"A chorus of voices exhorts kids to study science. No one stops to ask whether it is inhumane to force adolescents to spend the bulk of their time studying subjects most of them hate." -- Unabomber Manifesto, Ted Kaczynski

(Personally, I think that the notion of a core curriculum is mistaken,, but so is much of public education, and I don't know which small concrete steps would be best to move it forward.)