I don’t often whine about our educational system, because it generally seems so beyond hope (though that’s not rational, because it doesn’t really differentiate it much from most of the other things that I whine about–maybe it’s just because it’s so much more important).

But I ran across this piece in the Atlantic by Elinor Burkett, that I had to share. At the age when most are seriously thinking about retirement, she decided to go back to high school as a journalist, and find out what was going on there. Based on the experience, she wrote a book entitled Another Planet: A Year in the Life of a Suburban High School, published in the last month.

I haven’t yet read the book–I don’t know if I can bear it. It brought to mind the conclusion of the report almost two decades ago by the commission on education that stated something like, “if a foreign power had imposed on our nation the educational system that we have, it would justifiably be considered an act of war.” Nothing of significance seems to have changed in the past twenty years. The interview almost brought me (a relatively tough guy) to tears over the (mis/non)education of our nation’s youth.

Read it.