UNDERSERVED

 UNDERSERVED

Will Fitzhugh
The Concord Review
11 November 2022

If American students were allowed no access to physical exercise in school, regardless of  age, sex, race, ethnicity, religion, IQ, or national origin, there would be general agreement that they were being underserved. If there was no access to first aid in their schools as well, again they would be seen as underserved.

But though the majority of American students are never asked to read one complete history book in school, or work on one serious term paper, almost no one seems to understand that in this way, they are all underserved as well. The fact that the great majority of American students who go to college, arrive there never having read a nonfiction book or written an essay that was not about them, means that most are quite unprepared for college books and college term papers.

Naturally, given the very many billions spent on the education of American students, most taxpayers do not want to see them underserved and deprived of essential learning experiences.

The problem, as Robert Pondiscio points out, is that American educators too often want to provide students with a mirror instead of a window, fostering narcissism and ignorance in the process.

Surely if our schools are mostly producing ignorant and solipsistic students, those students are clearly all being underserved, and denied the serious work they must do to attain the literacy they need to be useful and successful in our society.

Perhaps it is time to give this irresponsible neglect more attention….