Atheist

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The Think Tank has a mind of its own :- ) and right now, it seems to be on the U.S. school system.  As y'know, we live to serve.  This post addresses sensitive gender topics.  If you don't want to be exposed to 2-way debate on gender issues, click on to the next post brotha.

If you do want to debate it, 'ave at me mate.  Say anything you like on SSI, especially if it happens to be the truth.  Only, say it in a civil, respectful manner.  This encourages the next guy to follow on.

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"The greatest threat to freedom is the absence of criticism." - Wole Soyinka

"In the absence of criticism and competition, all institutions inevitably morph to serve themselves." - I forget who (shoulda been the publisher of the New York Times, probably)

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Speaking to Matt's point, Dr. D has raised a large, aggressive, masculine -- and well-behaved -- son who was abused* by the K-12 system.  This despite our best, most sincere efforts to adjust to the female* teaching staffs.  By the way, speaking to Moe's point, Dr. D himself also had no father-figure role model.  And Dr. D was a foster dad to a 7th-9th grade student (a nice, smart kid) who as an 8th-grader, could not read well enough to write his own name.  Literally.

So you're talking microbrews to a 20-year AA member.  Also you are an expert:  you have attended the K-12 system, most of you recently.

Here are a few thoughts about the whether the 2015 U.S. school system will prosper going forward.

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I agree fervently with these three amigos.  In my mind, they're all correct:

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SABRMatt - the educational system in the secondary and elementary levels is currently designed to cater exclusively to girls...it's not surprising that boys are getting left behind.

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Mo' Dawg:  I'm respectfully disagreeing with Matt: Boys are getting left behind because so many of them are being raised without dads, figuratively or literally. After 34 years in the classroom, 32 at the secondary level, I'm pretty dead sure that I push the guys as much as the girls. More so, likely. They get no pass, behaviorally or educationally. Hold true for the vast majority of the teachers I've worked with, both great ones and terrible ones. More and more, we're seeing boys raised in homes with no male role-model or no steady one. Frequently, nobody at home asks them to be young men and shows them how. Hey, my dad was raised (with 5 siblings) by a tough mom and with an absentee dad and he grew up right. It can happen. But he was born in 1928, that situation was relatively rare. Not so today. You want to fix boys, start by fixing (way too many) dads. Oh, there is more to the remedy than just that......but that's a good place to start.

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