I was going to write about my niece tripping the school disciplinarian, but intel has advised me not to go to press with such information. Something about a "Geraldo effect." But I will comment on what brought the tripping about.

My niece, M2 (there are three M's in the family), is smart for her age. She reads incessantly (I’d wager the bulk of her allowance goes towards flashlight batteries so she can read after lights out), is hyper competitive (she's managed to make household ironing competitive) and has an unerring sense of what is right and wrong with the world. She also has about three molecules of diplomacy to her name and they usually go missing when she needs them most. Suffice it to say she does not back down from anyone for anything if she thinks she's right. Now, in your opinion, what would you do with an obviously talented and intelligent young girl in public school? Would you place her in advanced classes, offer her additional work so she can learn more, find her a mentor, polish her into a shining jewel of academia?

Well, maybe you would, but this is America, dammit. All folks are created equal, and even those smarty pants types gotta deal with the mouth breathers on the same plane.

When I was in school, I remember being in kindergarten and being allowed to read to the first grade classes (reading is still my passion, if you can't guess). I was in some sort of enrichment program from the single digit grades on up through high school graduation. You wanted to learn more, extra credit was yours for the asking. Wanted still more? Find a teacher to mentor you and work on an independent study. I knew kids who were working with guys from Bell Labs on improving superconductors before they could even drive. Smart kids were given a chance to push themselves beyond the standard curriculum. But now?

Now, students who excel are given the task of trying to improve the lot of their other students. Yes, the American school system now asks the honor students to lead the Ralph Wiggums of the world down the bright shining path of Knowledge. How intrepid! How ingenious! What a great way for teachers to shirk any educational responsibility!

M2, for her sake, didn’t take it sitting down. She wrote a scathing essay on how bad the current educational system is, describing it as a "gray smear" of students rather than having anyone be ahead or behind in learning (this from a middle school kid, mind you). To the teacher’s credit, she loved the essay and M2 may actually get the chance to read it before the school board. Despite this, though, she’s bored to tears in her classes (thus sending her down the mischievous path of tripping folks). Jiggsy and the Missus to the rescue!

We did the only thing we could do: send her our old textbooks from college and high school. I have no idea if she’ll even begin to understand Organic Chemistry without some teaching behind it, but at least it’ll give her something to do instead of trip folks.