In the waning days of our collective ChiCom Virus psychosis, we looked forward to sending our kids back to the classroom, where (we hoped) they would once again get a solid education in the fundamentals.

To our dismay, we found exactly the opposite.

Last fall, the National Assessment of Education Standards was administered to 13-year-olds across the country, testing students’ proficiency in math and reading. The results of “the nation’s report card” were abysmal. “The 13-year-olds scored an average of 256 out of 500 in reading, and 271 out of 500 in math,” reports The New York Times, “down from average scores of 260 in reading and 280 in math three years ago.”

But at least the pandemic was an equal-opportunity destroyer. The Times adds: “Achievement declined across lines of race, class and geography. But in math, especially, vulnerable children — including Black, Native American and low-income students — experienced bigger drops.”

Now, so-called education experts are scratching their heads without seeing the obvious — like, oh, the fact that many schools locked kids away for two years without any social interaction. As political analyst Ed Morrissey writes, “That certainly would explain why economically disadvantaged children suffered more of a drop-off, since they would be more at risk for learning loss in a remote environment — and some might not have had ongoing access to remote education at all.”

But that’s not all. The NAES found that scores had been falling long before the coronavirus. Morrissey adds: “The post-pandemic part of the plunge proves that not only did we get no benefit from those policies, we did real damage to the cognitive development of our children, and almost certainly their social and psychological health as well. The fact that scores had been falling previous to the pandemic does not negate that conclusion at all — it proves that our pandemic policies made an already-bad situation worse.”

If educators and politicians are looking for answers, they needn’t look very far. For example, California’s Mathematics Curriculum Framework seeks to replace rigor in mathematics education with cultural Marxist teachings in environmental and social justice. No kidding. Teachers there are instructed to teach “socio-political consciousness” instead of algebra — which, if you live in Cali, explains why your kids might not be able to solve a basic equation, write a complete sentence, or explain the difference between the executive and the judicial branches. But when it comes to political activism, they’re ready to take to the streets for Black Lives Matter, Greenpeace, or Pride Month.

For the sane opposition, here are Williamson Evers and Ze'ev Wurman from the Independent Institute: “A real champion of equity and justice would want all California’s children to learn actual math — as in arithmetic, algebra, geometry, trigonometry and calculus — not an endless river of new pedagogical fads that effectively distort and displace actual math.”

Unfortunately, the Left’s union-driven education agenda affects subjects across the board, including civics. As for the NAEP, “Just 13% of eighth graders met the proficiency standard for history,” Fox News reports. “Barely 20% met the standard for civics. According to the 2022 Annenberg Civics Knowledge Survey, less than half of Americans could name all three branches of government; less than 25% could identify the freedom of religion as guaranteed by the Constitution.”

And we wonder why these children grow up to vote Democrat. Even the paucity of civics education they do receive is becoming increasingly politicized.

“Teachers have rewritten their job description,” argues Bethany Mandel at The Spectator. “Out: civics basics. In: indoctrination. They believe that their mandate isn’t to teach history or civics, but instead, to brainwash children; and lo and behold, just a few years later, children are falling ever further behind in competence in this newly hyperpoliticized subject area.”

All this makes one wonder whether our kids might’ve been better off staying at home post-COVID. At least at home they’d avoid that steady diet of anti-American propaganda and Marxist indoctrination.

Former Republican Congressman Mike Rogers thinks some form of national service might unite the country again. And we get it. Serving others is never a bad approach, and it might help build character and unity among those who join in. But national service still leaves our kids without a solid education in the three R’s or even a basic grasp of civics.

We have years, perhaps decades, to fight and win this war. The good news is that a national movement is underway. Thanks to COVID-19, we finally got to see the true colors of the teachers unions. (Imagine that. They’re commie red.) And parents, students, educators, and political leaders are finally fed up with our schools serving as Marxist boot camps.