I had a friend who went to Catholic school. This was still in the days of the inkpots. In his class he had one of the brothers, who would toss his inkpot at a miscreant when he got angry. He would leave school as the polka dot kid. To make it worse, his parents added punishment and said nothing against the brother.

I asked one of my daughters who has retired from teaching. They teach the kids here to write more or less legibly, starting with printing and then cursive, but don't insist on more than that.

Iin college most develop their own method of writing, part scrawl, part shorthand of their own devising, and lose legibility for anyone other than themselves. From about grade 5 on, they are using computers.

Lots of skills gone by the board- shorthand, making stone arrowheads-