Larry Blanchard wrote:

There's a really good book called "The Memoirs of a Superfluous Man" by Nock
that contains, among other things, his observations on education. He says he
always deplored the state of US education till a friend pointed out that most
people are not educable, they're only trainable, and that's what the schools
were supposed to do.

Mandatory attendance and performance beyond a certain point, today,
leads to an accusation of attention defict syndrome...hell, they're
just bored out of their minds.
You'd be surprised how smart people get when it's something that
interests them.

And, that is what schools where supposed to do. Voc/ed has been
alleviated in most high schools in Iowa...in favor of technological
substitutes...who wants to be a desk potato when they can build
something with their own two hands? Not everybody, just a majority.