They have till five o’clock to finish.... The County Superintendent gives the teachers the hint that final questions will be based on questions sent out through the term, so the teachers attempt to get the children to memorize the answers to these questions. There is a good cram before the examination. Of course most of them pass.” The mother now faces the dilemma of continuing the ten year old child in school where she loses her interest and desire to learn, or teaching her at home which means that she will not have that shibboleth, a diploma, essential economically for almost any sort of job. [Pg 164] Here again, we may say, is an exceptional case, but it illustrates one of the most serious defects in our general education. That is that the educational system from bottom to top is coming to be operated more and more for the benefit of the unintelligent and not the intelligent. An educational system that is operated with public money should be run, so the easy logic runs, for the benefit of the public, all the public. Of course, the more of the public that enters the schools, the lower the work of the schools must be. Here and there there may be in a poor home an exceptionally keen and alert childish mind. Here and there is a poor home in which the parents are intelligent and do all possible to develop the child’s mind and provide it with a stimulating mental environment. But we know these are exceptional cases and not the rule. With the lowered quality of teachers themselves, due to over-demand owing to mass classes, and with the teaching geared lower and lower to meet the requirements of a lower standard of pupil, from kindergarten to college, is not the chance for the really intelligent child getting less and less? How can an intelligent child from a home where intelligent and ambitious and mentally alive parents help to kindle all the child’s interests and tastes be expected to take any interest in class work which is keyed to the rate of progress and general capacity of dull-witted children from homes that are cultural vacuums?