So public schools aren't really mediocre. There's a subtle elitism in the way they promote book learning over other kinds of knowledge and lock many people out of real education. So says, UCLA professor of education, Mike Rose in his latest book, Why School? Reclaiming Education for All of Us. In a town, where the preponderance of jobs are unskilled and certainly don't require a college degree this might be a rethinking about education we should look at.