I was going to make a big announcement on Storeboard.com today in what was supposed to be the first part of a three-part series on Religion, but that announcement has been postponed because a lot of my notes on the article accompanying the announcement are in a laptop that crashed yesterday.
The timing of the computer crash makes me wonder whether G-d, who is pictured on the left looking angry, is upset with me, doesn’t want me to make my announcement at all, or just doesn’t want me to make the announcement today because today is Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.
In all seriousness, I intend to complete the three-part series on Religion soon. Today, though, I am moving the third part in my series to the beginning, while I pray that my laptop can be fixed. I’m not sure that G-d will be too happy about this story either, but I’ll have to live with his/her scorn.
This article focuses on the fact that there appears to be a HUGE correlation between the most religious states in the United States and the least educated states and the states with the worst public schools. There also appears to be a much smaller correlation between the least religious states and the most educated states and the states with the best public schools.
The states that are the most and least religious are based on a Gallup poll of more than 174,000 Americans. Overall, Gallup classifies 41 percent of Americans as very religious, which it defines are people who say religion is an important part of their daily lives and attend religious services at least almost every week. Gallup also classifies 29 percent of Americans as moderately religious because they attend religious services or say religion is important part in their lives. The other 29 percent of Americans are nonreligious, Gallup reports. (The percentages are rounded off so the Math is 1 percent off)
Here are the most religious states and what percentages of their citizens are very religious:
1. Mississippi – 61.1% 2. Utah – 60.4% 3. Alabama – 57.4% 4. Louisiana – 56.1% 5. (tie) South Carolina – 54.3% Tennessee – 54.3% 7. Georgia – 52.2% 8. Arkansas – 51.4% 9. North Carolina – 49.5% 10. Oklahoma – 49.2% 11. Kentucky – 48.5%
Here are the least religious states and what percentages of their citizens are very religious:
1. Vermont – 22.4% 2. New Hampshire – 23.7% 3. Maine – 27.2% 4. Massachusetts – 28.4% 5. Oregon – 30.5% 6. Nevada – 31.5% 7. Washington – 31.6% 8. Connecticut – 31.7% 9. Hawaii – 32.0% 10. Washington, D.C. – 32.4%
Here is a list of the states with the best and worst public schools for kindergartners through high school seniors. Here is a list of the states with the most and least educated people based on the percentage of their citizens who graduated college.
The most religious state, Mississippi, also has the worst public schools and the second least educated citizens behind West Virginia. The third most religious state, Alabama, has the second worst public schools and the seventh least educated citizens. Louisiana is the fourth most religious, has the third worst public schools, and is the fifth least educated. Arkansas is the eighth most religious, has the seventh worst public schools, and is the third least educated. Kentucky is the 11th most religious, has the 10th worst public schools, and is the sixth least educated.
On the other hand, the least religious state, Vermont, has the third best public schools and is the seventh most educated. New Hampshire, the second least religious, has the fourth best public schools and is the eighth most educated. Massachusetts is the third least religious, has the second best public schools, and is No. 1 on the most educated list.
The inverse correlations between religion and education could be just a coincidence. In fact, I’m sure that G-d would not want me to imply that religious people aren’t bright.
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