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28 February, 2022

Oakland’s Educational Bureaucrats Steamroll Parents and Kids

<i>Oaklanders are mainly black so the bureaucrats probably thought they might not be likely to protest</i>

Conversations with some of California’s most vulnerable families show they have become the targets of increasingly autocratic officials entrusted with the education of their children

The pandemic kind of destroyed my kids,” Maplean told me. Her son, Da’vine, is 17 years old and a high school junior in Oakland. “Kids like him have to be in school,” she said. “It was really, really rough for him doing online classes. It put him back even farther than what he was.”

Last year, Oakland saw a surge in shootings, assaults, and homicides. Maplean tries to keep her kids home not only because she is still concerned about COVID, but also due to the increased threat of gun violence in their neighborhood—itself a product of policies that put school-age kids at risk by disrupting normal patterns of socialization for the most vulnerable.

“For the kids that don’t have anything to do with their lives, don’t have any support groups, of course they’re going to go out there and think it’s OK to start doing more violence,” Maplean told me.

Everything that was hard before COVID is worse now in Oakland. Prices are higher, and as a single parent Maplean feels the financial strain. “I used to take my kids out a lot,” she said. “Now I have to be really cautious. Money-wise, I just don’t have it.”

Maplean thinks masks, testing, and other mitigation measures were necessary for schools to reopen, but she knows that virtual learning took an emotional toll on her son. Da’vine once took pride in his schoolwork and good grades, so falling behind had an impact on his self-esteem. “He comes home and tells me he doesn’t know how to do the work,” Maplean said. Wealthy people “are able to make sure their kids get the education that they need, but what about the less fortunate ones? What about us?”

The San Francisco Bay Area, where Maplean lives, was once considered a center of tolerance and personal freedom. Since the pandemic began, it has become notorious for its inequality and dysfunction, brought about in part by rigid and often evidence-free COVID policies. In San Francisco and other Bay Area cities, unvaccinated people—including children—are barred from restaurants, movie theaters, gyms, and other indoor spaces. Schools in the Bay Area were closed for longer than almost everywhere else in the country, making the experience of children and parents in the educational system where I once worked an ongoing experiment in the costs of isolation and desocialization for some of the most disadvantaged children and families in America.

Like Los Angeles, some parts of the Bay Area tried to implement COVID vaccine requirements in schools but were forced to postpone them when thousands of kids didn’t meet the deadlines. Gov. Gavin Newsom has also recently announced an upcoming statewide mandate for children in grades 7-12, making California the only U.S. state in which COVID vaccines will be a condition for in-person school next year. The state legislature is currently set to vote on bills that would expand the mandate to include grades K-6, eliminate personal-belief exemptions, and enable kids 12 and up to get vaccinated without parental consent. Although the stereotype persists that only white Trump voters are unvaccinated, the Black and Latino residents of blue California have the lowest levels of vaccine uptake for both adults and teens.

What They Did to the Kids

Many of the parents I spoke with in order to better understand the toll of COVID mandates—imposed in many cases with little to no scientific consensus about their likely efficacy—are working-class mothers whom I know from when I was a public school teacher in Oakland. They preferred that I only use their first names, which makes sense, given their vulnerability to the whims of an increasingly autocratic, intolerant, and punitive bureaucracy that has shown no interest in putting kids or families first.

None of the parents I spoke with described themselves as “anti-vax.” Their kids have received all of their regular childhood vaccines, and some of their kids have been vaccinated against COVID, but they believe the COVID vaccines should be a personal choice. They spoke to me about the losses they have experienced, how school closures affected their families, and the ways in which institutions they once trusted have failed them. This is about much more than a school policy or a vaccine: It’s about the fact that parents have been sidelined, ignored, and left out of crucial decisions about their children’s lives. Their experiences and opinions about COVID and COVID restrictions are all different, but they share the same overwhelming sense that something in our state is going terribly wrong.

Even though Maplean often worries about her kids’ safety at school, she doesn’t support the vaccine mandate. “It’s not up to the school district,” she said. “It’s actually up to us parents.” At first Maplean did not want to get her kids vaccinated, but she’s glad she did. Her daughter has allergies, so Maplean brought an EpiPen with them to the vaccination site and was nervous that she would have to use it if her daughter had a reaction. Because of this, she understands why some parents have anxiety about the vaccines.

To date, 30% of students 12 and up in Oakland public schools have not verified their vaccination status, even though the district threatened to unenroll them or put them into “independent study” (online learning). “I just feel like the school district is pushing parents, especially African Americans, to force them to get their kids vaccinated,” Maplean said. As for why she thinks Black students have lower rates of vaccination, their parents “don’t trust too many people in Oakland. We as African Americans have trust issues with certain things of what we put in our kids’ bodies. I have that issue too.” Some of this hesitancy may be connected to the fact that COVID deaths have disproportionately affected minorities. Maplean feels that the city and the hospital system failed to provide adequate care: “They said ‘Forget these people, they’re going to die anyway’… And why? It’s because we’re poor.”

Ofelia, whose sons Jesus, 17, and Cesar, 16, are in high school in San Leandro, told me that it feels like the state’s approach to COVID has been like a lab experiment. “They have no control, so they’re trying to put everyone in a box,” she told me. “They’re saying, ‘Let’s see if this works, and if this doesn’t work, then we’ll try this, and then if that doesn’t work, then we’ll try this.’” During online learning, her sons’ school and their teachers did as much as they could to help them, but it was still challenging. “Emotionally, I think they checked out after the first month,” Ofelia said.

Ofelia was already under the worst possible strain; her other son died suddenly in June 2020 at age 24. “I can’t remember a lot of it because I was so distraught,” she told me, “but because of the pandemic we couldn’t have a decent rosary for him and we couldn’t have a vigil for him.” Only 10 people could attend the funeral and they had to stay 6 feet apart. It was difficult to get any emotional support. “That was really hard because I have a big family,” she said. “It was really hard to go through that and still have so much restrictions … You don’t realize that you’re going to have this loss in your family and then to still be so confined and you can’t do anything. It just makes it 10 times worse.”

Ofelia did not oppose the lockdown or the school closures because she felt that so much was uncertain, and both of her sons got the COVID vaccine. However, she does not think it should be mandatory. “This was something that I think they were throwing on everyone,” she said. “There wasn’t a lot of research about it. And it was not a choice. At this point it’s not your choice to get it—it’s either you get it or you can’t go into the restaurant to eat … Either you get it or you can’t go to school.” Ofelia told me that she has family members who passed away from COVID, but she firmly believes vaccination should be a personal decision. “Everybody has their reasonings,” she said.

More here:

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/oakland-educational-bureaucrats-steamroll-parents-kids

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W.Va.: House Judiciary Committee Delays Action on ‘Anti-Stereotyping’ Bill

With three days until the deadline when bills must be out of committees, lawmakers dove into a bill Thursday dealing with discussions of race and gender in West Virginia classrooms.

The House Judiciary Committee discussed House Bill 4011, the Anti-Stereotyping Act. The committee heard details of the bill for more than an hour, but put off any action on the bill until later today.

HB 4011 would require greater curriculum transparency for public schools pertaining to non-discrimination, diversity, equity, inclusion, race, ethnicity, sex, bias or any combination of those concepts. The bill also would prohibit the teaching and discussion of specific racial and non-discrimination topics often categorized under the name critical race theory, or CRT.

The bill states that no person should be blamed for the action committed in the past by someone of the same race, sex, ethnicity, religion or national origin. Schools and county board of education officials would be prohibited from compelling students and staff to adopt any belief or concept that one race, sex, ethnicity, religion, or national origin is inherently superior or inferior to another.

The House Education Committee recommended the bill for passage Feb. 3 after a contentious discussion that ultimately ended with Republicans on the committee moving to end further debate and vote on the bill.

The House Education and Judiciary committees held a public hearing on the bill Feb. 9, where 23 out of 25 attendees spoke out against the bill.

Del. Lisa Zukoff, D-Marshall, asked how does someone determine if a teacher has compelled a student to learn something prohibited by the bill.

“Where it seems worrisome to me is it seems so broad,” Zukoff said. “How do you prove and how do you determine whether this has actually happened?”

Del. Mark Zatezalo, R-Hancock, asked about a complaint from opponents of the bill that it would prohibit the teaching or discussion of certain historical topics in the classroom, such as discussions of slavery, segregation, and civil rights. Counsel for the committee explained that there was nothing in the bill prohibiting the teaching of history.

“I didn’t hear anything that spoke to any degree whatsoever about history or the teaching of history,” Zatezalo said.

Del. Joe Garcia, D-Marion, pointed to a provision of the bill that would prohibit teachers or administrators from compelling students or employees from adopting a belief that “An individual’s moral character is necessarily determined, in whole or in part, by his or her race, sex, ethnicity, religion, or national origin.”

“I just find it weird,” Garcia said. “An individual might be Adolph Hitler and you cannot discuss Adolph Hitler’s moral character as it relates to the history of what happened in Nazi Germany.”

While the bill doesn’t mention Critical Race Theory (CRT) by name, the bill is aimed at prohibiting the teaching of concepts derived from CRT, such as the anti-racism philosophies found in the works of Ibrim X. Kendi and Robin DiAngelo. Examples include teaching that racism is systemic regardless of whether a child believes they are not racist, saying that race-blind standards are inherently racist, and calling white students “oppressors.”

Todd Gaziano, the chief of legal policy and strategic research and the director of the Center for the Separation of Powers at the conservative Pacific Legal Foundation, testified that HB 4011 is very narrowly tailored and said some legislation in other states are too broad and restrictive. HB 4011 is based on model legislation offered by the foundation.

“When I was advising on some of the language … we were extremely careful about making sure that this was well grounded in federal law, but particularly well grounded in the First Amendment,” Gaziano said. “Certainly, you could condemn Nazis. That’s not a whole race. Could you condemn slaveholders? You should condemn slaveholders.

“No one should have any problem with this (bill), but if you do, you have a problem with federal law,” Gaziano continued. “What you can’t say is … all whites, by virtue of being white, have certain moral failings. But that is what is being taught … there are school systems with curriculum that say because of the virtue of the color of your skin you are an oppressor.”

https://www.theintelligencer.net/news/top-headlines/2022/02/house-judiciary-committee-delays-action-on-anti-stereotyping-bill/

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Why Don’t Universities Protect Freedom of Speech?

In 2017, Georgetown University revised its speech and expression policy to reflect an institutional commitment to freedom of speech on campus. The new policy committed the University to provide students and faculty with “the broadest possible latitude to speak, write, listen, challenge, and learn.” The policy specifically declared that speech “may not be suppressed because the ideas put forth are thought by some or even by most members of the University community to be offensive, unwise, immoral, or ill conceived,” and that the University undertook “a solemn responsibility not only to promote a lively and fearless freedom of deliberation and debate, but also to protect that freedom when others attempt to restrict it.”

That same year, Love Saxa, a campus group that advocated for marriage as “a monogamous and permanent union between a man and a woman,” was accused of being a hate group because of this definition, and threatened with defunding. In 2019, the Acting Homeland Security Secretary, who had been invited to deliver an address at the law school, was repeatedly shouted down by protestors and forced to leave without delivering his speech. The law school administration took no action to stop the protestors. In 2021, the dean of the law school summarily fired an adjunct professor for what he described as an “abhorrent” conversation in which she made “reprehensible statements concerning the evaluation of Black students.” He placed another adjunct professor on administrative leave for merely listening to these comments without disagreeing.

Last week, Ilya Shapiro, the incoming director of the law school’s Center for the Constitution expressed his opinion of President Biden’s decision to appoint an African-American woman to the Supreme Court on Twitter. In the abbreviated language needed to fit his comments into 280 characters, he stated: “Objectively best pick for Biden is Sri Srinivasan, who is solid prog & v smart. Even has identity politics benefit of being first Asian (Indian) American. But alas doesn’t fit into latest intersectionality hierarchy so we’ll get lesser black woman. Thank heaven for small favors?” In a follow-up tweet, he stated, “Because Biden said he’s only consider [sic] black women for SCOTUS, his nominee will always have an asterisk attached.”

The dean of Georgetown Law responded to these tweets with a campus-wide e-mail in which he stated that Shapiro’s “tweets’ suggestion that the best Supreme Court nominee could not be a Black woman and their use of demeaning language are appalling. The tweets are at odds with everything we stand for at Georgetown Law and are damaging to the culture of equity and inclusion that Georgetown Law is building every day.” Three days later, he issued a second campus-wide e-mail stating: “Ilya Shapiro’s tweets are antithetical to the work that we do here every day to build inclusion, belonging, and respect for diversity. . . . I am writing to inform you that I have placed Ilya Shapiro on administrative leave, pending an investigation into whether he violated our policies and expectations on professional conduct, non-discrimination, and anti-harassment, the results of which will inform our next steps. Pending the outcome of the investigation, he will remain on leave and not be on campus.”

One would be hard-pressed to find an institution whose principles and actions are more misaligned. Yet, Georgetown is far from unique in this regard. Almost all major universities make grandiloquent commitments to freedom of speech. Few honor these commitments in the breach. Why?

Contrary to right-wing rhetoric, university presidents, deans, and administrators are not woke ideologues. The answer is not ideology. It is incentives.

University administrators get no reward for upholding abstract principles in the face of student outcry and protest. Their incentive is to quell the dissension as quickly as possible, which usually means mollifying the protestors. Standing on principle tends to exacerbate the strife by provoking more virulent student protests and generating negative media coverage. Those who successfully quiet the disruption receive praise from the university administration. (Indeed, this is precisely what happened at Georgetown when the dean fired and disciplined the adjunct professors for their speech last year. The President of the university published a campus-wide message praising his “decisive actions [as] essential and consistent with the ethos and ideals we strive to sustain at Georgetown.”) They receive no personal blowback for violating the institution’s abstract commitment to freedom of speech.

Consider the position of Georgetown’s dean. He is confronted with students using social media to ramp up outrage and skipping classes to protest. The Washington Post and other media outlets have picked up the story. There is a real risk of things spiraling out of control and disrupting the functioning of the law school. His strongest incentive is to make this issue go away. How can this be done? By mollifying the students or by sticking up for the University’s commitment to freedom of speech on campus?

How surprising can it be that, in the event, the dean spent more than an hour trying to assuage the students? Reiterating his shock—“[a]gain, I was appalled to see the tweet. I tried to move as quickly as I can . . . within hours of the tweet going out, I made my statement.”—sympathizing with the students—“this is painful for all of us but I know how painful and awful it is for you, and I know what a terrible burden it is,”—and praising them for their input—“I’m grateful for you taking the time to talk, I’m grateful for your insights, I heard a lot today that I won’t just be reflecting on but that I’ll be moving forward with, and I will be in dialogue with you about what we’re doing.”

What personal detriment does the dean suffer from violating the University’s speech and expression policy? His actions have been criticized as a violation of academic freedom in a public letter signed by more than a hundred academics. The officers of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education published a column in the Washington Post decrying his action as a violation of freedom of speech. These actions may make the authors and signers feel good about themselves, but they impose no hardship on the dean personally.

Universities that layer an abstract commitment to freedom of speech onto an incentive structure that rewards the suppression of offensive behavior are committing the classic managerial blunder of “hoping for A, but paying for B,” which invariably produces B. For the abstract commitment to freedom of speech to have any practical effect, universities must alter their incentive structures. Those with the responsibility of enforcing the commitment must either be rewarded for doing so or punished for failing to do so.

Fortunately, these incentives can be changed. The first requirement is to add the following sentence to the university’s speech and expression policy: The University will summarily dismiss any allegation that an individual or group has violated a university policy if the allegation is based solely on the individual’s or group’s expression of his, her, or its religious, philosophical, literary, artistic, political, or scientific viewpoints. This makes the university’s abstract commitment to freedom of speech definite and explicit. Think of this as a freedom of speech “safe harbor” provision.

University policy is binding on the institution. It creates a contract between the school and its students and faculty that is legally enforceable.

The second requirement is to create a pro bono legal group that will sue any school that violates the safe harbor provision. This allows parties targeted for their speech to sue for the violation of their contractual rights.

The prospect of such lawsuits does not change the incentives of university administrators. But it does change the incentives of one party; university counsel. University counsel are not interested in winning lawsuits brought against the university. They are interested in preventing lawsuits from being brought against the university in the first place. The combination of the safe harbor provision and the realistic threat of lawsuit for its violation can motivate university counsel to restrain the conduct of administrators. They might require allegations of harassment to be reviewed by a member of the counsel’s office who knows how to distinguish complaints about speech from genuine harassment. They will almost certainly insist on revising the university’s anti-harassment training to stress that students and faculty should not file complaints based solely on the content of the viewpoint being expressed. But whatever steps they take would tend to give the college’s or university’s abstract commitment to freedom of speech some real practical effect.

The fear of being sanctioned by universities for advocating unpopular ideas does not arise from a lack of institutional commitments to freedom of speech. Almost all universities make such commitments. The fear arises from the fact that no university administrator has the incentive to honor the commitment when it counts. Adding a safe harbor provision to university policy and organizing a pro bono legal firm dedicated to protecting freedom of speech on campus—something the Foundation for Individual Rights is currently doing—can change this incentive.

Administrators will not act against their own interests merely to uphold an abstract principle unless there is some cost for failing to do so. The threat of damage awards can be that cost. It is a way of making universities that issue grandiose commitments to freedom of speech put their money where their mouths are.

https://www.independent.org/news/article.asp?id=14024&omhide=true&trk=title

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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27 February, 2022

British schools told to overhaul history curriculum to tackle 'diversity, migration and cultural change' instead of repeating the Tudors and Second World War

<i>The principal task of a history curriculum would appear to be to help children understand how we got to where we are today and to ask what lessons we can derive from the past so that we can avoid repeating old mistakes.  Conventional history teaching attempted that.  But it is hard to see how talk of 'diversity, migration and cultural change' does that</i>

The government is planning an overhaul of the history curriculum in schools that will push 'diversity, migration and cultural change' over 'classic' topics like the Tudors or the Second World War.

Children aged five to 14 will get to focus on the rich breadth of history, rather than being taught a narrow range of British-centric topics solely in preparation for GCSEs.

Schools Minister Robin Walker said that diversity had to be part of the 'canon' of history rather than an add-on, and hoped the move would lead to fewer people pulling down statues - instead placing them 'in context'.

'This is about the range of opportunities there are within the curriculum to teach world history and the relevance of that to modern Britain,' Walker told The Times.

'Do we want people to learn about the Tudors and the Second World War? Yes, absolutely. But we want to do it in a context of understanding Britain's place in the world.'

The new model curriculum will move away from Michael Gove's vision to teach children 'our island story' that he enforced as Education Secretary under David Cameron.

Model curriculums go into more detail than the national curriculum and sets out what schools are advised to teach to reach the highest quality of lessons.

According to The Times, it will apply to children aged 5 to 14, before they start their GCSEs and will be published in 2024. Gove's history national curriculum caused controversy when published in 2013, with some academics calling it 'offensive'.

Walker added that putting British history in context was key to fighting 'woke wars' over anti-racism groups and activists wanting to pulling down statues of historical figures.

'If there was more understanding you're less likely to have people wanting to pull down statues and more people wanting to explain the background around them,' he said.

Planned changes to the curriculum follow a slump in the number of students taking history at A-Level because of many regarding the subject as 'boring' and too narrow.

History entry figures for England fell by 13 per cent in the year to 2020. Geography saw a larger dip of 14 per cent. 

It comes as Birmingham City footballer Troy Deeney demanded the national curriculum included more history and experiences of black, Asian and ethnic minorities in Britain.

Deeney - who was a driving force behind Premier League players' decision to take the knee before matches in their fight against racism - believes the current curriculum is failing children from ethnic minorities.

He commissioned a YouGov survey which found the majority of British teachers think the school system has a racial bias and only 12 per cent said they feel empowered to teach diverse topics.

The professional footballer was encouraged by the Welsh Government, which will have a new curriculum framework in place from September where the stories of black, Asian and ethnic minority people will be taught.

