Dear Editor:

U.S. News just published. “How States Compare in Best High Schools.” Maine came in at 51. This is tragic for our young people. One of the most reliable predictors of financial success and happiness in life is a good education.  Our schools were academic leaders during the 1990s.  Last year another group published, “Kids Count Data Book,” listing Maine as number 34 noting that 71% of fourth graders in our school could not read proficiently. Why are we failing to educate our young?

The Maine Policy Institute recently released a report, “The Decline of Maine K-12 Education” available for download at https://mainepolicy.org/wp-content/uploads/Decline-Report-Final-1.pdf . It carefully documents Maine’s plunging test scores and adds other concerns; including an increase in student behavioral and mental health issues, a dire teacher shortage, and a 20% increase in the inflation adjusted amount Maine spent on each pupil from 2006 to 2022. Another statistic cited in the report is only 32% of teachers are very satisfied with their job and 56% have recently considered quitting.

A recent headline in, “The Maine Wire,” points to a problem, “Academic learning takes a backseat to Social-Emotional, Gender, and Race.” The article noted a majority of Maine voters want schools to get back to the basics - like math, reading, science, and writing. To make matters worse, not only are the scores tanking, but our students are also stressed and struggling emotionally with nearly half of schoolgirls reporting feeling sad or hopeless, a third reporting engaging in self-harm, and 11% attempting suicide.

The current culture wars being waged in our schools are harming our children and have lifelong consequences. By every measure Social Emotional Learning (SEL) and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) training are failed experiments doing more harm than good. Even now, some politicians and candidates haven’t gotten the message and are promoting more of the same. Pay attention folks, it is not just their future, it is ours as well. Society itself is becoming dysfunctional.

Joe Grant

Wiscasset