INVENIRE

One of the major drawbacks of democratic countries is that they are susceptible to the potential ignorance of the people. There are two antidotes to this, one of which has long been ignored. The parliamentary system, in which the electorate chooses representatives, is the first. This, to some extent, eliminates ignorance, as less-informed candidates are less likely to be elected to hold office. The second antidote, an antidote that has been ignored, is cultural literacy. The term was first coined by American educator E.D. Hirsch, and it describes the cultural and historical knowledge required to function as a citizen of a particular country. Hirsch has correctly identified that Western curricula place too little emphasis on the learning of facts, and rather that they inaccurately assume that children will naturally acquire knowledge as they increase in their critical thinking skills. Hirsch first devised this concept in the early 1990s as a college lecturer in Richmond, Virginia. He

The National College Athletic Association's (NCAA) March Madness tournament is big business. That is obvious. According to SBNation, the NCAA's TV deal for the tournament with Turner Broadcasting System, an American media company, is worth US$19.6 billion in total. The first deal was originally signed in 2010 and was originally written so that Turner would pay US$10.8 billion over the course of 14 years for broadcasting rights for the tournament. The deal was extended in 2016, for an additional 8 years. This cost Turner another US$8.8 billion, and it means that the company will have broadcasting rights until 2032. The tournament is by far the largest source of income for the NCAA. The NCAA's official financial statement for the 2017-18 year shows that the Association generated US$ 844, 267, 484 in revenue, from television and marketing rights fees. Over 777 million dollars from this was the result of their evidently lucrative deal with Turner. Considering all of this,

Late 1940s. South Vietnam. The Viet Cong have begun to infiltrate the South, building an underground labyrinth of tunnels, essentially building a city's worth of transport links. They have done this to transport vital resources across the country, in an effort to oust the French colonialists. This network of subterranean tunnels will prove useful in a decade or so. The communists have built, without the help of a large corporate investor, or a corrupt foreign government, a tool perfectly designed to crush the American forces, in support of the non-communist South Vietnam. The Cu Chi Tunnels lay beneath Vietnam, North and South. Tens of thousands of miles of tunnels were built to aid the resistance against the American capitalists. A brief study of the Viet Cong leads us to the conclusion that formal education is not necessary to lead a nation. There were some formally educated leaders of the Viet Cong, including lawyers like Nguyễn Hữu Thọ , But  there were also many influential

There a wide range of ramifications that are the product of teaching history in schools. These consequences are particularly obvious when history is taught to young children. One product of teaching history at schools that is important to note is the impression that children gain as a result of certain historical events. Children are particularly limited, in comparison to adults, in their critical thinking and reasoning skills. The notable disparity in reasoning skills between children and adults is the reason that children are legally prohibited from gambling; children are, in most cases, incapable of making rational decisions in important situations. Moreover, the cognitive development difference between adults and children has been documented in science. Jean Piaget, a Swiss psychologist, noted that children between the ages of 7 and 11 had developed logical reasoning skills, but were unable to apply these principles to unseen events. He named this stage the "concrete oper

In some American towns, high school football (or American football to the rest of the world) is a big deal. In the state of Texas alone, there are 50 stadiums  (with a capacity of 11, 000 are more) that were built with the purpose of hosting high school football games. To many Americans, this is no news story, but many others across the world likely have many questions. How large is high school sport exactly? When did this frenzy over youth sport begin? And how much money is being spent on the game? For many towns across the United States, there is little to do on a Friday night. Take the example of Aledo, Texas. It has a population of just under 3,000 and, therefore, is understandably void of the amenities found in a major city. The town's eponymous high school provide the entertainment on a Friday night with weekly American football matches in the autumn. The Aledo Bearcats, as they are named, are something of celebrities in this rural community; how else would they fill their

There has been much talk in recent years about making modern foreign languages compulsory until GCSE level, and recently, Lucy Noble, the artistic director at the Royal Albert Hall, stated that all students should take a GCSE in a creative art subject. Opinion journalists have also written in prominent publications such as The Telegraph, arguing that a modern foreign language should be studied by all students until the age of 16. I would like to make the case for making the study of a classical language compulsory in all secondary schools, as it has many benefits for both the students and the wider society. Classical languages, like Latin and Ancient Greek, are often overlooked, but I believe they are essential to a complete education. Classical languages form the basis for much of the English language, with about 60% of the language having either a Greek or Latin origin. In the jargon of science and technology, this number is 90%, with words like "computer" from computo, m