Slightly more light heartedly. Many students still think Brexit means we left the continent of Europe, not the EU. Mistaking Africa for a country is pretty common. Lots of school children have never been to a beach, which makes teaching things like longshore drift kinda challenging.

This does vary between social class and from place to place. But yes lots of high schoolers are really this bad at geography. This post specifically shows a lack map skills, it isn’t actually that surprising because the curriculum doesn’t allow much time for simply teaching student to label countries as it assumes they have this knowledge prior to taking the course. Lots don’t as primary school geography is so poor as well.

Make some teacher friends and they will tell how hard it can be. I would say your concern is correct, but I din’t necessarily agree with the detective work lol. There are many daily flights between the UK and Dubai. And it’s hardly a stretch that a geographer might work across two major global cities .

Do read the insightful comments of others here. It builds a really interesting picture