As public schools across the United States focus intently on promoting a leftist social agenda, there is apparently not enough time in the day to cover mundane subjects like math.
Not only have many districts taken the controversial step of eliminating advanced courses in an ostensible effort to promote equity, some schools have reached the point that no students are achieving even the minimum standards.
A review of 10 elementary and high schools in Minnesota showed that not even one student had reached grade-level math proficiency last school year.
The Center of the American Experiment released its findings from school records across Minneapolis and St. Paul this week and noted that math is not the only subject in which students are seriously struggling.
“As of the start of the 2022 school year, fewer than half of Minnesota students statewide are proficient in math (44.6 percent), and just under 50 percent can’t read at grade level,” researcher Catrin Wigfall wrote.
She went on to note that the state’s national assessment scores in both subjects “are the lowest they have been in 30 years.”
On the state level, 19 public schools did not have any students who achieved grade-level proficiency in math as evidenced by the results of the 2022 Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment. In one school, no students were proficient in reading.
Advocates across the ideological spectrum have sounded the alarm regarding the toll that pandemic-related school closures took on the educational process, but Wigfall insisted that this was not singularly responsible for the troubling trend.
“Defenders of the current system will likely point to COVID as the driving reason, and while school closures certainly exacerbated learning loss, poor and declining student achievement showed itself way before the pandemic,” she advised.
In response to the current trajectory, a number of prominent Republicans are calling for a reform — or even abolition — of the Education Department as part of a plan to give parents more input into the way their children are taught.
We just reintroduced HR 899 to improve education in 🇺🇸.
The bill is one sentence:
“The Department of Education shall terminate on December 31, 2022.”
sponsors@RepAndyBiggsAZ@RepBoebert@RepTimBurchett@RepJeffDuncan@RepMattGaetz@CongressmanHice@RepRalphNorman@RepChipRoy
— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) February 8, 2021
A group of GOP lawmakers who advanced one such measure last year wrote: “Our Parents Bill of Rights will protect parental involvement by reinforcing their right to be heard, their right to see curriculums, and their right to be updated on any violent activity that happens on their children’s campus. America’s parents should never be made to feel powerless—they should be empowered and protected when it comes to having an influence in their own children’s education.”
