Every time I think the public education system has hit rock bottom, another report proves it can, in fact, get worse.
The latest Nation’s Report Card just dropped and it’s pretty grim.
Reading and math scores for high school seniors are now at their lowest levels in decades.
Barely a third of students are considered proficient readers.
Just over one in five are proficient in math, and nearly half of all seniors scored below basic in both subjects.
That means we’re graduating students who can’t read, write, or calculate at even the most fundamental level.
And yet, year after year, we’re told the answer is “more funding.”
We’ve poured more money into public education than at any point in American history. But if money solved this problem, the charts would be going up—not down.
The truth is, it isn’t a funding problem; it’s a philosophy problem.
The schools aren’t broken. They’re actually operating exactly as they were designed.
Schools today are obsessed with trends—“equitable grading,” “social-emotional learning,” “inquiry-based literacy”—but they’ve forgotten the one thing that actually works: teaching kids truth.
Instead of reading full-length books, students get bite-sized “passages.” Instead of learning history, they get activist-driven “social studies,” and instead of learning to reason, they’re taught to memorize talking points.
The result is a generation that’s not just uninformed, they’re totally unanchored.
That’s why one of the most powerful things parents can do right now is reclaim their children’s education at home. Whether that means you pull your kids out of the system entirely, or you just commit to supplement what they’re learning at school with study at home in the evenings and on weekends—whatever you’re doing to take control is better than doing nothing at all.
A great place to start supplementing is with our Tuttle Twins America’s History books and curriculum.
It was built to give kids (and parents!) the content schools have stripped away. It’s history told honestly and clearly, and in a way that helps your kids see the cause-and-effect patterns that shaped our world. It’s more than just memorizing names and dates, because, let’s face it, that isn’t the kind of education that leaves any kind of lasting impact. It’s teaching kids why something happened, and how it relates to things that are happening now.
It’s rooting their worldview in solid historical context.
This week, for Columbus Day, we’re offering a massive sale on our America’s History books.
Because history shouldn’t be rewritten, watered down, or hidden. It should be understood, learned from, and lived.
When we teach kids truth, we give them power. And I want my kids to feel empowered about the quality of education they’re getting, and the control they have to shape their futures.
I suspect you feel the same.
— Connor
