Minding our minds

There is nothing wrong with our education system except for the fact that it’s awful.

As a recent graduate from the best university in New Jersey — I’m referring to Rutgers. Boo, Princeton — I believe I can offer a holistic view.

Now I can holistically analyze our education system, which has holistically taught me words like “holistically” but not how to get a job.

Still, I got three and a half years to show off “the frivolous work of polished idleness,” as Jim Mackintosh put it, which is a lot harder than it looks.

“Hark!” I hear you say. “The cultivation of knowledge and material resources are not incompatible.”

If you use “hark” and double negatives in casual conversation, you’re probably a Princeton snob. But you have a point.

Learning and value can go hand in hand. If you learn something valuable, you should be able to… well, produce value, right?

I wonder why Rutgers offers a class on American lawns and turfgrass.

Hey, this isn’t a spiel (for the state school grads) or an oration (for the Ivy Leaguers) against higher education.

It’s useful for particular subjects. Engineering. Nursing. Accounting. Dance in Istanbul.

I’m kidding about the last one, but my alma mater teaches it. Princeton doesn’t. Should I count that in Princeton’s favor or against it?

I don’t propose we should send loads of young people to trade school or the military. After all, someone has to fill up those dormitories.

No, even if we did that, we’d still have the same problems there that we have with colleges.

The reasons for that and the ways around it would take up another essay, so I’ll keep things short now. I don’t need my editor to attack me with a red pen this early in the morning.

If I had to choose one thing to focus on to improve our education system, I’d pick reading comprehension. Especially in the early grades.

We could encourage (synonym: require) particular standards (high ones) to pass from one grade to another, and inculcate good reading and riting habits (such as spelling and not using excessive parentheses).

Students who fail to meet these standards could repeat grades or at least take remedial courses.

This is not what many people want to read in the paper. But many people don’t want to read, period, so maybe we should do something about that.

Initially, reading is just an exercise. But as students advance, it becomes, almost exclusively, the way to gain knowledge.

As the pace of learning accelerates, a child’s ability to catch up is increasingly hampered by poor reading skills.

Doubling down early would help students level up later.

I know quantity isn’t quality. I don’t think quantity is as useful where higher education is concerned. I suggest it helps most in the lower grades.

It doesn’t take a Princeton brain to realize that more school generally leads to more learning, which generally leads to more success.

I generally don’t get paid by the word, so I’m only repeating myself for emphasis. Honest.

According to the National Center on Education and the Economy, American students spend, on average, 180 days in school each year. Canadians spend 193. South Koreans, 220.

Multiply them by 12 years of education, if you’ve been taught to multiply, and you’ll see some folks have years more learning than us before we all leave high school.

So we could try to read more, learn more, and do more.

Or we can pull more lines from Jim and remain in a state of “masterly inactivity” with “disciplined inaction.”

He’s terrible reading, actually, but what would anyone know?