In June, a report commissioned by Penguin and the Runnymede Trust found fewer than 1 per cent of candidates for GCSE English literature answered a question in 2019 on a novel by an author from an ethnic minority background

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10554393/Schools-told-overhaul-history-curriculum-tackle-diversity-migration.html

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UK: Net Zero and climate policies: Schools should teach to debate it

Net Zero Watch has given the thumbs up to new government guidelines reminding teachers of their legal duty to remain impartial on contentious issues surrounding climate and energy policies.

  

UK law states that teachers must not promote partisan political views such as contested Net Zero policies, having a duty to offer a balanced overview of opposing political views about different approaches to tackle climate change are taught.

 

Net Zero Watch’s director, Dr Benny Peiser said:

There is abundant evidence that children are being badly served by the teaching establishment. Far too often, pupils are being indoctrinated into an irrational belief in end-of-the-world climate catastrophism, and bombarded with political ideas of extreme environmental groups.” 

The announcement comes hard on the heels of new figures showing that increasing numbers of parents are choosing to abandon formal schooling entirely.

 

Dr Peiser said:

The new government guidance for teachers is welcome, but it remains to be seen if anything changes in UK classrooms. We will keep a close eye on the situation and will monitor whether the law of impartiality is being obeyed.”

https://www.netzerowatch.com/school-education-net-zero-and-climate-policies-teach-to-debate/

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A PTA Leader said conservatives should die

The Virginia PTA said Saturday that one of its officials had resigned after she was filmed at a rally saying, “Let them die,” during a speech interpreted as a denouncement of opponents of critical race theory.

Recently, the parents have been protesting and demonstrating against CRT (critical race theory). A learning procedure that is so controversial -- and beneficial for AG Garland’s family business. Of course.

Michelle Leete is the first vice president at the civil rights organization, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. She is also vice president of training at the Virginia state PTA and vice president of communications for the Fairfax County PTA.

Counter-protesters surrounded Leete to hear her speech. What ensued was a borderline incoherent rant that quickly turned into a call for violence.

Leeth berated and said,

“So let’s meet and remain steadfast in speaking truth, tearing down double standards, and refuting double talk, Let’s not allow any double downing on lies. Let’s prepare our children for the world they deserve. Let’s deny this off-key band of people that are anti-education, anti-teacher, anti-equity, anti-history, anti-racial reckoning, anti-opportunities, anti-help people, anti-diversity, anti-platform, anti-science, anti-change agent, anti-social justice, anti-healthcare, anti-worker, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-children, anti-healthcare, anti-worker, anti-environment, anti-admissions policy change, anti-inclusion, anti-live-and-let live people. Let them die. (everyone cheers) Don’t let these uncomfortable people deter us from our bold march forward.”

Unsurprisingly this video went viral and Leete herself was forced to resign from her position at the Virginia PTA for wishing death upon her parents.

One of many parents who were deeply disturbed by Leete’s comments was Harry Jackson who is a parent and the first African-American to be elected PTA president for Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, adamantly opposes CRT and now hopes the other organizations that employ her will follow suit.

He told CNN, Why would you ever wish death on someone who you disagree with, It was a responsible gesture by the Virginia PTA. Now I hope the Fairfax NAACP and PTA do the same.”

Speaking of hypocrisy, the NAACP has extended their support to Leete and her stance which debunks the group’s professed dedication to “equity” and “social justice,” both of which are anathema to equality and justice.

“The NAACP said it “does not condone or support violence of any kind, whether we agree with an individual’s ideas or not. We believe in peaceful demonstrations and activism to achieve social justice and equity. But we will always stand in opposition to anti-diversity and anti-equity rhetoric, and any ideas or policies that further an inequitable agenda.”

https://dailyheadlines.com/a-pta-leader-tried-ripping-conservatives-a-new-one-and-boy-did-it-backfire/

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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25 February, 2022

UK: Student finance overhaul will punish poorer graduates while top-earners pay less, ministers warned

A shake-up of university finance will punish poorer students while top-earning graduates pay less, ministers are being warned – as a call to bring back maintenance grants is rejected.

The long-delayed response to a review ordered by Theresa May also throws out a recommendation to slash annual tuition fees from £9,250 to £7,500, made because of fears that high debt deters disadvantaged teenagers.

Instead, fees will be frozen, while graduates will feel the pain of a cut in the threshold to start repayments from £27,295 a year to £25,000, to “make the system fairer for the taxpayer”, ministers say.

As expected, in a further cost-cutting move, students will be blocked from taking out loans – and, effectively for all but the richest, from going to university – if they fail to get strong GCSE or A-level grades.

The government will seek to sweeten the pill by scrapping interest on new loans, while a new “lifelong loan entitlement” will allow people to “retrain flexibly at any time in their lives”.

But Labour described the package – three years after the Augar report was published – as “another stealth tax for new graduates”, which would be “slamming the door on opportunity”.

The Education Policy Institute think tank warned it would be “regressive” and threatened to hit “students from disadvantaged backgrounds”.

“These policies are likely to result in lower- to middle-earning graduates paying more than they currently do, while higher earning graduates are likely to pay less,” said David Robinson, its director of post-16 and skills.

The chair of the parliamentary All-Party Group for Students, Paul Blomfield, attacked the dropping of the “important proposal for the reintroduction of maintenance grants for the poorest students”.

He also warned: “Freezing tuition fees, without additional teaching grant, reduces resources available to universities and means future students will be paying more for less.”

And Larissa Kennedy, president of the National Union of Students, said: “This government parrots the language of levelling up, but these proposals are classist, ableist and racist: they target those from marginalised communities, and seek to gatekeep education.”

The package, which will go out to consultation, will:

* Freeze maximum fees at £9,250 a year until 2025, meaning they will not have risen for seven years – while rejecting a cut to £7,500.

* Cut the repayment threshold to £25,000 for students starting courses from September 2023 until 2027 – despite the backlash against the recently announced freeze.

* Link the student loan interest rate to the – higher – RPI measure of inflation, scrapping interest for students from 2023, both during studies and after graduation.

* Extend the period before loans are written off from 30 to 40 years for new students – meaning many will be nearing retirement before they are out of debt.

* Deny loans to students who fail to achieve at least two Es at A-Level or at least a grade 4 pass in English and maths at GCSE.

* Promise almost £900m of new investment in higher education over three years – including £300m of day-today spending and £450m in capital funding.

Nadhim Zahawi, the education secretary, said the changes would “create a fairer system for both students and the taxpayer”, while making “higher education accessible and accountable”.

“This package of reforms will ensure students are being offered a range of different pathways, whether that is higher or further education, that lead to opportunities with the best outcomes,” he said.

But the document makes little attempt to hide that the motive is to save money, calling the current funding system “unsustainable” – with student loans totalling £161bn in April 2021.

Without action, those loans will reach more than half a trillion pounds in 20 years, ministers say, by which point only 23 per cent of new borrowers will be repaying them in full.

Taxpayers – most of whom have not been to university – are funding 44p of every pound of student loans, but will pay less than 20p under the new system, they argue.

The Augar report, published in the dying days of Theresa May’s government, saw her plea for the return of maintenance grants for low-income students, axed by George Osborne in 2015.

But, speaking in May 2019, the outgoing prime minister admitted it would be a decision for her successor.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/student-fees-loans-repayment-zahawi-b2021696.html 

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Transgender Berkeley English professor who backed burning of books is suspended by Twitter

A transgender Berkeley English professor who once backed the burning of books was suspended from Twitter after tweeting to the UK government that she hoped the Queen of England would die of COVID. 

Prof. Grace Lavery, a prominent trans activist, was in a Twitter spat on Sunday with an anti-trans advocate when the person accused Lavery of wanting to incite public disorder with her upcoming tour around the UK to promote her memoir next month.

During the back-and-forth, Lavery snapped that: 'I hope the queen dies' in a tweet that also tagged the UK government.

The post came as Queen Elizabeth, 95, tested positive for COVID-19. 

Twitter quickly suspended her account in response.

She told DailyMail.com that she supported people being canceled on social media - but apparently that does not apply to her.

Lavery said: 'I wholly support social media platforms taking action against harassment. 

'I do not think they should ban people for hoping that public figures die, whether the person in question is Elizabeth Windsor, Donald Trump, or Jeremy Corbyn,' Lavery said, the latter referring to a member of the UK's Labour Party that was suspended from the party in 2020 over anti-Semitic comments. 

She also complained that her Twitter ban was suppressing her freedom of speech.

'Bans on discussing the Queen's death additionally have the (presumably unintended) effect of suppressing speech about the line of succession,' she said.

'I'm not expecting any of the free speech activists to get incensed about this, of course, but their hypocrisy is nonetheless pungent.' 

UC Berkeley decline to comment on the issue, saying Lavery acted as an individual and that she has her right to freedom of speech.   

After being suspended from the platform and facing backlash, Lavery went on to Instagram to further insult the British queen in a sarcastic post paired up with the Sex Pistol's 'God Save the Queen.' 

'I certainly do *not* wish for the reintroduction of the guillotine, nor the public seizure of all lands and entitlements reserved by the Windsors, nor do I crave to appear on the front of the Daily Mail dressed in my (unmarried) mother's bridal veil' she wrote.

'Under no circumstances would I describe the Windsors as cruel, bloodsucking molesters and sponges, each of significantly below average intelligence even for the degenerate British ruling class; and at no price could anyone compel me to declare Elizabeth Regina an impassive, thoughtless windbag, as incapable of saying anything more thoughtful than a Tory's guff, as she is undeserving of even a legacy place in a second-rate provincial grammar school.

'We love our queen. God saves. Shine on, ma'am! (rhymes with SCAM).'

The post was preceded by Lavery echoing the words of others who stood by the queen and her decades on the throne. 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10542993/Berkeley-professor-suspended-Twitter-tweeting-hopes-COVID-stricken-Queen-DIES.html

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Australian parents turn to religious schools as public enrolments slide

Australia has recorded its most significant shift in school enrolments since 2008, with 6,388 fewer Australian students in the public system in 2021 — meaning less funding for state schools while private schools will see a windfall.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) annual schools report, the number of public primary and secondary students fell by 0.2 per cent in 2021, with low-fee independent Islamic and Anglican schools in the suburbs picking up the most new students.

The move from public schools was greatest in primary years, with 0.8 per cent of students leaving.

Overall, independent schools grew by 2.2 per cent across Australia, or 30,101 extra pupils.

The ABS said Australia's closed borders and the first net loss of migrants since 1946 was influential in the trend, with new arrivals generally guaranteeing growth at public schools.

Public schools receive $14,776 per student in a combination of state and commonwealth funding, so a drop of 6,388 students means $94,389,088 less for public schools. Meanwhile, funding to the private sector, which receives $11,724 on average per student, is expected to rise by $352,904,124.

It's money that will be gratefully received at schools like the Australian International Academy, a fast-growing Islamic school with three campuses in Sydney's outer western suburbs.

Principal Mona Abdel-Fattah started the school a decade ago with just 19 pupils. Today, there are 611, with more joining at the start of every year.

"It's almost a hundred a year, and at the moment, there are classes where we cannot accept any more students," Ms Abdel-Fattah said.

Ms Abdel-Fattah said the attraction for many of the young families in the area was the extra moral guidance and shared faith.

"A big attraction at our school is the Islamic environment. It's the identity, the care, the compassion," she said.

Islamic schools see huge growth as families prioritise values

Nasha Mohammed moved her 13-year-old daughter Lujain and 10- and six-year-old siblings Layan and Alfarouk from the state system to the Islamic school at the start of the year.

Mrs Mohammed made the decision because her daughter was entering high school and she wanted to prioritise values.

"I wanted her to be around people who pray the same way, are brought up the same way and have the same priorities and same ideas," Mrs Mohammed said.

Mrs Mohammed had a great experience at the public school her children attended last year, but as a busy mum decided to move Layan and Alfarouk as well.

"I wasn't really sure but I thought as a parent I thought it would be easier to drop them off in the same spot and pick them up at the end of the day," Mrs Mohammed said.

Lujain Mohammed said the smaller class sizes allowed her teachers to give her more attention.

"They know more about students' health and wellbeing," she said.

Nationally, Islamic schools have enjoyed enormous growth, with the number of students tripling over the past 15 years.

Last year's Australia Talks survey found parents at independent and Catholic schools had the highest rates of parental satisfaction, leading to calls for an investment in the public system.

Pressure on public schools expected to grow after recent baby boom

Leading International education expert Pasi Sahlberg, from the Gonski Institute at the University of New South Wales, said it would not be the last tough year for public education.

"Governments need to take the responsibility to make sure that the neighbourhood public schools [are] always good enough … for all children," Professor Sahlberg said.

"When this doesn't happen, for example due to insufficient resourcing of these schools, I'm afraid we are going to see trends similar to education statistics published today also in the future."

Professor Sahlberg and other education experts expect pressure on the public system to grow after a recent baby boom.

"This means new schools and many more teachers that need to be available as these numbers grow," he said.

"It is important that the governments will invest in their public infrastructure and human resources to secure a good school and trained teacher for every child."

Independent schools across Australia have welcomed the figures.

In New South Wales, the growth means that for the first time independent schools have more students than the Catholic sector, which set up its first school in Australia in the 19th century.

"This record growth now makes the independent school sector the second largest in NSW and reflects the confidence and satisfaction of parents from across the socio-economic spectrum," Association of Independent Schools New South Wales chief executive Geoff Newcombe said.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/markets/australian-parents-turn-to-private-schools-as-public-enrolments-slide/ar-AAUbsnl?ocid=winp1taskbar

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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24 February, 2022

UK: How schools are captured by ideological institutions

This week, Nadeem Zahawi told teachers that they have ‘an important role in preparing children and young people for life in modern Britain, and teaching them about the society and world they grow up in.’

Actually, after 26 years in the classroom, I had worked that out for myself. Children spend significant periods of their lives with their teachers, and we have a huge responsibility that goes far beyond drilling our pupils for exams.

But something has gone amiss in schools, and it seems that Zahawi might even realise that as well. In new guidance he has told teachers this week to avoid political bias in the classrooms. The guidance lays out certain topics that ‘should be taught in a balanced manner’ and tells teachers to ‘stop promoting contested theory as fact.’

Part of the problem with politics in schools is about resources as much as ideology. For too long, the agenda in education has been driven by exam results and league tables. Non-examined courses like PSHE – personal, social, health and economic education – have become Cinderella subjects.

PSHE is vital; probably more so to many children than even electric circuit theory, and I say that as a physics teacher. But when we are under huge pressure to perform, it is too easy for stressed-out teachers to divert time, attention and resources to activities that will bump up grades instead.

But PSHE still needs to be taught and we need resources to teach it, ideally pre-prepared and ready to deliver. Third party organisations have been only too happy to step into the gap with their own teaching materials.

Need to teach ‘Trans Inclusive RSHE’ to four- to seven-year-olds? Stonewall has lesson packs just for that. The hard work has all been done: ‘Each of our LGBTQ+ inclusive lessons has a PowerPoint that you can use to support your whole class teaching.’

If the subject is anti-racism, the British Red Cross offers downloads for free. But a charity’s proud history does not guarantee its political impartiality when it comes to education. Throughout the lesson plan, Black Lives Matter is capitalised – linking directly to the political campaign rather than the underlying truth that black lives do indeed matter.

Primary schools looking for a one-stop shop might be tempted by the educational package offered by No Outsiders. Their vision is grand – ‘inclusive education, promoting community cohesion to prepare young people and adults for life as global citizens.’ Make no mistake this is a professional outfit – they even sell merch to ‘wear with pride and show support for teaching equality in primary schools’. But schools are playing a dangerous game by contracting out their thinking.

If something looks too good to be true it probably is, and propaganda is still propaganda when it is branded with rainbows and sparkles. It seems that the Department for Education has finally noticed.

The guidance that Zahawi’s department issued this week pointed out more of the blindingly obvious, ‘Schools should be aware that “partisan political views” are not limited to just political parties. They may also be held by campaign groups, lobbyists and charitable organisations.’

Zahawi added, ‘Clearer guidance on political impartiality is just one part of my wider work to give children the best possible education.’

But it is much easier for a government minister to talk about political impartiality than it is for teachers to deliver it. Zahawi might say that, ‘no subject is off-limits in the classroom, as long as it is treated in an age-appropriate way, with sensitivity and respect, and without promoting contested theories as fact,’ but to make progress we need to be able to distinguish contested theories from facts.

As a scientist, I can dismiss creationism as a belief with no place in the classroom. But other people do hold the belief that the earth is young. Not only that, but they believe that there is proof of Noah’s flood in the geological record. We can debate who is right and who is wrong, but I am not going to start teaching creationism in the meantime.

But what about gender identity? Again, as a scientist, I see no need to invent something unprovable and unfalsifiable to explain that some people might be unhappy with the sex of their bodies. Is gender identity any different to creationism? Both are based on belief and both have proponents who claim to have supporting evidence. However, while creationism is usually dismissed without debate, there is great social pressure for gender identity to be accepted without debate. Why?

Zahawi’s guidance extends for 9,000 words, and includes 19 scenarios starting with climate change and ending with political systems. Each one can be up for debate – or not. Those who win an individual debate may be content with their prize, but the real power is held by those who decide just what can be debated in the first place. Campaign groups, lobbyists and charitable organisations – to use Zahawi’s words – have been astonishingly successful in this regard.

But identifying the problem is only the first step to putting this right. We need to empower teachers and schools and give children the resources to think for themselves. There, the government has a poor record. I teach physics; I also used to teach critical thinking. I taught my pupils to analyse arguments, identify flaws, assess the credibility of sources, and construct reasoned arguments of their own – all based on evidence and examples. However, in line with the government programme of general qualification reform, the A-Level course was cancelled in 2016.

If Zahawi is serious about rectifying the problem, then he needs to get to the heart of the problem. We might possibly evict those unhelpful influences from schools, but we are less likely to remove them from the internet. In short, we need to teach children to think for themselves.

https://www.spectator.com.au/2022/02/how-schools-are-captured-by-ideological-institutions/

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Critical race theory-related ideas found in mandatory programs at 23 of top 25 US medical schools

At least 23 of America’s 25 most prestigious medical colleges and universities have some form of mandatory student training or coursework on ideas related to critical race theory (CRT), according to CriticalRace.org, which monitors CRT curricula and training in higher education. 

"The racialization of medical school education is troubling. It's one thing to recognize the health needs of different populations, it's entirely different to inject racial politics into medical care. Demanding that medical school students become activists is dangerous," William Jacobson told Fox News Digital. 

Jacobson, Clinical Professor of Law at Cornell Law School and founder of the Legal Insurrection website, founded CriticalRace.org’s sprawling database that previously examined elite K-12 private schools and 500 of America's top undergraduate programs. 

"The mantra of the so-called 'antiracism' movement has no place in medicine. Current racial discrimination in order to remedy past racial discrimination is wrong generally, but is downright dangerous in medicine," Jacobson added. 

The schools examined were based on the rankings by U.S. News’ rankings of America’s top medical schools. Of the top 25 colleges and universities, 23 had some sort of mandatory training and 21 have offered materials by authors Robin DiAngelo and Ibram Kendi, whose books explicitly call for discrimination, according to Jacobson. 

Training is sometimes targeted, such as a new requirement for a major or department, and sometimes school-wide. The subjects of mandatory training and coursework are worded and phrased differently at individual schools, but use terms including "anti-racism," "cultural competency," "equity," "implicit bias," "DEI – diversity, equity and inclusion" and critical race theory, according to CriticalRace.org.

The study found that 16 of the top 25 medical schools have declared that anti-racism, DEI, CRT, and/or other similar elements will be embedded into the general curriculum of the university. Among them is The University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, where first-year students must take "Health Equity, Advocacy, and Anti-Racism."

At the University of Michigan Medical School, the school’s Anti-Racism Oversight Committee recommends that it, "[i]ncorporate critical race theory, health justice, and intersectionality framework into doctoring materials," according to CriticalRace.org.

