In my day, being smarter than a 5th grader got you into 6th grade. Today, for matching wits with a 10-year-old, Jeff Foxworthy will hand you a crisp, new $1 million bill. (Because, really, knowing your state capitals is worth senior law partner money.)

By the end of fifth grade you're expected to know...
1. Which of the following was not one of the original 13 original colonies?
a) Delaware b) Vermont c) South Carolina d) Maryland

2. How to evaluate: 1/4 + 1/6 =?

3. What three particles make up atoms?

4. The word "incredulously" is what part of speech? (Extra credit: define it.)

(Answers below.) Did you get all four? Congratulations! Click to apply. Good luck. Don't wear checks.

The thing is, two hundred years ago, President Thomas Jefferson was pretty much the smartest guy alive. Today's president, not so much. And who's got a vested interest in an under-educated country? People pushing "clean coal," "the long war" and dinosaur/human cohabitation. All our childs are getting left behind. And good luck paying that trillion dollar war debt out of the taxes on their Burger King incomes.

To be fair, we live in an age where we're bombarded with information to process. Every day we make choices about which facts to retain (the names of Britney's kids or the Dallas Mavericks' 2^nd round draft choice) and those we need to jettison (where Pakistan is on a map). And like most choices we make they have to do with our survival and well-being. We'll tend to remember the facts that will help us in our jobs or, at least, at the water cooler.

Because it's true what they say: No one likes a wiseguy. No one likes an egg-head, know-it-all, academic, poindexter, "so-called expert," "Ivory Tower intellect." Intelligence is fine if it helps someone find a tax loophole, but otherwise, put that thing away. You'll poke someone's eye out

Children get the message early. Just tune in any Harvard-grad-written sitcom and you'll see: Kids need attitude, not aptitude. "Leave It to Beaver" has become "Leave It to Eddie Haskell." Children are our future. Just not the smart ones.

And in his diabolical cleverness, by selecting 5th Grade as the litmus test for American IQ, Fox TV Reality guru Mike Darnell has seized upon this new paradigm and engendered an unholy union between innocence and its antithesis, television.

For smarty-pants like the show's Cody, MacKenzie, Nathan, Olivia and Sierra, 5th grade is at once a high point and a twilight. Tragically, what they can't know is that this is the last time in their lives they'll get street cred for good grades. Because (not coincidentally) 5th grade is the last moment (until Assisted Living) when it doesn't matter if you're cool. Your mom picks out your clothes; you can't cross the street by yourself; and anyone who wants to "get with you" is registered in a database.

Soon puberty will hit and an A+ won't have the cache of a B cup. Making honor roll won't be as good as making the team. And knowing who's on the Supreme Court won't count as much as knowing who likes whom. Only, they'll discover no one wants to know the difference between subject and object pronouns and they'll say "who likes who" for fear of coming off as a pathetic geek.

After Grade 5, being able to name all the elements is a liability, not an asset. And sure, a 5.0 on your AP Physics exams will get you into Harvard, but not into the hip new club or a cheerleader's pants.

It's quite a juxtaposition this show serves up: Exuberant grown-ups celebrating their cluelessness and adorable, precocious 5th graders basking in their giftedness. Fast-forward a year, and the adults may still have some of the $1 million they won from knowing the seventh planet from the sun. And the kids will be smart 6th graders past their prime... fired from their TV gig... hungry to learn how to be cool.

Answers: 5/12; proton, neutron, electron; adverb; Vermont; "with disbelief"... but not in that order.

by Toby Muller