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MODERN ROMANS: A WARNING FOR AMERICA, BRITAIN AND ISRAEL

Chapter 12

Crisis in Education

Education in early Rome was oriented towards development of character and inculcating Roman values that made the empire strong. Foundation of that education had been laid in the home. Roman youth were educated to assume their responsibilities towards the family, community and the nation with strength, and follow the examples of their illustrious ancestors or former great leaders. In order to be considered as cultured as the best of their conquered subjects, later Rome began to borrow from their subjects’ culture, particularly the Greeks, and established schools of rhetoric and philosophy based on the works of pagan Greek philosophers at various levels to rival those at Athens and Rhodes. As a result, education oriented towards building character and responsibility was completely forgotten, at home and in school. 

M.L. Clarke notes: “The Roman Schools (leaving out of account the philosophers) did not profess to do anything more than inculcate a particular branch of learning. They did not claim to build character, to teach religion or patriotism or morality, and some ancient teachers were notoriously ill equipped for such teaching....“Yet there was certainly a feeling abroad that a school master should be something more than a mere instructor, that he should take the place of a parent, perhaps even supply that moral guidance that some Roman homes conspicuously failed to provide” (Roman Civilization, p. 208, section by M. L. Clarke, edited by J.P.V.D. Balsdon).

E.B. Castle analyzing the education of Roman youth in the first century states: “we find several conditions of good education sadly lacking. The moral, social and intellectual climate was not healthy; there was no grand conception of the education of the whole man...” (E. B. Castle, Ancient Education and Today, p. 124). 

Roman educators believed that they were not in the business of developing character, inculcating moral or religious values or patriotism among their students. Modern educators in America and Britain believe the same and think their purpose is to impart materialistic knowledge in their specialty to their students. Unfortunately, some schools were even doing a poor job of imparting materialistic knowledge in Rome. Here is how Roman historians describe education in Rome at the height of the empire.

Jerome Carcopino writes: "On the whole we are compelled to admit that at the most glorious period of the empire the schools entirely failed to fulfill the duties which we expect of our schools today [written in 1940]. They undermined instead of strengthened the children's morals, they mishandled the children's bodies instead of developing them, and if they succeeded in furnishing their minds with a certain amount of information, they were not calculated to perform any loftier or nobler task…

"The pupils left school with the heavy luggage of a few practical and commonplace notions laboriously acquired and of so little value that in the fourth century Vegetius could not take for granted that new recruits for the army would be literate enough to keep the books of the corps....Popular education then in Rome was a failure" (Jerome Carcopino, Daily Life in Ancient Rome, pp. 106-107).

This means that Roman education in high schools did not equip all students with the basic skills of reading, writing and arithmetic, besides being devoid of teaching character development, moral values or abilities that made Rome great. There must also have been plenty of school dropouts as in schools and colleges today. 

Even higher education in Rome did not fare much better. M.L. Clarke states: "So, far from preparing young men for practice in the courts...the schools [of rhetoric] accustomed them to a thoroughly unreal atmosphere and sent them into the world with much to unlearn" (Roman Civilization, p. 209, section by M. L. Clarke). 

Carcopino writes: "...The Romans saw no long-term usefulness in disinterested research...they made a collection of the results research had achieved, and lifted science ready-made into their books, without feeling any need to increase it or even verify it" (op. cit., p. 113).

This means not much original research was being conducted in the sciences in Rome, and what science was being taught was lifted from what mainly the Greeks had already developed. Historians astonishingly note that during the 400s A.D., besides some religious writings because of the Church controversies, no literary or scientific works of note were produced in the Empire. The prosperity and luxurious living had dulled the Roman mind. Historian M. Rostovtzeff notes:

"In this atmosphere of indolent contentment, the privileged classes, and especially the urban middle class, came to find their ideals in pleasure, the pursuit of gain....Creative genius dwindled...[which education should have sparked]. No new artistic discoveries were made...the pen, the graving tool and the pencil produced highly spiced work, able to attract and amuse the mind but incapable of elevating and inspiring it…Under the brilliant exterior of the Roman Empire we feel the failure of creative power...we feel the weariness and indifference which undermined, not merely the culture of the state, but also its political system, its military strength, and its economic progress" (Rostovtzeff, Rome, pp. 322-323). "  

Roman Empire declined and fell because the education system failed to produce great men of art or science who could make breakthrough discoveries, or men of letters of the caliber of Abraham Lincoln or Winston Churchill who could inspire and motivate the wealthy and the middle classes to work to advance the Empire’s glory.

