‘A Recipe for Idiocracy’

For the past several years, America has been using its young people as lab rats in a sweeping, if not exactly thought-out, education experiment. - Rose Horowitch

• Schools across the country have been lowering standards and removing penalties for failure. 

The results are coming into focus.

• Five years ago, about 30 incoming freshmen at UC San Diego arrived with math skills below high-school level. 
• Now, according to a recent report from UC San Diego faculty and administrators, that number is more than 900—and most of those students don’t fully meet middle-school math standards. 

Many students struggle with fractions and simple algebra problems. 

Last year, the university, which admits fewer than 30 percent of undergraduate applicants, launched a remedial-math course that focuses entirely on concepts taught in elementary and middle school...