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It's Official: America Is Now As Dumb As A Bag Of Hammers
Ever wonder why America will elect precisely the president it deserves in just over a year? Here's why.
2011 SAT Reading Scores hit all-time low
h/t John Lohman
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looks like my 401 i mean 201k performance chart
this is easily explained by the increase in blonds in the population.
I blame Halo.
Can't blame the Injuns , the commies, the hippies, must be a new breed; the incult.
Inculto delenda est...sounds very juicy...but I'm playing on innuendo as I can't tie my shoe strings.
I don't wear those shoes no more. Thats progress. Every thing comes easy. Maybe it'll soon becum "came".
support at 500 have been violated. I see next stop at 480. The Fibonacci pivot point at 460 is a set up for rebound but I advise clients to sell the rally while buying the dip.
Don't worry. It'll never go below 200.
If it drops another 10% does that mean we get QE3?
Looks like a Union endorsed Globalization/multicult chart. " A society is only as good as the minds that goes to make up said.. Society"
I blame the Internet
does this include all the "undocumenteds"?
and hey, the students may have low reading scores, but yo they got street cred!
"undocumentards"
So it's gone down 1% in 30 years? (502 in 1981 to 497 in 2011) It is certainly the end of the world as we know it.
Jump! You Fuckers!
From a currently unemployed 1984 National Merit Scholar with an 800 Engish SAT score. Barely broke 700 in Math so I could be wrong. ;)
Nice technique to pick low-to-low point, nevermind the avg in '73 was 530.
I was trying to add "I wonder what happened between 1973 and 1980? Flouridation?" when you posted your comment.
A few recreational pharmaceuticals
And just think around the early 70's, all the college bound kids were trippin on LSD!
If I could remember 1969; at all, I could be more specific about this, but I'm pretty sure LSD is harmless.
The US Department of Education was established in 1979.
I think it's hydroponic pot that is numbing these little shits brains. That shit is a lot stronger now than back in the day.....besides, see what all this fucking TEXTING has done? The fucking idiots CAN"T READ NOW!!!!
If that graph represented the performance of a Bank CEO, he'd be getting one fat, mother-effin, bonus!! BOOYA!
just start the scoring from 530, problem solved, smartest kids ever
Buy The Failed Dunce bitchez....
Idiocracy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0O7_3o3BrI
I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, t he olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rgh it pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! if you can raed tihs psas it on !!"
So, you're saying I've got a chance??
Literacy in the Confederacy of full persons, not slaves, was perhaps only 40% and as we know that was the greatest democracy in history. Literacy in New England, den of abolitionists was double that. Only be reducing literacy, and hell who knows, bringing back slavery, can this nation be saved.
we are, as john kennedy toole put it, a confederacy of dunces
Hear, Hear ! Boy, that IPA works fast ! Hops, Bitchaez ! It's not just for breakfast anymore.
There's always room for improvement!
Pardon me, but if you answer 400 questions correctly on the Math and Reasoning test, for two points each; where is the room for improvement ? Or was this irony, or one of them other things I'm not real good at.
I don't understand this thread.
Squeeky Fromm, Girl Reporter (Squeekyville High -Class of 02)
Your not a loan.
Oh, NOW I get it!!! Hammers come in BOXES, not bags. Duh, I fill like a idiot.
Squeeky Fromm, Girl Reporter
I was looking through all the events of 1973.
That was one crazy year.
I'll take your word for it; I was just starting to remember things again around 1973. 1969 seems to have ended when I attended a youth event in Golden Gate Park that involved tiny blue pills; but I'm assured by friends (?) that I had a good time.
Didn't they dumb that test down in about '94?
Originally, I thought, each side of the test--math and verbal--was supposed to have a mean score of 500. And it was set up so each 100-point jump either way was 1 standard deviation.
But the country got so dumb that they had to jigger the exam with easier questions and/or birth-death-style adjustments such that it's basically impossible to compare different-era scores.
Another weird thing was the disappearance--in absolute numbers, not just on a % basis--of the number of test takers hitting the 750 verbal level. I think the Wall Street Journal wrote about it in the early 1990s. As I recall, no one had an answer for why that was.
