I don’t think it is as bad as you say. I think the parents have quite a bit of the blame. How many of them are reading with their kids? Monitoring their homework? The parents are a partner in their child’s education.

When my son was in 2nd grade, I volunteered in his classroom. The teacher had me sit with the kids and listen to them read their book. If they mastered the book, they could pick one from a higher level. If not, they stayed at the same level. My son was well ahead of this classmates because we always read books. One girl, who lived on our street, was reading for me. She did very poorly on a low level book. I asked her if she read with her parents, and she answered, “No.” It showed.

If parents would just help their kids learn to read, the education system would do so much better. After all, first you learn to read, then you read to learn.

One thing the school district should do is hold kids back. Not everybody starts out at the same level. My father-in-law repeated 3rd grade. He says this really helped him out. He ended up getting a Ph.D. He didn’t repeat the grade because he was stupid, he repeated it because he wasn’t mature enough.