Education in Modern America and Britain

The parallels between decline of education in the Roman Empire and in modern America and Britain are not exact. America and Britain still produce and teach a great deal of scientific and other material knowledge. We along with other nations are all fulfilling the end time prophecies in Daniel 12:4, “4 But you, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.”

It is estimated that until 1900, knowledge doubled every century. By 1950, knowledge had started doubling every 25 years. Now knowledge doubles every 12 months. But due to the Internet of Things, knowledge will soon start doubling every 12 hours.

There has been a tremendous explosion of scientific and technical knowledge in our time, and America and Britain continue to make their fair share of contributions. But this overall impression of the state of scientific and technical knowledge in America and Britain hides very disturbing trends. Increasingly, the international faculty in universities is of foreign origin. The figure stands at 53.8% according to the Journal of Multicultural Studies (December 2018, “Higher Education Experiences of International Faculty in the U.S. Deep South’ Elizabeth Omiteru et al.)  

Not only are most of the faculty foreign born, a majority of the Silicon Valley tech workers are immigrants, not including the American born children of immigrants, who are heavily employed in the biggest market cap companies like Google, Microsoft and Amazon.  

Henrique Dubugras writes: “In fact, not only are 57 percent of the Bay Area’s STEM [science, technology, engineering and math] tech workers immigrants, they also make up 25 percent of business founders in the U.S. You can trace the immigrant entrepreneurial streak in Silicon Valley from the founders of Sun Microsystems and Google to the Valley’s most notorious Twitter user, Tesla’s Elon Musk.

“Immigrants not only built the first microchips in Silicon Valley, but they built these companies into the tech titans they are known as today. After all, more than 50 percent of billion-dollar startups are founded by immigrants, and many of those startups were founded by immigrants on H-1B visas. (Tech Crunch; Why Silicon Valley needs more visas, by Henrique Dubugras January 13, 2019). 

Pew Research reports that in the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) for 15 year-olds, in 2017 the USA ranked 24th in average Science scores, 38th in mathematics and 24th in reading in the world (https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/02/15/u-s-students-internationally-math-science/). We also have to take into account the fact that average American scores are brought up by children of immigrants. In fact, the National Geographic Spelling Bee contest is consistently won by Indians, and in any international science and math competition the U.S. is represented by a great majority of children of immigrants. 

In the PISA report, China and India do not even figure among the 72 nations listed. But don’t let that fool you. With both nations having populations greater than 4 times the population of the USA, even with one fourth the number of Chinese and Indians being able to compete at the level of the average American scientist or engineer, they can still produce more of them than the USA. And the best and brightest of them are already counted among America’s scientists and engineers.   

Most Americans don’t know it, but most Indians and virtually all Chinese are hostile to America and Britain. It does not require stretching the imagination too far to think that in any war, these workers in Google, Microsoft and Amazon will sabotage American systems to shut down America because of our heavy reliance on computers in virtually all our infrastructure such as electric grids, transportation systems, banking and insurance industries, and all processing of transactions by businesses. They will help our enemies hack our military and space systems to sabotage the American war effort. Reliance on foreign labor and even soldiers was one of the major causes for the downfall of Rome as will be explained later.

Beyond materialistic knowledge, the slide in education to develop character and morality in youth has been much worse in America and Britain today than it has ever been in the history of mankind, leave alone only in the days of decline of the Roman Empire. Here are the severe problems with education in America and Britain (A&B):

1)  Two trends that have greatly impacted the education system in A&B is single parent homes, generally headed by mothers, and radical feminism. 

