I hope people were listening a few days ago when Bill Gates talked about American high schools. Gates said U.S. high schools are obsolete.

He's not the first to say that, but maybe his stature will bring more attention to a problem that needs solving. While plenty of people beat around the bush and tinker at the margins, we maintain a system that works for only a minority of Americans. Not only does our current system fail too many students, it frustrates and intimidates parents and discourages teachers, who, like students, are wrapped in so many quick-fix bandages they can barely breathe.

I looked up a transcript of Gates' speech and saw that he did not mince words.

"By obsolete, I don't just mean that our high schools are broken, flawed, and underfunded — though a case could be made for every one of those points.

"By obsolete, I mean that our high schools — even when they're working exactly as designed — cannot teach our kids what they need to know today."

That bears repeating: Even schools that are working just as they are designed to work are failing us.

Our education system is designed to teach only some kids what they need to know to be ready for college, work and citizenship.

Gates said that two-thirds of students, most of them low-income or minority children, aren't getting what they need. Poor white children and large numbers of minority students suffer the consequences of a two-tier system. There is a rigorous education for kids lucky enough to be born into the right family, but most other children are stuck with courses that won't get them where they need to be.

"This isn't an accident or a flaw in the system; it is the system," Gates said.

Parents who have survived the system know this. Savvy parents put tremendous effort into trying to get our children into special programs, or the right school, because we know that good education is rationed.

Ask parents which high schools and which programs they want for their children? It's not a secret.

But who is trying to change the system?

Parents put their energy into navigating the system on behalf of their children.

Educators put most of their efforts into tweaks in the existing system.

Journalists write about money and sports and the flap of the moment — bite-size issues.

Gates was addressing a national summit on high schools, hosted by the National Governors Association, and Achieve, Inc., an organization put together by governors and business leaders to make high-school diplomas more meaningful.

Their Web site includes surveys of business people who say they have difficulty finding qualified employees, and professors who say students are coming to them unprepared for college work.

Of course, high school teachers have told me they get students who didn't get what they needed in middle school and, everyone knows those first elementary school years are a powerful key to future learning.

There are a lot of problems in need of solutions.

Our son is a seventh grader and we are already heavy into high-school hunting — exchanging information with other parents who also worry about their kids not landing in the right tier. This is nuts.

The current situation continues because we are willing to assume that some kids either can't or won't learn.

Gates pointed out examples of schools that succeeded with populations of poor children and with black and Hispanic children. Those are the kids most often in mind when people say it's up to parents and children to make education work.

He suggested a formula, that is in wide circulation: Rigor, relevance and relationships/respect.

I had coffee with a member of the Federal Way school board last year, Charles Hoff, who regaled me with stories about programs that work because they fill young children's after-school and weekend hours with the help they aren't going to get at home.

Those are programs that don't make the child pay for not having a family foundation that can do all that is expected of it.

The cover of a recent Time magazine trumpeted a story about what teachers hate about parents. Somewhere in there was a statement that kids don't learn to get things done at school. They learn it at home or not at all.

That echoes the research that shows parental income and education are better predictors of a child's educational outcome than anything about school itself.

If it is the kids and the parents, then we really can save a lot of money. If transformation is pointless and educators irrelevant, just shut schools down. I hope we're smarter than that.

Gates may not have all the answers, but I'm glad he's raising the questions.

Jerry Large: jlarge@seattletimes.com