The study also found that an additional six of schools mandate department-specific training, including University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and Yale School of Medicine.

At Yale, the Department of Psychiatry’s Anti-Racism Task Force’s Education Subcommittee "is charged with addressing the legacy of racism on training, increasing the representation of BIPOC individuals, anti-racism training efforts, social justice and healthy equity curricula, and interfacing with the clinical subcommittee regarding the clinical context of training," according to CriticalRace.org’s findings. 

School-wide training consisting of modules, online orientations, and other programs were found at 12 of the schools, including Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine where Kendi’s "How to Be an Antiracist" is required reading for the class of 2025. 

"Medical school activism is playing out in real world patient care, with health departments in multiple states, including New York, injecting racial preferences into COVID therapeutic eligibility," Jacobson said. 

Critical race theory isn’t only pushed on students, as 17 of the top 25 institutions were also found to have some type of mandatory training for faculty and staff. For example, The Office of Education at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis will "require diversity and bias training for all searches and admissions processes including student, resident, fellow, faculty, and staff positions in education," according to the study. 

David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA also required anti-bias and anti-racism training for all search committee members. 

"When a patient presents for treatment, that person needs to be treated as an individual, not just as a member of some larger racial or ethnic group," Jacobson said. 

CriticalRace.org, which details activity and contact information for each school, previously found that at least 236 colleges or universities of 500 examined have some form of mandatory student training or coursework on ideas related to CRT. 

"While our prior databases on higher education and elite private schools served as educational tools for students and parents making application decisions, the medical school database serves as a wake-up call for the public to pay attention to the damaging racialization of medical education," Jacobson said. 

https://www.foxnews.com/media/critical-race-theory-related-mandatory-top-medical-schools-report

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‘Clear’ need for STEM boost to prepare job-ready graduates

The billionaire founder and chief executive of logistics software outfit WiseTech, Richard White, has called for a major boost to STEM education in Australia, declaring he’ll “tell anyone who listens” that the nation needs to improve its outcomes for primary and high school students.

Amid an ongoing battle for tech talent, WiseTech on Wednesday posted an 18 per cent increase in revenue to $281m for the first six months of the financial year, while earnings before interest taxation depreciation and amortisation jumped by 54 per cent to $137.7m.

The company also upgraded its EBITDA growth guidance by 10 per cent to 43 per cent, representing EBITDA of $275m to $295m.

Its net profit climbed a whopping 74 per cent to $77.4m.

Mr White said that WiseTech’s string of acquisitions in recent years was beginning to pay off, and that its CargoWise product in particular had been up a strong performer, with its revenue up 33 per cent year-on-year.

WiseTech’s software helps simplify logistics solutions for businesses.

It noted that despite the overall positive outlook “uncertainty around future economic and industrial production growth and/or global trade may lead to alternative outcomes” and “prevailing uncertainties relating to sovereign and geopolitical risk may also reduce assumed growth rates.”

The executive, a former guitar tech for AC/DC, said that for both WiseTech and Australia’s technology sector more broadly, Australia needs to boost its education efforts and pump out more job-ready graduates.

“This is something I‘ve been clear on for more than a decade,” Mr White said. “I want Australia to lift education, particularly digital technology education, and I’ll tell everybody, from politicians to industry leaders and everybody, that we need to do better.

“In primary school, and in high school, we need to get students in to digital technologies and into STEM so that when they arrive in the workforce they‘re highly skilled in the technologies for the future, rather than focused on what they might perceive as an interesting career but that is not necessarily the future.”

WiseTech shares closed up 4.2 per cent to $44.58.

The company has been caught up in the recent choppy market valuations, but Mr White said that businesses with strong fundamentals will have no trouble weathering the storms.

He added that while the recent acquisitions have been important for WiseTech’s success, he’s concentrating now on “not getting distracted by shiny objects’’.

“It’s important that we focus on really sticking to our knitting, and making this business’s core capabilities better and better,” he said. “So to be frank, the next year is about more of the same and being as good as we can.”

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/technology/clear-need-for-stem-boost-to-prepare-jobready-graduates-wisetech-chief/news-story/4dddf6bc386fcf6257d7634bc533d67e

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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23 February, 2022

Progressive SUNY Binghamton professor rebuked for race, gender policy

SUNY Binghamton officials have rebuked a professor who said white students should clam up in class and let others lead academic discussions.

A syllabus for Ana Maria Candela’s sociology class alerted students that she would be calling on non-white coeds first.

Candela wrote that “if you are white, male, or someone privileged by the racial and gender structures of our society to have your voice easily voiced and heard, we will often ask you to hold off on your questions or comments to give others priority and will come back to you a bit later or at another time.”

Student Sean Harrigan shone a light on the pigment-specific pedagogy after he filed a Title IX discrimination complaint to the school.

Harrigan told The Post Monday that Binghamton officials scrambled to revise the syllabus and later insisted that they opposed the practice.

“How am I supposed to get a full participation grade if I’m not called on because of the way I was born?” Harrigan, an economics major, said Monday.

A school spokesperson said that they cleansed Candela’s syllabus of the offending phrases.

“The faculty member has updated their syllabus, removing the section in question, and is now in compliance with the Faculty Staff Handbook,” the school stated.

Dubbed “progressive stacking,” Candela’s policy aimed to “give priority to non-white folks, to women, and to shy and quiet people who rarely raise their hands,” the syllabus read.

Candela extolled the strategy in the first draft of her syllabus, telling students that it yields “tremendous benefits for our society.”

Over time, the academic said, “those who feel most privileged to speak begin to take the initiative to hold space for others who feel less comfortable speaking first, while those who tend to be more silenced in our society grow more comfortable speaking.”

Harrigan said that Candela also routinely equates capitalism to slavery during lectures. “This is just the tip of the iceberg,” he said. “The sociology department scares me.”

Harrigan said a professor in another class on “nonviolent compassionate communication” — also being offered through Binghamton’s rhetoric department — strongly encouraged him against choosing America as an example of a compassionate nation.

The student said campus opinion is generally split on progressive curricular trends — with some embracing them and others bristling.

“The Faculty Staff Handbook outlines principles of effective teaching, which include valuing and encouraging student feedback, encouraging appropriate faculty-student interaction, and respecting the diverse talents and learning styles of students,” the school said.

Candela’s syllabus “clearly violates those principles,” a school official said

https://nypost.com/2022/02/21/suny-binghamton-professor-rebuked-for-race-gender-policy/

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NYC schools need more opportunity — not race-based ‘redistribution’

New schools Chancellor David Banks last week basically apologized for the new “standards” for admission to the city’s screened middle and high schools — and rightly so.

“As I got here, there were a number of things that were already in motion,” Banks said at a Queens meeting. “For right now we’ve come up with this new admissions criteria. We had to make a decision because parents need to make decisions on admissions sooner rather than later,” saying he’d re-examine the issue next year.

In other words, he doesn’t endorse the changes; he just fears that another revamp at this late date would make things worse.

Maybe so, but parents are rightly outraged. Department of Education Chief of Enrollment Sarah Kleinhandler basically admitted the point was the racial re-engineering that obsessed the old regime: “When we modeled this, we saw that black and brown children had . . . the percentage of their access to these screened high schools [go] up 13 percent.”

To get there, the de Blasio folks created a complex algorithm with “buckets” that basically blur the kids’ achievements, so that children with grades averaging 85 have the same chance as those with 99s (among other anti-excellence moves). Then it’s just a lottery; luck, not your hard work, is the deciding factor.

Of course, all families should have access to high-standards public schools for their children, at every level. But right now the only sure way to get that is to manage to get them in as tots to a Gifted & Talented school that feeds directly into good schools all the way through grade 12 — or to win another lottery, for entry into a public charter system like the Success Academies.

Students who enter a Success primary school are guaranteed seats in the network’s middle and high schools — all of which work with children of all ability levels, including special-needs kids. Yet the network as a whole produces test scores better than those of Scarsdale’s public schools.

We’re not saying the entire public-school system should do the same: Some kids are better off on a vocational track at some point; a few really want a performing-arts program, and so on. And while other charters satisfy many of those desires, the regular system should too: The city’s large enough to offer the whole range.

What the city doesn’t need is gimmicks that aim to award seats on the basis of skin color, rather than ability. The race-obsessives don’t even want selective performing-arts schools to do auditions as part of admissions.

If Banks doesn’t manage to stamp out that thinking fast, the system he runs will continue its current rapid enrollment drop.

https://nypost.com/2022/02/21/nyc-schools-need-more-opportunity-not-race-based-redistribution/

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Racially Sensitive 'Restorative' School Discipline Isn't Behaving Very Well

The fight outside North High School in Denver was about to turn more violent as one girl wrapped a bike chain around her fist to strike the other. Just before the attacker used the weapon, school staff arrived and restrained her, ending the fight but not the story.

Most high schools would have referred the chain-wielding girl to the police. But North High brought the two girls together to resolve the conflict through conversation. They discovered that a boy was playing them off each other. Feeling less hostile after figuring out the backstory, the girls did not fight again.

This alternative method of discipline, called “restorative practices,” is spreading across the country – and being put to the test. Many schools are enduring sharp increases in violence following the return of students from COVID lockdowns, making this softer approach a higher-stakes experiment in student safety.

“Kids are getting into more fights and disturbances because they are struggling,” says Yoli Anyon, a professor of social work at San Jose State University. “So schools are relying on restorative practices as a way to help young people transition back to the classroom.”

Long pushed by racial justice groups, the method aims to curb suspensions and arrests that disproportionately affect students of color. It replaces punishment with discussions about the causes and harmful impact of misbehavior, from sassing teachers and smoking pot to fighting (serious offenses like gun possession are still referred to the police). The hope is that students, through apologizing and making amends, will learn from their misdeeds and form healthier relationships with peers and teachers, making school violence less likely as they continue their education.

Orange County, Calif., is spearheading an expansion of the program into 32 schools, and Iowa City just started its own. Many other large districts – including Baltimore, Chicago, Kansas City, Miami, New York City, Oakland, Pittsburgh, Seattle and Washington D.C. – introduced the alternative in recent years.

Denver, which pioneered restorative practices more than a decade ago and inspired districts to follow its lead, seems a good place to ask: Is the kinder approach working? Yes and no, and often the answer depends on the eye of the beholder. Suspensions have fallen significantly, in keeping with the intent of the changed discipline policy. But fighting and other serious incidents have not meaningfully declined, the district says. Other cities have reported similar outcomes, according to evaluations and school leaders.

Critics point to the massacre in Parkland, Fla., as a chilling example of what can go wrong. Nikolas Cruz, who killed 17 fellow students and staff members in 2018, was able to stay in school – and pass a background check to purchase the weapon he used – because the district tried to address his violent behavior before the shooting through counseling instead of referring him to authorities.

The reasons for the mixed results in Denver, where Latinos and blacks make up two-thirds of the students, and other cities are complex. Some teachers and administrations don’t buy the restorative philosophy. In schools struggling with low test scores and overcrowded classrooms, it seems like another time-consuming educational fad. And students who are demoralized by school sometimes see a restorative conversation as an easy way to escape suspension rather than a learning experience.

“Restorative practices aren’t a silver bullet that alone fix behavior problems,” says Don Haddad, the superintendent of Colorado’s St. Vrain Valley School District, which has used the program for years. “It only works as part of a comprehensive improvement of schools, with better academic programs that give students hope for the future. Otherwise, it has the potential to be just another feel-good program.”

https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2022/02/02/racially_sensitive_restorative_school_discipline_isnt_behaving_very_well_814382.html

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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22 February, 2022

UK: Free speech student fears he's in danger of being cancelled by the Open University for posting ‘statement of solidarity’ with controversial professor

A student who formed a club to promote free speech after a series of academics were attacked for their views says he is now in danger of being ‘cancelled’ by Britain’s biggest university.

Sam Cowie, 28, formed the Free Speech Society at the Open University (OU) last year but has been told his moves to get official affiliation for the club are currently ‘on hold’.

In emails seen by The Mail on Sunday, the university’s Student Association lays the blame for the OU’s decision on his posting of a ‘statement of solidarity’ on social media in support of Professor Jo Phoenix, an academic who quit the Open University in December following a campaign by trans activists.

Last night, Mr Cowie, a second-year psychology student from Glasgow, who has received the support of the UK’s Free Speech Union, said: ‘I formed the club because debate is being stifled and people are being bullied and mistreated, especially senior female academics.

It’s sinister ...why can’t people talk about perfectly reasonable things without being slammed?’

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10531737/Student-fears-cancelled-Open-University-supporting-controversial-professor.html

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Pennsylvania School Removes CNN from Classrooms

A Pennsylvania school board has voted to end mandatory streaming of a CNN-affiliated program in its middle school over concerns that such broadcasts are biased.

Fox News reports:

The Norwin School Board voted 5-4 Monday to end requiring homeroom teachers to show students CNN 10, which is described as “compact on-demand news broadcasts ideal for explanation seekers on the go or in the classroom.”

Teachers will now use their discretion on whether to keep TVs turned off, show the newscast, or show patriotic videos on events such as Veterans Day or the attack on Pearl Harbor, Trib Live reported.

One mom, Ashley Egan of North Huntingdon, said broadcasting CNN-affiliated programs is “feeding [her son] every day that CNN is a label you can trust.”

CNN 10 was first added to required viewing material in 2019 in the district, after schools had previously viewed similar programs from Channel One.

Egan noted that CNN is not “unbiased” and supported the decision to end the mandatory viewing.

https://trumptrainnews.com/2022/02/16/pennsylvania-school-removes-cnn-from-classrooms/

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Florida governor: school districts that defied no-mask mandate to lose $200m

Florida’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, is backing a controversial proposal to strip $200m in education funding from Democratic counties that defied his executive order last year banning mask mandates in schools.

DeSantis, who is widely seen as a leading heir to Donald Trump in the Republican party, plans to send the money instead to mostly Republican counties that supported him.

The plan, which some analysts believe is almost certainly unconstitutional, was part of a budget bill that passed the Republican-dominated Florida house on Wednesday.

It was immediately attacked by teachers unions, school districts and education advocates, who say the penalties will strip further resources from classrooms in a state already in the bottom four of per-student spending nationally.

“This is retaliation by legislators and the governor,” said Jabari Hosey, president of the advocacy group Families for Safe Schools and a parent of school-age children in Brevard county.

“We are down over 150 teachers in Brevard right now. We need more social workers, there’s a performance gap because of Covid that is still present in our community. We need more funds, more opportunities, more instructors.

“To retaliate and to attack the public school system they are supposed to be promoting is very sad. Frankly, it’s embarrassing.”

Under the proposal by the Republican state congressman Randy Fine, school districts in the 12 Florida counties that implemented mask mandates last summer in defiance of DeSantis’s executive order will forfeit amounts based on their size.

Brevard, where Hosey’s children attend school, and which Fine represents, would forgo $4.5m.

Two-thirds of the money would come from south Florida, which votes overwhelmingly Democratic in local, state and national elections. Miami-Dade, the nation’s fourth largest district with 357,000 students, would lose $72m; Broward, the sixth largest with 270,000 students, would forfeit about $32m; and Palm Beach, the 10th largest with 193,000 would give up $28m.

Of the others, Alachua, Duval, Hillsborough, Indian River, Leon, Orange, Sarasota and Volusia counties, all but three backed Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election in Florida, which was won by Donald Trump.

“Following the law is not optional. These school districts broke the law, and they were broken for nothing,” a visibly angry Fine told fellow legislators on Wednesday.

He insisted during a turbulent session of the Florida house appropriations committee last week that the state would cut the salaries of administrators earning more than $100,000 and not “reduce funding for any direct educational service or resource that impacts the education of kindergarten through grade 12 students”.

He conceded, however, that the policy was intentionally punitive to counties who refused to fall in line with the governor. “It is intended to reward the 55 school districts, the overwhelming majority of which followed our state law and respected the rights of parents over the past year,” he said.

Initially, DeSantis, a fierce critic of mask and vaccine mandates, declared himself against the proposal. “My view would be let’s not do that,” he said in an appearance in Jacksonville on Friday, telling reporters he instead preferred to let parents sue school districts individually if they felt children were harmed by “forced masking”.

By Tuesday, however, the governor backtracked, supporting Fine’s initiative and parents’ rights to file lawsuits. “They should get compensated for academic, social and emotional problems caused by these policies,” he said in a tweet.

Having passed the Florida house, the $105bn budget that includes the redistribution of education funds must now be reconciled in the state senate, which also has a Republican majority.

If DeSantis eventually signs it into law, it is likely to face legal challenges. Hosey’s group points out that every Florida county with mandates dropped them as soon as the original executive order became law in November, following a lengthy legal back and forth with districts who insisted they followed advice on masking from the Biden administration and federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Additionally, they say, the fines target the salaries of school district administrators who only implemented the mask policies, not the school board members who set them.

John J Sullivan, director of legislative affairs for Broward county public schools, told the Guardian in a statement that students would be directly affected by the withholding of funds.

“We are disappointed in the governor’s reversal. We hope the senate will not agree to penalize administrators who have worked tirelessly to meet the unprecedented challenges caused by the pandemic, always focused on the health and safety of students and teachers,” he said.

“This penalty would have a negative impact on the services the district is able to provide to our students.”

Administrators in Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties have issued similar statements, and educators’ unions have condemned the plan.

“We have 165 vacancies and a lot of it has to do with the salaries we can offer to teachers. So that money would mean a lot to our school district and it’s a shame that someone would do that. It’s totally punitive and politically motivated,” Wendy Doromal, president of the Orange county classroom teachers association told WMFE radio.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/us/florida-governor-school-districts-that-defied-no-mask-mandate-to-lose-200m/ar-AAU5n2p?li=AAaeSy5

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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21 February, 2022

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick wants professors to lose tenure if they teach CRT

Texas college and university professors may soon lose tenure if they teach critical race theory (CRT) in their classrooms, according to the Lone Star state's lieutenant governor, who has vowed action by the state.

In a warning message to educators this week, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said he will work to strip them of their job security in the state if they teach CRT.

"The critical race theory people are trying to take us back to a divided country," Patrick told reporters at a press conference.

"Tenure to these professors who voted 41-5 telling the taxpayers and the parents and the legislature, and your own board of regents, to get out of their business that we have no say what you do in the classroom… You've opened the door for this issue because you went too far."

"What we will propose to do is to end all tenure for all new hires," Patrick said, vowing that the state legislature would take action against those who teach the subject in their classrooms.

"The law will change to say teaching critical race theory is prima facie evidence for good cause for tenure revocation," he said. In addition to his comments concerning tenure, Patrick said he wants annual reviews for the professors rather than six year reviews.

Patrick's remarks came after a vote by the Faculty Council at the University of Texas at Austin on a resolution to "defend academic freedom" by allowing the promotion of critical race theory in classrooms.

In a video that has been viewed over 10,000 times, UT-Austin Associate Professor of Finance Dr. Richard Lowery spoke out against the resolution which affirmed the "fundamental rights" of professors to push critical race theory in classrooms.

Lowery told Fox News that critical race theory, which promotes the idea that the United States is inherently racist, has "no scientific basis."

"From an academic perspective it basically assumes its conclusion," Lowery said. "There’s no reason to do research when you’ve already assumed that everything is driven by this one particular thing. They assume everything is driven by racism so you go back and figure out how things are driven by racism and that’s not actual research. It’s not falsifiable. It has no scientific basis."

Differing from Lowery, Andrea Gore, a professor in the Division of Toxicology and Pharmacology at UT-Austin, offered support for the resolution, saying it is "educators and not politicians" who should be making decisions about what is taught in schools across the state.

"This resolution affirms that its educators and not politicians who should make decisions about teaching and learning and it supports the rights and the academic freedom of faculty to design courses curriculum and pedagogy and to conduct related scholarly research," Gore said.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/texas-lt-gov-dan-patrick-wants-professors-to-lose-tenure-if-they-teach-crt

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DeSantis, first lady vow to 'change the narrative' on kids' mental health, keep politics out of classroom

Florida's Gov. Ron DeSantis and his wife, Casey DeSantis, sat down with Fox News Digital in a joint interview during which they reiterated their commitment to keeping Florida free in addition to announcing a new focus on cancer research and children's mental health in the months following the first lady's breast cancer diagnosis.

