re: 50 percent of American adults can’t read at or above an 8th grade level.

American exceptionalism

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School systems all over the country do not hold children back for failure. These kids simply get pushed through the system until they are ejected into the general population. These young adults have little to no practical skills or experience to function as independent/productive citizens.

This is a sad reality that we have created with low expectations.

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Again, this falls on the parents/community. The pressure from communities to produce X graduation rate or get shut down while not addressing a school may have a population of kids from parents who barely graduated themselves is huge. I worked with a counselor in a middle school who got written up for refusing to “socially” promote a kid who was failing across the board because the parents didn’t want him to be “embarrassed”. I’m sorry, if your kid isn’t mastering content then you shouldn’t be able to say whether they get held back or not.

The best HS in the state of Kentucky (public or private) is a magnet public school who can be selective of who they take. Difference between public and private is that private schools are able to be selective of students and can kick out the shitty ones.

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Our public school system has performed wonders.

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People with a median IQ of 80 don't learn much no matter who is doing the teaching. We have a demographic problem, it influences just about everything in society negatively.

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Again, this falls on the parents/community.

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Which is why public schools are doomed to failure and we already spend more money per student than most nations, with a pathetic return.

Schools have become social service centers, not halls of education.