Comment by throwway120385

I don't read it as blaming the education system. In my mind it's an indictment of all the trends of the past 20 years in the public education system: austerity, lack of autonomy for teachers, heavy reliance on metrics and standardized testing to establish success. What we're getting now out the other end of that is a lack of critical thinking and a reduction in traits that can't be quantified like critical thinking.

Basically if our education system sucks, it's because we've spent 20 years cutting corners, cheaping out, over-relying on metrics, and enforcing top-down control over teaching and curriculum. No wonder it sucks. Our public policy has been to stamp the outliers out of the system and crush it into mediocre mush.