- Dear Newsweek:
letters@newsweek.com
-
- Re: "The key to saving America education" by
Thomas and Wingert/ March 15, 2010
-
- Firing bad teachers won't change the fact that inner
city parents, poorly educated parents and illiterate immigrant parents
by the millions cannot speak, write or read English. As a former teacher
in Denver, Colorado, we suffer 85 different languages from students and
parents that cannot speak English. Result in 2004: 67 percent dropout/flunkout
rate. In Detroit, Michigan last year, 76 percent high school flunkout rate
per Brian Williams at NBC. No matter how excellent our teachers, we cannot
teach in classrooms when a majority of the kids cannot comprehend English
or survive in our culture of academic excellence. Final result: American
kids suffer at the hands of dumbed down classrooms and devolved academics.
Key to saving American education-stop relentless immigration.
-
- Frosty Wooldridge
- Golden, CO
- Ph. 303 666 6186
-
- P.S.
-
- Forty years later, and 100 million people added to the
United States from disparate cultures around the world, educational systems
around America grind on in total chaos. With a massive Middle Eastern
immigrant load in Detroit, Michigan, as reported by NBC's Brian Williams,
"76 percent of high school students in Detroit schools flunked out
this Juneother cities like Chicago, Los Angeles and Houston feature similar
dropout rates from 50 to 60 percenteach year 1.2 million teens hit the
streets illiterate." That leads up to the distressing fact that
1 in 7 Americans remains functionally illiterate:
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- Illiteracy Statistics
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- 42 million American adults can't read at all; 50 million
are unable to read at a higher level that is expected of a fourth grader.
- The number of adults that are classified as functionally
illiterate increases by about 2.25 million each year.
- 20 percent of high school seniors can be classified as
being functionally illiterate at the time they graduate.
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- Source: National Right to Read Foundation
- Where Illiteracy Leads
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- 70 percent of prisoners in state and federal systems
can be classified as illiterate.
- 85 percent of all juvenile offenders rate as functionally
or marginally illiterate.
- 43 percent of those whose literacy skills are lowest
live in poverty.
-
- Source: National Institute for Literacy
-
- Yet, with those disturbing figures, our U.S. Congress
imports an added 2.5 million legal and illegal immigrants into this country
every year. That equals over 200,000 every 30 days. Their kids overwhelm
our schools. They subvert education for our own children. The immigrants
themselves face daunting challenges as to culture, language and jobs.
-
- In Denver, we suffer 85 languages and a 67 percent Denver
Public Schools flunkout rate as reported by the Rocky Mountain News in
a story "What Happened?" Ironically, the 'Rocky' bankrupted
in 2008 because not enough people could read! The same holds true for
dozens of cities across our country.
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