World War II, the war to end all wars.  But as we can see from watching the news on TV and reading the newspapers, the world is still a scary place.

                I think President Jack Kennedy’s greatest accomplishment was to inspire out young college students to take an interest in the sciences, especially physics.  He challenged them to send Americans to the moon and back. And by gum our young brainy youths did it.  I remember reading back then that it was prestigious for a college student to be seen carrying a slide rule along with his books. 

                Science isn’t for everyone, only a few of us have the talent to become a Norman Rockwell, Einstein, Darwin, Hawking or Jack London.   According to Sagan too many of our youths are discouraged from becoming scientists.  He suggests that if the same emphasis placed on sports was placed on math, chemistry, physics, and the biological sciences we wouldn’t be in the educational crunch we are in now.

                Back to what the USA excels in:  sports, fantasy, iPods, fancy cell phones, rock and rap music, and possibly computers, as I see it.  And from the drug wars in Mexico, drug runners fighting for the right to addict America’s youth, we must excel in illegal drug consumption.  But as I watch television and see the previews of movies coming to town, and hear what movies are the biggest money makers, fantasy must top the list.

                Let me define fantasy.  If you don’t think our youth are less educated than Japanese youth, it is a fantasy.  If you don’t think that America’s lack of scientists will result in future problems and effect our way of life, it is a fantasy.  If you think it’s cool to take drugs and listen to rap music, it is a fantasy.  If you think the USA should abandon capitalism for socialism, that we will be better off, it is a fantasy.   If you had to make a choice between religion and science, and chose religion thinking you don’t need science, it is a fantasy.   

                It is hard for me to fathom - as enlightened as this generation is, as rich and stable science has made our lives, we still rely way too much on fantasy.  We are not making science interesting and challenging for our gifted youth.  Parents, especially, have fallen down on the job – and so has our educators.  We tend to reward mediocrity and I blame the liberal, social democrats who are obsessed with “spreading the wealth” - and the timid conservatives that let socialists and communists push them around – and the politicians who have wrecked our country for a dollar and vote, and all the presidents going back to Carter must share in the blame - at least those are my thoughts.