The state of American education is looking increasingly questionable, at least judging by one teacher’s classroom experience.
Miss Dugan, a high school English teacher and popular content creator, recently tried to get her students to appreciate F. Scott Fitzgerald’s literary classic The Great Gatsby.
But their reactions to the book left people concerned, with many saying that the country’s future is “doomed.”
An English teacher recently tried, and failed, to get her students to appreciate The Great Gatsby
Miss Dugan, who regularly posts about hilarious classroom experiences, shared her students’ thoughts on The Great Gatsby with her 581K followers on Instagram and 454.2K followers on TikTok.
In the viral video from last week, she recalled some of the comments her high school students made while working their way through the 1925 novel, which is widely considered one of the greatest works of American literature.
Their first complaint was about Fitzgerald’s writing style, with one student questioning why the author had to make things so complicated.
“Why did the dude write like this? Bro is doing too much. It’s like Old English or something,” Miss Dugan read out the student’s comment.
Another appeared to have an interesting interpretation of the novel’s central characters, declaring, “Tom’s tough, but Gatsby’s tougher.”
The teenagers also seemed unimpressed by the framing of the sentences and dialogues.
“There’s no way people used to talk like this. The writing is performative AF,” one student remarked.
The content creator read out her students’ remarks, leaving thousands of followers stunned
When the teacher explained that the language certainly was reflective of the times, one student took the discussion in another direction.
“So what, did we all just get dumber or something?”
At this point in the video, Miss Dugan simply stared at her camera and couldn’t afford more than a blank expression.
The students also had some strong opinions about the characters after they watched the film adaptation.
When asked whether the characters looked the way they had imagined them while reading, the teacher received another blunt response.
“I mean, not really like, bro, I thought Daisy be, like, hot,” one student said.
“So what, did we all just get dumber or something?” one student asked
Perhaps the most confusing response came when the teacher tried to check whether the class remembered a major event from chapter eight.
“Can anyone remind us what big event happened in chapter 8?” she asked.
“Yeah, that dude came over, and Gatsby got slimed out,” a student replied.
Viewers resorted to some dark humor about how the troubling times the world was heading into.
“Dark age incoming,” one said, while another wrote, “We’re screwed.”
Netizens questioned the state of American education and felt the country was heading towards the “dark age”
“Each one felt like a dagger in my heart,” one said about the students’ remarks.
“Our future leaders,” said another. “Glad I’ll be long gone before that happens. Good luck, world.”
“This is honestly so upsetting,” one wrote, “calling the writing performative is crazy.”
Another thanked Miss Dugan for her commitment to teaching, saying: “BA in English here. You are doing the Lord’s work.”
Troubling data shows that teenage readers in the U.S. are falling behind
The concern online appears to be backed by troubling data.
American students are continuing to fall behind in reading, according to the latest results from the global Program for International Student Assessment (PISA).
The results also showed that the achievement gap between the country’s strongest and weakest readers was widening.
The 2025 PISA results found that reading scores among 15-year-olds in the U.S. had dropped 14 points compared with 2022 PISA results.
It also revealed that the gap between students in the 90th and 10th percentiles was wider in the U.S. than in any other country included in the globally recognized international exam.
Education Secretary Linda McMahon said the scores from the assessment confirmed a “decade of stagnation and a devastating gap” for students in the U.S., according to a statement.
Calling this moment a “stress test” for the country’s future, she added:
“To pass it, we must enact a hard reset that stops protecting a failed status quo and instead builds a system that empowers state leaders and embraces innovative learning options through school choice.”
Social media users resorted to some dark humor about how the troubling times the world was heading into
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