"This word is new to us... hoh-mmm--worrrrk? Homework?"

Phi Beta Cons on National Review Online:

• The 2006 High School Survey of Student Engagement found that 55 percent of high school students spent less than one hour per week "Reading/studying for class." Only 10 percent exceeded ten hours per week.
• In 2004, the Horatio Alger Association found that 60 percent of teenagers logged five hours of homework per week or less.

Oh, where to even begin? The complete failure of professional pedagogy courses to emphasis homework anymore? The always-unwritten-but-ever-present administrational emphasis on passing the most students? The failure of many households to engage with the education process? The continual emphasis on rote learning of exams? (Oh hush, this was true even before NCLB.) The wrong-headed excuse that homework is "insensitive" to students who have to work to support their families? (Here's a thought: you're reinforcing the cycle when you do this!)

I could go long but I have a meeting in 15 minutes.