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Feathers are the things birds have that are part of their wing and help them fly. Pens were made from feathers at sorme points in history. I think the term you are looking for is nib, if you mean the metal part of a pen that touches the paper.
You have pens like the platinum Preppy and platinum plasir which have double seals around the nib. I left my preppy for an entire year and it still didn’t dry out. They aren’t the only brand to use tricks like this, my TWSBI Eco was also left for a year and was a-okay. It’s always good before buying a pen to check the reviews and see what their cap seals are like. Rollerballs do require less maintenance though you are correct. If you do leave a fountain pen and it gets clogged there are ways to fix it, as I had to do with two more of my pens that did clog when they were left with the others.
I’ve used cheap mechanical pencils before but not expensive ones. How much better are more expensive mechanical pencils?
I am from the UK. This idea of states having an influence over their education system seems weird to me, though I guess we might allow something similar with Scotland, Wales, or Northern Island.
As I said we really don’t teach handwriting that well. They give kids either ball points or these triangle grip things that are actually designed to increase the force it takes to write. Why? No idea but someone thought that was a good idea to stop people who write too quickly and mess it up. Weirdly that actually helped some people. Even though it makes no sense to me.
It’s interesting though that you say cursive is more legible for dyslexic people. I think for everyone else print handwriting beats cursive. Not that that’s the issue as it’s still perfectly readable when done right. I am talking about people with typical doctors handwriting who can’t actually write it properly. I am also talking about the difficulty of the technique needed and how that could be a problem for some students. You say teachers adapt but my experience is that they don’t. If making students use cursive improves grades though it might be worth it. I am wondering why that’s the case that it improves grades.
Either way I think typing should be much more of a focus in modern education. People type more often than they write by hand, yet there is almost no education on how to use a keyboard. Heck lots of modern school students apparently don’t know how to use a computer. I’ve heard of people going to University and not understanding how files and folders work, because it’s just presumed that new generations actually know this stuff without being taught.