President Barack Obama has launched a new initiative to get American
schools to teach computer science. Appearing at a Newark, New Jersey,
middle school, the president suggested that students, especially girls
and minorities, should learn "not just how to use a smartphone but to
create the apps for a smartphone."
If we lived in a country
where most students were graduating from high school with good English
and math skills and with a firm grasp of American history and
government, we might be in a position to make time for advanced computer
skills. But we don't. Only about 68 percent of Newark's students even
graduate from high school.
As for those students who do graduate,
not just in Newark but across the country, it seems that smartphone
skills come pretty naturally. Who hasn't seen a middle-aged adult
getting tutoring on his iPhone from a teenager?
Meanwhile, Obama's
progressive allies have been assiduously slanting the teaching of
American history and government to produce new generations of
left-leaning citizens -- that is, when they teach civics at all.