Unfortunately, the populace would not accept that and so every credential gets inflated to worthlessness.

90%+ of all people in undergrad and 50% of grad school probably shouldn’t be there. They just want the credential, to get the job, to get the money. This is understandable but there is no interest to actually go deep or learn anything. Socratic style seminars are silent. Deep critique or wrestling with a topic only if pandering or grade related. Humanities watered down to irrelevance compared to STEM which has to keep some rigor or the bridges collapse and lights dont turn on. Academia is inflated by, wasted on, and ruined by them. They would be much better served by a high school diploma that wasn’t meaningless

Obviously literacy is super important but these are examples of things where literacy plays very little role, because ~nobody can read a bill, or follow a written legal argument. I mean a very literate person can get something out of reading it, which is nice until they then completely misinterpret it, or hear what their friends say about it and get onboard purely based on vibes.

I feel like it matters more for the economy and the future of knowledge work which, uh, is a little uncertain these days.

I recorded some tutorial videos for some kids a while back, to help them prepare for an exam.

The feedback I got was very positive, but I suspected they weren't learning as much as they thought. So I made a practice exam for them, and they failed it.

This was a wake-up call for them. They revisited the material, and got a good score on repeating the practice exam, and a good score on the actual exam.

So, there needs to be a forcing function. The brain will generally be as lazy as it can get away with, in any situation. So if you want to develop some skill or faculty, you need to create a situation which demands its use.

(Ditto for if you want to retain a skill or faculty!)

Multiple times in my career in tech, I've had people complain that a 2-page write-up is too long. These are well compensated people that went to top universities. I can't imagine what they would do if faced with a 20-page article.

I suspect that has something to do with it.

https://archive.ph/XvPXE

Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM (5 days ago, 866 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48309233

If you can read cursive, the Newberry has a job for you (62 days ago) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47607255

Kids rarely read books anymore, even in English class (5 months ago, 346 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46259233

US high school students’ scores fail in reading and math (8 months ago, 1089 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45182657

Ask HN: How to gain the ability to read with focus and learn? (11 months ago, 39 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44346359

Scores decline again for 13-year-old students in reading and mathematics (2023) (41 days ago, 292 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47867755

It sure looks like phones are making students dumber (2.5 years ago, 151 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38695500

UK surgery students ‘losing dexterity to stitch patients’ (7.5 years ago, 172 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18339299

Several Baltimore schools have no students proficient in state tests (9 years ago, 101 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14385703

Many McGill education students cannot calculate an average (11 years ago, 274 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9080665

Text: "it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus, forty feet long or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill."

Respondent: "It’s probably some kind of an animal or something or another that it is talking about encountering in the streets. And “wandering like an elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill.” So, yup, I think we’ve encountered some kind of an animal these, these characters have, have met in the street."

- abolish teachers unions

- fail / keep back students who don't meet standards, in a completely objective fashion with no regard for racial / ethnic / gender sensitivities

Well… yes. The loans are secured, so it is within the college’s interest to make 13th grade.

>showed that the mere presence of a participant’s smartphone — whether that be face down, powered off, untouched, or across the desk out of vision — measurably reduces available working memory and fluid intelligence on cognitive tests

Claim without data that I see, but ok… going on…

>Eighty-three percent of LLM users could not quote a single line from essays they had written minutes earlier.

Well, this makes sense. They didn’t write anything. This isn’t ground breaking, they let the students cheat.

>districts replaced sustained reading with the practice of pulling “evidence” from disconnected short passages, the same format used on the standardized tests that increasingly determine school funding

I remember this first hand.

>The students who cannot read a 20-page article today are the voters who will not be able to read a bill, or the jurors who cannot follow a closing argument, tomorrow.

I’m certain I remember my parents complaining about the same with my generation…

There are probably excellent points around these topics. But… this article doesn’t make the point as well as that kid getting his classmates failing to read a simple sentence on video.