Truth deeper than testing

I wish to affirm Mr. Alec Jones’ concern that some students and other citizens do not appreciate the value of a “well-rounded education” (June 11). As we bemoan the underachievement of U.S. students relative to their foreign counterparts, it is assumed that a more content-intensive, standardized, assessed approach centered on “basics” will rejuvenate the anemic U.S. economy. This misguided quantitative pedagogy usually marginalizes qualitative study and the humanities (i.e., history, foreign language, art, music).

Is it possible that our diminished global competitiveness and prestige is a function of an arrogant ethnocentrism bred by a population educated to the parochial expedients of career rather than learning for the sake of understanding the wider world? As Plato reminds us: If the student “holds no converse with the Muses … having no taste of (such) learning, he grows feeble and dull and blind, his mind never waking up or receiving nourishment, and his senses not being purged of their mists … and he ends up being uncivilized … with no sense of propriety.” I do not know where Mr. Jones was schooled, but he has learned well an essential yet endangered truth.

John B. Hagney

Spokane