The Tragedy That Is Texas Education
Store owners in Houston wanted people to know that their stores were open during road work along the access road. They asked for signs.
You only had one thing to do ….
Hell, everybody knows it’s spelled bidness.
September 16, 2014 By: Juanita Jean Herownself Category: Uncategorized
Store owners in Houston wanted people to know that their stores were open during road work along the access road. They asked for signs.
You only had one thing to do ….
Hell, everybody knows it’s spelled bidness.
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My name is Susan DuQuesnay Bankston. I live in Richmond, Texas, in the heart of Tom DeLay's old district. It's nuttier than squirrel poop here.
I am honored and privileged to know Miss Juanita Jean Herownself, hairdresser extraordinary and political maven. Since she does not have time to fiddle with this internet stuff, I type her website for her and you can read it if you want to. If you don't, she truly does not give a big bear's butt.
A lot of what I post here has to do with local politics, but you probably have the same folks in your local government.
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Well, sure, any smart TAyuksin knows it’s BIDNESS.
1Yeah, they got “access” wrong too… Akses.
2there’s not sufficient space for the U.
3They misspelled ACKCESS too. Dummies!
4It’s not just Texas. Have a look at some of the posts on Twitter and Facebook. It appears that grammar and spelling have taken a backseat in American education.
5From the KTRK-TV website, copied and pasted with no alterations:
“I’m glad they put the sign up, but they spelled “business” wrong and it don’t seem right to me,” said store clerk Terry Lavalais.
So much for spelling. What about grammar and punctuation?
6I am now PREPARED to cease admitting I’m a graduate of SMU
7A speech impediment that galloped off and jumped on a sign. Gosh, aren’t there any speech therapists in Texas? Sigh!!!
8Were they “homeskooled”?
9Is there ANY proofreading by supervisors, or are they just as dumb?
10The Digital Age has made all text ephemeral. As a result, no one cares about grammar, spelling, or punctuation. Brevity, speed, and viral coverage have taken their place.
11No, IronCelt, it didn’t. Stoopid I’d still stoopid.
12My high school english teacher–long dead, would spin.
13I used to work as a proofreader. I still flinch (inside) when I hear or read, “Between you and I … ” and such. Unless something unforeseen happens, I have a lot of years left. I shudder to think about the future of my native tongue.
14Expect more of this if Greg Abbot gets elected & continues to cut education. Rick Perry keeps inviting businesses from all over the world to come to Texas, but doesn’t tell them they have to bring their own educated workforce too.
Good Grief.
15Testing has made correct spelling obsolete.
16ru L8? me2. hrry^. c u sn.
That was the word I missed to take first place in my fifth grade spelling bee and I still came closer than they did.
17No, Sam, they were homescholed like those carrying the sign “Homescholers for Perry”, one of my two most favorite Tea Party signs, the other being “Get a brain! Moran!”
18Apparently an education has become obsolete and “elite.” It shows my age, but there was a time when people actually aspired to be well-educated. I’m so thankful that my children and grandchildren are literate, although I’m starting to wonder if I should be humiliated to admit that.
19I have apologized on this board and others because I am dyslexic and dyscaculate (sp) so sometimes the spell check doesn’t fix my offerings. I was humiliated often enough in childhood that I made sure my children were literate and well spoken and well read…without education we are lost, it’s not funny at all. The lack of logic, the lack of critical thinking, the inability ( Don’t you know who I am!?!) to handle correction…we are sick and dying as a culture, and I grieve to see it.
20@Elise Von Holten. I began my teaching career in 1974. At that time, teachers had a lot of control over how kids would be taught, but as the years went by, the federal government and state board of education took that decision away from teachers. After NCLB, we had less time to spend on teaching critical thinking skills and logical thinking since the focus was shifted to equipping students to pass tests. I live in GA where many college professors are speaking out about how many of our high school graduates can’t write a decent college essay and/or research paper. They have also mentioned the lack of critical and logical thinking skills among college freshmen in GA. For some students, their first year of college is spent taking remedial classes in math and English so that they can learn the things they didn’t learn in high school. They/their parents are paying college tuition, but the students aren’t getting college credit for the remedial coursework. Plus, they have to pass the remedial courses before they’re permitted to enroll in any college-level classes. Some professors want to do away with the remedial classes because they contend that that is not what their many years of studying to earn advanced degrees prepared them to do, and I agree. Whenever a teacher at my school tried to challenge students to prepare them for college, we were thwarted either by administrators, board members, or parents because we were “expecting too much from students.”
21IronCelt: “I” care about spelling, grammar, and punctuation! And I’ve tried (and mostly succeeded) in making my children care as well. The downside to caring is flinching every time I see things like “the Smith’s house” or “your welcome”. Fingernails on blackboards, I’m just saying.
22The very least one should expect is that the English in English teacher and English language should be spelled with a capital E. Of course, I was an Engish major many years ago when English and creativity and logic meant something and one had to learn how to write essays, research papers, reports, articles, stories, and theses, not to mention a doctoral dissertation. My mother, who expected me to learn how to spell correctly, taught me from her old “blue-back speller” .The 500 word spelling list that she had to know when she went to school in Louisiana in the early 1900’s became my list of spelling words to learn first.
23I am not fond of what is called education today, and the results are wretched. Our society suffers from what our schools are turning out, but the greatest suffering is that which our young people must endure because they must live their lives without the benefits of reading life-changing books, making carefully thought out decisions, knowing the history of their world, understanding the great scientific discoveries that lift and change our future, and possessing the profound power of human reason and logic derived from minds fully schooled in the convoluted chain of human ideologies and activities throughout the centuries.
Don’t go nuculear over this, I’ve seen simular misstakes.
24Ellen Childress, your final paragraph is so powerful.
My children definitely did not learn how to write or to read for pure pleasure and learning. That is, and was, so sad for me as I love reading life-changing books as you mentioned.
My nine year-old granddaughter reads better, and many more books, than her dad has ever read in his life.
Thanks for your post. It is so true – and so sad at the same time.
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