On Focus on the Family web site, in an article titled “How Could Divorce Affect My Kids?” Amy Desai, J.D., writes: “Research comparing children of divorced parents to children with married parents shows:

*  Children from divorced homes suffer academically. They experience high levels of behavioral problems. Their grades suffer, and they are less likely to graduate from high school. [Other studies show that children of divorce are more than twice as likely to drop out of school when compared with children of intact families].
*  Kids whose parents’ divorce are substantially more likely to be incarcerated for committing a crime as a juvenile.
*  Because the custodial parent's income drops substantially after a divorce, children in divorced homes are almost five times more likely to live in poverty than are children with married parents.
*  Teens from divorced homes are much more likely to engage in drug and alcohol use, as well as sexual intercourse than are those from intact families.
*  Before you say, "Not my kid," remember that the children and teens represented in these statistics are normal kids, probably not much different from yours. Their parents didn't think they would get involved in these things, either. Again, we're looking at increased risks.

A few more statistics to consider:

*  Children from divorced homes experience illness more frequently and recover from sickness more slowly.
*  They are also more likely to suffer child abuse.
*  Children of divorced parents suffer more frequently from symptoms of psychological distress.
*  And the emotional scars of divorce last into adulthood.
*  85 percent of all children that exhibit behavioral disorders come from fatherless homes (Centers for Disease Control). Children from fatherless homes are 20 times more likely to have behavioral disorders than those from homes with a father and mother.
*  About 56 of children from fatherless homes obtain poor grades in school, or grades below their ability. 

I worked seven and a half years in the welfare department of the State of Florida. Many of the families on welfare started on welfare 3-4 generations ago when the welfare programs started. They were single parent families headed by unwed mothers. The next generations were unable to break the cycle because of poverty and because the children’s education was affected.  

Radical feminists believe that the greatest oppression at work in our society is based on male dominance in society and the workplace. They argue that any dependence on men equals oppression of women. Many of them also believe that married women cannot be feminists. This movement since the 1960s through its various organizations such as NOW (National Organization for Women) fought for the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) and changes in education in schools and colleges.  

The consequences of radical feminism for education have been that schools developed anti-boy attitudes. Normal behavior of boys began to be viewed as dangerous and to be curbed. As a result, extremely broad zero-tolerance policies were drafted. When boys behaved in normal active ways, they were ‘diagnosed’ as suffering from attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and drugged with Ritalin. 

One can imagine the impact on male students in schools where in the U.S. about 77 percent of teachers are women. In primary schools, nearly 9 in 10 teachers are women.  

Notes columnist John Leo (as quoted in Modern Romans): “We spent most of the 1990s fretting about bogus research claiming that schools were shortchanging and damaging girls, when the truth is that boys are the ones in trouble.

“Boys were much more likely than girls to have problems with schoolwork, repeat a grade, get suspended and develop learning difficulties. In some schools, boys account for up to three-fourths of ‘special-education’ classes. They are…four to nine times more likely to be drugged with Ritalin. Student polls show that both girls and boys say their teachers like the girls more and punish the boys more often.

“Girls get better grades than boys, take more rigorous courses, and now attend college in much greater numbers. While the traditional advantage of boys over girls in math and science has narrowed…, the advantage of girls over boys in reading and writing is large and stable. In writing achievement, 11th-grade boys score at the level of eighth-grade girls. The Department of Education reported this year: ‘There is evidence that the female advantage in school performance is real and persistent.’ The school failure of so many boys, magnified and fanned by anti-male hostility, is a severe social problem” (columnist John Leo, “It’s Tough to Be a Boy in American Schools,” July 10, 2000).

“Boys are wired differently,” says Michael Gurian, family therapist and author of The Wonder of Boys, “noting what he sees as the boy’s natural inclination to be more competitive, aggressive risk takers - tendencies which can be interpreted as misbehavior. ‘It’s the teacher’s job to create a classroom environment that accommodates both male and female energy, not just mainly female energy’ ” (Brad Knickerbocker, “Young and Male in America: It’s Hard Being a Boy,” The Christian Science Monitor, April 29, 1999, p. 2).

God foretold these conditions in modern-day America and Britain through Isaiah the prophet: “As for My people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O My people! Those who lead you cause you to err, and destroy the way of your paths” (Isaiah 3:12).

