or Why the Chinese are the smartest people on earth.

Most Asians are Smarter than Most Americans

When I was teaching middle school in San Leandro, California, I was surprised to notice something for the first time: the majority, if not all of my Asian students had the highest grades in all of my classes. Was this a fluke? Was it due to some inherent reverse prejudices that we hold about the smart Asians?

It was neither. Prior to 1993, I had never even had any Asian students as a teacher in South Florida. Yet, in the Bay Area, the Asian population of my school was at least 25 %. And every one of them was an ideal student, a model for all others. They may not have been the most outgoing or the most popular, but they were simply as dedicated to each task as anyone could be. They would stay after class to ask me if I could recommend extra books for them to read, extra essay topics they could use to practice… all of that.

Currently, I tutor a number of Asian students, primarily Chinese. At the end of one of my tutoring sessions, my student Aaron asked me if he could please have more homework. I gladly complied and I put together a work packet that, frankly, most kids in this country, would glare at as if it were the apocalypse itself.

Chequered History

The Chinese are usually NOT considered to be the favored peoples of the world to most Americans. Those bastards are MEAN and don’t give their people basic freedoms, right? And what about that Tiananmen Square (which occurred in 1989)? Yes, it does seem like that was a bad thing, no question. And let’s not get started with Mao’s Cultural Revolution.

Greatly Low Expectations

However, as we are currently at the cusp of a complete ruination of the American educational system, we can point to many factors, including: the misuse and overuse of technology in the classroom, the lack of concern for revised educational policy in the non-existent Department of Education, the obsessiveness of American youth with vapid, online culture , and the leniency of the adults who are supposed to be in charge (parents, teachers, school administrators). We no longer expect much from our students, and students will almost ALWAYS rise to our expectations. If we expect nothing, we get nothing.

Rampant and Elected Illiteracy

And truly, nothing is expected of the leaders in this country, including in any academic way. We all are perfectly aware that the preshidant is …maybe if I’m being kind….”semi-literate.” He will never actually read anything, other than maybe his own twitter-twatter-tweets. But if anyone, especially any literature person or even English teacher, were to take out a red pen, my oh my! What a sea of red pen blood/ink there would be! I counted the number of words in one sentence from one of his Christmas Day tweets: the shortest sentence in it had 89 words. The longest had 174 words in it. Every one of my ninth graders would recognize what we (the educated dinosaurs) would call “run-on sentences.” Hopefully, our student population will not attempt to emulate this shit-turd’s writing style or form. Here’s one of the shorter ones, with 94 words:

I’m in Colledge

As I have said before in an earlier blog, a current and widespread trend in colleges is for professors to never assign students to read actual whole books. The idea is “They won’t anyway, so why bother?” These wise professors and college administrators are opting for assigning portions of books, chapters, or even just excerpts. And these students are the people who will be performing surgeries or handling entire corporations or legal cases in the future or even become lawmakers , if there are still going to be laws….which is not at all a sure bet. These are people who can’t read a whole book. Why should they have to when the elected leader of their country can’t read one page? They , too, can aspire to be the president one day, with sub-par literacy.

Race to the Top?

When President Obama was in, the Department of Education instituted the “Race to the Top,” with myriad measures to improve education in the U.S. Now, we have what we should call a “race to the bottom.” The task: which schools can produce illiterate, lazy, incompetent students the fastest and the best!

On the other hand, the Chinese expect a lot. And yes, Chinese school-aged students and teenagers (living in China) may be more stressed out than their highly relaxed but depressed and air-headed American counterparts. The Chinese youngsters are stressed out when they receive a B, and so many other non-Asian students are just happy to pass.

If this whole thing sounds racist, or stereotyping, or unresearched, I am not claiming to have done any research, in the traditional sense of the word. My research is and has been my teaching experience after 35 years. But I challenge you to do your own research about it, and then tell me the ways I have erred.

World Domination

When I asked Aaron to do some research on Google or to watch a YouTube video about something, my supervisor informed me that “They don’t have Google or YouTube in China.” Well…good for them. That is probably why China and the Chinese will own and run the whole world within the next several decades. And my bet is that they will run it far better than our current government does. I’m IN…sign me up for it.

A Non-Sequitor

By the way, most dinners at Chinese restaurants (in China), which are filled to the brim with so much meat and/or seafood and fresh vegetables always, do not exceed the price of TEN American dollars. Look it up! I pay that here in Florida for one small bowl of meatless hot and sour soup, usually.