The SAT's of today are nowhere near what they were in 1950 thats for damn sure. Now theyre all 'Rain forest math' and 'racially accomodative' and all that PC bullcrap.
Plus 1 for "rainforest math" that's brilliant
"Rain Forest Math" Bwa-haa-haa. Too cool. Hey, God must have loved us, he gave us beer! You do know, don't you that Hops is closely related to Cannabis? You didn't know that? well, there you go, bippy, and its legal, Hic.
Beer is what caused mankind to finally settle down and create civilization.
He needed to farm to get a reliable crop to make beer.
My theory: A greater percentage of people could be taking the SAT now. Perhaps it was originally confined to people applying to the top teir schools (and thus, smarter-than-average people). Once everyone started taking it, it watered down the average.
*tier
Dude, it's a judge; what do you want? literacy ? you want literacy, go to the library, already. Ha. Ha. oH, Oh, I'm getting whoopsy.
I'm sure there's some truth to that, given the numbers of stupid kids who go to college. But I bet it still declines amongst all segments of the population (except for immigrants or their kids).
No, no , no. It's not true. The National Merit Scholarship Test was given to the entire seniour high school class; to "standardize" the test. You'll have to look that up. I'm getting drunk, but not because i'm a superannuated useless old degenerate; it's because I'm suffering from Angst ! So there, put me down as a victim. Anyway, what the fuck was this about; oh yeah, the test, well, look it up; he's wrong.
Was gonna read it - but then thought I'd wait for the movie. I hear Matt Damon is going to be the lead.
"Matt Damon" - Team America
Matt Damon ! Matt Damon ! What about his co-star Ben Affleck; he's much better looking and besides he's my cousin; or else my mothers sister is a lying bitch; which is pretty likely.
Yet they accuse Ron Paul of being against education because he wants to dismantle the Dept. Of Education.
Well ...... it clearly isnt working so lets throw a shitload more money down that rabbit hole in the name of education.
Ridiculous.
The first thing to do if you find yourself standing in a hole is; stop digging. However, this completely mystifys the military and the federal government.
Well, we now know why the banking oligarchs chose this point in time to put Obama in office and pull their shenanigans.
Are they trying to say poor readers will identify with Bachmann or just Republicans in general?
A campaign technique hitherto be known as 'Corndoggin' (works for Perry too, I guess).
/sarc
Ron 'Angry Gramps' Paul can read, even if he's the Libertarian's equivalent of Howard Dean.
Mittney will be drawn out when Perry's overlords command funds to be moved.
Romney is the choice of establishment, country club republicans.
Karl Rove, and that Ivy League carpet bagger Bush, dig them some Romney.
I just hit the inverse function key F666.. Shits all good!
Ok, now show the asian american SAT (read: inverse) chart.
Just like with CPI, educational consumers merely 'substitute' expensive learning for cheap learning.
So we need to adjust the score upward to reflect that.
There. Problem solved.
No Banker Left Behind
Bitchez.
Good one
The answer is homeschooling.
Saw that chart in my nightmares 20 years ago, back when I was still teaching in public education. They were then just introducing all kinds of deseased crap in testing and ebonics and "educational reform". I now write software and my own kids have never set foot in a brick+mortar school.
At 11 and 15, they just finished acting lead roles in Hamlet. They are brilliant and can read anything; the 11 yo is now reading Hound of the Baskervilles.
Kids are amazing. Just stay out of their way and they'll run far and fast.
-= fyre =-
i hate to be a dick but home school kids were always a bit "off".
You sure it isn't actually everyone else?
Why hate yourself for being a dick, when you could hate yourself for being a fool ? And, part of the problem. Every item of propaganda that may fall on fertile ground does damage.
What, you think a child should be forced to learn to interact and socialize outside of his immediate gene pool?
How terribly.......human.
*diseased
"deseased" lol. Open mouth, insert foot
depends on the genetics; one meaning of IQ 90 is: never learns to read with adult speed and comprehension. If the genetics are there, they're unstoppable and conventional education is largely meaningless. But, and this is a big but; it can do un-limited harm. unlimited. I've seen it. it's not pretty. Home schooling is very good.
