“Whenever people talk glibly of a need to achieve educational "excellence," I think of what an improvement it would be if our public schools could just achieve mediocrity.”

Government seminaries (public schools) are fulfilling the measure of their creation (IQs are diminishing while information offering and receiving are exponentially decreasing). Mediocrity is graded on a bell curve with an ever lowering of achievements.

When we issue flat critiques, we need to quantify quality.
My dad was a damned smart man, a product of "public schools." I didn't learn half as much ... and it wasn't the fault of "the schools." Mr. Sowell, take your eye off the high-powered lens of your chosen microscope and examine other facets of "education."

For sure, the level of education being supplied by government schools is far less than what previous generations received. I have noted that the current SAT tests are not as difficult as in my day. I have an old 5th grade notebook of my grandmother's -- besides having perfect cursive penmanship, the topics covered were similar to those found in university today.

The primary problem with government schooling is that it basically has turned the school into a church, with the religion being government, and the god being collective power. When churches served as fellowships of the community, the school did not have to devote so much time to social/cultural programs. But organized education has typically been to train students to enter a world in which they will be required to obey commands until one day they may become the ones giving the commands -- maybe. Most of the great minds in history were self-taught.