Is our children learning?

This is a question I often find myself asking every time I go home to New Orleans. During one of my latest trips back to the 504, I decided to go to a coffee shop to do schoolwork. As soon as I sat down, the place became FILLED with all of these 16yr old high school students who were also "working".....except their definition of working was walking around to each others tables and flashing their iphones about while I sat like a lech and watched. In any event, as I spied on the teens in an almost Humbert-Humbert like fashion, I overhear the following conversation:

Girl 1: Ugh. I have to give a presentation on Hamlet and about something called a Sole-i-quiwhy
Boy 1: I think you pronounce it soliloquy.
Girl 2: Why are soooo smart??? we would have never figured it out if you hadn't known.
Boy 1: I mean, its no big deal, I am just really good in school. I have like, above a college aged vocabulary.
Layne: *to herself* WTF does that mean? What is a college aged vocabulary anyway?? He knows what "pre-game" or "keg" or "DUI" means?? Or, if he went to MHC, he knows what "the male gaze" or "the gilded cage" or "gender subversion" means??
G1: Oooh -- maybe you can help us then, so....what does...Sole-i-quiwhy mean?
G2: Jen, he said it was pronounced soliloquy, and how do you not know what it means if you have to do a presentation on it??
G1: No, I mean, I do know what it means...it means when, like, the gods from, like, above or whatever come and help or, like, do something.
Layne: *Snorts and says to herself* looks like someone can't tell the difference between deus ex machina and a soliloquy, what a loser !!!! *Layne then realizes that maybe she herself is the loser having known such a distinction*
G2: Jen, don't be stupid...that's what a monologue is..you know, Mono for like 1 god.
Layne: *to herself* Oh boy.
****there is some back and forth discussion between Girl 1 and Girl 2 about what a soliloquy means while Boy 1 looks on amused. Layne wonders if maybe this boy might be the hope of the generation, and that maybe he is smarter than he appears, and that maybe we aren't all doomed. He sure looks confidently on as the two girls bicker, getting progressively cattier with one another. Boy decides to finally set them straight****
Boy 1: Y'all are both wrong. It's a totally easy mistake though -- i mean, I totally wouldn't have known what it means but I only know b/c of my college aged vocabulary..but like, I don't study or work hard or anything..I just get good grades naturally. But, like, whatever. Soliloquy means to kill your sister.
L: ****lets out an audible laugh, so loud that everyone in the coffee shop turns to look at her. She immediately fears that the catty teenagers are going to spread mean stories about her in homeroom the next day..when reality sets in, and she realizes that a) she is not in high school, b) she, in fact, has a college degree in English Literature and c) who the f cares if some 16 yr olds think she is a creepy old weirdo. The coffee shop finally turns their attentions away from her*****
Girl 1 and 2: OMFG!! YOU ARE SO RIGHT. So, its like, when Hamlet kills his sister Ophelia?? COOL! I'm sooo going to get an A on this presentation.