God foretold the outcome in verses 8 and 25-26: “8 For Jerusalem [symbol for America and Britain] is ruined, and Judah [state of Israel] is fallen: because their tongue and their doings are against the Lord, to provoke the eyes of his glory… 25 Your men shall fall by the sword, and your mighty in the war. 26 And her gates shall lament and mourn; and she being desolate shall sit upon the ground.” 

2)  Schools are no longer a safe environment for students to learn in. In inner cities in large urban areas, children often have to pass through crime infested neighborhoods in which they live, and then go to school with fear always lurking in the back of their minds whether the next mass shooting will occur in their school.

Here are the ten deadliest mass shootings in America in schools, colleges or universities with the number killed besides those injured:

Virginia Tech – April 16, 2007 – 32 victims 
Sandy Hook Elementary School – Dec. 14, 2012 – 26 victims
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School – Feb. 14, 2018 – 17 victims
Santa Fe High School – May 18, 2018 – 10 victims
Umpqua Community College – Oct. 1, 2015 – 9 victims
Red Lake Senior High School – March 21, 2005 – 7 victims at the school
Oikos University – April 2, 2012 – 7 victims
West Nickel Mines School – Oct. 2, 2006 – 5 victims
Northern Illinois University – Feb. 14, 2008 – 5 victims
Santa Monica College – June 7, 2013 – 5 victims
Marysville Pilchuck High School – Oct. 24, 2014 – 4 victims

Seven of these deadliest mass shootings have occurred in this decade, which indicates that the schools are getting more violent. All this occurred despite pro-active police vigilance and close monitoring of social media and tips by students themselves knowing that they could be the next victims. 

National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) reported the following statistics on crime in schools in America during the 2015-2016 school year:

*  79 percent of public schools recorded that one or more incidents of violence, theft, or other crimes had taken place, amounting to 1.4 million crimes. This translates to a rate of 28 crimes per 1,000 students enrolled. During the same school year, 47 percent of schools reported one or more of the specified crimes to the police, amounting to 449,000 crimes, or 9 crimes per 1,000 students enrolled. The percentage of public schools that recorded incidents of violent crime, serious violent crime, theft, and other incidents varied by school characteristics. For example, 57 percent of primary schools recorded violent incidents compared with 88 percent of middle schools and 90 percent of high schools. 
*  10 percent of public-school teachers reported being threatened with injury by a student from their school.
*  In 2017, about 4 percent of students ages 12–18 reported that they had been afraid of attack or harm at school during the school year.
*  The percentage of students in grades 9–12 who reported that illegal drugs were made available to them on school property was 20 percent in 2017.
*  In 2017, among students ages 12–18, there were about 827,000 total victimizations (theft and nonfatal violent victimization) at school and 503,800 victimizations away from school.  
*  In 2017, about 20 percent of students ages 12–18 reported being bullied at school during the school year. Also in 2017, about 16 percent of students in grades 9–12 reported that they had carried a weapon such as a gun, knife, or club anywhere at least 1 day during the previous 30 days, and 4 percent reported carrying a weapon on school property at least 1 day during the previous 30 days.

The causes for the atmosphere of violence in schools are many. Children coming from broken, single parent homes who have not learnt respect for authority are more prone to violence. Radical feminism has given boys a raw deal who act out when behavior and expectations contrary to their nature are imposed on them. When children are taught that there are no moral absolutes, good and evil are relative terms, the Ten Commandments are not the code to live by and religion is to be strictly kept out of schools, then doing what seems right to one is acceptable. Corporal punishment is not tolerated and if a teacher as much as roughly handles a student because of severe disciplinary problems, he will likely lose his job. The students know that teachers cannot touch them, and if they do, they will likely lose their jobs. Increasingly parents will not allow teachers to touch their kids. If they do, parents will sue the school for violating the ‘rights’ of their children. Under such conditions, we should not wonder why it is an extremely difficult task to control violent behavior of kids in school.  

All this means more expenditures for security in schools to employ more security officers, install metal detectors and other security equipment and features in an effort to prevent drugs, firearms and other weapons, and violence from making it into the schools. 

