Intellectual Espionage -- Food for Thought

Why has American literacy continued to fall? "Looking back, abundant data exist from states like Connecticut and Massachusetts to show that by 1840 the incidence of complex literacy in the United States was between 93 and 100 percent wherever such a thing mattered. Yet in 1818 we were a small-farm nation without colleges or universities." Some interesting facts and possible reasons are shared in Educational CyberPlayGround.