The Personal Website of Mark W. Dawson

The Madness of Modern American Education

The Madness of Colleges and Universities

With the rise of anti-Americanism, Anti-Semitism, pro-Islam, pro-China, and Internationalism sentiments, along with the deteriorating quality of education and lack of critical thinking skills, American Colleges and Universities have become a cesspool of poor education. They have become centers of indoctrination rather than education, as I have examined in my Article on "Indoctrination versus Education". The suppression of Free Speech, violent protests, the support of terrorists and terrorism, crushing student debt, and marketplace worthless degrees are all too commonplace in modern American Colleges and Universities.

Modern American Colleges and Universities are not producing educated, informed, rational, and reasonable graduates, but they are inducing a herd mentality amongst their students and professors that will stampede to support any cause that the Progressives/Leftists mob leaders deem important. The students and professors are led to believe that as they are more intelligent, better educated, and morally superior, they are, of course, always correct and that their causes are what is best for America and Americans. However, they are so intellectually bereft and emotionally unstable that they cannot intellectually rationalize or reason nor calmly discourse their viewpoints, as I have examined in my articles on "Rationality" and "Reasoning". In their studies, their professors often concentrate on theories and ignore realities, as I have Chirped on “04/07/25 You Let Out a Bunch of Stuff”. This appalling lack of proper education has led them to believe in the falsehoods of Pseudohistorical, Pseudoscientific, and Pseudoeconomics as factual and truthful, as I have examined in my Chirps on “04/08/25 Pseudohistorical and Pseudoscientific Progressivism” and “04/09/25 Progressives Pseudoeconomics”. 

As I have previously examined these problems in my Chirps on "07/26/24 College Student Behavioral Problems", "09/22/22 College and University Education", and "02/11/21 Modern College and University Studies", it has become apparent to most Americans that these problems have become systemic in modern Colleges and Universities. We have also recently seen an appalling rise amongst young Americans, and especially college students, in the belief that domestic terrorism, and even assassination, are acceptable political tactics, as I have examined in my Chirps on "03/31/25 Domestic Terrorism – Part I" and "04/01/25 Domestic Terrorism – Part II". This has placed College and University students, professors, administrators, and their alumni on the left side of the political spectrum rather than the American side, as I have Chirped on, "03/27/25 Team America or Team Left".

At the end of the movie “The Bridge on the River Kwai”, the mostly fictional story of the attempt by British Commandos to destroy a train bridge being built by British Prisoners of War during World War II, the British doctor who treated the POWs sits on a hillside to view the first train to cross the bridge. Instead, he witnesses the commando raid and the deaths of all but one commando and the death of the British and Japanese commander who built the bridge, as well as many Japanese soldiers. After he witnesses the destruction of the bridge (the untrue part of this story), he exclaims, in the last dialog of the movie, “Madness, Madness, Madness”. In observing modern Colleges and Universities, most Americans mutter to themselves madness, madness, madness.

It is time to end this madness in Modern Colleges and Universities. President Trump’s defunding of Colleges and Universities that engage in this madness, as well as the deportation of foreign students who engage in madness, is a good first step in ending the madness. The other steps that should be taken are as I discussed in my article “College and University Education”. Let us guide Colleges and Universities back to their true functioning—a proper and quality education, the development of critical thinking skills, and the maturation of their students to become productive and contributing members of American society.

The Madness of K-12 Public Education

The Madness of Colleges and Universities has been seeping down into our K-12 Public Schools. However, it is a different type of madness in our K-12 Public Schools. K-12 Public School teachers and administrators have begun to believe that it is their responsibility to educate their students on morality and social values rather than provide them with a solid educational foundation. The madness of Social Engineering and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) permeates K-12 Public School teachers, administrators, and school boards. Political Correctness, Wokeness, and Cancel Culture are the only acceptable standards for K-12 Public School teachers and administrators. Parental rights are ignored or circumvented. Teacher unions have become part of this problem as they have exclusively focused on the needs of their union members and have forgotten about the needs of students and parents.