Besides violence, there are other problems in schools that worry parents. The school buildings in many school districts are not safe. There are also fears that buildings may have been built with carcinogenic materials such as lead paint or asbestos; or may contain other hazardous materials, germs and viruses that may pose a severe health risk for their children. America’s infrastructure is aging. For example, in the school district in which I live in Florida, because of a hue and cry raised by parents, it will take two years before the aging air-conditioning units can be replaced to provide proper heating and air-conditioning during school time. Lack of a safe learning environment in many schools contributes to poor performance by students. 

3)  There is a high degree of alcohol and drug use in American schools. According to Merckmanuals.com: (https://www.merckmanuals.com/home/children-s-health-issues/problems-in-adolescents/substance-use-and-abuse-in-adolescents):

“Alcohol is the substance most often used by adolescents. About 70% of 12th graders report having tried alcohol, although only 55% say they have ever been drunk. About 50% of 12th graders have consumed alcohol in the past month and are considered current drinkers. Heavy alcohol use is also common, and nearly 90% of all alcohol consumed by adolescents occurs during a binge. (“Substance Use and Abuse in Adolescents” by Sharon Levy).

 
In 2017, about 8.8% of high school students reported current cigarette use (smoked in the previous 30 days), down from 27.5% in 1991. But, “According to studies sponsored by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), current e-cigarette use (nicotine vaping, not counting other substances) among middle and high school students increased markedly from 4.5% in 2013 to about 21.6% in 2018. About 42% of high school students have tried e-cigarettes. With newly reported deaths due to use of e-cigs, their use is no longer safe. 

Use of other substances among adolescents remains a serious problem. The Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance nationwide survey of high school students done annually by the CDC reported that, in 2017, 19.8% of high school students were current marijuana users (which is below the peak rate of 25.3% in 1995). About 35.6% reported having used marijuana one or more times in their life. In 2010, the rate of current marijuana use surpassed the rate of current tobacco use for the first time.

In the same survey, the following percentages of high school students reported using illicit substances one or more times in their life:

Prescription drugs (taken without a prescription): 14.0%; Inhalants (for example, glue, aerosols): 6.2%; Hallucinogens (for example, LSD, PCP, mescaline, mushrooms): 6.6%; Cocaine: 4.8%; Anabolic steroids (taken by mouth or injected into a muscle): 2.9%; Methamphetamines (nonprescription): 2.5%; and Heroin: 1.7%.

Prescriptions of Ritalin, Adderall, Vyvanse, Concerta have already been mentioned. The Drug Enforcement Agency classifies them as Schedule II drugs which include cocaine, methamphetamine, Demerol, and OxyContin. 6.4 million children between the ages of 4 and 17 have been diagnosed with ADHD. By high school, nearly 20% of all boys will have been diagnosed with ADHD – a 37% increase since 2003 (www.esquire.com/news; The Drugging of the American Boy, By Ryan D’Agostino, March 27, 2014). "We are pathologizing boyhood," says Ned Hallo-well, a psychiatrist who has been diagnosed with ADHD himself and has cowritten two books about it, Driven to Distraction and Delivered from Distraction. "God bless the women's movement—we needed it—but what's happened is, particularly in schools where most of the teachers are women, there's been a general girlification of elementary school, where any kind of disruptive behavior is sinful. What I call the 'moral diagnosis' gets made: You're bad. Now go get a doctor and get on medication so you'll be good. And that's a real perversion of what ought to happen. Most boys are naturally more restless than most girls, and I would say that's good. But schools want these little goody-goodies who sit still and do what they're told—these robots—and that's just not who boys are." 

These ‘mental disorders’ are first diagnosed in schools by mainly female teachers and administrators who do not possess the knowledge or training to make such diagnoses. If parents resist putting their children on these drugs, they are forced by school administrators to do so with the threat of being reported to “Child Protective Services” for refusing treatment.

Another problem facing American and British children is the addiction to social media, TV and the Internet in general. According to the NCES, in 2017, the percentage of all children using the Internet from home was highest among 15- to 18-year-olds (78 percent), followed by 11- to 14-year-olds (68 percent), 5- to 10-year-olds (57 percent), and 3- and 4-year-olds (45 percent) (https://nces.ed.gov › programs › coe › pdf › coe_cch). 

