[speaker001:] you say you taught school for a while
[speaker002:] yes it's been some years ago I haven't taught in the last twenty years
[speaker001:] oh what grades did you teach
[speaker002:] I taught about half the time at the high school level and about half the time at the junior college level
[speaker001:] okay uh and what general subjects
[speaker002:] um business subjects
[speaker001:] okay okay
[speaker002:] do you have children in school
[speaker001:] uh not yet uh my first son is uh about two months old now
[speaker002:] um-hum
[speaker001:] none of them presently going into college um
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker001:] do you see anything in particular do you see you feel is wrong about the school system the way it's running now
[speaker002:] uh well other than the fact that it it's not difficult enough and it doesn't last us long enough during the school year uh I one of the the big errors uh that was made over the years is passing children along when they hadn't really completed the get grade that they were in
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] and allowing children to graduate from high school who couldn't read and write
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] and cipher
[speaker001:] uh-huh yes
[speaker002:] oh when I taught at the uh junior college level um I taught uh business law at the sophomore level and we were on the quarter system so they had this was the last two quarters in the sophomore year so they had to
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] think up something for me to teach at the uh front end of the in the fall
[speaker001:] yes
[speaker002:] so I taught a little course called office machines now if you keep in mind this was long before the days of the hand held computer calculator
[speaker001:] yes
[speaker002:] so we started off with a ten key adding machine
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] and uh ah one of the first problems was to add three tenths and twenty four hundredths and invariably a substantial proportion of the class would come up with twenty seven hundredths so I would have to launch into a discussion of common denominator and explain that every figure that was entered into that ten key adding machine with two decimal places
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] was a number divided by a hundred and in order to add three tenths to anything it had to be changed to thirty hundredths
[speaker001:] um-hum um-hum
[speaker002:] and uh the only criterion for getting into the junior college where I taught was being eighteen years of age uh having a high school diploma was not a prerequisite it was for some of the the curricula but it wasn't for the business curriculum
[speaker001:] yes huh
[speaker002:] so so that's
[speaker001:] not not even a GED was required
[speaker002:] I beg your pardon
[speaker001:] a GED wan't even required or was that available yet
[speaker002:] uh no it was not at that time uh to take courses all you had to be with eighteen years of age
[speaker001:] huh
[speaker002:] uh so uh the the new math I think ruined our math uh I was teaching at the high school level when it was being introduced to the seventh grade and eighth grade and uh I went to a lecture and the math teacher said well we used to teach business arithmetic at the seventh and eighth grade level but now we're going to teach the new math like how to to count in the binary counting system
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] and uh uh the base twelve and that sort of thing and uh we're gonna teach the theory of mathematics and never mind percentage
[speaker001:] um-hum yes
[speaker002:] so um
[speaker001:] hm
[speaker002:] I I checked my my son my son was uh let's see when would he have been in eighth grade about oh in the middle sixties he would have been in the eighth grade and I checked his eighth grade math book
[speaker001:] so they try to teach a concept
[speaker002:] and uh there were no percentage there were two pages devoted to percentage and ratio and proportion
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] and in in his algebra book there were no fractions no percentages and course he proceeded on to geometry and um that sort of thing fortunately my boys have a very high aptitude in math
[speaker001:] yes
[speaker002:] but uh there's a a a great population out there that does not and uh so I went through this uh lecture of counting in the decimal counting system and I said if this doesn't make sense to you memorize it and learn your two-doms
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] because it's a percentage world out there
[speaker001:] oh yeah yes