The Underground History of American Education

I read this book after a lifetime of public schooling- from kindergarten to graduate school. In fact, I had trained to be a teacher myself at one point. When I found this book I literally could not put it down. Gatto was stating everything that I had intuitively known was wrong with the American public school system all along in amazing encyclopedic detail. I truly felt like I was reading a secret history that I was never supposed to find out about. I have yet to find a flaw or inaccuracy in any of what he points out- it all has the loud ring of Truth. The major premise here is that American schooling has been dumbed down to provide mindless, loyal workers who cannot think for themselves. At least this is the schooling provided to the masses. This was a deliberate act with roots in 19th century industrialism. He shows how the Civil War demonstrated to industrialists and financiers how a standardized population trained to follow orders without significant thought could be made to function as a money tree. Moreover, the proper schooling could be used to strip the common population of its power to cause trouble. You see, our global power and corporate wealth is based on a third-rate educational system that actually works against developing men and women of true character and intellect. The mindless bureaucrat and worker who follows a system without thought or question is the pattern that our "efficient" system depends on. That is what schooling produces. One should never confuse schooling with true education- and definitely not with intelligence. ( Amazon customer)