>< Set IMHO ON >
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>I see the "diagnosis" of ADD in school age children more than anything as a symptom of the steady decline of our education system, the lowering of our educational standards and expectations of our children, deteriorating teaching and parenting skills (including proper discipline at home and at school) and 40 years of a welfare system that broke down a traditionally strong family unit. Directing and focusing a child is mostly a teaching skill, and our school systems have lost sight of what they were established to do. Ours are more focused on administrative issues and getting kids prepared to pass an academic assessment test instead of teaching them for life. Something memorized for a test is fleeting, while something learned is for life. How sad.

Another thing I heard from the guidance councellor (or councilor or counselor - there should be some difference in meaning between these spellings) in the middle school here, is that the teachers and other staff are wasting tons of time on just distributing the paperwork for this or that, to protect themselves from being sued. The paperwork is as computerized as can be, but it has to be written once, printed, distributed, signatures collected, filed, stored. I'm getting to sign some quite ridiculous approvals, endorsements and whatnots quite regularly. It takes me a dozen minutes a month - multiply that with the number of kids and months. And still, that's just one school.