Though the number of Americans completing their education has dramatically increased in the past century, the quality of that education has declined. In comparison to other civilized countries, America's standards contrast greatly. Statistics show a rapid decline in the refinement of once vital classroom skills. Instead of gaining a vast general knowledge, American education tends to lean on the experts. What was once considered common knowledge, has become a thing of the past. America's division of knowledge has led to the depletion of American education.
             America's attitude towards education evolves with each decade. In the early twentieth century, those who were fortunate to be educated received exemplary erudition. During the nineteen fifties, the American literacy rate steadily increased. In his article, "Common Stock", Cullen Murphy recollects of a 1956 board game intended for young children. This board game, Go to the Head of the Class, featured questions such as " 'who was the Napoleon of the Stump?'" and " 'Simone Simon was born where?'" If these same questions were to be interjected into a modern history class, the resulting mumbles would be a pitiful display of the standard of learning in today's classrooms.
             While the general standards of education for American students has declined, those wishing to excel in a particular skill or profession has rapidly increased. American society continues to steadily increase the number of expert professions. Murphy likens these changes to those in eighteenth-century England's enclosure act. American culture tends to divide knowledge into classes or categories of particular study instead of presenting a clear illustration of the whole to its members. As this sectioning of knowledge continues, people will become more ignorant of what was once common knowledge. This knowledge is evident in other cultures. Not only responsible for their own history, but students in England and Japan a...