I just ordered fries at MacDonald's. The price was $4.09. I didn't have four ones so, rather than dealing with a bunch of change, I gave her a five-dollar bill and a dime, hoping for a dollar bill and a penny in return. Instead, she told me I had given her too much money. I suggested she give me a dollar bill and a penny in change. Instead, she handed the dime back and proceeded to make change for the five.
I've had that happen. At least now I know it's not just Virginia. This is the generation for whom Math Class consists of "Here is the ON switch" and "These are AA batteries."
Funny. The thing is, if one were so blessed with a just a little bit of reason and even if she couldn’t negotiate making change in her head, all she had to do was to punch up the amount given to her and the derned machine would have told her how much to give back. When someone is continually given all the answers during their formative years in school instead of teaching kids how to educate themselves then we end up with boxes of rocks labeled “clueless”.
I was gonna make a similar observation. In a sense, she was thinking rather than blindly entering the amount (which would have yielded the desired result.) In fact, I've told people to just enter the amount I've given them. I know the look I'll get when I point out that I got a single bill and a couple of coins, rather than a fist full of change...I'm at the stage of my life that "the look" is my motivation to do it. They're probably angry I didn't just use plastic and avoid the entire mess.
That happens for thesame reasaon most people can't tell the time unless they use a digital clock...they were never told the 24 hrs. clock (worldwide used)...aka military time.............And, please, don't ask them to add minutes and secondfs because they will accuse youy of child abuse.
A college secretary was going bonkers changing the time (classes) from the American way to the 24 hrs. clock. I told her add 12 hrs. to any PM time you have on the paper. She thanked me until the day I graduated
All of these modern "improvements" that were supposed to free us up for higher-level purposes ignore the fact that the mind needs to be exercised just as muscles do. What good is "excelling" when you've lowered the starting point? It's no wonder people seem to be unhappier (and angrier) than ever before.
They turn the most simple things into the most complicated. ones. I, a professor of Spanish, had to divert time from the verbs and the adjectives to explain the rule of signs to dome of my HS student.
This is another hurdle that employers are finding they must overcome. The National Association of Manufacturers reports that at any given time, there are over 500,000 manufacturing job vacancies in the United States. Part of the problem is that applicants cannot pass entry-level reading and math tests. I've got a story I'll post and then tag you about a high school in DC that had a "record graduation rate" because they gave diplomas to students who didn't even show up to class. Minimum test score = 50%, even if you didn't take the test.
The 2017 high school graduating class of Balou High School in Washington DC set a record for the number of college admissions (most were community college.) Smelling something rotten, two local new organizations (National Public Radio and American University Radio) investigated. Here's my synopsis of the articles I read, along with links to their full text. This is disgusting. ***************************************************************The majority of graduating students at a Washington, D.C. high school did not attend more than six weeks of high school, but still managed to get into college, an investigation into the students’ records found. NPR and WAMU looked into the seniors who graduated from Ballou High School in 2017, a school located in a poverty stricken area of the nation’s capital, to see how much school the graduating students missed. Ballou High School was previously heavily praised for all students in its senior class getting into college. Almost half of the graduates had unexcused absences that totaled to more than three months of missed school, documents obtained by NPR and WAMU reveal. About 20 percent of the high school graduates were absent more times than they were present for classes, emails and records also show. The District of Columbia Public Schools system policy states that students who misses a class more than 30 times should fail that class, according to WAMU. Despite these absences, all of the 2017 seniors got into a college, a feat for which the school received high praise. One student said the class-wide acceptance was a repudiation of all those who said the school —at one point only 3 percent of students met the reading standards — couldn’t do it. “Everybody just, they was betting on us failing, and we all came together and we graduated,” said student Me’Ashja Hamilton. Some teachers who spoke to the outlet said they felt they had to graduate failing students due to pressure from the high school administration. Other teachers said the lack of expectations allowed students to do what they wanted and not show up for class. Many teachers got a $30,000 bonus for the “accomplishment.” “This is [the] biggest way to keep a community down. To graduate students who aren’t qualified, send them off to college unprepared, so they return to the community to continue the cycle,” the teacher said. The Ballou High School principal did not agree to an interview with WAMU, but two DCPS officials gave a statement to the outlet. “It is expected that our students will be here every day,” DCPS Chief of Secondary Schools Jane Spence said. “But we also know that students learn material in lots of different ways. So we’ve started to recognize that students can have mastered material even if they’re not sitting in a physical space.” *************************************************************** $30,000 bonuses and teachers aren't even carrying the workload they were paid for in the first place due to an obscenely high rate of absenteeism. And DC schools are always in the top 2-3 nationwide for per-student spending...needs more money, huh? You can imagine what the "learning environment" was for those kids who tried to do the right thing and show up for class. And I don't let the parents off of the hook. There was no backlash reported. They way they'll "fix the problem" is likely to be to falsifying attendance records. I can find no follow-up to any heads rolling, but I did find an article on a student being beat to death in a Ballou classroom the following year for refusing to let other students make calls on his cell phone. THIS is a situation where I would endorse strong protests to make it get fixed...it demands it. Townhall Daily Caller WAMU Study International
Few days ago, in a case debated in front of an arbitrator one of the contestants said: "My sister moved to Brazil, in the EUROPE OF THE SOUTH."
What was sown is being reaped. In college in the 70's! I saw the college professors were already recognizing the dumbing down of America and were resigning , some with early retirement, instead of taking part in the things they were told to do. Some people got really irate when it was noted that a lot of those who joined the army was because they could not get a job they wanted elsewhere. A veteran of V-nam said a couple years ago that he saw the 'youngsters' recruited and sent because they were not smart enough to know what was happening. Did you mean "lowered" ending, or graduation, point ? Some students start out way low on reading or math skills, but by grace and working at it become proficient by the time they graduate - some even smarter than their teachers ! (as written)
? for breaking what law ? They are doing what they are pressured to do in the educational system today, and politic system.