 White Privilege and Racist America, along with Critical Race Theory (CRT), have become de jour education in K-12 Public Schools, while LGBTQIA+ and Modern Feminism ideas are instituted in their curriculum, pedagogy, student counseling, and the issues of transgenderism are tearing apart all schools and their extracurricular activities. Socialism ideals and ideas are propagated without historical or critical analysis of the failures of socialism, and capitalism is disparaged without examining its (positive) history and benefits.

The most egregious problem is that the test scores of K-12 Public Schools have gone down in the last several decades, and K-12 Public Schools are failing to prepare their students to become productive and contributing members of American society. Much of this curriculum and pedagogy teaching is done under the rhubarb of Free Speech and/or Teacher prerogatives, as I have discussed in my articles on Free Speech and Public Service and Free Speech and Parental Rights. And

But how much free speech does a government public servant have in the performance of their public service? Public servants are ubiquitous in today’s society, and while most of them serve behind the scenes, some of them interact with the public. In their interactions with the public, we have certain expectations and standards for their conduct with the public. As such, they have no unrestricted free speech rights when dealing with the public, and if they violate these expectations and standards, then they can be disciplined and even fired for excessive violations. This is a limitation of their free speech rights as a condition of their government employment. Any public servant who interacts with the public must meet these expectations and standards or face the consequences. An appeal to their free speech rights has no basis for violating these expectations and standards in their conduct with the public.

I am also troubled when it comes to free speech, which conflicts with the parent's right to raise their children and shape their morals, ethics, and character. Parents should have the right to determine what teaching is acceptable in the rearing of their children and which teaching is unacceptable to them if they believe that the speech is deleterious to their child's upbringing. This Parental Right can, and often, have been abused by parents. However, this Parental Right has also been abused by those who are not the parents of children. Too often, parents narrowly constrict what their children can read, hear, and view, and too often, others widen what children can read, hear, and view beyond what is acceptable to the parents.

The balance between teachers’ rights and parental rights, along with student needs, is very difficult to accomplish, as parents and other people concerned have different opinions on what is best for children. This problem may seem intractable, as the different protagonists are at odds as to what is best for the students, parents, and society, which raises the question:

"The most basic question is not what is best, but who shall decide what is best?"
- Thomas Sowell

Thus, in K-12 Public School education, the question is who will decide what is best? In the past, we have depended on the experience, virtue, and wisdom of teachers, administrators, and school boards to decide what is best while they keep in mind parental rights. Given the abysmal situation of the current K-12 Public Schools education system, we can no longer depend on teachers, administrators, and school boards to decide what is best. Consequently, the curriculum and pedagogy, as I have Chirp on "11/07/21 Education and Pedagogy", need to be examined and corrected by all concerned with K-12 Public education, along with the examination of extracurricular activities and the policies of student counseling. A better solution must be found if we are to reform our K-12 Public Schools to meet the needs of the students and parents. Educational vouchers for all K-12 students may be a better solution, as I have written in my article “Education Vouchers for All K-12 Students”.

School Boards and the public have also forgotten, or do not know, the admonition of one of the great defenders of free speech:

"To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical."
  - Thomas Jefferson

In most cases, I am a free speech absolutist, except for public servants and in K-12 Public Schools in the performance of their duties and responsibilities. Keeping in mind the admonition of Thomas Jefferson, as public servants and K-12 public education are funded by taxpayers, their funding is compelled by funding. School Board members should remember this admonition when reviewing the curriculum for education and pedagogy content, as well as student counseling.

President Trump’s attempts to reign in these K-12 Public school problems by withholding Federal taxpayer funding to those school boards that are part of these problems are commendable. If school boards, administrators, and teachers cannot produce an education that meets the needs of the students or violates parental rights, then taxpayer funding for their schools is inappropriate, as well as sinful and tyrannical. And, as the Federal Department of Education has in the past been a part of these problems as it has grown larger and more intrusive in public education, it is appropriate that it be disbanded and their worthy efforts be reassigned to other Federal Departments.