In the public s response to open-ended questions, education does not dominate its concerns, but rather is at the top of a widely disparate list of concerns. Now I am going to read a list of some of the issues that will probably be discussed in this year s presidential election campaigns. The American public generally gives higher grades to the state of education in their local communities than they do to the education system in general across the country. Similarly, parents give higher grades to the education their children receive than they do to the educational system nationally. A Gallup survey conducted for the international educational association Phi Delta Kappa has shown for years that the grades Americans give to schools in their local communities are much higher than grades they give to schools nationally.
Opinion is dramatically different, however, on the quality of education one s own children receive.
Students are often given the grades A, B, C, D, and FAIL to denote the quality of their work. Suppose the public schools themselves, in this community, were graded in the same way.