Article #15 >>>>> Origin and Consequences of Wretched Public Education Throughout the United States

Suicide and Drug Addiction as Consequences of Lives Devoid of Knowledge, Purpose, and Appreciation for the Magnificence of Nature and Human Potential

In the course of 14 years of pre-kindergarten through grade 12 education, students should be prepared to live lives of cultural enrichment, civic participation, and professional satisfaction  >>>>>

Graduates should have knowledge and appreciation for the music and art of many genres and cultures. 

They should have a firm understanding of the objective facts and major trends in world and American history.  

Graduates should have read and gained firm comprehension of the United States Constitution and the political and governmental systems of the nation.  

They should be able to locate all of the world's nations on the globe and to have a firm grasp of the geographical features of the United States and the world's nations and cultures.

Graduates should be deeply read in classical English, world, and ethnic-specific literature.  

They should have grasp of the fundamentals of biology, chemistry, and physics;  the human body and health;  the formation of the universe and planet earth;  the evolution of earthly life;  and the natural world.

Graduates should have fundamental skills in the vocational and technological arts;  they should have a vision of their professional possibilities and an understanding of those technological forces that exert powerful influences on their lives.  

And graduates should have considered world belief systems and vigorously discussed the ethics that should drive human behavior and provide meaning and purpose.

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But high school graduates have neither depth and breadth of knowledge nor any energetically considered or discussed ethical principles.  Those who go on to college or university matriculation in undergraduate or graduate programs gain field-specific knowledge but little breadth.  

Most Americans are woefully ignorant and ethically bereft;  they are adrift in personal universes of delusion and illusion, desperately seeking answers pertinent to meaning and purpose, given to all manner of false information.

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Thus does the bulk of humanity live aimlessly.

Many act with elevated stupidity.

Many are given to extreme forms of destructive behavior.

In the United States, over 45,000 people commit suicide each year.  Drug overdoses number more than 95,000.  Over 95,000 alcohol-related deaths occur annually.  Drunk driving accounts for 28% of all auto-related deaths.  More than 25% of the adult population engages in at least one episode of binge drinking per month.

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Thus do an ignorant and morally vacuous people, devoid of knowledge and purpose, live out their one earthly sojourn never comprehending the elevated morality and exquisite beauty that should characterize the gift of Existence.