Casey DeSantis told Fox News Digital on Monday that she feels "really good" and is starting to get her energy back again, after announcing she completed her final round of chemotherapy for breast cancer in January. She said she was motivated by her family, including children Madison, 5, Mason, 3, and Maime, 22 months, to continue fighting.

As part of his wife's commitment to continue fighting, Gov. DeSantis proposed to increase the state's budget by 60% for cancer research, bringing the total to $100 million. The first lady told Fox News Digital that early detections and screenings for cancer were imperative, especially in the aftermath of the pandemic that saw a large decline in individuals seeking preventative medical treatment.

The other pocket of funding would be dedicated to technology and innovation so "we can finally find a cure for this thing," she said. The first lady in recent months has visited numerous children's hospitals and cancer centers throughout the state to discuss importance of early screenings and offer a sense of hope for children and adults going through chemotherapy.

Empowering kids

The first lady also talked about mental health impacts of the pandemic in addition to physical impacts, stating that her resiliency initiative, launched in February 2021, is aimed at empowering kids to be able to persevere through life's challenges. The initiative includes a "resiliency toolkit," as well as the Hope Ambassador Clubs program, designed to create "kind and compassionate school environments" through peer-to-peer volunteering.

"With mental health, what I noticed in traveling the state and speaking with a lot of kids is that if they come forward and say that they have a mental health issue, that they feel like a victim and that there's a stigma associated with it," Casey DeSantis told Fox News Digital.

She detailed working with the state Department of Education to pass a standard and curriculum that goes toward mental health in addition to engaging with well-known athletes, including Peyton Manning and Tom Brady, and sports teams to discuss how no one is immune from hardship. "We're really trying to change the narrative with that," she continued.

In addition, the first lady said that virtual learning during COVID "was a terrible, failed experiment and our poor kids suffered immensely," which is why she's proud that the governor kept schools open.

"The governor keeping the schools open has done so much for these kids’ emotional and mental well-being. I really am so sad to hear that that's even part of the dialog in other states that you would be closing schools, not providing the opportunity for some of these kids."

On the topic of education standards for Florida's schoolchildren, Gov. DeSantis weighed in, citing the state's ban on teaching critical race theory as well as the new education standards his administration enacted last year on teaching of American civics, the Holocaust and character standards.

He told Fox News Digital that the education standards will be taught from "a vantage point of facts and truth," and without infusing political ideology. Gov. DeSantis referred to the 1619 Project, authored by Nikole Hannah-Jones, who recently incorrectly claimed that the Civil War started the year it ended, among other controversial statements.

"So, for example, this 1619 Project that the New York Times parrots, they say that the American Revolution was fought both to defend slavery," he said. "But if you look, there's literally nothing in the historical record."

Weaponizing history

The governor continued, "And so it's a historical, they're trying to weaponize history by distorting it in order to advance a political agenda. And so I think we've tackled that right. We are, though, increasing the ability of parents to be involved in the curriculum. Parents have a right to know what's being taught in schools. There's going to be more rights for parents after this legislative session so that they can make sure that our standards are enforced," he said.

Casey DeSantis, a former TV host, also weighed in on the state of the national conversation, saying, "I think we are divided, and I think it's very unfortunate. I think that if there were more outlets that would probably tell more accurate information that I don't think that we would be so divided. I think that there's a lot of entities that make a profit off of divisiveness." Gov. DeSantis chimed in, slamming the mainstream media "legacy outlets" for trying to "nullify" the 2016 election results by attempting to tie the Trump campaign to collusion with Russia.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/desantis-first-lady-kids-mental-health-politics-classroom

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Education Department erases $415M in student loan debt for 16,000 borrowers

The Department of Education announced this week it will cancel $415 million in federal student loans by nearly 16,000 borrowers allegedly misled by for-profit colleges.

The borrowers, who attended DeVry University, ITT Technical Institute, Westwood College and the Minnesota School of Business/Globe University, will receive the relief through a legal provision known as borrower defense, which allows individuals to discharge some or all of their student loan debt if their school misled them or otherwise engaged in other misconduct.

"The department remains committed to giving borrowers discharges when the evidence shows their college violated the law and standards," Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said in a statement Wednesday.

The department found that between 2008 and 2015, DeVry University, a for-profit university headquartered in Illinois, repeatedly misled students by claiming that 90% of its graduates actively seeking employment landed a job in their field of study within six months of graduation. The job placement level was actually closer to 58%, according to the department.

The department has so far identified about 1,800 borrowers who will be eligible for more than $71 million in discharges because they "relied upon DeVry's misrepresentation in deciding to enroll." The number of borrowers who qualify for discharge is expected to grow as the department continues to review outstanding claims from former students. All borrowers with approved claims will receive full relief.

"Students count on their colleges to be truthful," Cardona said. "Unfortunately, today's findings show too many instances in which students were misled into loans at institutions or programs that could not deliver what they'd promised."

In a statement, Devry's Donna Shaults, senior director of university relations, noted the university's board of directors and leadership have changed since 2015.

Still, she maintained the university had been misrepresented by the government.

"We do believe that the Department of Education mischaracterizes DeVry's calculation and disclosure of graduate outcomes in certain advertising, and we do not agree with the conclusions they have reached," Shaults said.

In total, the Biden administration has approved about $2 billion in loan forgiveness for more than 100,000 students allegedly defrauded by their schools.

https://www.foxbusiness.com/money/education-department-student-loan-debt-forgiveness

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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20 February, 2022

Top California university may have to slash admissions after neighborhood group complains

The University of California, Berkeley may have to slash its new admissions by about one-third after a neighborhood group in the hilly Bay Area city challenged the environmental impact of the top college’s expansion plan.

The university is asking California’s supreme court to intervene after the local group, called Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods, successfully argued the university was violating a major environmental law by failing to account for increases in the trash, traffic and noise that increased enrollment and new construction would bring.

As a result, the university will have to send out 5,100 fewer admission letters than planned next month, and forgo $57m in tuition fees over the 2022-23 academic year.

The case sits at the intersection of several big debates roiling California at the moment: how to reduce educational inequities and rein in increasingly unaffordable tuition fees? How to address a housing crisis even as nimby homeowners seek to stifle new development?

At the center of the UC Berkeley case is the state’s environmental law – the California Environmental Quality Act – which critics say is being brazenly used by neighborhood groups to block necessary housing and infrastructure using the pretense of environmentalism. It has also raised the alarm that amid unprecedented demand for higher education in California, thousands of students will miss their chance at a degree from one of the top US universities.

The construction project near campus that triggered Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods’ challenge would replace an existing parking structure with accommodation for 30 graduate students, and classroom space for the university’s public policy program.

In its environmental impact study for the new construction, the university argued increased enrollment previous years had “no significant environmental impacts”. UC Berkeley has also said that it should be able to address the concerns raised in the lawsuit without having to limit enrollment in the meantime.

But in August, a county judge disagreed. “Further increases in student enrollment above the current enrollment level at UCBerkeley could result in an adverse change or alteration of the physical environment,” superior court judge Brad Seligman wrote, ordering the school to freeze enrollment at the same level as 2020-21.

The court’s assessment essentially concluded that crowded classrooms full of college students posed an environmental threat akin to a highly-polluting highway project, said Jennifer Hernandez, an attorney who often defends developers from CEQA litigation.

Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods has stated that the university, which has increased its enrollment from 31,800 in 2005 to 43,100 last year, has failed to provide adequate housing for students. The group argues students have pushed into the city and impacted housing prices and homelessness in surrounding communities. It has further suggested that the university adjust admissions to let in fewer students from other states and other countries – who pay higher tuition fees than California residents – to admit more locals.

“UC Berkeley students themselves have repeatedly said that UC should stop increasing enrollment until it can provide housing for its students,” said Phil Bokovoy, president of Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods. “We are all very concerned that UC Berkeley will create a housing crisis next fall.”

But critics of the group have countered that while the university should do more to house students – many of whom struggle to find apartments and afford rents in one of the most expensive California regions – Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods shouldn’t be blocking the development of new housing in making that point. Bokovoy, who is a graduate of UC Berkeley himself, has suggested that the university expand elsewhere in the Bay Area.

The university has not yet detailed how it would decide which offers to rescind if the freeze were to go ahead. But it has said the losses in tuition revenue would reduce the university’s capacity to offer financial aid to low-income students and could limit class offerings.

Because many graduate students have already received their admissions letters and because of the number of new admits the university would have to cut down, undergraduate students are expected to be most affected.

Riya Master, a senior at UC Berkeley and the external affairs vice-president for Associated Students of the University of California, a student association, said she worried that lower-income, first-generation and minority students who might have had fewer extra-curricular activities listed on their applications due to the opportunities that were available to them would be disproportionately affected.

Environmental law is “not being used with the intention of protecting the environment. It’s being used to limit access, it’s being used to keep the neighborhood the way an older, primarily white generation wants it to be”, Master said.

In a letter to prospective students, Olufemi Ogundele, director of undergraduate admissions, wrote: “This is unsettling news, we know” and reassured students that the university is working to avoid a reduction in new admits.

The freeze on admissions would come as the demand for seats in the University of California system continues to rise. Applications to the UC schools have soared, especially since the state university system phased out a requirement to submit standardized entrance exam scores. Applications to the schools were also up among Black and Latino Californians. The number of students who took semesters off due to Covid-19 seeking to return to campus this fall will further squeeze the university’s ability to admit new students, UC Berkeley said.

“This is a disaster for the university, and this is a disaster for students,” said Ozan Jaquette, an assistant professor of higher education at the University of California, Los Angeles. “It’s the meanest thing I’ve ever heard.”

For many students, a degree from a highly-regarded public institution is a “big massive engine of social mobility”, he noted, adding that there would not be a way that Berkeley could feasibly reduce admissions to the extent currently required without it affecting students from all backgrounds.

“Trying to use CEQA as a population control statute is a real slippery slope,” said Hernandez, the attorney.

The CEQA, a landmark law initially signed into law in 1970 by then-governor Ronald Regan, has recently been at the center of several high-profile court cases challenging developments. The state’s attorney general has intervened in some cases that use CEQA to challenge new construction in fire-prone wildlands.

But the state’s strict environmental laws are also used to challenge in-fill construction in cities, including affordable housing. Over the past several years, CEQA has been used to delay or block the development of affordable apartments for disabled veterans in Los Angeles and a 500-unit building in housing-crunched San Francisco. Recently, the wealthy Bay Area town of Woodside tried to use the state’s endangered species law to block the construction of new duplexes.

The law can be exploited by people who want, rather than protect California from the effects of climate change and pollution, to preserve “their own personal environment, as they experience it, outside their window when they want to take a quiet nap in the afternoon”, she said.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/us/top-california-university-may-have-to-slash-admissions-after-neighborhood-group-complains/ar-AAU0pAE?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531

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Charlie Kirk, Students Rally Against Chicago Mask Mandate

The history of the COVID pandemic includes a wide range of stories. Many of them explaining the draconian measures taken by governments around the world, in response to erroneous forecasts provided by the “experts”.

Marxist political governors in the U.S. used the temporary emergency powers afforded to them by their state legislatures, to control their populations, similar to past tyrannical fascist dictators such as Stalin and Mussolini.

As more and more data has come out concerning the effectiveness of natural immunity, and as more stories of politicians and elite members of Hollywood flouting the rules they put in place, a strong movement to fight the mask and vaccine mandates is increasing.

For example, last week, a maskless Georgia Democrat Stacey Abrams visited an elementary school, where she required children to cover their faces.

On Wednesday evening, Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk and Illinois students hosted a rally, with a standing-room-only crowd of 1,200 people, at the Arcada Theatre in the Chicago suburb of St. Charles, where he, Chicago-area students, and TPUSA activists gathered in protest of forced masks.

“We know it’s not about public health. We know it’s about control,” Kirk said

https://trendingpolitics.com/tyrants-be-warned-charlie-kirk-students-rally-against-chicago-mask-mandate-ethom/

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Australia: Shorter, fewer school suspensions under controversial behaviour policy

The length of school suspensions will be halved and students cannot be sent home more than three times a year under a new behaviour strategy designed to reduce the high number of sanctions against vulnerable children in NSW public schools.

Parents support the policy, but the teachers union says it will increase safety risks for staff and students by constraining teachers’ ability to manage disruptive and dangerous behaviour.

The changes come amid concerns that 40 per cent of suspensions – including around two-thirds of the hundreds of kindergarten suspensions each year – involve students with disabilities. Indigenous students are also more likely to be sent home from school.

Under the new policy, to begin next term, principals must give a warning – valid for 50 days –if a student’s behaviour is raising the prospect of suspension, and can only send them home immediately if there is a threat to the safety of others.

Students from kindergarten to year 2 can be sent home for a maximum of five days instead of the previous 20, although the government abandoned an earlier plan to ban all suspensions in that age group. A principal must take in the student’s circumstances – including any disability or background of trauma – before making the decision.

A new expulsion process will require schools to give the student and their parents seven days’ warning of a decision and to conduct a risk assessment before the student attends another school. If the risk is too great, the minister can ban the student from the public system.

There are also new rules around the use of so-called restrictive practices such as seclusion, which can only be used in an emergency, and mechanical restraint, which requires parental consent and approval from the student’s medical team.

Education Minister Sarah Mitchell said the new strategy would also come with extra resources, such as behaviour specialists to support schools and training for staff in managing student behaviour.

“Behaviour management in our schools is one of the most important aspects of providing quality education, and we need to get it right,” she said.

“We know that what is currently happening is not working as too many students, particularly those with learning difficulties or from low socio-economic families, are suspended and do not receive the support they need.”

The suspension issue has divided school communities. Parents say students are being suspended for behaviours caused by their disability, but teachers say they don’t have the resources to deal with extreme behaviour that puts other students and staff at risk.

A draft of the policy, released 18 months ago, was welcomed by parent groups but led to tense negotiations with principals and the teachers’ union, who argued it would undermine their ability to protect the safety of staff and students.

One of their chief concerns was the scrapping of a list of grounds for suspension, ranging from physical violence or drug possession - which would result in a long, or 20-day suspension - to continued disobedience or aggressive behaviour, which could lead to a short, 10-day suspension.

The Secondary Principals Council said it had not yet seen the finalised policy so declined to comment.

However, one principal – who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak to the media – said some were angry enough to consider industrial action if their concerns were not met.

The new strategy allows principals to apply to their superior, the regional director, for permission to suspend students for longer than the maximum 10 days, or more often than the three times outlined in the policy.

The Advocate for Children and Young People, Zoe Robinson, welcomed the policy. “We know there is a link between suspensions and youth justice. We welcome this policy reform as a step forward and are glad the department and Minister have worked with and listened to children and young people.”

P&C Federation president Natalie Walker also backed the plan. “This strategy looks to provide a more inclusive and engaging and accessible education for all children and families in NSW public schools.”

Louise Kuchel from Square Peg, Round Whole – a community of parents advocating for children with disabilities – said parents supported reducing the number and length of suspensions but wanted to see them banned for the youngest children.

“Some parents have lost count of how often their kids have been suspended,” she said. “We’re not improving outcomes for young, neurodivergent people when we keep excluding them and sending them away.”

However, the NSW Teachers Federation wrote to the NSW Department of Education on Thursday, warning the policy would increase teachers’ workload and put safety at risk.

“It will constrain the ability of schools to manage and address appropriate student behaviour, denying the vast majority of students a safe and settled learning environment,” deputy president Henry Rajendra told the Herald.

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/shorter-fewer-school-suspensions-under-controversial-behaviour-policy-20220218-p59xu4.html

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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18 February, 2022

A Student Sleuth Found Evidence that Our University Practices Reverse Racism. Here’s Why I Advised Him Not to Publish It

<i>It's stupid enrolling underqualified students in advanced courses.  They will mostly just flunk the courses concerned</I>

At the American university where I teach, one of my assigned tasks is to advise undergraduates—mostly freshmen and sophomores. This essay describes a conversation I had in 2017 with one of those advisees. I will call him Daniel.

Daniel was a sophomore at the time. He had been an advisee of mine for a year already, and I’d come to understand that he was a prodigy. I’d also formed a hypothesis, based on a certain bluntness and lack of social tact he exhibited, that Daniel might be on the autism/Asperger’s spectrum. He seemed weak on interpersonal skills and narrowly, even obsessively, focused on math and science. During his first year of university studies, Daniel had taken a number of upper-level math and physics courses that none of my other advisees had taken, and had earned flat As in almost all of them. His GPA probably would have been a perfect 4.0 if the university had allowed him to take only math and science courses. As it was, it was a 3.85.

At the end of his freshman year, Daniel applied for admission to a competitive honors program that our university runs, but he was rejected. He came to my office to discuss this—or, rather, to complain about it. I soon realized that he was not just disappointed; he was angry. Daniel believed he’d been treated unfairly. He believed he was the victim of reverse racism.

I told Daniel that I understood why he was upset, but I reminded him that the program he’d applied to is highly competitive. The admissions committee presumably received many strong applications. There is always some subjectivity in admissions decisions, I noted, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Subjectivity isn’t the same as unfairness.

Daniel said he wouldn’t be upset if he believed that the applicants who’d been admitted to the program were as strong as him, or stronger. But he said he had reason to believe they were not.

I asked him what he meant by that. He then pulled a laptop out of his backpack and opened up a spreadsheet.

Daniel proceeded to explain that he and a friend had both applied to the same honors program and had both been rejected. Afterwards, they wondered who had been accepted. They scrutinized the social-media accounts of fellow students and found several dozen applicants who’d posted about being accepted. A lot of them, they noticed, were either African American or Hispanic. Daniel and his friend then asked around and identified several dozen students who had been rejected, many of whom were Caucasian or Asian. This made Daniel and his friend suspicious. They decided to create a spreadsheet—the one Daniel was showing me—to organize the data they’d collected; and then they decided to gather more.

Daniel explained that he and his friend wanted to find a measure of academic achievement that they could track statistically. A student’s GPA is not public information, but the Dean’s List is; so they were able to use that as a discrete variable—Dean’s List, yes or no—as a rough proxy for achievement. Daniel explained to me that it would have been better to use a continuous variable (like GPA), but he and his friend had to work with what they had.

Daniel explained that he and his friend had performed various kinds of statistical analysis on the data, and had concluded that admission to the honors program was closely related to Dean’s List status within certain groups. However, there were large differences in acceptance rates across those groups. Overall, he told me, the factor that explained the most variance in admissions outcomes was (as he’d suspected) the race or ethnicity of the applicant. The patterns were quite stark. African Americans who weren’t on the Dean’s List had a better overall chance of being admitted to the honors program than whites or Asians who were on the Dean’s List.

I told him that I thought he might be right about why he hadn’t been accepted into the program. It looked to me like the push for diversity might have been the cause, or at least a key factor, in regard to the decision—though it was impossible to be certain. I then briefly (and perhaps half-heartedly) outlined the usual justification for affirmative-action programs.

But what I emphasized most was that I thought it would be unwise for Daniel to launch a campaign against the admissions committee, even if his data was as strong as he seemed to think it was. I told him that a campaign of the sort he was considering would almost certainly fail. He might get some catharsis out of it in the short run, but it would probably do no good in the long run. The committee was unlikely to revisit its decisions or change its procedures going forward. Support for affirmative action is almost universal among academics. Very few are even willing to express hesitations or second thoughts on this issue, lest they be deemed racists. The people who make these decisions feel good about the people who benefit from affirmative action, and they avert their gaze, as much as possible, from the people who are harmed by it. They might be embarrassed by Daniel and his friend’s data, but they would probably not abandon their approach.

I warned Daniel that I thought his plan might end up doing him a lot of harm. If he chose to make his exposé public, the most likely outcome would be that some student or faculty member would accuse him of being a racist. Publishing his data would probably end up hurting him rather than helping him.

