Asymmetrical Information

You may be letting the children off too easily. Several highly successful blacks (Thomas Sowell, Walter E. Williams, John McWorter, Bill Cosby, etc.) have pointed out that in many black neighborhoods, doing well in school is considered "being too white". Interestingly, these individuals (PhDs all) are not looked upon as "black leaders", but too often as "Uncle Toms" or "Oreos", by self-appointed "black leaders", perpetuating the stereotype.

In grade school and high school, the issue is challenging the intellectual capability of each student to his/her full potential. This is very difficult when classes consist of students representing the full spectrum of intellectual capability and motivation. It is nearly impossible to properly challenge the "curious" and the "driven" when the classroom is being disrupted by the "bored", the "disturbed", the "drugged" and others not capable of or interested in learning.

Segregation (not by race or ethnicity, or sex, or sexual orientation, or physical handicap) by capability, motivation and achievement creates the opportunity to effectively challenge students to achieve to their capacity. These students, regardless of race, ethnicity, etc. can then compete in a meritocracy at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Walter Williams and Bill Cosby both grew up in the Philadelphia projects. Their parents cared and their teachers cared, but they achieved. I would argue that, in many ways, it would be easier today than when they accomplished it, were our government schools willing and able to keep the best and the brightest challenged.

Jane Galt:

"... It is not meritocratic in the sense that there are hardworking and talented people who do not move as easily into this system as they should, because the primary and secondary school systems are highly unmeritocratic. ..."

Primary and secondary schools have little to do with it. Few are so bad as to keep a hardworking and talented person out of a top college. Lack of family money is far more significant. Even if financial aid covers the complete cost of attending (which I believe is rare) there still is the opportunity cost. And of course there are social problems in being much poorer than your peers which may make attending a top college unattractive even it is theoretically possible.

The system ceased being meritocratic when the PC police decided that the traditional "F" of the middle school and higher level grades was discouraging and psychologically damaging, and replaced it with an "in progress" (or some even more serpentine-forked nonsense) along with an infinite loop of retry opportunities.

I don't see your point, anony-mouse.

If you're talking about the cohort which regularly receives "F"s in middle school and above, they are pretty far down the list in the meritocracy context.

As for the topic of the post, I'm sorry but in my humble view there is plenty of meritocracy to see everywhere one looks. It may not be the utopian meritocracy that Jane laments, but then again the uselessness of top-tier secondary education is one of her pet hobby horses.

If you work hard and continue to learn (i.e. acquire new skills, both hard and soft) throughout your career (educational and professional), the meritocracy we have in the US allows you to maximize your chances in life. I would go so far as to say our system offers the chance to maximize better than any other - certainly any other that I've experienced personally or have read about.

I agree with Winterspeak that access to all the various facets of meritocracy might not be fair, particularly in one's early years, but if you put together a solid foundation based on hard work and have your wits about you, you will go far.

Cheers,

I agree that it takes hard work and talent to get into a top school, but I don't agree that the same is necessary to then succeed there. Grading curves in the Ivy League, for instance, are extremely generous. Few people get C's, and fewer still flunk out.

Winterspeak says:
Unfortunately, the current American local tax based education system is not meritocratic, where a voucher system would be.

Can you provide any evidence or reason to believe your comment that a voucher system would be meritocratic.

Or is this just another example of the libertarian
tendency to just made up things and acting as if it should be taken as a proven fact in the debate.