Dear Tylers:
You are so spot on with this one. Americans are dumb, period. If you speak with the general population about something more complex than a box score or reality television, a high percentage of the time, the person has no idea what you are talking about. None. Heck, you can sometimes even see the stupidity in someone's face. And say this humbly -- I'm no genius, I get many things wrong, people are smarter than me.
Great post. Great.
If you speak with the general population about something more complex than a box score or reality television, a high percentage of the time, the person has no idea what you are talking about.
Maybe that's because you're batshit crazy and most folks can't follow your psychotic rants?
(I kid! Too easy.)
Seriously though, people ignore a lot of stuff because that's what is *encouraged* in this society. If you ever try to bring up politics or the economy in a professional work environment, for example, HR will tell you not to do it. Try a social setting where any kind of "decorum" is expected. Or an academic environment. VERY consistently the conversation will be redirected by people for fear of "upsetting" anyone.
This infantilism is our downfall.
Lots of people have learned, rightly or wrongly, that if you're being contradicted or disputed, the most effective response is shouting and (threats of) violence. We, as a PEOPLE, can't really discuss ANY kind of contentious issue in that social environment.
"Growth?"
No correlation to this, not even a 1:1
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/03/10/us/20090310-immigration-explorer.html
Get that chart outa the way, I b fixn a high score this bitch.
First we need to learn how to make things. Than we read about them. Right now kids are trying to read what is written in Chinese.
Looks exactly like the SPX over the past month. I'm still short greed and now you're telling me I should short dumb now, too!!??
I thought that WAS the SPX...reading too fast~~
We can't read good
Insert Carlin here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FAA8lHW8wE
Step one, know it for what it is.
Like the movie Idiocracy. I like money..........
"I resent that remark." - A. Bag O'Hammers
"I resemble that remark." Avery G. Toole
Oh see Dick and Jane.
See Dick throw the ball to Jane.
See Spot run. Run Spot!
Thar. I kin reed good, cause I bean schooled.
(sarc off)
Sadly it is not just about reading, it is also about comprehension. Kids can read the words, but they can't figure out what the words mean.
Dumbing down Amerikan skool children has been the goal of TPTB since the late '60's when it they realized that the educational system was turning out independant thinkers capable of connecting the dots to the conclusion that the Military Industrail Complex, Wall Street and Government were (and still are) all on cahoots and that their master plan was perpetual war, planned obsolesence, depletion of natural resources and serfdom for the plebs.
TPTB are right on target!
*Industrial
You're really fucking annoying.
Spell check that, dipshit.
If you find reality annoying; you may have a problem.
You realize, of course, that it's hopeless ? Amerikan Skool--
I hope we all realize that SAT scores are a trailing and a future indicator of the state of education. Right? Unless I'm missing something, I'd guess a gap of at least 10 years in either direction, but it's fuzzy.
And I wouldn't limit my list of causes to presidential policy, either. I'd put technology and alienation high on the list, for that group of kids and their parents' generation.
My deep concern is for the future. The prior nadir on that chart, in the early 1990s (my class), inflicted pretty serious consequences on the country's ability to even present itself as hosting intelligent life. It's been a hell of a new millenium, bravely embraced by my peer group of idiots. But the new generation coming up? It's the difference between a domesticated dog and a feral one trained to fight. I find both states abhorrent, but...
This metric is intended to hoover around 500 +/- and is adjusted yearly to assure that AVERAGE for all tests taken in any specific year is about 500. There is no absolute reference here. Its used as a means of filtering applicants for colleges, no more or less.
If you want to know what the grade of incoming freshmen is then talk to a seasoned college prof...their comments will chill you to the core.
*hover. We can fight this, bitchez! One tpyo at a time!!
I love you too, man. You're the bomb.
Even his tpyos are bitchin'; what's not to love?
Not if you're Canadian; if you're Canadian it's definetely "hoover", eh, hoser?
That's right. The professors know what test scores mean, but they're not allowed to talk about it. Obamma was processed thru Harvard Law School; I use the word in a similar vein to manufacturing processed cheese; it's an amazing thing to meditate on.
