mav,

Nice of you to check in. Please explain what a physical handicap has to do with learning ability?

One of my best friends father was a serious alcoholic. His mother floating around in a Valium induced haze. He is a full professor and working on his second or third Ph'd. He was also valedictorian of my high school. Does the fact that alcohol is a legal drug and the valium was by prescription really change anything?

Which learning disabilities? I have a friend of mine with two dyslexic, ADS children. They've done quite well up through ninth grade without dragging the rest of the class into the mud. Granted they've only managed a 3.8 average. Need I add that none of the private schools would even consider them.

Strange that all these problems have existed for a long time, yet public schools (with all those undesirables mixed with the select), managed to invent, discover and build the modern world.

You start with the absolute fact that the public school system is bad, wrong and a failure and work backward, picking and choosing facts that support your original assertion. Much more convenient that way,.

I will agree that chronic discipline problems need to be pulled out of the mainstream. Do that and add class sizes comparable to that of most private schools and I think that even with all those undesirables, you'd be amazed at what public schools can do. As they have demonstarted in the Palm Beach District.

I miss how schools teach promiscuity.That's a moral value and the duty of the parents. Their failure isn't the schools fault. Homosexuality seems to be at least partially genetic. It can't be "taught".(What would you call the call the class?) Given that over 60% of the adults in this country believe in some form of junk science (and less than 40% have any confidence in science) I think you need to look else where for blame. And if those statistics can be laid at the door of the public schools, why would we let people like that make important decisions about their children?

Your comment on political correctness is valid. It is contrary to the supposed value of education and learning and no one seems willing to stop it. Quite the contrary, they institutionalize it, It has and will come back to haunt us.

I also agree that we have given up trying to teach children how to think. I lay that at the door of some parents.(the ones who are politically active on both ends of the political spectrum). Teaching children how to think means they start asking questions, questioning assumptions and challenging the accepted. Neither the PC nor the RR crowd want their orthodoxy questioned. Their solutions are two-fold. Intimidate the public schools. And start private schools that support their particular mind-set. Another problem to be solved.

Regards,

John

PS: (and in partial jest) Maybe, rather than special schools for the less than ideal, we can just deport them. Saves tons of money and helps clean up the gene pool. Sorry, but you were edging real close to the edge there.