Is there a Crisis of Scientific Illiteracy in America? Is science education in America lagging behind?
What there is a crisis of in America, and it’s a bad one, is information logistics. It rarely gets from its origin to where it needs to go, as the American school system is a sad patchwork of privatization and nationalization. Nobody really knows how to fund and update schools. They’re having a tough time keeping up to snuff on the technology field because of the poor state of info crowdsourcing and experimentation. It seems to me that America is the Windows of the world – a patchwork of hotfixes and quirks. It gives us character, but sometimes there’re things character has to be put aside for. The problem is even worse for math than it is for science. The by far biggest problem with America’s school system is the fact that life management, conflict resolution and social skills aren’t taught. They teach us to assemble food, assemble information and assemble theories, but it’s up to ‘parents’ to teach us how to live, and… well, you can see how well that works in the good ol’ USA, my i
I taught science in high schools for 25 years, and there is a crisis of scientific illiteracy in the USA. Too many students just turn off with the “I don’t get it” attitude. I think it’s pretty hard to find really really good science and math teachers. I was OK but not truly great. Perhaps if really great teachers could make the $$$ that engineers or other science careers do, more students could experience great teaching. Perhaps some really talented educator/scientists could create curriculum to grab students attention and really get them to learn science. Perhaps there is a way to cure “math phobia” but I have no idea what it is. Making the best science students sit in the same classroom as those who hate science is counterproductive. Separate them by ability and let the eagles fly and the turkeys flounder. Not everyone can and not everyone wants to be a scientist, but we should give them all a chance in elementary school and then meet the needs of the really interested science stude