When Daniel heard me use the word “racist,” even in this conjectural, non-accusatory way, he responded angrily. He told me that he was not a racist. He had voted for Democrats in the 2016 election and hated Donald Trump. And as it happens, I had reason to believe this was true. The morning after that election, Daniel had come to visit me in my office, deeply troubled by what a Trump presidency might mean for scientific research and funding.

Daniel told me that he believed affirmative-action policies were justified for college admissions, but he did not think they should be used to filter out qualified applicants to honors programs and graduate programs.

He then spoke for several minutes about his own ethnic background. He reminded me that he was Jewish, and told me that both of his parents had put up with a lot of antisemitic discrimination in their universities and workplaces. Back then, they were regarded as “non-white” and were discriminated against as a result; now (ironically) he was considered “white” and was being discriminated against on that basis.

I listened with real sympathy. The situation seemed unfair to me, too. To be honest, I’ve never been quite clear on how we’re supposed to get over centuries of judging people by their skin color or ethnicity by paying more and more attention to skin color and ethnicity.

In the past few years, in fact, I’ve increasingly had the sense that affirmative action may be backfiring. Policies meant to correct historical iniquities seem to be stoking racial resentment. Like Daniel, I dislike Trump intensely. I don’t have much in common with his followers, and I certainly don’t think of myself as one of them. But I do, increasingly, understand some of the grievances that motivate them. I wish I didn’t, but I do.

In the end, as I’ve mentioned, I didn’t tell Daniel about any of my personal experiences or private thoughts. I assured myself that doing so might be counterproductive: after all, my goal was to calm Daniel down, not rile him up.

I told Daniel that he could still succeed at our university, and get accepted by a top graduate school, even if he never made it into the honors program—as long as he just kept on taking challenging math and science classes and posting good grades. That would carry the day. He would move ahead, while the unqualified would fall by the wayside, unable to do the heavy intellectual lifting that advanced courses required.

https://quillette.com/2022/02/17/a-student-sleuth-found-evidence-that-our-university-practices-reverse-racism-heres-why-i-advised-him-not-to-publish-it/

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UK: Government rolls out ‘guidance’ on teaching racism in schools

The government is rolling out guidance to schools on how to approach teaching racism for the first time, following controversial ministerial intervention in classrooms.

Schools are already required to teach in a politically impartial way, but this instruction from ministers will specifically advise teacher on how to address “sensitive issues”.

The guidance comes after the education secretary, Nadhim Zahawi, waded into a debate over the teaching of anti-racism in Brighton schools last week, and ordered an investigation after becoming “concerned” by non-discriminatory resources being shared with students.

Slides from race training given to teachers in Brighton and Hove schools leaked to The Sunday Telegraph said that “between the ages of three and five, children learn to attach value to skin colour: white at the top of the hierarchy and black at the bottom”.

“Over the last few years, there has been much discussion about political impartiality in schools, often in the context of specific political issues and movements,” the education secretary said of the government’s unique guidance.

“I know that this has at times been difficult for school leaders, teachers, and staff, as they navigate how to handle and teach about these complex issues sensitively and appropriately.

“That is why I’m pleased this government is publishing clear guidance explaining schools’ existing legal duties on political impartiality.”

The manual suggests that the teaching of historical figures should focus on “factual information” about them, and that teaching of the British empire should be presented in “a balanced manner”.

One scenario refers to teaching pupils about racism and cautions that teachers should be aware that campaign groups such as Black Lives Matter “cover partisan political views”.

The recommendations say that “teachers should be clear that racism has no place in our society” when covering this topic with pupils, and should “help pupils to understand facts about this and the law”.

It adds that some campaign groups such as BLM may cover “partisan political views … which go beyond the shared principle that racism is unacceptable, which is a view schools should reinforce”.

“Examples of such partisan political views include advocating specific views on how government resources should be used to address social issues, including withdrawing funding from the police,” it adds.

The guidance says that for recent historical events, “including those which are particularly contentious and disputed, political issues may be presented to pupils”.

It also states: “This includes many topics relating to empire and imperialism, on which there are differing partisan political views, and which should be taught in a balanced manner,” adding that schools should be free to teach pupils about significant political figures, including “those who have controversial and contested legacies”.

But it adds that this may need to be reserved for older pupils, and says that it could be advisable to focus teaching on “what these figures are most renowned for and factual information about them”, if teachers think pupils may not be able to understand the full context of contested information about their lives.

The guidance states that when teachers are discussing the decriminalisation of homosexuality with pupils, they should not present discriminatory beliefs held at the time in an uncritical way, or as though they are acceptable today.

It adds that pupils should not be presented with views that oppose fundamental societal values, such as views denigrating freedom of speech or the democratic process.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/racism-schools-government-guidance-teaching-b2016601.html

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School District’s ‘Equity Specialist’ Admits How They Are Indoctrinating Students

It appears that states like Texas, which has taken steps to try to prevent the advancement of the controversial idea of Critical Race Theory (CRT), may have rushed through their legislation too quickly, leaving gaps in the bill’s language, which those on the left are exploiting.

A former “equity specialist” at a Texas school district admitted that its schools teach through a Critical Race Theory (CRT) “lens,” according to videos obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Jonathan Pérez, a former “Equity Specialist” at Fort Worth Independent School District in Fort Worth, Texas, says the school district teaches through a CRT lens, during an August 2020 equity training session for teachers, according to a video leaked by a teacher and obtained by the DCNF from Carlos Turcios.

Mr. Turcios is an activist who spent four years on FWISD’s Racial Equity Committee and is now an education activist fighting CRT in the district.

“The fact is there are so many … things, policies, practices, procedures, programmings that we have that have been deep … in our system so long that when we really dissect it through a Critical Race Theory lens, is one of the lens that we use, we see how these inequities come up and show up,” Pérez said during the training, according to video footage obtained by the DCNF.

In one of their glaring hypocrisies though, while insisting the culture becomes color blind, they teach those attending their classes to view nearly EVERY interaction with people, in terms of race.

Instead of building people’s self-confidence and skills, which provides them with the best opportunity to compete in the workforce, their racial leadership works to reduce standards, tries to end the traditional merit-based system for determining promotions, and confusingly promotes antiracism by teaching racism against those with “white privilege”.

“Racism shows up on our way to work, on the radio, on the TV shows, again, it shows up in multiple forms,” he said. Peréz added that it reminded him of a tweet he had seen that said “racism is so deeply embedded in our country, that when you protest against it, people think you’re protesting against the United States.”

He said the goal of their racial equity team is “to dismantle institutional and systemic racism” in the district “at the community level, school board level, the district level, the campus level and the student level.”

The district holds an annual “Racial Equity Summit,” where speakers and administrators discuss equity initiatives that FWISD is implementing, but Peréz said you “can’t dismantle a 400 year old racist system in one day or two conversations.”

At the December 2021 FWISD Equity Summit, racial equity consultant Altheria Caldera gave a presentation where she said you should “never be embarrassed to be antiracist” and explained it is “totally okay to be woke,” according to a video of the event shared with the DCNF.

“In fact, you should be embarrassed not to be [antiracist] … school board members and other elected officials … [if] they are hesitant at any point to say that they are antiracist, they don’t need to be in that position,” she said. “Because, if you are not anti-racist, what are you?”

Peréz explained that to “make this kind of change it starts at the very top” with school board members.

“Our school board members passed a racial equity policy that allows us … I don’t want to say allows us, but … gives us the opportunity to bring these conversations to the forefront without the fear of getting in trouble or retaliation,” he said.

“Especially for our white brothers and sisters, when we get into these conversations, it gets so hard that they many times either they just don’t want to listen to it or even for our colleagues of color, students of color, like it’s so hard that people would just rather not deal with it,” he added.

Teaching people to be racists, in their journey to defeat racism, only makes sense to those who immerse their selves in far-left bubbles.

The radical group never leaves the Kool-Aid sessions long enough to see that their views of people with white skin areas anti-Ameican and the abuses people of color experienced based solely on their skin color too.

https://trendingpolitics.com/school-districts-equity-specialist-admits-how-they-are-indoctrinating-students-ethom/

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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17 February, 2022

'The city of San Francisco has risen up!' Three woke school board members are BOOTED OUT in recall election

Three woke San Francisco school board members who invested more time on social justice issues - like the botched renaming of 44 schools - instead of reopening them during the pandemic have been ousted in a rare recall election funded largely in part by Silicon Valley billionaires and millionaires. 

In a hot-button election, 70% of parents in the liberal city voted to recall the board members on Tuesday, according to the San Francisco Department of Elections.  

The school board has seven members, all Democrats, but only three were eligible to be recalled: school board President Gabriela López, Vice President Faauuga Moliga and Commissioner Alison Collins. 

The effort was well-funded by some of Silicon Valley's billionaires and millionaires, led by early Apple investor Arthur Rock, who poured more than $500,000 of his billion-dollar fortune into the recall. PayPal CEO David Sacks - who has three children and opposes mask mandates and school closures - donated $75,000, and venture capitalist Garry Tan donated $26,000.

Among parents' main frustrations were that the school board failed to address reopening schools during the pandemic, and instead focused their efforts on renaming 44 because they claimed they were named after 'problematic' American icons, like Paul Revere and Abraham Lincoln. 

But committee members embarrassed themselves after it was revealed they did not consult historians and used inaccurate Wikipedia entries and other non-scholarly sources to determine which personalities were racist and problematic. 

'The city of San Francisco has risen up and said this is not acceptable to put our kids last,' said Siva Raj, a parent who helped launch the recall effort. 

'Talk is not going to educate our children, it's action. It's not about symbolic action, it's not about changing the name on a school, it is about helping kids inside the school building read and learn math.'

The school board also scrapped merit-based competitive admissions at elite $42,000-a-year Lowell High School, which disadvantaged Asian American students.  

San Francisco Mayor London Breed is now tasked with appointing replacements to the board - who will also likely be Democrats.   

'The voters of this city have delivered a clear message that the school board must focus on the essentials of delivering a well-run school system above all else,' Mayor London Breed, who supported the recall, said in a statement. 'San Francisco is a city that believes in the value of big ideas, but those ideas must be built on the foundation of a government that does the essentials well.'

The election was the first recall in San Francisco since 1983, since a failed attempt to remove then-Mayor Dianne Feinstein after she passed a handgun ban.

Opponents called the recall a waste of time and money, as the district faces a number of challenges including a $125 million budget deficit and the need to replace retiring Superintendent Vincent Matthews.

But parents in the politically liberal city launched the recall effort in January 2021 out of frustration over the slow reopening of district schools, while the board pursued the renaming of 44 school sites and the elimination of merit-based competitive admissions at the elite $42,000-a-year Lowell High School.

The campaign to recall the three school board members attracted major donations from Rock, the 95-year-old billionaire who was an early investor in Intel and Apple; as well as Sacks and Tan. 

Rock, who has an estimated net worth of $1.1billion, has given nearly $400,000 directly to two recall committees, and an additional $150,000 to two political action committees supporting the effort, reported The Daily Beast.

Committee members allegedly used references from Wikipedia and other non-scholarly sources to determine which personalities were racist and problematic. 

Several of those citations has now been proven to be factually incorrect: 

1. One committee member urged that the name of acclaimed American poet James Russell Lowell should be stripped off a high school because a Wikipedia citation stated that he did 'not want black people to vote'.  

However, that claim is false - and scholarly articles assert that Lowell 'unequivocally advocated giving the ballot to the recently freed slave'.

2. The committee concluded that Paul Revere's name should be removed from a middle school after citing an article from the History Channel website. 

Members alleged that Revere's military activities were tied to 'the conquest of the Penobscot Indians', which was untrue. 

3. James Lick - who resided in San Francisco - was also deemed 'racist' after members failed to critically read an article about the famous 19th century businessman. 

The committee stated that Lick had funded a sculpture showing an American Indian lying at the feet of white men. 

However, in actuality, Lick died 18 years before the sculpture was created, and it was only partially funded by his posthumous estate. 

Public records indicate that during the 1980s and 1990s, Rock donated money mainly to Republican candidates and causes, but over the past three decades he has emerged as a major Democratic donor, including to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. 

A major proponent of charter schools, Rock has poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into school board elections in districts from coast to coast, including Los Angeles, Minnesota, New Mexico, Georgia and New York, reported Mission Local.

Additionally, Rock has donated some $12million to charter schools and organizations that promote charter schools all over the country. In San Francisco, the school board has been hostile to the proliferation of charter schools. Opponents of charter schools believe that charters draw the top students from regular public schools, leaving behind the most vulnerable students to be educated, with fewer resources, and reducing the overall quality of public education.  

The second-highest donor to the recall effort in San Francisco is David Sacks, the founding COO of PayPal and general partner at his venture capital fund, Craft Ventures, who contributed $75,000 to push out the three school board members, after bankrolling a failed effort to recall Gov Gavin Newsom. 

Sacks, who has been vocal about his opposition to school closures and mask mandates, tweeted after the vote on Tuesday: 'Every child deserves a high-quality education. School boards and administrators work for parents and students, not the other way round. Competence matters more than ideology. That's what San Francisco voters affirmed tonight.'

Garry Tan, co-founder of Initialized Capital, contributed just over $25,000 to the recall effort. Tan began donating to local elections last year, pouring $50,000 into a campaign to recall the ultra-progressive San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin, who has been widely criticized as being soft-on-crime. 

The mayor, one of the most prominent endorsers of the recall, praised the parents, saying they 'were fighting for what matters most - their children.' 

The pressures of the pandemic and distance learning have made school board races a hot-button topic as frustrations over pandemic measures reach a boiling point. 

In a statement on Wednesday, House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy said that San Francisco parents were standing up to have their voices heard. 

'Over the past two years they have watched liberal school boards in their communities prioritize renaming schools over re-opening classrooms,' he said. 'School boards have used 'equity' and 'social justice' as an excuse to discriminate and lower standards for children. This is exactly what the San Francisco school board did and why three of their members were recalled in a landslide.' 

Many commenters on Twitter greeted the news of the recall with glee, mixed with disbelief. 

'There is hope for #California yet! Mindblowing that this is in #SanFrancisco!' tweeted one user. 'The recall votes were not even close. This was a powerful statement!'

Another weighed in: 'DANG I AM SO HAPPY ABOUT THIS!! SUPER PROUD of California right now....and that is NOT a sentence I ever thought would be coming out of my mouth!'

In San Francisco, one of the nation's most liberal cities, the recall effort split Democrats. Breed, a Democrat, had criticized the school board for being distracted by 'political agendas.'

The ousted board members - Collins, Lopez and Moliga - had defended their records, saying they prioritized racial equity because that was what they were elected to do.

Both sides agreed that San Francisco's school board and the city itself had embarrassed itself under the national spotlight.  

One of the first issues to grab national attention was the board's January 2021 decision to rename 44 schools they said honored public figures linked to racism, sexism and other injustices. On the list were Abraham Lincoln, George Washington and trailblazing US Senator Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat.

Instead of consulting historians to inform their decisions, the committee members used inaccurate Wikipedia entries to justify renaming the schools.

The school board's plan to scrap merit-based admissions at the elite Lowell High School, where most students are Asian, drew ire from local parents

After an uproar, the school board scrapped the plan.

Collins came under fire again for tweets she wrote in 2016 that were widely criticized as racist. In them Collins, who is black, said Asian Americans used 'white supremacist' thinking to get ahead and were racist toward black students.

Racism against Asian Americans has come under a renewed focus since reports of attacks and discrimination escalated with the spread of the coronavirus, which first appeared in late 2019 in Wuhan, China.

Collins said the tweets were taken out of context and posted before she held her school board position. She refused to take them down or apologize for the wording and ignored calls to resign from parents, Breed and other public officials.

Collins turned around and sued the district and her colleagues for $87million, fueling yet another pandemic sideshow. The suit was later dismissed.

Many Asian parents were already angered by the board's efforts to end merit-based admissions at the elite Lowell High School, where Asian students are the majority.

As a result, many Asian American residents were motivated to vote for the first time in a municipal election. The grassroots Chinese/API Voter Outreach Task Force, which formed in mid-December, said it registered 560 new Asian American voters.

Ann Hsu, a mother of two who helped found the task force, said many Chinese voters saw the effort to change the Lowell admissions system as a direct attack.

'It is so blatantly discriminatory against Asians,' she said. In the city's Chinese community, Lowell is viewed as a path children can take to success.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10519279/Three-woke-San-Francisco-school-board-members-ousted-rare-recall-election.html

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Now woke headteacher who banned punishments and shouting at children forces pupils to go VEGETARIAN 'to stop climate change'

Parents have blasted a 'ludicrous' rule forcing pupils at a primary school to become vegetarian to 'help the planet'.

Barrowford Primary School in Lancashire has banned meat from lunchboxes and its canteen in order to educate children about the environmental impact of eating animals.

The rule was introduced last year, but parents were not told until a letter was sent out by the school on Thursday. 

In the letter, headteacher Rachel Tomlinson said she had made the decision in order to 'stop climate change'.

She cited the carbon footprint caused by the livestock industry and that meat and dairy products 'come at a huge environmental cost.'   

But parents have reacted with fury, with one mother threatening to move her daughter to a different school. 

Barrowford Primary School was branded 'inadequate' by Ofsted in 2015 - the office's lowest possible rating, before achieving a 'good' rating just one year later.

Tomlinson at the time received widespread criticism for her controversial approach which prevented teachers from raising their voices and removed all punishments for misbehaving students.

Zoe Douglas told The Sun that the meat-free rule was 'a joke'.

She said: 'I think they forget that non-meat eaters and vegans have to take a lot of supplements.

'What supplements they getting instead at that school? Nothing, probably saving on food costs.'

Another parent, who wished to remain anonymous, said children should not be forced to give up meat.

'Vegetarian is a choice for when they are older. Why not accommodate the veggies, vegans, whatever and add to the menu instead of making our kids adapt?

'And to request parents pack lunches that are veggie as well, not to mention the local farmers, this is absolutely ludicrous.' 

Tim Bonner, chief executive of the Countryside Alliance, told MailOnline that schools should 'stay well clear' of banning meat.

He said: 'It is increasingly clear that decisions to ban meat have become political statements used by some local authorities, which have nothing to do with the environment.

'Schools should obviously stay well clear of going down that route.

'While providing youngsters with the knowledge of how food is sourced and talking about balanced diets should be encouraged, it must not be up to individual head teachers to dictate whether or not meat can be consumed by its pupils.

'That decision must come down to parents and guardians and them alone.

Barrowford Primary School's 'inadequate' 2015 Ofsted rating 

Awarding the school the worst rating, Gill Jones, lead inspector said: 'Teaching is inadequate. 

'Staff expectations of what pupils can achieve are not high enough.

'Behaviour requires improvement. In lessons, pupils do not always concentrate on what they are doing and are too easily distracted.

'The teaching of reading is ineffective.

'In some classes, the weaker readers read aloud too infrequently to an adult and young children are not prepared for the curriculum.'

The school later regained its 'Good' rating in 2016, but it is unclear whether Tomlinson continued her controversial approach in scrapping all punishments for misbehaviour.

'Schools would be better off teaching the value of sourcing nutritious, sustainable meat produce from local farmers and could benefit from listening to those stalwarts of our countryside directly.'   

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10515015/Fury-primary-school-bans-MEAT-lunchboxes-canteen-Parents-blast-ludicrous-rule.html

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Leader Of California Teachers Union Insists On Masking Children, Attends Rams Game Maskless

California residents tend to roll with what’s trendy. And right now, it’s en vogue to support mask mandates, especially for children, while ignoring such mandates for yourself.

The most noteworthy current fashionistas in the state are people in positions of power. And that group now includes Jesse Aguilar, a member of the California Teachers Association Board of Directors, who was photographed without a mask at the Rams’ NFC Championship Game in late January.

Aguilar deemed it unnecessary to wear a mask, though he’s part of a teachers association that recently called to keep children wearing masks in schools.