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, the facts about digital media use are: 

Almost 75% of teens own a smartphone. They can access the Internet, watch TV and videos, and download interactive applications (apps). Mobile apps allow photo-sharing, gaming, and video-chatting. 25% of teens describe themselves as "constantly connected" to the Internet. 76% of teens use at least one social media site. More than 70% of teens visit multiple social media sites, such as Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram. 4 of 5 households (families) own a device used to play video games. (https://www.healthychildren.org/English/family-life/Media/Pages/The-Benefits-of-Limiting-TV.aspx).

According to the academy, overuse of digital media and screens can place the children at the following risks: obesity; sleep problems; problematic Internet use such as when time should be spent doing homework or leading to addiction to use, Internet gaming disorder or depression; negative effect on school performance; risky behaviors (Teens' displays on social media often show risky behaviors, such as substance use, sexual behaviors, self-injury, or eating disorders. Exposure of teens through media to alcohol, tobacco use, or sexual behaviors is associated with earlier initiation of these behaviors); sexting, invasion of privacy and predators; and cyberbullying. 

Here is another surprising statistic: Over the last 8 years, all the new, non-TV things—Facebook, phones, YouTube, Netflix—have only cut about an hour per day from the dizzying amount of TV that the average household watches. Americans are still watching more than 7 hours and 50 minutes per household per day (TheAtlantic.com, May 30, 2018).

From the University of Michigan, Michigan Medicine website: TV viewing among kids is at an eight-year high. On average, children ages 2-5 spend 32 hours a week in front of a TV—watching television, DVDs, DVR and videos, and using a game console. Kids ages 6-11 spend about 28 hours a week in front of the TV. The vast majority of this viewing (97%) is of live TV. 71% of 8- to 18-year-olds have a TV in their bedroom; 54% have a DVD/VCR player, 37% have cable/satellite TV, and 20% have premium channels.

Literally thousands of studies since the 1950s have asked whether there is a link between exposure to media violence and violent behavior. All but 18 have answered, "Yes." The evidence from the research is overwhelming. According to the AAP (American Academy of Pediatrics), "Extensive research evidence indicates that media violence can contribute to aggressive behavior, desensitization to violence, nightmares, and fear of being harmed." Watching violent shows is also linked with having less empathy toward others. The problems caused by excessive TV viewing are obesity, risk factors for adult health problems later in life, children mimic stunts on TV and can hurt themselves, more likely to use alcohol and tobacco, get their sex information from TV which leads to promiscuity.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 39.5 percent of high school students reported having had sexual intercourse. And 30 percent had sex in the three months prior to the study. What’s more disturbing is that according to another CDC report, about half of the 20 million new sexually transmitted infections reported each year were among young people between the ages of 15 to 24. 57% of high school seniors report that they had sex in their lives. 

All these distractions are impediments to learning in our schools. Is it any wonder that the USA ranked 24th in average Science scores, 38th in mathematics and 24th in reading in the world in 2015? These days when America is increasingly challenged as the world superpower by the E.U, China, Russia and India, her educational system is failing her.  

4) Students in schools and colleges are being taught that there are "no moral absolutes." That has shaped their attitudes towards pre-marital sex, which continues on into adult life in extra-marital sex. The fruits of our education system are borne out by the statistics.

About one-third of high school students report they are sexually active. Approximately two in five high school students (41%) report that they have had sexual intercourse. The results for Student Life’s 2017 Sex Survey revealed that 76.4 percent of Washington University students have had sex—an increase from last year’s figure of 67.7 percent, whereas sixty percent of Harvard College students reported having sex in a 12-month period, and many of them did so without protection.

The United States continues to lead industrialized countries with the highest rates of adolescent pregnancy. Importantly, 88% of births to adolescents 15 to 17 years of age in the United States continued to be unintended (unwanted or mistimed). Fifty percent of teen mothers drop out of high school.

One in two sexually active persons will contract an STI (Sexually Transmitted Infections) by age 25. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that nearly 20 million new STIs occur every year in this country, half of those among young people aged 15–24. ... The total estimated direct cost of STIs annually in the U.S. about $16 billion (http://www.ashasexualhealth.org/stdsstis/statistics). 

