Education and America .. WTF is wrong?

[mike_c]

20. as a current working university professor I don't believe curricula have been "dumbed down..."

...in any systematic sense. In my own field-- life science-- just the opposite has happened. We teach stuff to first semester undergrads that was advanced material when I was in grad school. If anything, the life sciences curriculum has become a fire hose that's difficult for undergrads to drink from. At my institution we're bolstering that with team learning and active learning pedagogies that shift even more responsibility for learning onto the students (because data indicate that approach is more effective, even though it's more challenging and therefore less comfortable for students). But dumbing down? Not anywhere I've worked in the last 25 years.

I will agree that students seem less well prepared for that today, in general, than they seemed nearer to the beginning of my career, but part of that is likely age/perception gap as well. I'm nearly two generations removed from most of my students today.