A Twitter account for fed-up parents of students in Los Angeles public schools, @UTLAUncensored, blasted Aguilar on Monday evening, posting his maskless photo and the following message:

“This California Teachers Association Board of Directors Member, Jesse Aguilar, isn’t interested in a ‘cautious’ approach for adults, only our kids. This is Jesse Aguilar. He went to NFC championship game with 70k strangers – he is #DoneWithCovid but his Union wants kids masked.”

Aguilar’s hypocrisy is just the latest example of “rules for thee, not for me” amongst the CA elite. LA mayor, Eric Garcetti, also attended the NFC Championship and insisted he was “holding his breath” when a photograph of his maskless mug at the game surfaced and went viral on social media.

California governor Gavin Newsom posed maskless at the same Rams game attended by Aguilar and Garcetti, but assured everyone he only did so briefly for the photo op.

On Sunday, roughly 70,000 strangers, including Garcetti and a who’s who of A-list celebrities, attended the Super Bowl maskless, while children throughout California returned to school in masks on Monday.

Predictably, after he was caught maskless, Aguilar refused to except any blame and blatantly lied about his surroundings.

“This person wants to know where my mask was. It was in my pocket. I took it off for the picture. There was nobody in front of me,” Aguilar said via a since deleted Facebook post. “I’m glad to wear my mask in a pandemic. It’s not hard and it shows I care about the people around me. I was glad SoFi required proof of vaccination. Getting vaccinated is the sane thing to do in a pandemic. I’m glad sane people behave in a sane manner in an insane time. Where’s your mask?”

It’s just a shame they don’t (yet) make trendy masks for the lower half of the body. Aguilar could use one to hide his bullshit.

https://www.outkick.com/leader-of-california-teachers-union-insists-on-masking-children-attends-rams-game-maskless/

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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16 February, 2022

Does a Teacher Have a Right to Refuse to Call a Girl a Boy? Virginia’s Supreme Court May Decide

In 2018, a female student told teacher Peter Vlaming that she was transgender and wanted to be called by a masculine name. He agreed to call his student by the new name, but explained to the principal that he could not in good conscience use male pronouns for a female student. He was fired. (Photo: Alliance Defending Freedom)

A Virginia teacher was fired for refusing to call a girl a boy. Now, the state’s Supreme Court has the opportunity to decide whether a local school board violated the teacher’s legal rights.

A lawyer for French teacher Peter Vlaming asked Tuesday that the Virginia Supreme Court take up the case, Vlaming v. West Point School Board. 

“No government can force any Virginian to express messages that violate their core beliefs,” Chris Schandevel told The Daily Signal after arguing for Vlaming before Virginia’s highest court.

Schandevel, a lawyer with the Christian legal organization Alliance Defending Freedom, asked the court “to reinstate the lawsuit that [Vlaming] filed in state trial court,” which dismissed the case without explanation last August.  

As previously reported by The Daily Signal, the West Point School Board fired Vlaming in December 2018 after he declined to use male pronouns to refer to a female student who identified as a transgender male. 

Almost a year later, Vlaming filed a lawsuit against the West Point School Board for breach of contract, arguing that the body violated his rights under the Virginia Constitution. 

“Mr. Vlaming was not fired for something he said; he was fired for something that he could not say based on his religious beliefs,” Schandevel argued Tuesday. 

“This is a case about compelled speech,” he said. 

Lawyers for the West Point School Board did not present an argument before the Virginia Supreme Court.

Before being terminated, Vlaming taught French for seven years at West Point High School, about 40 miles east of Richmond. 

In 2018, the female student in question gave the teacher a letter saying she was transgender and wanted to be called by a new masculine name. Vlaming agreed to call the student by the new name, but explained to his principal that he “couldn’t in good conscience pronounce masculine pronouns to refer to a girl,” he told The Daily Signal during an interview in 2020. 

Vlaming said he tried to avoid using female pronouns with the student, but in the fall of 2018, he accidentally called the student “she” in front of the class. The same day, Vlaming was called to his principal’s office and put on administrative leave. 

Superintendent Laura Abel said Vlaming could return to teach at West Point High if he would use male pronouns proactively to refer to the female student. Vlaming again explained that he could not in good conscience refer to a female as a male. 

Abel recommended that Vlaming be fired, and the school board voted 5-0 to terminate him. 

Vlaming loved teaching and was well liked by students. Some students spoke out in his defense after he was fired. 

“I had huge support—students who truly came to my side and parents who came to my side to encourage me, to express their support,” Vlaming told “The Daily Signal Podcast” during a September 2021 interview. 

His lawyer says that Vlaming, a father of four, has not been able to find a job at another public school because of his termination. He is seeking $1 million in damages. 

If the Virginia Supreme Court takes up Vlaming’s case, arguments likely would be scheduled for the fall, Schandevel said. 

“We’re very optimistic that they’re going to take the case,” Schandevel said. “And once they do take the case, we’re likewise equally optimistic that they will rule in Peter’s favor.”  

In America, “protections for free speech and for free exercise of religion are just foundational for the functioning of our democracy,” Schandevel told The Daily Signal, “and this is a very important case to affirm that for all Virginians.”

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/02/15/does-a-teacher-have-a-right-to-refuse-to-call-a-girl-a-boy-virginias-supreme-court-may-decide

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San Diego County School Retracts ‘Wheel of Privilege’ Teaching Tool

A school in San Diego County claims it has removed a “Wheel of Privilege” graphic from its professional development training materials after the image was exposed on social media and parents objected.

The image was touted as part of professional development training by the Black Mountain Middle School in Poway Unified School District (PUSD), according to the Californians For Equal Rights Foundation (CFER), whose executive director posted the graphic on Twitter.

The “Wheel of Power/Privilege” teaching tool was designed to rank people by power and privilege based on skin color, body size, and gender identity, as well as citizenship, language, wealth, and other factors.

CFER stated in a Feb. 9 newsletter that it was “alarmed by such a such divisive narrative, rooted in critical race theory (CRT) and intended for middle-schoolers.”

“We exposed the issue on social media. In the meantime, PUSD parents and residents contacted the school leadership to demand explanations,” CFER stated.

The school’s principal, Scott Corso, indicated in an email sent to a parent on Feb. 7 that the graphic was shared as one idea at a Big IDEA (Inclusion, Diversity Equity Awareness) committee meeting “for a future professional growth day with educators.” The virtual meeting was open to the public.

“After further reflection on feedback received and working with Shawntanet Jara, PUSD Director of Equity and Improvement, we have modified our activities. We have decided not to use the graphic entitled ‘Wheel of Privilege,’ nor the video related to intersectionality,” Corso said in the email obtained by The Epoch Times.

Corso claimed in the email that the school is not teaching CRT.

“We have no interest in promoting Critical Race Theory. That is not our intent,” he wrote. “Our intent, as educators, is to examine our own personal biases in order to support all students and be the most inclusive school we can be.”

CFER disagrees.

“While the education establishment stubbornly denies their engagement with CRT, mounting evidence shows otherwise,” CFER stated in its newsletter.

“By now, it’s a moot point,” Wenyuan Wu, CFER’s executive director, told The Epoch Times on Feb. 9.

“We’re not talking about teaching critical race theory as a legal doctrine or legal hypothesis. We’re talking about propagating and inculcating key tenets of critical race theory such as race essentialism, intersectionality, and anti-racism as a bandage or solution to all observed problems in our society,” Wu said.

The claim CRT isn’t being promoted or is not “widely taught” in California schools is more than just an argument of semantics, Wu suggested. Rather, she contends, it’s a deliberate subversive tactic the “education establishment” commonly uses to hide from parents that they’re teaching “pseudoscientific ideas” based on the tenets of CRT to their children.

“Call it whatever you want. Call it Mickey Mouse. It does not change the fact that it’s teaching or indoctrinating our kids with very bad illiberal and un-American ideas about race in our society,” Wu said.

CFER sees the removal of the “Wheel of Power/Privilege” as small victory in its battle against CRT concepts. It encourages a “robust rebuttal to the narrative of victimhood and disempowerment.”

The next Big IDEA meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, Feb. 15 at 6 p.m. on Zoom, Corso said in the email.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/san-diego-county-school-retracts-wheel-of-privilege-teaching-tool_4271285.html

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Maryland Legislature Considers Creating ‘Advisory Council’ to Collect Data on Homeschoolers

If we have learned anything about left-wing cultural revolutionaries over the past few years and decades, it’s that they insist that all conform to their view of “diversity.”

All are welcome, except for those who disagree.

That’s why it’s so troubling to see government authorities rope in, and attempt to control, people attempting to maintain their independence.

Maryland Delegate Sheila Ruth, a Baltimore County Democrat, recently proposed legislation in the Maryland House of Delegates that would create a deeply worrisome “advisory council” to watch over and gather data on homeschool families.

The 16-seat council would be staffed by four political appointees, four government officials, and eight members of the homeschool community. It would “gather information on the needs of homeschool parents and homeschool umbrella schools,” and would effectively sweep homeschool parents under the wing of a government agency.

This is precisely the sort of thing many homeschool parents wanted to avoid when they chose that path for their children in the first place.

Bethany Mandel, a conservative writer and homeschool mother living in Maryland, raised the alarm about this legislation and called out Ruth on Twitter.

In a message to The Daily Signal, Mandel explained why the legislation is so troubling. 

The advisory council—whatever its current stated intent—could easily be used to browbeat homeschool families.

“They’ll pass more restrictive rules on us and say, ‘It was suggested by homeschooling families themselves! We have a council!’ (That they chose.),” Mandel wrote.

The Home School Legal Defense Association, a legal support group for homeschoolers based in neighboring Virginia, also warned about the potential for abuse by the proposed advisory board.

“This bill would create a quasi-official source for information on homeschooling, which would, in turn, minimize the effectiveness of grassroots homeschool groups and individual advocates,” HSLDA noted in a statement.

Homeschooling has thrived for decades without government assistance. Instead of creating a new bureaucratic entity to gather information on the needs of homeschool programs, HSLDA encourages government entities and actors to respect homeschooling programs by preserving liberty and avoiding unnecessary regulation.

The legislation was so worrisome that a group of members of the Maryland General Assembly called for the bill to be withdrawn.

The letter said that the advisory board would put an enormous amount of power in the hands “of just a few partisan political appointees” and that a 16-person advisory panel in no way could represent the diverse opinions of homeschool families in Maryland.

A Change.org petition calling on Ruth to withdraw HB 832 is seeking 2,500 signatures, and as of this writing, it has garnered nearly 1,700.

As troubling as the legislation is, it’s not happening in a vacuum.

Another piece of legislation, introduced in January, demonstrates the radical plans in store for the state’s public schools. House Bill 352 aims to create an American Studies and Social Equity Standards Advisory Board.

The purpose of the bill would be to redirect examinations of history in schools to be framed around race and ethnicity.

It essentially would mandate a laundry list of diversity, equity, and inclusion requirements for public schools in the state. One of the bill’s sponsors said it wasn’t “a critical race theory bill,” which is almost laughable. This legislation uses almost every buzzword imaginable related to critical race theory, just without literally saying “critical race theory.”

Clearly, Maryland legislators think their constituents are stupid. 

Just as bad, evidence suggests that they will leave no stone unturned to bring leftist indoctrination to every K-12 public school student in the state.

It isn’t just happening at the state level.

Maryland’s largest school district, Montgomery County Public Schools, is going through an “Antiracist System Audit.” The interim superintendent, Monifa McKnight, recently released an update, announcing that Montgomery County school curriculums will now all flow “through an antiracist lens,” especially in social studies.

This comes from the Montgomery County Public Schools website:

This summer, a cross-office team was charged with creating a long-term plan to transform curriculum and develop interconnected and interdisciplinary learning experiences for students, PreK-12 that strengthens students’ sense of racial, ethnic, and tribal identities, helps students understand and resist systems of oppression, and empowers students to see themselves as change agents.

What this is effectively announcing is that the public schools are for the revolution, one based on racial essentialism, and they will be indoctrinating your kids to be loyal foot soldiers in the cause.

Oh, but weren’t we informed by left-wing media commentators that critical race theory isn’t in schools, and that it’s just a figment of our imaginations?

The fact is, this sort of pedagogy is being introduced and enforced around the country. The left-wing media can spin and twist and try to deny it, but parents are catching on to this being the reality.

That matters very much when considering Maryland’s proposed homeschool advisory board. Given the transformation of institutions—especially public schools—into engines of wokeness, it’s not hard to see how malicious such a governmental board could become.

An agency constructed to “gather information” and staffed by political appointees could quickly turn into a governmental hammer to bludgeon homeschool parents into looping their children into the cult of diversity, equity, and inclusion.

It should be no surprise that this effort comes as parents around the country have begun to protest the curriculums and policies of public schools, both for their embrace of critical race theory—or whatever they want to call its associated ideas—and absurdly restrictive COVID-19 policies.

The left’s attitude is that they have an inherent right to indoctrinate your children. Any attempt to stop them from doing so, from within the public school system or from without, is treated as illegitimate.

That’s why what’s happening in Maryland is so concerning and a sign of things to come.

They want you and your family to comply with the cultural revolution that’s sweeping our institutions. They won’t let you go. They don’t want you to have a choice until all your choices are the same.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/02/13/maryland-legislature-considers-creating-advisory-council-to-collect-data-on-homeschoolers

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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15 February, 2022

School Assigns Seventh Graders to Read Novel Glamorizing Illegal Immigration

A Virginia parent says his seventh grade daughter was assigned to read a book meant to “elicit sympathy” for illegal immigrants. 

At the end of January, Michael Erickson’s daughter and her classmates were assigned the 2007 novel “Crossing the Wire” by Will Hobbs. 

The novel promotes a “leftist-leaning philosophy that we should just open up the borders and take whoever we want,” Erickson told The Daily Signal during a phone interview Tuesday. 

Erickson’s daughter, whom he prefers not to name, attends Katherine Johnson Middle School in Fairfax, Virginia, about 20 miles west of Washington, D.C. 

When he learned about the reading assignment for English class, Erickson did some research on Hobbs’ novel, which tells the story of 15-year-old Victor Flores and his harrowing journey north from Mexico to cross the border into America. 

The novel depicts Flores’ goal as to find work and support his impoverished family. The boy hops trains, stows away in vehicles, and walks miles in the desert. 

In his initial email Feb. 1 to his daughter’s English teacher, Erickson said, he took issue with the reading assignment because the novel relays this message: “Mexicans should be allowed to flood over the borders and into America, and we should feel sorry for them.” 

Erickson told The Daily Signal that the purpose of the class is to “examine story development, and character development, and structure, and plot.” He added that the course itself is “laudable, just the selection of the book was … outside of what I felt was appropriate.” 

Perhaps his daughter and the rest of the class could be “assigned an alternate book assignment to read that is more appropriate?” Erickson asked the teacher.

In reply, he received an email the following morning from the middle school’s principal, Tammara Silipigni, informing him that an assistant principal, Michele Johnson, would talk with him over the phone about the situation. 

When Erickson spoke with Johnson Feb. 2, the father requested that the English class be assigned to read a different book. 

The assistant principal told him that it was possible for his daughter to be assigned another novel, Erickson recalled, but that the rest of the class would continue reading “Crossing the Wire.”

When he asked Johnson whether other parents would be informed about the novel and given the option of their child reading a different book, Erickson said, the assistant principal said no. 

The public school’s curriculum and what’s taught to students are “shrouded in secrecy,” Erickson told The Daily Signal. 

Even when his daughter was doing virtual learning at home during the pandemic, Erickson said, her school lacked “transparency on what our children were being taught, which is a real sticking point with me, because except by accident, parents … are never provided an opportunity to understand what their kids are being indoctrinated in and taught, etc.” 

Erickson filed a formal complaint with Fairfax County Public Schools, asking that Johnson Middle School reconsider the assignment. 

Just before publication of this report, Silipigni emailed Erickson Thursday morning and told him that his daughter’s English class had been shifted to a writing assignment while his request for reconsideration of the book assignment moves forward. 

Johnson Middle School did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment on Erickson’s account of what happened. 

Illegal immigration remains a hotly contested issue for Americans as the Biden administration transports into the nation’s interior tens of thousands of migrants who cross the southern border unlawfully. 

U.S. Customs and Border Patrol reports that monthly arrests at the border number in the hundreds of thousands, “a 30-year high,” former State Department official Dan Negrea and James Carafano, vice president for national security and foreign policy at The Heritage Foundation, wrote in a recent commentary. (The Daily Signal is the multimedia news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.)

Unless “media attention is brought to bear” on what is occurring in public schools, “then nothing changes and nothing is affected,” Erickson told The Daily Signal. 

“Everybody’s complaints or objections [are] shooed away to the side,” he said, and the schools “continue to storm forward doing whatever they want.”

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/02/10/school-assigns-seventh-graders-to-read-novel-glamorizing-illegal-immigration

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Ethnic Studies is Anti-American Racist Nonsense.  American History IS Black History

Kevin Jackson

Once, I accidentally discovered a black history book in my school’s library. It must have been a “God-thang”, as we say in the vernacular.

As I thumbed through that book, I was overwhelmed at the things blacks accomplished. But as I read, I never felt slighted that my school wasn’t teaching me “black history”. I already felt empowered as an American; yes, a black American. And to see things specific to how blacks helped form America made me even more proud.

I would have loved to learn more specifically about the history of blacks in America. Nevertheless, I understood that my history classes were glimpses of history. Perhaps these stories were told from a particular perspective that favored whites. But such is history.

It was white men who discovered what would become America. And while their tactics were questionable by today’s standards, their actions built the best country in the world.

These days however, Leftists look at history in retrospect. They teach about an oppressive America, created by colonializing indigenous peoples. To this I say, “Who gives a sh*t! America is the best country in the world…period.”

Whatever got America to this point is ok by me. All countries have their bugaboos.

In a few hundred years, America has demonstrated its ability to overcome all our ills. Regardless, Leftists want to focus on America’s supposed ills, while wholly ignoring all the great things this country has given the world; like the mosaic of our people.

As Politico reported:, school districts have been attempting to divide America along racial lines.

In 2006, Tucson Unified School District’s Mexican American studies curriculum was relatively unknown. The program — a series of middle and high school classes highlighting Mexican American contributions to U.S. history and culture — had shown promise in lifting Latino students out of lower test score brackets and boosting graduation rates. Only a handful of detractors had shown up at school board meetings to grouse about the curriculum’s race-focused teachings.

Again, I have no problem with having Mexican kids learn about their historic contribution to America. The problem is the indoctrination these ethnic studies programs teach.

The article showcases the real agenda of these programs:

Then, Jonathan Paton, a Republican lawmaker representing Tucson at the time, got ahold of a recording of labor organizer and Chicano rights icon Dolores Huerta telling an auditorium of Tucson High School students, “Republicans hate Latinos.” Suddenly, GOP lawmakers in Phoenix were decrying “Raza Studies,” as the program was known, as a plot to indoctrinate children with ideas about white people as racists and people of color as their victims. (“Raza” is Spanish for “race,” though the teachers who adopted the name said the intended translation was more akin to “the people.”)

A legislative panel ordered school administrators to defend the program at the state capitol in Phoenix, with one lawmaker accusing the district of running a “sweatshop for liberalism.” By 2008, lawmakers were setting their sights on banning TUSD’s Mexican American studies program altogether with a bill to prohibit classes from teaching beliefs that “denigrate American values.”

“Organizations that spew anti-American or race-based rhetoric have no place,” Russell Pearce, a Republican representative who sponsored the first attempt to outlaw the classes, said at a 2008 hearing. “We ought to be celebrating unity as Americans and not allowing, with taxpayer dollars, these organizations.”

Thank God Russell Pearce noticed what Leftists have been trying to hide for some time. Leftists are divisive racists. And like a wolf in sheep’s clothing, they do it all in the name of unity. As if we’re too dumb to catch on.

https://theblacksphere.net/2022/02/ethnic-studies-is-anti-american-racist-nonsense/

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Wait, What? Colleges Now Offering Counseling If You Heard Free Speech?

