I'm not sure if the downfall of grasping the fundamentals is having AP computer science courses (which allow students to actually skip the intro to CS in college) in high schools today or if it is just a failure on the part of the schools finding qualified teachers to teach this type of subject to the students with the right curriculum. The main problem seems to be is that the teachers are not teaching the fundamentals or teaching them correctly of the languages to the students. It could be for several reasons:

• not qualified teachers
• the school board misunderstanding of what should be taught and tested
• Or just a terrible curriculum of the courses

In these cases, it's almost not worth having the actual course taught to H.S. students - if what they learn is incorrect or outdated. Not having the basics down is a major downfall to many who try to learn a programming language. Often times, they do not realize that the basics or fundamentals are missing or highly misunderstood until they try to produce an actual program - in which they have severe problems with. So, I guess my thoughts are if they have a program at this level(h.s. and below)..perl, c/c++, or java should not even be taught until they(school administration) have a firm grasp as to what the students are going to be achieving from taking the class, as well as understanding that their course is substituting the intro to cs courses (if the ap tests are passed).

Other than that, I think it'd be a great idea to add perl to the languages being taught in schools.