It's "couldn't care less". When you say "could care less" you are endorsing the claim of American Kids Getting Dumber. If you still don't get it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om7O0MFkmpw
Exactly. And at any one point there are only a handful of high performers. The rest of us get by just fine with basic math and skills borderline literacy. This is true in all fields, even the hard sciences, if there even is such a thing. The vast majority of research organisations are desparately copying what a few standouts discover.
The few truly innovative and driven students will self-select as long as they are given a chance. I'm not endorsing the dumbing-down of education but it doesn't really scare me either as long as a reasonable baseline is maintained. Looking at my 10 yr. old daughter's public school curriculum for math and sciences I have to say that it's not so different from mine, which was German public schools of the 70s and 80s.
By the way, "could care less" is ok in common usage now - heard it on NPR so it must be true.
Sure, the US doesn't have a monopoly on any of that, but I'm not ashamed of what our best and brightest are doing.