The attitudes seems to be that learning is uncool and almost everyone is, as far as I can see, more concerned with looking cool now than getting their head down working a bit for a few years (or even the few months upto the exams) and leaving school with good grades. Then, those who want to learn can be off put by the amount you're expected to learn, sometimes crap teaching and the d!cks in the classroom who are disrupting the lesson trying to be 'cool'.
Alex