Ask Teachers to Do Fewer Things Better

When Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was visiting U.S. troops headed to Iraq in 2004, a soldier asked why his unit had to scrounge scrap metal in trash heaps to weld onto old Humvees to strengthen them against attacks. Rumsfeld memorably responded, “You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time.” Many thought he was being dismissive, to which he later responded in his memoir, “My response told a simple truth about warfare: As a conflict evolves, both sides adapt to the reality of the battlefield.”