First let's all get this straight..it's is no longer called education....
It is now called indoctrination
Free thinkers are a rare breed in our society
that is exactly what Glenn Beck said!
But on a serious note... schools no longer teach English, they teach Language Arts. WTF is that anyway?
It's maeking pictuers with teh ASCII lettars.........FIXED PITCHES BITCHEZ!!!1!!1!
No worries. The iPhone 5 comes with an implantable literacy chip.
I dont get it, so 500 students got a skor of over 2,010? This is mutch hyer skor than 1,973 this is imroovment.
Is this from Oweblahma's time at Columbia?
Yes, that is the dumb downed version they are using today. Racially correct. Has some questions in ebonics, etc.
Bernanke scored an 800 on this test back in the day.
what they fail to mention or evaluate is that most of what is used
to test reading ability is not worth reading and is poorly written.
i suspect .... so ....
"hey teacher, leave those kids alone
all in all your just another
brick in the wall." j.w. ?
bag of hammers bitches !
...and other complaints concerning miss education, medication
and the so called evaluation / grading process.
the fault clearly need be laid at the steps of the learning
institutions and their financial underpinnings.
Hammer head sharks and shattered pinhead shards.
Bags of blood and barrels of oily mud
I can't spell SAT it always comes out as shat.
In Deutch its not the reading score its the breeding score
In China its the writing on the empty wall
In Japan its the Fuku Fuji jujitsu
In Italy its the bunga of the gunga crowd.
in Iceland its the holy smoking cloud
In Greece its the lost fleece
In France its the last dance
In US of A its lost honour of greenback
In Mehico its getting hi then into body bag
In Venezuela its maccho and its bold n bad
In Afghan its collateral damage and woman sad
In Brazil its hopium on sugar cum
In Artic its polar bear barb q
Nowhere is it paradisio
Maybe time to move to Cornucopia on Moon
It's possible I was wrong about LSD being "harmless"; I'm willing to admit to this.
you must be on steroids then the type that shrinks the nuts n the brain.
Job Applicant: So what does the job pay?
Prospective Employer: I'll pay you what you're worth.
Job Applicant: I can't work that cheap.
You don't need SAT scores to tell you that people are getting dumber. Just look at how many people borrow $100,000+ to get a degree that qualifies you for a job that pays $30k/yr.
+1m... F'ING AWESOME BRO.. JUST PRICELESS!!!
Yep, I notice they do not test for business sensibility either.
I have to wonder if the government funding incentive spikes (ie no child left behind) coincide with SAT spikes?
Educators are not immune from corruption (see Detroit Public Schools)
You can see the definite impact in the early 80s of the "Strivers" added points for minorities scores that "exceeded expectations" to increase scores and then the "re-centering" (dumbing down the test) in 94/95 back to a mean of 500 after that practice was stopped and scores tanked.
What is the meaning of the chart? Is it the median score? Lots of commentary on a score that ranges between 200 and 800. If it is the median, that means that there are High School Juniors and (maybe) Seniors who are (being forced?) to take the test with insufficient preparation.
See, e.g.: http://www.testmasters.net/SatAbout/Scoring-Scale
But, well, there was a recent thread on "Peak College". Here ya go:
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/nia-release-s-college-conspiracy-video-...
So, it might not be "Stupid Americans", it might be "NEA Outcome Driven Feeder Mechanism toward the 'Higher Education' Bubble."
And there is all of this bitchin' about "Exploiting" college athletes. How about "Exploiting" marginal students to get them into debt slavery. College loans can't be discharged in a personal BK, don't cha' know.
- Ned
This is why teachers across America demand union representation...too many couldn't make it on their own merit.
Now, decades later, they still have a job and we have these dumbed down kids. Billions of tax dollars later and Johnny still can't read.
@ Tyler Durden
Love a lot of your article headings Tyler,You make me laugh even addressing serious subjects.I laugh because you are usually completely correct.The way you put words,line right up with my brains perception of reality usually.
Just a guess,thats probably why most people come here...well that and the planted stories of course lol
Cheers to ya
Look who's talking. This blog reads like the ending of Flowers for Algernon sometimes.
