A curious mixture of disbelief, outrage and satisfaction swept over me as my own IQ score was divulged to me in November 1966. The results of a routine psychological survey were being read out to me, a junior officer of one of Canada's major chartered banks. The mention of English vocabulary 50% beyond the average for university graduates prompted me to ask whether IQ tests were merely measuring the ability to read. The answer was that this had been the subject of some considerable investigation in the past and was likely to continue so for years and years to come.
Something is seriously wrong in the field of education, world wide. During the past decade the Americans have produced the first generation in history to be less literate than its parents. Violence in many high schools is a way of life.
My own reaction to high school was to practice sleeping in class with my eyes open as far as possible, so that I could read what I pleased until 3 or 4 AM.
"Excellent communications and interpersonal skills" is a phrase that is pasted all over the "careers" and "help wanted" advertisements of daily newspapers. Yet, the television commercials of these same corporations tell us that mediocrity is nothing less than a necessity in human communications. Indeed, the average citizen thinks and speaks with a vocabulary of just 3,000 words and recognizes 6,000 words in print. Politicians, by definition, are representative of the average citizen.
It seems logical to me that tens of thousands of citizens who read far better than average wander through life never knowing just how well they can read, and that tens of thousands of potential Mensans out there have not the slightest suspicion of their situation and wonder daily why they are unable to speak easily with the people around them.
Just as I did.

This item by George Noviss was included in MC2 (Mensa Canada Communications) January 1986 and reprinted in 98 Proof, March 1986, of Mensa Transvaal

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