The major problem of American Schooling is the method, not what is being taught or the students.
We base our teaching on a very left-brain sided favoritism. This doesn't help to develop other sides of the brain- even the art and music programs aren't helping because they all set up the same way.
A little while ago there was a guy, Dr. Calvin W. Taylor who was with the University of Utah who did a study about how students learn. I'm going to summarize it, but if you want to read about it in depth go here:
http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/taylor.shtml
Essentially he believed that each person had one, two, even three unique talents that they outperformed the norm in. The difficult part was that with school, a lot of these kids only were taught a narrow range of academics and way of teaching would limit the discovery of these talents- they may never know how good they were at something until much later on in life, where it would be harder to craft the skill. He also believed that, once those talents are discovered, things need to be taught in the way that person will understand. He demonstrated that, if you were teaching about money in math, one thing you would do is take the kids out to a McDonalds and order something, and have them count out the exact change.
The point of the survies were really that everyone learns differently. A lot of people are visual learners, some are hands on and need to do it to see it. Some people are very atheletic and there was a way of teaching, a more physically active and involved way of teaching that got to them better than memorization. Artsy types, who tended to be more visual did better with models--- not models that you see on a projecter, but hands on models that they perhaps even participating in making.
A more active and exploritory style of learning that is seen in many private art schools is what needs to replace the current one.