🚀 go-pugleaf

Several things have happened to education here in the US:

We have ceased to treat the K-12 teachers as professionals that they
should be.  As a result, many of our teachers are not acting like
professionals--just doing what is necessary to get by.  The result is a
demoralized teaching cadre teaching our nation's children.  We need to
start by once again treating our children's educators like
professionals.  While they won't immediately live up to our expectations,
they will eventually respond in the direction of professionalism.

Universities are no longer as interested in a faculty member's ability to
teach as they are in a faculty member's 'grantsmanship' and ability to
do research.  In spite of what you often hear, (good researchers are good
teachers) I have observed low corrlation between research ability and
teaching ability.  This has led to university practice of hiring people
who care very much for their research but not very much for the courses
that they teach.  The students see this as indifference on the part of
the faculty member.  The result is an unenthusiastic, indifferent student
body, which feels alienated from his/her would be mentors.

American society must soon realize that if it wants an improved standard
of living, it must learn to produce more value in a shorter time.  This
'learning' to a large degree is going be done by our education system.  If
we want the good life--we'll all have to get a better education so that
we'll know how to get it.