For many years, and almost in spite of itself, Texas managed to gradually improve the educational level of the general populace. This was mostly driven by economic necessity. For instance, you can’t very well find oil without a working knowledge of geology, bullshit wildcatter legends notwithstanding.. In another field, the Dust Bowl and its eventual solutions, especially contour plowing, gave many farmers a healthy respect for agricultural science. With success comes complacency though and fundamentalist grifters have labored long and hard to reverse this progress since the 1970s. They understand that their prosperity depends on ignorance, and control of education is the only way to ensure a sufficient supply of ignorant marks.