You can watch cable news to learn what's wrong with American education.

On a regular basis, there's a new video of kids beating each other up, kids using the Internet to bully their classmates, teachers and administrators acting inappropriately, even criminally, parents complaining -- the whole system failing miserably.

Usually, the networks bring on some so-called experts who explain this most recent report of bad schools, bad teachers, bad students. They grimace, frown, wring their hands and remind us that the public schools are just out of control.

The suggestion is that the bad behavior is quite representative of the 14,000 school districts in the country, including the 700 districts in New York state. And it all reinforces that comforting memory that schools, students, and, of course, we, ourselves, were better in the old days, part of that Golden Age of education.

But if you want to see something good about American education, go to a kindergarten graduation at one of our local schools.

On a hot night early this month, I attended the AuSable Forks Elementary school graduation. There were 24 students in two classes, and the gym was filled with parents, siblings and grandparents as the kids -- wearing mortarboards -- processed in while "Pomp and Circumstance" played.

For the next hour, we got a taste of what the students learned over the last 10 months. There was no mention of grades or scores, tests, quizzes or examinations.

But there were songs that taught about language: Farmer McDonald had a vowel, "with an AA here and an AA there... Old MacDonald had a farm, AEIOU."

And songs that taught about people: "The world is a rainbow/With many kinds of people/It takes all kinds of people/To make the world go round."

There were photos of field trips to apple orchards and pumpkin patches, and Nubian goats that were brought to their classrooms.

Everything pointed to the kids learning to learn and enjoying learning. And their teachers, Jennifer Bruno and Lori Parrow, as well as teacher aides Mrs. Hall and Mrs. Ford, enjoyed teaching them.

Well, if you're not careful, you could leave an evening like this with some optimism. You might think that some schools teach kids very well, that the kids enjoy school and like each other, that the staff is effective, professional and caring. You might believe the teachers when they say goodbye to their students, telling them to "most of all, remember that you're a very special kid."

You might even begin to wonder how accurately television portrays education.

But good education doesn't end in June.

Fortunately for the graduating children, they and their siblings can keep learning throughout the summer because even if schools are closed, libraries aren't.