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Kind of comes off that way. Listen, I understand that minorities in this country are worse off than whites, I get it. Too many people seem to turn a blind eye to black success in this country, if you live in a certain area your views will be different.
Are you claiming that because I live in Dallas I think differently about blacks and Latinos than if I live in say San Francisco?
I stated earlier one of my heros is Ben Carson.
Trust me, I'm all for success no matter ones color.
Their figures seem to be pretty sketchy. I seriously doubt that 75% of today's youth are unqualified for military service. But even assuming their figures are accurate, the military needs nowhere near 25% of that population.
OMG
A). Articles like this always source studies - more or less you are calling Condi Rice a liar. Good luck with that.
B). Holy smokes the point is not about a lack of qualified young people for the military! It's that 75% of kids don't exceed those low standards.
As Dallas is a majority minority city this topic rings critical here IMO.....
Just skimmed thorough a Council on Foreign Relations paper about education in The US.
Grab a barf bag you'll need one maybe two.
75% of young American adults are ineligible for military service due to:
A). Being too fat
B). Criminal records
C). But mostly for being too dumb to pass our military's laughably easy educational thresholds and or testing.
Our black and Latino youth are disproportionately responsible for the state of failure listed above.
Regarding the military ASVAB test..........
As part of a psychology class in college I took a version of the ASVAB, trust me it's easy. The ISEE test that local 8th graders take for admittance into private high schools is orders of magnitude more difficult. And we have legions of HS grads and GED holders who cannot pass the ASVAB.
The CFR paper more or less concludes that the embarrassing state of educational failure by our youth is nothing short of a national security problem. I've maintained as much for years.
Generally, we are fostering a persistent educationally segregated underclass.
So how do we turn the tide?
The entire concept of a large military is archaic and outdated. Increased emphasis (and less politicization) of the hard sciences, exposure to science at younger ages in education, is part of the answer. Sparking intellectual curiosity at a young age is hugely important.
Are you claiming that because I live in Dallas I think differently about blacks and Latinos than if I live in say San Francisco?
I stated earlier one of my heros is Ben Carson.
Trust me, I'm all for success no matter ones color.
I think if you live in a certain city and most of the blacks in that city tend to cause problems and are mostly dysfunctional, it will affect how you see things. Where I currently live blacks live just as well as whites do, for the most part. I live in the South and many whites in this city have a broader viewpoint of black success than many in New York(where I grew up) do. Sorry if I did not explain it well enough in the previous post, one of the problems with computer communication.
I think if you live in a certain city and most of the blacks in that city tend to cause problems and are mostly dysfunctional, it will affect how you see things. Where I currently live blacks live just as well as whites do, for the most part. I live in the South and many whites in this city have a broader viewpoint of black success than many in New York(where I grew up) do. Sorry if I did not explain it well enough in the previous post, one of the problems with computer communication.
No problem.
I can assure you that I want blacks and Latinos to be as successful as whites and Asians. I think we can agree that - that goal will not be met so long as the current persistent and deep educational gulf exists between these groups.
The entire concept of a large military is archaic and outdated. Increased emphasis (and less politicization) of the hard sciences, exposure to science at younger ages in education, is part of the answer. Sparking intellectual curiosity at a young age is hugely important.
I think the first part of your statement is broad and significantly wishful. The second part I agree with unreservedly. We need more engineers, IT types, physicists , mathematicians, doctors etc. We also need all manner of educated business types accounting, finance, actuaries etc.
People said exactly the same thing after WWII. He nearly lost all of Korea due to dearth of military manpower.
Assuming you are correct in a general sense the educational needs of the military will increase not decrease.
And further the broad point is not about the military - it's that 75% of young people can't meet the very basic minimum standards of the military. How can/will our private sector compete with the South Koreans, Chinese, Japanese, Scandinavians and others who culturally value education much more than we do?
With the breakdown of the family unit which in my generation drove expectations for high academic achievment, we face a challenge of how to provide and support that expectation. I am not experienced in education since we have no kids, but cant help but wonder why we get the results we do for the money spent per pupil. I hear its we need more money for education but would like to see a deeper look at this topic from a global competitive standpoint. We can crumble from within if we dont address this issue. We also seem to de emphasize math and science in any broad way which is one of the forces driving jobs overseas. Oil engineers are so scare in the US, the employment roster in Houston in this industry looks like the UN. These are great paying very challenging and rewarding jobs but so how we dont push kids into majoring in engineering or science other thn high tech.
there are so many things involved, but a lot of it IS the changing demographic and a lot of time is just getting people to learn the language. If you start with a handicap, it is unfair to blame the teachers for the failure, and almost impossible to advance just past the basics. They keep making the tests easier, and the kids keep failing them.
that said, parents have some responsibility for what has happened in america. When i was growing up, parents liked to brag about their children being "academically talented" and now we have a country where parents try to get their children declared "damaged goods" in some way (ADD, ADHD, etc.) so that they can extract some money or some aid from the "system".
how did that happen? where are the parents who are encouraging the dreams of their children? how many parents even know what their child's dream is, and are helping to facilitate it? how many parents ask their children what they want to be when they grow up and help them start in that direction?
what happened to reading-where you can learn and "travel" to different countries, learn other cultures, read biographies of successful people, etc.
i hear parents say "there is nothing for my kids to do". WHAT?, really.
oh, and i see what you are saying --with the new doctors entering our area-almost ALL from foreign countries, and hardly any americans at all--- and the higher paying jobs are being filled by more non-americans.
why is that even happening? i suppose for the same reason that our borders are wide open.
I think the first part of your statement is broad and significantly wishful. The second part I agree with unreservedly. We need more engineers, IT types, physicists , mathematicians, doctors etc. We also need all manner of educated business types accounting, finance, actuaries etc.
Our kids are lousy in math and are functionally illiterate coming out of HS.
Good luck with that wish.
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