5) We have already discussed how schools in America are not safe places to work. Teachers have to face disobedient, disruptive, abusive and sometimes violent and intimidating students. Many teachers who love their profession are often driven away from the profession because teaching and learning in schools have become extremely difficult.

Is it any wonder then that many teachers are unable to pass state-mandated tests? Some of the best teachers are simply shying away from the profession.

In some schools, it is difficult to distinguish young teachers from their teenage students from their attire because both wear beach clothing, halter-tops, short shorts and exposed midriffs, or low-rise jeans, in addition to tattoos, bellybutton rings, tongue and lip piercings. Such clothing is worn even during conferences with parents. As a result, school administrators increasingly have to instruct teachers on proper dress codes which they should have learnt while they were studying to be teachers in college. 

In almost all countries, children in school are required to wear uniforms. Among students, being unable to afford the expensive clothing worn by some leads to problems of an inferiority complex among other problems which causes unnecessary tension and distraction to learning. In America’s schools ‘anything goes’ as far as dress is concerned for students and teachers. Teachers call it infringing on their freedom to ask them to dress professionally as an example for their students. Such attitudes have led to continual lowering of standards of dress and conduct in schools.

6) Debate continues whether school curricula are adequate to impart students the necessary skills to become employable (so that they can pay their student loans when they attend college), and be able to compete effectively with students internationally. The problem lies in what is being taught. The educators do not realize that has a major impact on student performance in all areas of learning, because the students are left confused with their minds twisted. 

There is a failure to educate the whole individual with zero emphasis on character development, morality, religion, civic duty and patriotism. One college President remarked: "We're not in the business of building character. I doubt if some of us are qualified…Colleges are not churches, clinics, or even parents. Whether or not a student burns a draft card, participates in a civil rights march, engages in premarital or extra-marital sexual activity, becomes pregnant, attends church, sleeps all day or drinks all night, is not really the concern of an educational institution." 

In 1969, John Fischer, editor for Harper's Magazine offered his opinion that the knowledge most youth receive in colleges is only "bits and pieces which don't stick together and have no common purpose.... The typical liberal-arts college has no clearly defined goals. It merely offers a smorgasbord of courses, in hopes that if a student nibbles at a few dishes from the humanities table, plus a snack of science, and a garnish of art or anthropology, he may emerge as 'a cultivated man' whatever that means." (Harper's Magazine, September 1969).

In a The Real Truth magazine article titled “The Education Crisis – Part 2”, the magazine states (https://rcg.org/realtruth/articles/164-aec.html):

“In a recent editorial, “Teaching the Values That Make America Strong,” the National Education Association (NEA) president “urged the nation to recognize that public schools are on the frontlines in this new era (of reclaiming the nation’s spirit), because it is in the classrooms more than any other place, that we create and nurture the citizens of tomorrow.” This is a true statement. But the question is: What kind of future citizens are they creating and nurturing?

“He goes on to state that America is defined by, among other things, its “commitment to an open, tolerant, democratic society...For two centuries, public schools have been preservers and transmitters of America’s ideals. In our schools, generation after generation of native-born and immigrant students have been taught America’s core values...

“Public schools have never stopped teaching values. We teach them explicitly, and more important, we model those values. Everything we do and say in front of our students is a value statement—and those values include the all-American values of honesty, responsibility, self-discipline and love of country. Public schools also stress one other value that is especially urgent today: tolerance and respect for people of different colors, cultures, and faiths...the student may not realize it, but she is a ‘combatant’...against terror and hate.”

“The NEA began in 1857 and has grown into a powerful labor union of 2.7 million members. This organization has a direct effect on what is taught in schools. They write the curriculum, enforce it, lobby for it and pay for it by supporting candidates who support their views. They believe that they know best—and that it takes a “village” (government) to raise a child.

The Recent Scandal in College Admissions 

So, what kind of values does the NEA and American public schools promote? The article continues:

“The NEA teacher’s manual claims that our children are not ready for the society they envision, one of tolerance for everything, without judgment of whether something is right or wrong. In their push to eliminate hate, they preach acceptance of everything. They proclaim that our children “may need mental health care...to conform to the planned society in which there will be no conflicts of attitudes or beliefs.”