Could you give us a sample; I have no idea what a flower of algernon is. If it's not an engineering t extbook, however, I refuse to be cowed by your erudition; all engineers know that things that are not engineering textbooks are "merely words".
Bag of Hammers...oh, that hurts.
Top Test Scores From Shanghai Stun Educators By SAM DILLON Published: December 7, 2010With China’s debut in international standardized testing, students in Shanghai have surprised experts by outscoring their counterparts in dozens of other countries, in reading as well as in math and science, according to the results of a respected exam.
In science, Shanghai students scored 575. In second place was Finland, where the average score was 554. The United States scored 502 — in 23rd place — with a performance indistinguishable from ...... Poland!
OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/07/education/07education.html
Better be no more Polock jokes....
Their education is a joke too. Their students may know some trivia but they can't even tell the lies fed to them from the above because they don't have critical thinking abilities.
well at least nobody is being left behind. Everyone will be bankrupt and illiterate together.
Yes, Thank You Jeebus ! Nobody will be left behind !. Good point ! Hic. Boy, I'm getting up to cruising altitude now.
So I'm assuming the "verbal" portion of the SAT is now called "reading"? I took mine a loooong time ago.
I did pretty well in the math section -- but horrible in the verbal, which I recall to have been pretty much useless in my everyday life.
It was full of archaic words that nobody really uses or even cares about. And this was supposed to give an idea of how an intelligent a person is??
Bottom line: It's one freakin' test. So kids don't do all that well on a test. And this is supposed to be important?
P.S. My SAT was taken at 8:00 on a Saturday morning. I'm assuming they still take it around that time. I'm also assuming kids haven't changed much when I was their age. I assure you, most 17-year-olds aren't exactly awake yet at 8:00 on a freakin' Saturday morning -- let alone being in the absolute best mental condition to take this "all-important" test.
Fatuous.
Try doing the GRE on a Saturday morning when you are a little bit older and a bit hungover :)
17-year-olds never party on a Friday night??
I did great on the verbal and the logic but screwed up on the Math - but at least I knew I was screwing up.
Your commentary is a shining example of Tyler's point.
I have had students show to exams stinking, staggering, "I can smell it on your breath," drunk. I had a young lady falling on me at the front of the class. I (wrongly) did what I could to help her cover for herself (I worried about her future). I had a young man who was brilliant when he wasn't drunk, and smelling up the front row with booziness most mornings and silent, when he was. Beautiful mind that kid, he wrote great papers and was a solid musician. I had an older male vet (at least he was older than me) who sat at the back of the class and came to class drunk every day and still made As. I had to let it go. He got cantankerous from time to time, but he made genuinely good contributions to class discussions.
It is not discussed here, but there is a culture of students that "do" college as an experience (kind of like Disney land or something) rather than as preparation for their future. Wealthy parents feel obligated to "buy" this experience for their kids and do not pressure them to get good grades and think that getting drunk and partying is normal and how it is supposed to be. A C average seems to be fine by these parents. Studies show that students in the middle, the one's who have parents that pay for some things, but not all, have a better completion/success rate than those who have it all done for them (i.e. all the money they want) and those who do not have enough support (and may need to drop out or slow down their progress because they need to work [the five+ year BA]). There is a sweet spot to these things.
It is so complicated. There is a narrative running about "how it is" and reality is another beast. Some students have parents that cling to them and get in their way. Saw many bright girls drop out because their lazy assed mother made her take care of her. I could go on. I have been in this trade long enough that I have seen some of these women come back after 10 years to finish. They need it for their self esteem, they know it won't get them a job.
It is so much more fucked up than you know. All our jobs are.
If you overlay a chart of government education spending, it will probably be inverse to this chart.
Correlation if not outright causation.
We're spending a lot to create an illiterate electorate.
It is obviously a money problem see...
http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/182894_10100539150180594_8377576_71209127_7907890_n.jpg
It is obviously a money problem see...
http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/182894_10100539150180594_8377576_71209127_7907890_n.jpg
Good thing I got my edumucation certificate in 96, IM smart huh!
if that chart were adjusted for how dumbed down the tests are today...it would be in the single digits.
here's an interesting example. take a look at this Harvard entrance exam from 1899:
http://www.ivygateblog.com/2011/04/you-would-never-have-gotten-into-harv...
