I had always asked for more advanced work to expose myself to what was coming up, and to see if I could learn it. I was scorned for not behaving like the rest of the kids and not coloring in the plants that were printed onto the edges of my spelling test.
I'm a bit older than you, but that kind of crap happened in my school too. My dad is also a bit older than you, and that kind of crap happened in his school too. Since its inception, public schooling has always had a strong mission of social conditioning.
To rant some more... My generation consists of people who were brainwashed to believe any disruption of environment is evil, and socialism is the cure to all societal/governmental/economical ills.
Sure, it'd be much better to have our
rivers catching on fire and
our utilities run by multinational corporations...
It sucks. Luckily, that school system failed me. I came out with the ability to rationalize
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.