When my son was in the fifth grade, I got called in for a conference. He was really upset, as it was one of his favorite teachers, who did science and math for his class (an interesting setup where a single portable was shared by two teachers, one of whom did science/math, the other doing language arts/social studies/etc, and mid-day the classes would switch rooms.)

Anyway, he’s gotten into an argument, and was slated to get a failing grade on a test.

The question in contention that started it all:

“How many states of matter are there?”

His answer: “at least four”, and went on from there to ponder states beyond plasma.

Teacher marked him wrong, he got testy about it, things spiraled out of control.

I wound up having a nice discussion with the teacher. Eventually got her to understand that while her textbook view of “three states of matter” was observably correct and probably appropriate for a fifth-grade class, it was incomplete.

Crisis averted.

And when I returned home, I got to explain to my son that tests in school only partially measured the success of the student in mastering the material, but that rather they almost entirely measured the success of the teacher in getting the students to score well on the tests, and that let the teachers keep their jobs for the next year. A subsequent conversation was had on the difference between being correct, and having the answer that was being looked for on the test.

That’s the meat of it: public education has devolved into standardized tests which primarily measure the effectiveness of teachers in getting students to score well on the standardized tests.

Until that changes, “the facts” are in fact irrelevant. The only thing that matters is how well your kid does on the tests, and if you want them to get a real education you either have to get really, really lucky, or supplement outside school.