I noticed, about 30 years ago or so, that the education being given to those younger than I seemed lacking. I went into a shop & took a piece of foar rubber to a clerk to be measured & cut to size. The young girl was, at the least, in high school. I had to explain that the sign said it was sold by the foot, & that I needed 2 1/2 feet. She didn't know that a one foot section, plus another one foot section-joined together-made two feet. The had no idea how to measure half of a foot. After I explained that about the feet, I then explained that one measured less than one foot by inches. "How many inches are in a foot?" she asked me, after having just shown her how to measure the two feet on the store's yardstick. She had worked for several months in that section of the store, she told me, and everything else was sold by the yard. She knew how to measure one yard. I remember thinking, "It must be the new math."