“They preach moral relativism—that if you have a good enough reason for doing something, then, in that case, it is right to do it. They teach that there are no absolutes of right and wrong.

“The NEA promotes “values-free” sex education to elementary school children, under harmless-sounding names such as “Family Living.” As a result, more and more children are being caught having sex on school buses, something unheard of just a few decades ago. Homosexuality is taught as a viable alternative lifestyle, with books such as Heather Has Two Mommies, My Two Uncles, Daddy’s Roommate and Who’s in a Family (a book that teaches children that all man-made definitions of a family are valid—including families headed by same-sex couples).

“The following are actual courses taught in schools across the nation: “What They Didn’t Tell You About Queer Sex & Sexuality in Health Class: A Workshop for Youth Only, Ages 14-21” or “Teach Out,” which was held in Massachusetts. It featured that state’s Department of Education employees—government employees—instructing children as young as 14 in how to properly perform homosexual acts!

“Another recommended book in the California school system, “One Teenager in Ten: Writings by Gay & Lesbian Youth,” discusses, in explicit detail, a 16-year old’s first lesbian experience with her 23-year old dance teacher. The story continues, teaching that she should hide the experience from her religious parents.

“Make no mistake. These are the “core” values that educators want to be tolerated and taught. Yet, when a 16-year-old student at Woodbury High School near St. Paul, Minnesota, wore a shirt bearing the slogan “Straight Pride,” he discovered that there was no tolerance for his point of view—he was suspended from school!

“The NEA also promotes the distribution of condoms and contraceptives to children, along with abortion counseling without parental consent.”

One of the values the NEA president stated they impart to students in schools is honesty. How well are schools succeeding? In a 2017 study of 43,000 U.S. public and private high school students, the Josephson Institute of Ethics found that 64 percent admitted to cheating on a test in the last year (https://www.theclassroom.com/cheating-schools-16729.html). 

While about 20% of college students admitted to cheating in high school during the 1940's, today between 75 and 98 percent of college students surveyed each year report having cheated in high school. (https://web.stanford.edu/class/engr110/cheating.html). 

Cheating is not done by students only, but teachers are resorting to cheating to help their students score higher grades because of state-mandated testing for schools. The website https://www.propublica.org/article/americas-most-outrageous-teacher-cheating-scandals lists school cheating scandals since 1987-1989 which include: the 1987-1989 scandal in the state of West Virginia which was discovered after suspicions that the poor state was performing in schools well above the national average; In Columbus, Ohio, after President Clinton lauded a school after astronomical gains in scores, cheating was discovered in 2000; Students Claim Cheating (2000); Steven Leavitt the author of ‘Freakonomics’ and Brian Jacobs discovered that 4-5% of classrooms cheated in Chicago high school standardized tests in 2002; in 2011, the director of a group of six charter schools in Los Angeles ordered his principals to break the seals on state tests and help students prepare for the exams with actual test questions; in the famous 2011 Atlanta cheating scandal teachers were so used to changing students' answers on standardized tests that they gathered for "erasure" parties and prepared answer keys on plastic transparencies to make the cheating easier. 

The 2019 university admissions scandal in which wealthy parents and celebrities used bribery to influence admissions of their children to top universities is another symptom of our society which has imbibed the “any which way you can’ philosophy. Felicity Huffman has been sentenced to 14 days in jail. Others such as Lori Laughlin face trial. A Chinese woman has also been charged in the scandal.     

School textbooks are no longer allowed to make references to God or the Bible. Existence of God is not acknowledged in textbooks. The Ten Commandments can no longer be displayed in any institutions of learning under the guise of separation of Church and State. The theory of evolution as an explanation for creation is the only explanation taught in schools and colleges. Creationism cannot be taught in schools. 

The education system in A&B is worse than in Rome. The problems described are the strongest evidence that our modern education does not build character and right values, and we are suffering the consequences. It took more than 100 years for Rome to fall after the rot had set in. It will take much less time for A&B to fall.  

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