This year's epidemic of low test scores has an unusual culprit. Since the end-of-grade scores from tests taken in the spring were made public last week, authorities have been searching for an explanation as to why children in the south scored so low. They have made an interesting connection.
Crates of chickens being trucked along the highway in the back of an open truck can spray a lot of very harmful bacteria into the cars behind them, researchers have found.
"If you get stuck behind one of these trucks, roll up the windows and pass them quickly," advised Joe McDonald a researcher at The Eggland Institute in Farmville, Massachusets.
Economists have also noted that people in the south have been consuming more chicken with the bad economy. They warned that the problem may get worse if southerners continue to eat more chicken and insist on riding with their windows down and resting their elbows on the open window.
It also doesn't help to have foolish people dressed in "Eak More Chikin" cow costumes on the side of the road distracting drivers. This distraction adds to the misery of drivers who are already distracted with failing mortgages, no sexual relations, cell phones and fighting, mutant children in the backseat.
Researchers also advised that pregnant women should not drive behind these trucks.
The federal government is in the process of requiring all chicken trucks to provide warning labels:
"Warning: Driving too close to this vehicle may result in brain damage to unborn children, and your child's failing their EOG's (End of Grade Tests), as well as the obvious of having shit all over your face."
McDonald and his colleagues at the Bloomberg School of Public Health focused their study on the entire south since it is this countries major chicken producer.
The study is being published in the first issue of the Journal of Infection and Lower Test Scores.
"It's ironic that it would be these chicken trucks that are causing our kid's test scores to go down, since it is those very trucks that are bringing the wholesome nutrition that our kids are eating in the morning before we send them off to take those rigorous tests," said Mrs. Jane Pittman whose husband drives a truck for Tyson Foods, Inc.
