A vice president of a state university once said to me during an interview:
"I wonder when the state legislature is going to notice that they are giving us money to teach to students the same things they gave high schools money to teach to the same students?"
Unfortunately, at least where I live, it is almost entirely not allowed to fail students in primary or early high school. So, graduating effectively means "I didn't die before age N". And of course, it's a downward spiral: if you can't multiply and divide, you sure as hell can't factor an equation, and you're definitely not going to get anywhere trying to understand the graph of a parabola.
No, that's what high schools should be doing.
No wait, actually, that's what primary schools should be doing.