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For all requirements $R of everyday life:

- "Schools should be required to teach $R, and not graduate a student that hasn't learned it!"

- "The evil school wouldn't graduate my snowflake merely because s/he couldn't pass the standardized test for $R!"

Are you saying that one individual might hold both of those positions? Or is your point that people disagree on what is important in school? I'm trying to understand the argument you're making here.

I'm saying that "verifying schools are really teaching $R" requires something like a standardized test, but those are already unpopular even for things that people agree schools should be teaching.

Hence there is a tension between "graduation rates" and "adding more things-schools-have-to-teach", and yes, probably a lot of people who don't see the contradiction (between hate for standardized tests and demands that schools teach $R) as clearly as I've laid it out here.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com