user: Write an essay on the decline of the quality of education in America as a result of egalitarian policies.

assistant: The decline of the quality of education in America has been a topic of concern for many Americans for many years and it is commonly believed that one of the reasons is due to the implementation of egalitarian policies. Egalitarian policies aim to provide equal treatment for everyone regardless of gender, religion, economic status, and political beliefs. However, in the real world, these policies have consequences that could have contributed to the decline in the quality of education in America.

One of the consequences of egalitarian policies is neglecting individual differences. Generally, it is known that each person is unique as everyone has their own combination of intelligence, personality, knowledge and experiences. And education more specifically relies on intelligence which is different from person to person. For example, a person with higher levels of intelligence tends to be able to learn faster than a person with lower levels of intelligence with the same amount of time spent learning. An egalitarian policy will treat these two types of people the same. This would not only fail to challenge high-performing students but would also fail to provide sufficient support for low-performing students to reach their full potential. As a result, students with who higher and lower than average performances would not receive a rigorous education that prepares them for higher education and career success. Thus this would reduce the quality of education in America.

Another problem with egalitarian policies would be people having insufficient knowledge getting into higher levels of education. As previously mentioned, people will learn a different amount of things even with the same treatment. This means that the level, depth and breath of knowledge each people gets from the same education is different. Egalitarian policy would make the people will all levels of knowledge the same chance at getting into a higher level of education. This would be especially bad for people who did not master the necessary knowledge and skills during education. This is because the egalitarian policies would set them up for failure in the future which reduces the quality of education in America.

Lastly, egalitarian policies would reduce the motivation of people to over-achieving. If you would get the same treatment regardless of your achievements, there would be few benefits to over-achieving such as the joy of getting achievements. This reduction in motivation will make people less likely further improve their level of education outside of the minimum requirement required by the school. This would reduce the quality of education for people who would have improved themselves further if there was instead an incentive to over-achieving. 

In conclusion, due to egalitarian policies neglecting individual differences, allowing people to get into higher levels of education with insufficient knowledge ,and reducing the motivation of people to further educate themselves, it would cause a decline of the quality of education in America.

user: Modify the essay to include the long term consequences of such policies. Cite examples where possible.