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Failure of Moral Education in the Public Schools in the Post-Modern Era
Like any nation of the world, the United States was not immuned to the ebbs and flows of the cultural changes throughout the centuries. As mentioned earlier, during the early settlement, the pilgrims were devoutly religious people who were escaping from religious persecution. They were coming from a religious era where the prevailing values were of a Christian one.

After the settlement of the colonists, many people began to move west to populate the land. There was a lot of land for farming and later for industries to take place. Before the First World War, the United States was already into the industrialized era leaving behind the post-Christian era.

Around the times of 1960 during the Vietnam War, America was in a state of soul-searching. It was at this time that the Free Speech Movement was captivating the nation after the work of the Black civil rights leader, Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.; a Baptist church minister.

The post-modern era followed. This has propelled the American people into another form of soul-searching, the need for individualization and the quest for individual sexual-freedom and pleasure to define the identity of oneself. Marital relationship begins to disintegrate as spouses seek self-satisfaction over mutual happiness. Separation and divorce continue to be common among families. Children continue to suffer as innocent participants in the great American family disintegration. There is also loosening of sexual boundaries, where abortions, homosexuality have become personal rights protected by privacy laws. Similar to the people in the human potential movement of the sixties, the underlying belief of the post-modernist is that people are inherently good and government and educational systems should not meddle with the autonomy of individuals.

As mentioned previously, the educational system was impacted as the second casualty in the disintegration of the social fabric of America. Schools have to teach sex education, how to survive parental divorce, blended family dynamics and gender-identity crises. Together with the post-modernist¡¦s views, the educational elites believe that religion should not be taught in schools, because so doing there is an infringement of "separation of church and state." This was galvanized by the lawsuit brought on by a Texas woman O¡¦Hara who did not want her son to pray in public school.

"Value-Free" education became a priority and the potential of each student was to be respected. Some experts believe that there is no such thing as "value-free" education, because "value-free" itself is already a form of subtle value. Religious beliefs of any kind, Christianity in particular was taken out of public schools at that time. In their place, post-modern beliefs were taught instead under the guise of "value-free" education. One of the side effects of this education is the increase of student self-esteem and confidence without the actual academic achievement as the background. For example, American students, having the advantage of high technology, continue to score very low in math scores comparing to most industrialized nations. This has become the modern day American irony and the shame of the educational system in the United States.

As the public schools become more and more involved in the emotional development of students instead of the academic teaching of the three R¡¦s, student learning decreased and school violence increased. This can be witnessed almost weekly in 1999 beginning with the Columbine High School shootings in Colorado. Teenagers, especially Caucasian middle-class boys shocked America with their violence. Politicians blamed the lack of gun control as the main reason, while educators blame the lack of school funding and security as the main reasons. While most experts believe that school violence is a culmination of multiple factors beginning with the disintegration of American families, the main factors were that teenager boys were alienated from their parents and their peers, and later they used drugs, alcohol and violent video games to suppress their aggression and depression.

At this writing, congress is coming to realize through this school violence that American youths are out of control because the moral fabric of society under post-modernism is disintegrating. Curiously, after the Columbine tragedy, the House of Representatives and Congress have recently passed a new law reinstating the legality of the display of the Ten Commandments in the public schools.

Over decades of emphasis on emotional development of students, the public schools have been attempting to do all things for all people. While denying the need for religious values for students, American schools were inculcating a different version of liberal values of "diversity" and "tolerance." Students were left with the impression that their feeling is the ultimate authority. Schools found themselves teaching issues of self-esteem and students are made to "feel good" about themselves. This comes as no surprise because this is consistent with the post-modernism philosophy. Students inadvertently focus on themselves instead of having to consider the needs and emotions of others when they socialize or in conflict resolution situations. Since there is no "absolute" right or wrong because a person¡¦s liberty and feelings become paramount, order and moral issues become very difficult to conceptualize.

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Specific Moral Issues in Education for Consideration

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Introduction &
The Early American Settlers

Early American Leaders and the Resources of Moral Values

American Educational System Now and Then

Moral Education in the Public Schools in the United States

Failure of Moral Education in the Public Schools in the Post-Modern Era

Specific Moral Issues in Education for Consideration

A Future View of Moral Education in the United States

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