Heck I am lucky to have attended such a pretigious institution one that began OVER 100 years before yours

1784 > 1897

I attended some of the best public schools with ample resources and facilities that in no way failed me. I also always lived in upper-middle class to wealthy towns that had large universities in them, Boulder and Davis.

Public schools did not fail me.

So then you failed?

Not in my secondary education ;-)

Its not the schools, its the teachers (they have something about this in Freakanomics). They are plenty of bad teachers, because they get tenure in 3 years, as opposed to 5-7 years for professors to get tenure. We need to increase tenure and have contracts that allow us to fire bad teachers.

I went to a secondary school which wasn't to great, I had a lot of bad teachers that should have been fired. Luckily there was this Post-secondary enrollment program (which I think should be every where) that allowed me to attend college courses for free during my junior and senior year. Probably what got me through high school.

one of the other freakonomics talking points was that the parents play a major role. if they care about your schooling and your success, that is a decent indicator of how well you will turn out. this stuff starts getting a lot scarier when you have your own kids...

i'd rather have my own kids than yours.

Waiting for Superman, watch it.

the music video by the flaming lips?

wasn't 'the flaming lips' your gf's nickname in college?