I looked through this. I'm not a complete moron but when i looked at that test...the only thing I was able to answer with certainty was my name...and after a few minutes...i became unsure of even that.
Here's a sample question:
[in Logarithms and Trigonometry] 9. Find by logarithms, using arithmetical complements, the value of the following:
[(0.02183)2 x (7)2/5]/[?(0.0046) x 23.309]
(and remember...1899. No calculators)
And apparently...the Columbia University exam was even tougher:
http://spectrum.columbiaspectator.com/opinion/in-the-late-1800s-columbia...
Now a days, I doubt 1 in 50 tenured professors could pass either one of these tests...But in 1899...this is what it took to get in as a student.
How things have changed indeed.
The question mark inside the bracket bothers me; I'm not familiar with expressions that have question marks inside the brackets. Other than that; the main problem is that they don't specify how many significant digits they want.
I assume the question "what's a synonym for OMG LOL GR8?" wasnt on the test.
I blame texting. Oh and also, who has time to read when you have to help mom and dad make mortgage payments?
Blaming texting is silly. Language evolves with new technology.
Edit: Bitchez!
Evidently no one has time to read:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACbwND52rrw
Fish Rots From The Head.
- Ned
Its the weather fault
It is also Bush's fault.
I think the chart was attacked by Algos.
This is more proof we should pass the jobs bill now!
Hear! Hear! Pass the Jobs Bill ! Why, ? The sooner we get it over with the better. I've been reading the decline and fall of the British Empire for the last week; it's very interesting; no one ever admits that its game over. they have to be beat over the head with it.
Whatever. I mean, me no think this be right yo. Chartz be dum. I'm from the America and I knoz all kinda stuff about junk.
I'd like to see some old fancy college teaching dude, text a twitter, update his facebook while driving and eating a cheeseburger all at once. I'm doing it right now, I got mad skillz ya all.
Americaz in #won bitches!
DP
It is sad. Was talking to a college student in Illinois recently and he asked where I was located. I said Toronto and his response - "I don't know where that is". It blew me away but guess I shouldn't have been surprised ... but sometimes I still am.
You really wanna see the students head explode tell him it's in Ontario....
Don't worry, they'll know it's one of the 57 states.
Right. "Toronto Indianna ?" forty percent of the little darlings can't point to where the sun goes at night.
This needs its own ETF: STPD
Television, The Drug of a Nation - The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy
http://youtu.be/ebWk9pBXSso
PE - She Watch Channel Zero?!
Flavor Flav is not the guy to bring up during a discussion about literacy.
(Chuck D was OK.)
too-fuckin-shay
That's it ! That's it ! That is the problem; Television. If I weren't so drunk I could explain this; but trust me I think I understood it all once. I wonder if you can collect Federal Disability for Angst caused by a long series of irrational Federal Decisions? Hmm. Have to look into that.
and............you can SEE just where every RIGHTWING/FASCIST/REPUBLICAN whitehouse took office.
amazing.
every FASCIST regime delights and demands a dumbed down electorate in order to keep the people reactionary and susceptible to their propaganda.
America HAS PROVEN that stoooopid people, en masse, are dangerous.
As long as I have been on here, I've been saying exactly this.
Only a group of retarded morons would elect Barry Soetero dog catcher.
The fact is, as the SAT scores so accurately portray, your average Amerikan is more interested in where Casey Anthony is hiding and when she will "tell all".
These are the same people who acquitted O.J.
Read? Who needs to read? All I need is some of that Obama stash of cash. He gonna pay my rent, make my car payment, and even gonna pay for my gas.
Ain't goberment great?
I'm not going to dispute the assertion that the intelligence level of the populace is frightening; however, this chart is more of a reflection of the "everyone should go to college" mentality that has resulted in greater numbers of intellectually unprepared students taking the test (and eventually taking out large, non-dischargeable loans to pay for a degree of dubious value) than it neccessarily is an implication that American students are becoming dumber as a whole.