After picking my jaw up from the floor, I felt I needed to respond to Jeannie Jackson's letter of Wed., 4/23. Ms. Jackson unwittingly underscores the essesnce of today's education system failings: As a society we've spent more than a generation throwing inadequate funding and half-baked programs at students, teachers, and administrators, and as a result we have graduates from these programs now raising their own children; these new parents have never developed an interest in self-improvement or a motivation to excel at anything. This lethargy is passed on to their kids, who see no point in striving for more than a rewarding career at Walmart. Ms. Jackson clearly never was instilled with a passion for learning and an understanding that in order for our society and our species to address true "future problem solving", a solid math and science foundation is critically important. The initial reaction to her letter is to burst into laughter, but we should instead view it as a frightening indication of the depth of the problem we face with education programs today.