As an educator, I realize that subjects like reading, math and science are the tested subjects and therefore considered to be at the top of the pecking order of academia.  As a music educator, I believe that music and the arts are essential to the education of the whole child.  However, I’ve recently become aware of a deficit in education that is going to result in millions of people losing their way literally.  That subject is geography.

I’m currently watching a basketball game where Missouri is said to be in the southeastern conference.  Unless Missouri has recently moved, it is solidly in the middle of the midwest.  I know this because I’ve had to drive through it to get to the southeast.  And I love Texas, after all it’s where I was born, but it is set solidly in the south central part of the country, not the southeast. But going back up north, perhaps Missouri wants to move east, after all, Saint Louis is in the Atlantic 10.

Louisville is another school who thinks it is on the east coast.  Don’t they realize people will get lost thinking that Louisville is on the Atlantic Coast and Kentucky is in the Southeast and yet they are in the same state?  How confusing is this?  However, they aren’t alone, as someone must think  Notre Dame and Pittsburgh are on the Atlantic Coast as well.

Butler and Xavier are more midwestern than Big East but poor Creighton is really off kilter as a school in a state that is just about the farthest from any ocean.  Have we stopped teaching directions as well as geography?  I’m sure there are others, but doesn’t it concern you that these are institutions of higher learning and they don’t know where they are?

It’s not just geography of course.  Math seems to be an issue as well.  The Big 12 is actually the Big 10 and the Big Ten is actually the Big 14.  Maybe it’s the new math and I’m just not up to speed.  What in the world are we teaching in schools these days?

Of course, it’s not just obvious academic issues in terms of geography and math,  it’s a cultural issue as well.  Seriously, there’s not a hint of a southern accent from Missouri and I’m pretty sure they aren’t connoisseurs of country ham, biscuits and sweet tea, which I would think would be a prerequisite to joining any part of the southeast, bless their hearts.

All of this is very tongue in cheek of course, but I’m always surprised at how many young people don’t know the basics of geography in our own country, much less of the world.  In an age where the world seems to be getting smaller, wouldn’t you think it would important to learn those places on the map that we can call or Skype any time of the day or night?  Of course it’s difficult to put in the time necessary when all emphasis is placed on only two or three subjects.  Just a little personal commentary there.

So my question is, where are all of those lovely mimeographed pages of the United States maps that we had to fill in and color?  Where are the maps of the continents with the countries I had to look up to spell?  They seemed like fun when I was a kid but I certainly remember what I learned so it must have worked.  I definitely learned that Missouri is NOT in the southeastern United States!