The Writing on the Wall

By Sean McVeigh

When I was a young lad at St. Francis de Sales (before they added the highfalutin “Catholic Academy”), I was lucky enough to have some pretty legendary teachers. To this day, my friends and I are very fond of reminiscing on some of the old quirks that these teachers had. Some of their methods of getting the gift of knowledge through our impermeable adolescent skulls were, at times, unconventional. For example, I occasionally still use the lyrics of a song I learned in the fifth grade to determine parts of speech in a sentence. All in all, I think they did a darn good job if I do say so myself.

I imagine most things are not all too different at schools these days than they were for any of us. Sure, there are some big things: we did not have smart boards or iPads — our bookbags, shockingly, were full of books — but for the most part, how much could’ve changed? Heck, some of those legendary teachers I mentioned are still at it, finding new and creative ways to break through those ironclad juvenile noggins.

Last week, however, my naive belief in an immutable elementary education was shattered. I read an article about how today’s kids are struggling to read cursive — let alone write it — because computers have essentially eliminated the need. And because it is no longer needed, it is no longer taught in schools. In 2010 (14 years ago!), cursive instruction was removed from the national Common Core for K-12 schools.

A generation ago, everyone’s handwriting was pristine (well, unless you went to med school or were Billy Madison opining on Phil Rizzuto). It had to be; that’s how you communicated. I still receive letters from my Great Aunt Anne — God bless her — and every time, I find myself marveling at her perfect handwriting. Handwriting was drilled into her as a child and perfected over eighty years of constant practice. Now, there isn’t even an opportunity for kids to hone their skills. Handwriting was the technology of the day. Like many forms of technology, it dominated the world … right up until the point that it didn’t. For better or worse, as always, the tech has evolved, and the new generation is treating cursive like a floppy disk.

I am of a unique generation. We were born in a world without modern technology but were young enough to have it greatly affect our everyday lives at a very early age. By the time I was in college, the majority of the class used a computer to take notes. There was very little pen and paper happening. I would bet my bottom dollar there is almost none in today’s college lecture halls.

I am nothing if not old-fashioned and so I took my notes by hand. In actuality, this was mostly due to my incompetence when it came to typing. The problem for me was I also had terrible handwriting. Most of the time I couldn’t even make out what I had attempted to record.

I suppose kids still need to know how to sign their names. It will probably come to an end eventually but if they ever want to open a bank account they will need to write at least the letters of their name in cursive. Maybe I’ll just name my future child “The-quick-brown-fox-jumps-over-the-lazy-dog McVeigh” — that has a nice ring to it.