The Colorado State University (CSU) has 17 different departments to those “affected by a free speech event” that seeking help, they said.

These indicators learn, “If you happen to (or somebody you recognize) are affected by a free speech occasion on campus, listed below are some assets…” The signal then lists 17 departments/assets that each the scholars and college can contact if they’ve been triggered by free speech on CSU’s campus.

The following are on the list of where these so-called affected students can reach out for help are the Dean of Students, Office of Equal Opportunity, Multicultural Counseling, Incidents of Bias Reporting, the Office of Equal Opportunity, the Vice President of Inclusive Excellence, and a Victim’s Assistance Hotline.

CSU is validating the self-victimization of young adults and encouraging students to fear free speech and think of it as dangerous. Instead of preparing its students for the real world, the university is teaching its students that different opinions are negative things and instead of being intelligent confronted and/or dealt with, they should instead seek counseling.

This image was initially posted to Instagram by Turning Point USA’s local chapter. The conservative student organization accused the school of intolerance with the caption, “And we haven’t even had an event yet gotta love the intolerance of @coloradostateuniversity”

Back in October, CSU sent out an email threatening to arrest the unvaccinated students if they are caught on school property without first submitting proof of vaccination or being approved for a vaccine exemption.

In a statement with Fox News, CSU spokesperson said that “CSU is committed to Free Speech as both a legal protection and a foundation of the robust debate that is core to higher education, we also recognize the power of speech to impact people deeply, and we are committed to supporting all of our students. The sign is a list of some of the many resources available to our students. It is not related to any event in particular, but rather is intended to share resources knowing that protected speech will always, and must always, be part of higher education.”

https://theinformedamerican.net/wait-what-colleges-now-offering-counseling-if-you-heard-free-speech/

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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14 February, 2022

Leftist Educators Brainwashing Kids: MLK Legacy Destroyed. Is the Dream Salvageable?

“The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.

Those thought-provoking words are from Martin Luther King’s contribution to his 1947 Morehouse College newspaper entitled, “The Purpose of Education.”  His words encapsulated what many would come to define as education’s essential functions. After all, wasn’t it the dream of every parent to see their children achieve that which they themselves could not? As a result, for many years, we have entrusted our offspring to a system of learning with teachers who could take our children beyond our own limitations.

At one time, most of us took solace in leaving our kids in the hands of a system we trusted. Yet, over the last quarter-century, the trust has wained. Today, a great many parents are not so certain the U.S. education system is “building character.”

The NY Post Reveals A Stark Classroom Reality

In a recent article by the NY Post, editorialist Paul Sperry offers this: “An elite Manhattan school is teaching white students as young as 6 that they’re born racist and should feel guilty benefiting from “white privilege”, while heaping praise and cupcakes on their black peers.

Bank Street has created a “dedicated space” in the school for “kids of color,” where they’re “embraced” by minority instructors and encouraged to “voice their feelings” and “share experiences about being a kid of color,” according to school presentation slides obtained by The Post.”  Meanwhile, Sperry goes on to write, “… white kids are herded into separate classrooms and taught to raise their “awareness of the prevalence of whiteness and privilege,” challenge “notions of colorblindness (and) assumptions of ‘normal,’ ‘good,’ and ‘American’” and “understand and own European ancestry and see the tie to privilege.”

In her 2020 New York Post opinion piece, “Public schools are teaching our children to hate America,” Mary Kay Linge quotes education scholar Michael J. Petrilli:  “In many schools, you are more likely to encounter the 1619 [project] or [Howard] Zinn version of history than anything positive,” he said. “We’re telling our young people that America is racist and oppressive and has only failed over the years to do right by the most vulnerable, rather than that we were founded with incredible ideals that we have sometimes failed to live up to.”

Are these articles anomalies? Should we be concerned? Is there any correlation between these “teachings” and the rise in youth violence?

When it comes to such questions, the answers are no, yes, and absolutely

According to Childrensdefense.org:

In 2019 – 696,620 children were arrested in the U.S.

A child or teen was arrested every 45 seconds despite a 62 percent reduction in child arrests between 2009 and 2019.

During the 2015-2016 school year alone, there were over 61,000 school arrests and 230,000 referrals to law enforcement, largely overrepresented by students with disabilities, Black students, and Indigenous students.

The prioritization of police over mental health professionals in schools often leads to the criminalization of typical adolescent behavior and fuels the school-to-prison pipeline. Today, fourteen million students attend schools with police but no counselor, nurse, psychologist, or social worker.

For the future of our children, the writing is on the wall.

Many of us as parents have allowed those teaching erroneous and revisionist history to taint the baton of academia long before even passing it on. As Kevin Jackson explains, leftists look at history in retrospect. They teach about an oppressive America, leaving out the context that created an amazing country.

Somewhere along the way, we have made the tragic segue from teaching children how to think as Dr. King suggests, to telling them what to think. This is not training our children to think for themselves as future adults.  We can no longer pretend to fool ourselves. This is not teaching and strengthening our children’s minds; this is indoctrination that cripples young minds.

These are the world’s contributions to the delinquency of our minors.

https://theblacksphere.net/2022/02/leftist-educators-brainwashing-kids-mlk-legacy-destroyed/

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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute says Alabama school system's 'disconcerting' response to complaints from a Jewish student about a teacher who asked class to perform Nazi salute shows lack of commitment to diversity

The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute has called an Alabama school system's response to complaints from a Jewish student that a teacher had classmates perform a Nazi salute 'disconcerting' and that it shows a lack of commitment to diversity. 

While Mountain Brooks Schools issued a statement saying it was 'deeply apologetic for the pain' caused by a lesson that 'lacked sensitivity,' the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute questioned actions taken by the system.  

In a story first reported by the Birmingham-based Southern Jewish Life, a Jewish student said he was shocked last month when a history teacher at Mountain Brook High School had classmates stand and give a stiff-armed Nazi salute during a lesson on the way symbols change. The teacher has not been identified.

The student, Ephraim Tytell, said school officials reprimanded him and told him to apologize to the teacher after he shared a video and photos of the incident on social media. Tytell said he refused.

Tytell, the only Jewish student in the 11th-grade history class, and several of his classmates refused to stand. 'I felt upset, unsure of what's going on. Just kind of shocked,' Tytell told CBS 42. 

'They proceeded to tell me that I'm making Mountain Brook look bad for uploading the video and sharing it and asked me to apologize to my teacher, which I refused to,' he said. 

'The day after, he made our class, and our class only, put up our phones and he moved me from sitting in the back of the class to right next to him.' 

The lesson was said to be intended to show how symbols change by demonstrating that something very similar to what's now widely known as a Nazi salute was used before World War II to salute the U.S. flag. 

The 'Bellamy Salute' was ditched in 1942 for the right-hand-over-the-heart gesture following the United States' entry into the second world war. 

The population of Mountain Brooks is 97 percent white with a median household income of $152,355, making it the state's wealthiest suburb, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. 

Mountain Brooks school system was previously ruled one of the top three most segregated school systems in the country, according to the nonprofit EdBuild. 

On Tuesday, the school system issued a statement saying the video and photos shared online 'are not representative of the lesson' and that no one tried to teach students how to do a Nazi salute.

With blowback continuing, the system followed up with a more conciliatory statement on Thursday, that said in part: 'There are more effective ways to teach this subject without recreating painful, emotional responses to history's atrocities.'

'To improve our instructional strategies, we will continue to work with the Alabama Holocaust Education Center to advance training for our teachers surrounding Antisemitism, the Holocaust and its symbols,' the statement said. 

The school system said it stands 'absolutely and unequivocally' against antisemitism. 

The Birmingham Jewish Federation said the district's follow-up statement was a 'direct result' of conversations it had with leaders of the school system. 

School officials 'fully recognize and understand the insensitivity of the instruction in the classroom that day and the absence of a safe space for learning for the students,' the Jewish organization said.

William Galloway, a spokesman for Mountain Brooks Schools, said it was against system policy to comment on whether the teacher remained in the classroom.

'Understanding the sensitive nature of this subject, Mountain Brook Schools has addressed the instructional strategy used with the teacher and does not condone the modeling of this salute when a picture or video could accurately convey the same message,' the school system's statement said.  

Mountain Brook Listens, a group that works to promote diversity in the virtually all-white city of 22,000, issued a statement saying the incident showed the need for more resources, education and training on understanding implicit biases, building empathy and acting with more compassion.

'And our entire community, including our school system, must foster an environment where people feel safe to report behavior that they are concerned about and certainly not create an environment that cultivates any ''fear of reprisal,''' it said.

Last year, Mountain Brook's school system responded to community complaints about a diversity program produced by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) by dropping the lessons. Schools had begun using the material after anti-Semitic events, including a video of a student with swastikas drawn on his body.  

Opponents claimed the lessons focused too much on race and gender and criticized the ADL as being too political.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10506009/Birmingham-Civil-Rights-Institute-says-Alabama-school-shows-lack-commitment-diversity.html

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Australian university bosses order review of perfect university entrance scoress after IB students beat iconic James Ruse school

<i>Lenient marking has been widely used as a response to pandemic difficulties and IB markers may have gone a bit too far.  But how to mark during extensive classroom absences is not an easy dilemma to solve</i>

Powerful university chiefs have ordered a review of International Baccalaureate results amid concerns that overly generous marking gave private schools an ATAR advantage after more than one in 20 IB students in NSW achieved 99.95 last year.

The surprising results have upset some school principals, parents and many in the broader education sector, who worry that inflated IB results could undermine the fairness of the HSC. Students with top ranks gain access to the most sought-after degrees in the state, such as law and medicine.

The IB is offered in only some NSW private schools and is often part of the school’s marketing. It is not offered in public schools. Former HSC boss Tom Alegounarias said the most disadvantaged students suffered when “financial privilege” played a role in school-leaving credentials.

“There is no clearer ethical responsibility than to treat all students equally, and our universities are failing at it here,” he said.

But a spokeswoman for the IB said the organisation’s priority was to ensure students were not disadvantaged when applying for university during the pandemic.

Last year fewer than 600 NSW students sat the IB diploma, but at least 41 of them achieved the highest possible university entrance rank, compared with just 35 across the whole country the year before. Of 55,000 HSC students eligible for ATARs, only 48 achieved the same 99.95.

Twelve of the IB top achievers were from a single, non-selective girls’ school, and nine were from a non-selective boys’ school. Just five students from the highly selective James Ruse Agricultural High – the state’s top school for the past 26 years – achieved the same rank by doing the HSC.

The NSW Vice Chancellors’ Committee has asked the University Admissions Centre (UAC) – which it owns – to investigate the sharp rise in so-called perfect scores, a number of sources told the Herald on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak publicly. IB students’ ranks will not be affected.

The university chiefs are concerned about so-called grade inflation, which involves awarding higher marks than in the past for the same standard of work.

“As we saw with the HSC, changes were made to IB assessment procedures in consideration of the pandemic and this may have impacted on their scores,” the UAC’s head of marketing and engagement, Kim Paino, said. “But we will continue to monitor IB results to ensure that our conversion remains fair.”

The IB was generous in its marking of Northern Hemisphere exams last May, giving out quadruple the number of top marks as it had on average over the previous four years.

The number of top IB ranks does not affect the number of top ranks given to HSC students, but it does secure them spots in the state’s most sought-after university courses at the expense of lower-ranked HSC students.

The issue of how to equate IB marks with the ATAR has long been a point of friction, partly because of the lack of information given to Australian authorities, and partly because many in the education sector feel it gives some private school students an unfair advantage.

The IB only gives Australian authorities a mark out of 45, and not the students’ raw marks. UAC equates a 45 with an ATAR of 99.95. In contrast, UAC has access to all HSC data and analyses it significantly, adjusting according to subject difficulty before giving students a mark out of 500 and ranking them.

UAC was supposed to get more detailed data from the IB for 2022 university admissions so that it could better differentiate ranks, but the IB decided to delay that until 2023, saying students had already faced too much disruption during the pandemic.

Many of the private principals whose schools do not offer the IB are worried about this year’s results.

“It’s causing consternation,” said one, who did not want to be named. “I think there will be some schools who think, ‘if you can get 12 kids to get 99.95, why would we be doing the HSC?’ I think it’s a real threat to the reputation of the future of the HSC if that’s going to continue.”

Ms Paino said UAC was guided by fairness and accuracy when assessing ATAR equivalents for international qualifications, which include British A-levels and American SATs. “It’s not always easy because of the very fine-grained nature of university selection ranks,” she said.

“We also regularly review our conversions to ensure they are providing a fair comparison with local students.”

The chair of IB Schools Australasia, David Boardman, said the conversion from IB scores to ATAR equivalents was managed by Australian authorities and the association had no input. “The association wishes that all students are treated equitably regardless of whether they study an IB program or an alternative,” he said.

The IB Organisation has been honest about easing students through the pandemic. “The IB has taken the pandemic’s global disruption to education into account when determining grades for this year,” a spokeswoman said. “The IB’s main priority has been to ensure students are not disadvantaged by the pandemic, including their applications to university and higher education.”

How does the International Baccalaureate compare to the HSC?

There has been significant grade inflation in Britain’s A-levels since the pandemic began, with the proportion of students there getting top grades rising by almost 75 per cent. The IB is widely used in Britain, where students with both credentials compete for university entry.

Between 2017 and 2019, between 260 and 275 students achieved top scores of 45 in the May session of the IB. In 2020, that climbed to 341, and in 2021 it soared to 1187. There were fewer candidates in 2021 than in 2020.

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/nsw-uni-bosses-order-review-of-perfect-atars-after-ib-students-beat-james-ruse-20220210-p59vi3.html

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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13 February, 2022

Woke Brooklyn College that banned campus cops from carrying guns  is forced to call for help from OTHER schools during active shooter threat

<i>Brainless Leftist twitch does not survive real life</i>

Top administrator Michelle Anderson, formerly a Yale Law school professor who specialized in rape law, yanked the Glock-19 pistols from peace officers on the Flatbush-Midwood campus in early October last year after a school official said she was 'triggered' by the sight of a female campus security officer wearing a firearm. 

'It is all somewhat ironic because this woman peace officer had been personally authorized to carry her Glock on school grounds by Anderson herself several years ago,' a source told DailyMail.com. 

On February 3, the school issued an 'active shooter' threat and at least 10 peace officers from five other institutions were called to respond to the shooting while on-campus security were dispatched to collect their locked up guns from lockers. 

While the threat was not acted on, the new edict raises questions of how the school can ensure the safety of students on campus in a city where gun crime has risen 30 percent year-on-year, according to the latest NYPD crime statistics released on Wednesday. 

In Brooklyn south alone, where the college is located, gun crimes have risen a staggering 111.1 percent year-on-year. 

On February 3, Brooklyn College issued an 'active shooter' threat and at least 10 peace officers from four other institutions were called to respond to the shooting while on-campus security were dispatched to collect their locked up guns from lockers

At least nine institutions of the 25 under CUNY control continue to allow armed patrol guards, including City College of New York in Manhattan, Bronx Community College, Kingsborough Community College and Staten Island College. 

Earlier this month, two unarmed campus cops at Virginia's private Bridgewater College were shot dead when a former track star, 27, opened fire on them. 

At least nine institutions of the 25 under CUNY control continue to allow armed patrol guards, they include: 

- City College of New York, Manhattan

- Bronx Community College

- Kingsborough Community College, Brooklyn

- Lehman College, The Bronx 

- Hostos Community College, The Bronx

- Guttman Community College, Manhattan

- Medgar Evers College, Brooklyn

- Queensborough Community College, Queens

- Staten Island College 

John Painter, 55, and J.J. Jefferson, 48, were gunned down after confronting a suspicious man stalking near Memorial Hall on the campus of the small college in the Shenandoah Valley at 1:20 p.m. 

The suspected shooter was identified as Alexander Wyatt Campbell, 27, who fled the scene before being hunted down at a nearby waterway about 40 minutes later. Multiple firearms allegedly belonging to Campbell were recovered, with weapons found both on and off campus, officials said. 

Shortly after the October 'no gun' policy at Brooklyn College was instituted, Anderson participated in a Zoom meeting with campus administrators, faculty and students with the goal of revamping campus safety by eliminating police involvement and without armed security .

'She is all about wokeness,' a CUNY campus police supervisor, who asked not to be named for fear of retribution, said. 

Shortly after Anderson's disarming edict was handed down, on October 21, there was a shooting just off campus in which four people were wounded.

'Please be cautious when coming to or leaving the Campus,' a text alert to students and staff said. 

Although the shooting was off campus, the warning underscored the hazards of the urban campus, especially in light of the city's rising crime rate.

The union officials who represent the campus cops acknowledged that there was a 'departure' in status for their members, but offered a guarded response.

'Although it is the prerogative of the college president not to utilize the full measure of protocols within the campus security system set up by CUNY, all is well until something bad happens,' Gregory Floyd, president of Local 237 of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, said.

'Then, the responsibility of that decision also falls on the president — and CUNY as well, for allowing such a departure.'

Each armed peace officer earns about $50,000 annually and has undergone 50 hours of firearms training, the source said.

No Brooklyn College students were hurt in the off-campus shooting, but other colleges have not been so lucky when it comes to violent crime.

On December 11, 2019, Barnard College student, Tessa Majors, 18, died after she was fatally stabbed by three teenagers during an armed robbery in nearby Morningside Park.

More recently, in early December 2021, a Columbia University graduate student, Davide Giri, 30, a Ph.D. candidate in computer science who was attending the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, was stabbed to death about two blocks from his apartment building, not far from the college's Upper Manhattan campus.

And this year marks the 15th anniversary of a mass shooting on the campus of Virginia Tech in which 32 students were gunned down by one of their classmates. 

About 600 peace officers are employed by CUNY throughout the entire university system, but only about 100 are authorized to carry guns while patrolling those schools that permit an armed security presence. Most are in uniform, although a small number of armed campus cops do occasionally patrol in plainclothes.

Despite Floyd's statement and claims by multiple sources who spoke to DailyMail.com, a spokeswoman for Brooklyn College insisted that armed CUNY peace officer have never been allowed to patrol the campus while armed, but keep their firearms locked in a campus security office.

'The safety of the students, staff, and faculty in our campus community is of the utmost priority at Brooklyn College and our excellent public safety team ensures this every day.

'Public safety officers have never been permitted to carry a weapon while on campus patrol. Weapons are secured and brought out in emergency situations. Authorized administrators have always kept firearms on their person while in their secured offices, but they do not patrol the campus.'

One veteran CUNY security official sharply disputed the accuracy of the Brooklyn College spokesman's statement.

'It's an absolute lie that authorized Brooklyn College peace officers were previously not allowed to patrol while armed,' the official said.

Joseph Giacalone, a retired NYPD sergeant and author who is an adjunct professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, was flabbergasted by the decision to strip guns from trained law enforcement personnel for no discernible reason tied to campus security objectives.

He suggested that Anderson, Brooklyn College's president — who enjoys a chauffeured vehicle driven by a campus security peace officer, as do all senior-level CUNY executives — was advocating an indefensible policy that was not rooted in public safety.

'Once again, we see those with school-owned vehicles and private chauffeurs making security decisions for the rest of us.

'If Brooklyn College thinks their students will be safer with no cops around, go ahead. God forbid something happens. I wouldn't want to be on the wrong end of that lawsuit,' he noted.

Giacalone added that 'criminals are opportunists and if they know cops are not welcome on campus, they will take advantage of it. It's only a matter of time. One would think that after two students [from Columbia and Barnard] have been murdered . . . you would make your campus more secure, not less.'

Forcing campus cops to rush for their guns during an emergency — or responding while unarmed — can pose unanticipated dangers, he insisted.

'The confusion this can cause during an emergency or police response is off the charts,' said.

On October 7, less than a week after the gun policy change, Anderson participated in a Zoom meeting 'to develop a new CUNY-wide public safety plan' attended by approximately a dozen CUNY officials and some CUNY students. 

'Brooklyn College has stated that the impetus for a new strategic plan [on campus security] are the Black Lives Matter and George Floyd movements,' the source quoted Anderson saying.

'These two experiences must be incorporated into any new operational plan and any new rebranding efforts of CUNY public safety,' Anderson added, according to the source.

She sought to do so without police involvement.

'Brooklyn College has recommended that the relationship with the NYPD and CUNY public safety be eliminated and 'policing' be removed from the CUNY public safety mission, its practices and tactics,' Anderson stated, according to the source.

The college spokeswoman denied that there was any friction between cops and the college.

'Brooklyn College values its relationship with the NYPD and will continue to work closely with it to keep our campus community safe,' she said.

The policy change, however, seems to be a continuation of tensions between law enforcement and the administrators at the college.

In November 2017, the New York Post reported how Brooklyn College officials barred NYPD cops from walking on the campus while armed so they could use the bathroom — incidents that purportedly 'triggered' some nervous students who felt threatened by the prospect of seeing cops with guns in their midst.

Donald Wenz, a retired NYPD captain who currently serves as Brooklyn College's director of public safety, told the student newspaper, The Excelsior, that he was trying to keep New York's Finest out of sight.

Police were only allowed to use a dirty bathroom in the isolated West End Building that had a broken toilet with a stained seat and no soap or paper towels, the Post reported.

Joseph Tirella, spokesman for CUNY, did not respond to a DailyMail.com request for comment.

Wenz declined to comment. Hector Batista, CUNY's CEO and André Brown, the university's director of public safety — both of whom attended the recent Zoom meeting in which Anderson spoke — did not return phone calls.

Giacalone warned that the Brooklyn College president may be playing with fire.

'Any policy that limits their certified armed personnel from carrying their weapons while on the campus is only inviting trouble. When mass shootings are unfortunately common in and around educational facilities, one would think that this plan is short-sighted. Even more so, have there been complaints of misconduct or unlawful use of weapons by the staff? If not, I need to ask, why this now?' he said.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10412213/Woke-Brooklyn-College-bans-campus-police-carrying-guns.html

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California Schools Can Change Students‘ Gender Categories Without Parent Consent

Dov Fischer 

A Catholic mom in Northern California enrolled her daughter in a public charter school. During her initial Zoom classes, the girl, an incoming freshman who had not yet stepped foot in the school due to COVID-19, was asked her name and “preferred pronouns.”

She chose a male name and male pronouns. The school then routinely used this information without informing her parents, and then began to socially transition the child—the first in a series of steps culminating in a so-called “sex change.” 

It’s a measure of the peril of our culture that these parents have asked that I protect their anonymity. They have good reason to fear: soon after they voiced their anger with school officials, Child Protective Services showed up at their doorstep.

It’s bad enough that some in government aspire to divide us by race, religion, or languages. But using our schools and law enforcement to divide our families? Deliberately separating parents from their own children in order to indoctrinate our children with radical gender ideas—starting in preschool?

This is wrong. Had COVID-19 not forced so many classes into our homes via Zoom, few of us would have become aware of it.

And that’s just the tip of the proverbial non-binary iceberg. The gender category “non-binary” now appears on all student information forms. Few parents, reared in a prior generation, realize that “non-binary” means “unlimited gender choices.” The California Department of Education defines “non-binary” as anything beyond the historic “male-female” binary understanding of gender—new terms for a new age, including “transgender,” “non-gender,” “intersex,” “agender,” “gender-queer,” “gender fluid,” “Two Spirit, bigender,” “pangender,” “gender nonconforming,” or “gender variant.” Really.

The California Department of Education says these genders are ever expansive, ever evolving and ever changing, and that children can self-certify or choose their own gender. The Center of Disease Control and Prevention defines “gender nonbinary” as “gender creative,” meaning children can create or make-up their own gender, and these non-conforming imaginary genders are marginalized minorities. 

Troy Flint, the chief information officer from the California School Boards Association, says “non-binary” means “multiple options.” These teachings not only denigrate our respective faiths but also defy common sense. 

The California Teachers Association adopted a policy in January 2020 stating students should be able to access hormone therapy without parent consent, for the sake of “equity.” This is already a reality for foster youth starting at age 12, thanks to Assembly Bill 2119. Also, according to Assembly Bill 1184, minors can bill their parents’ insurance without their parents’ consent for gender-affirming care, which includes hormone therapy or “sex-change” operations.

Today’s accommodations could consign a child to lifelong ramifications—powerful hormone treatments, a lifetime of meds, inability to bear offspring, horrific and grotesque surgeries that irreversibly remove core body parts.

I am an Orthodox Jew. Although my viewpoint on this matter may be inconsistent with the zeitgeist, it is normative among more than 1,500 American Orthodox rabbis with whom I affiliate in organizations like the Coalition for Jewish Values, the Rabbinical Alliance of America (Igud HaRabbanim), and other mainstream Orthodox Jewish bodies.

We rabbis speak for congregants, lead synagogues, teach at yeshiva elementary schools, high schools, and advanced-degree programs. Our voices rarely are heard by Americans because media focus elsewhere.

We stand boldly and proudly alongside Americans of other faiths who share family values similar to ours. Devout Catholics, Protestants of varying denominations, faithful Muslims, Hindus, and others. We work together in the Statewide Interfaith Coalition (www.Interfaith4Kids.com), a network of many races, ethnicities, religions, and skin colors to oppose extremist gender ideologies infiltrating pre-K-12 education. Together, we oppose the erosion of parental rights, as well as the deceptions perpetuated through public education today.

A colleague, a Southern California imam, has asked, “When will we collectively say enough is enough?” It’s not hard to imagine that we’re on the road to becoming a society in which the state owns children. But not yet.

In America, parents give birth, feed, nourish, house, clothe, and embrace their children. We are not compelled to inculcate them in a state religion. We decide whether they trick-or-treat on Halloween or deliver mishlo’ach manot on Purim—or both. We monitor and guide their social media. We help them choose friends. We teach them to obey the law.

Here in the state of California, school personnel or mental health workers partnering with schools, now have authority—solely based on a child’s request, regardless of age—to change a child’s gender category in the California Data System without parental knowledge or consent. This betrays parental trust no matter religious or non-religious affiliation.

Sacramento and the local school boards must leave parents to mentor their children on gender matters. If they don’t, they will begin to exit public schools in great numbers.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/02/09/now-only-parents-can-defend-parent-rights-in-our-public-schools

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Florida’s Parental Rights in Education Bill Hits Target: Gender Ideology Harms Kids

Children are being targeted with sexual content—not just in social media, but also in school curriculums. As with other recent controversies, however, leaders in Florida are fighting back.

Lawmakers in the Sunshine State have introduced a new bill, Parental Rights in Education. If the name doesn’t ring a bell, that may be because big media have mislabeled it as the “Don’t Say Gay” Bill.

The bill would not ban the word “gay.” Rather, it would protect children from teachers and other school officials who seek to sexualize and bombard them with gender ideology.

In particular, it would require schools to be transparent with and get permission from parents for any health services students receive. It would also prohibit elementary school teachers from pushing classroom discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity. 

Liberal activists are claiming that the parental rights bill would harm kids. Nonsense. It would protect young kids from what is, in effect, sexual grooming—whether in the classroom or the nurse’s office.

The fact that this has become a partisan issue is a sign of how bizarre our culture and politics have become.

In recent years, sexually explicit and age-inappropriate material have flooded America’s classrooms. For example, last year in Washington state, a first-grade teacher read students “I Am Jazz”—an infamous children’s book that promotes transgenderism.

Sexually Explicit Content Harms Kids

Anyone with common sense knows that we should protect young children from sexual content. Scientific evidence confirms that wisdom.

We know that early exposure to sexual content can harm young students. It has been linked to poor “mental health, life satisfaction, sexual behavior and attitudes, and pornography-viewing patterns in adulthood.”

Decent schools used to know that kids need visual and intellectual space to flourish and mature into healthy, balanced adults. Unfortunately, times have changed. Schools are now often a pipeline for sexualizing kids as young as kindergarten.

The fact that activist-educators do this in the name of “compassion” or “gender equity” doesn’t change what’s really happening.

Bad Medicine

What’s more, the fashionable gender ideology peddled by many schools is contrary to the best medical evidence.

According to the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 88% to 98% of those struggling with gender dysphoria will reconcile with their biological sex after going through puberty.

Trendy gender interventions can prevent this healing and set children of a lifelong path of surgeries, hormone treatments, costly and painful medical treatment, and physical illness.

That’s the problem with all three stages of the transition trifecta—puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgery.

But even prior social transition can lead to harm. If a girl spends her teen years presenting and imagining herself as a boy, she will be more likely to take the next steps on the path to gender “transition.”

She won’t get those years back, even if she changes her mind. She will be out of sync with her peers.

Then there’s the physical harm.

Puberty blockers have been shown to reduce bone density, which can lead to lifelong problems. Cross-sex hormones can sterilize those who receive them. And removing sex organs is just sterilization—full stop.

Parents have the most interest and incentive to weigh the options, the risks, and the irreversible, life-altering consequences of these methods.

A healthy culture recognizes that parents—not teachers and school nurses—have the chief responsibility for helping their children who struggle with their sexed bodies.

Transparency

Of course, there’s honest debate about what is age-appropriate and about what is the best treatment for those with gender dysphoria. So, in short, who should decide: teachers, administrators, or parents?

The Florida bill sides with parents—as it should. That’s why much of it is about transparency for parents. Parents can then decide when, if, and how their kids will be exposed to sexually explicit content and referred for therapy and medical treatment.

In a normal world, a law mandating transparency wouldn’t be needed.

Teachers would share the values and priorities of the parents in their communities. Today, however, many public schools treat parents as hostile and reactionary impediments to gender indoctrination.

Those schools aid and abet in the “social transition” of kids who request it—using and enforcing “preferred pronouns” and the like—while hiding it from parents. Parents in Wisconsin and Florida are currently suing their school districts for doing just that.

Such deception strikes at the natural bond between parents and their children. Moms and dads, not teachers and principals, know their children best.

Moms and dad have the right and responsibility to raise their children. They may delegate some of the details to schools, but that does not mean they give up their prerogatives.

The new Florida bill recognizes the well-being of children and the right of their parents to raise and teach them. Other states should ignore the liberal media trolls and follow Florida’s lead.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/02/11/floridas-parental-rights-in-education-bill-hits-target-gender-ideology-harms-kids

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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11 February, 2022

British Education Secretary responds to why Eton shouldn’t pay tax

<i>British private schools usually offer various sorts of assistance  -- such as access to playing fields -- to government schools in their area.  Eton offers access to its rowing lake.  But the basic reason they are given charitable staus is that they are non-profit institutions which  provide high quality education to their pupils which is not readily abvailable elsewher</i>

Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi came under fire as he appeared to avoid explaining why Eton College, which charges £44,000 a year, deserves charity status which exempts it from taxes.

The Tory MP said to Sky News presenter Kay Burley that 50 per cent of the independent education sector has charitable status, including Eton.

Without saying exactly why Eton should be allowed to dodge taxes, Zahawi added: “I want to see those schools do much more to open up to children from disadvantages backgrounds.

‘Evidence suggests the best way forward’, Zahawi says

“They are doing a lot already, they want to do more with us on our journey which is really my focus, which is a system that is diverse. We have academies, we have free schools, we have independent sector, that’s a good thing I think in an education system.

“They want to do more on that journey, where we get every child to have a great education in every part of the country, at the right time in the right place, but I think it’s also important that they play their part.”

“What does that mean?”, Burley asked.

Zahawi replied: “Well, can we get our independent schools to join us on what the evidence suggests is the best way forward, which is a family of schools that are well-managed, tightly-managed, really well-supported in a multi-academy trust that’s high performing, that we know from evidence delivers the best outcome?”

https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/nadhim-zahawi-eton-college-tax-charity-311583/

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British school slammed after pupils penned critical letters of Boris Johnson

The Education Secretary has slammed a primary school that was accused of encouraging its 10-year-old pupils into writing highly critical letters on Boris Johnson.

Nadhim Zahawi, 54, shot a direct warning to the Labour-run council which oversees Welbeck Primary School in Nottingham and insisted 'no school should encourage young people to pin their colours to a political mast'.

Staff at the school were blasted yesterday for allegedly pushing the youngsters as young as 10 into penning notes attacking the PM and calling for him to resign. 

Welbeck Primary's Twitter account shared a picture of the children brandishing documents addressed to a local Labour MP, who supports the headmistresses.

Another showed a pupil scowling next to a whiteboard which said 'lies, mistrust and selfish' next to 'Boris Johnson' in an adult's handwriting.

And one zoomed in on a letter allegedly written by a year six student using the phrase 'PMQs' and breaking down the UK economy and pandemic response.

Meanwhile the headteacher has tweeted a series of left-wing messages and used the phrase 'Tory scum' online.

Mr Zahawi warned that schools must not address political issues in a 'partisan' way.

'While there is a clear need for schools to address political issues in the classroom from time to time, this must not be done in a partisan way. No school should be encouraging young people to pin their colours to a political mast,' he said.

Meanwhile an A4 letter, allegedly written by one of Welbeck's year six students to Labour MP Lilian Greenwood was also posted online.

It went into excruciating detail about the UK economy, the political situation in Westminster and the Government's response to the pandemic.

Letter criticising PM over the economy, politics and pandemic that was 'written by a TEN-YEAR-OLD' sent to Labour MP 

An A4 letter, allegedly written by one of the year six students, to Labour MP Lilian Greenwood, was posted online by the school.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/uknews/school-slammed-after-pupils-penned-critical-letters-of-boris-johnson/ar-AATF6FU

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Native American Group Says OK to NJ School’s Use of ‘Warrior’ Name

WILDWOOD — As many New Jersey schools reconsider their use of Native American images and names for their teams one school is keeping it with the blessing of a Native American education group.

The district began a review of the Warrior name and consulted with The Native American Guardian’s Association, a group that advocates for increased education about Native American history especially in public educational institutions. The group's philosophy is "educate not eradicate."

"Whenever the Board of Education’s use of Native American imagery has come into question, the position has been that any exploration into changes to the district's branding should be made in collaboration with the school community in consultation with representatives of Native American Indian communities," Superintendent J. Kenyon Kummings said in a written statement. "The board kept its word and in doing so found additional cultural and educational benefits for our students."

NAGA gave its approval of continued use of the Warrior name in part because it makes a distinction between the use of a mascot and a logo.

The group believes that removing Native American imagery from popular culture further discredits their importance in U.S. history.

“The process was helped by the fact that the Wildwood Public School District has not had a mascot (costume) for over two decades," Kummings said.

NAGA will also provide education about the “rich cultural heritage and social justice for this longtime marginalized race," according to the district.

Wildwood Board of Education President Ernest Troiano III defended the use of the Warrior for 107 years as one of respect for what the name represents.

“Schools and teams using the nickname 'Warriors' have done so out of reverence for the classic Indian warrior … for their prowess in combat and never giving up – something that is important in the context of athletics. We wear the Warrior name and logo in unity, and with pride, for what the Native American Warrior represents.”

https://wpgtalkradio.com/native-american-group-says-ok-to-nj-schools-use-of-warrior-name/?utm_source=tsmclip&utm_medium=referral

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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10 February, 2022

A new report finds systemic racism, sexual obscenity, and anti-Americanism in U.S. public education, even in a deeply red state

While Idaho is considered a refuge for people fleeing Democrat-controlled areas, a new report shows the state’s supermajority Republican legislature has not protected children from far-left politics in public schools, including state-sponsored racism and hiding transgender ideation from childrens’ parents.

Report authors Anna Miller and Dr. Scott Yenor note that the kind of extremist ideology affecting kids in blue and purple states is also metastasizing within small-town and rural public schools in locales that faithfully vote Republican.

“School administrators in Coeur d’Alene manipulated an 11-year-old girl into believing she was a boy and should undergo gender transition surgery,” Miller writes in a study overview in The American Mind. “The elementary school counselor had coached the young girl into believing she was transsexual and instructed her how to tell her parents about her new identity. According to a recorded phone call between the counselor and parent, the principal and other school officials had known about this and began calling the girl by a boy’s name while purposefully choosing not to inform the child’s parents.”

Coeur d’Alene has a population of approximately 54,000, according to census data. It’s in rural north Idaho, within commuting distance to Spokane, Washington. It’s a conservative lumber, manufacturing, and health-care town surrounded by mountains and lakes. People live there to enjoy the classic American way of life, but their public schools work to undermine that way of life with public resources, in the absence of effective oversight from elected officials.

Leftist morality that undermines the beliefs and desires of a majority of Idaho’s citizens is rampant throughout the Republican-run state’s education systems, says Miller and Yenor’s recently released report for the Idaho Freedom Foundation and Claremont Institute’s Center for the American Way of Life: “Things that were unthinkable five or 10 years ago now are everyday practices in public schools across America.”

Many Idahoans have “the sense that Idaho is immune from these disturbances,” the report notes. “Our school districts seem responsive and responsible. Our laws emphasize conservative values. We have Republican supermajorities… There may be an Idaho difference, but the difference is not what people think. Idaho is uniquely complacent about the trends that people in other states see.”

Putting Explicit Sexual Info In Kids’ Hands

One of the most visible ways many Idaho public schools push extremism common to far-left locales is in exposing kids to adult sexual practices and gender ideology, often without parent knowledge or consent.

For example, a “socioemotional learning” curriculum “used in many school districts statewide including Coeur d’Alene, Pocatello-Chubbuck, and West Ada … encourages students to question their sexual orientation and gender, be activists for issues such as transgenderism, and use the website LoveIsRespect.org for sex advice. The website includes resources such as ‘Five tips for your first time,’ refers places to get an abortion, and promotes sexual taboos like polyamory,” the report notes.

Being a red state offers little, if any, refuge from sexual voyeurism in schools, the report notes: “data suggests that LGBTQ-affirming curricula are widely available in Idaho’s education system. They estimate 31% of Idaho’s middle schoolers and 51% of high schoolers are taught about sexual orientation and similar numbers are taught about ‘gender identity’ and ‘gender expression.’ Similarly, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network’s (GLSEN) data show 12% of schools teach curriculum promoting the LGBTQ agenda and 47% of school libraries provide students with LGBTQ-related resources,” Miller writes in The American Mind.

Idaho public schools spread such sexual ideology despite state laws requiring schools “to teach abstinence and provide factual, medically accurate and objective information.” The report details how even though several state laws attempt to restrain public schools from exposing children to pornographic and politicized sexual details, many teachers ignore the laws’ text and clear intent.

Teachers Are Deliberately Trained to Teach Racism

Idaho’s education system also heavily subsidizes the racial grievance industry with public funds, starting with teacher training and certification, the report notes. Idaho’s state board of education adopted certification rules common to 18 states that require teachers to develop “culturally responsive teaching. ” These Interstate Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium rules “cite Gloria Ladson-Billings’s definition of culturally responsive teaching. She is known for introducing critical race theory to education,” the report notes.

To be certified to teach in Idaho, teachers and other school personnel are thus required to “reflect on personal and cultural biases” “to broaden and deepen his/her own understanding of cultural, ethnic, gender, and learning differences.” To be certified as a “culturally responsive educator” under these requirements, “Two key practices include the rejection of colorblindness and replacing instruction about facts with narrative stories,” the report notes.

In Idaho, this has resulted in the same anti-American and racially biased lessons parents have exposed across the nation. For one example, “iCivics curriculum used in Boise School District’s Third Grade Citizenship unit teaches children that NFL players kneeling in protest at the playing of the national anthem is a sign of civic engagement, rather than disrespect to the country.”

This also results in Idaho churning out teachers who are trained to ignore and undermine any legal restraints on such highly politicized and socially destructive teaching.

“Teachers arrive in schools steeped in teaching techniques designed to dismantle traditional culture, reject colorblindness, adopt social constructivist views of truth and culture, and promote anti-racism. Teacher training reinforces and expands these early efforts. Education nonprofits offer curriculum and programming packages to school districts and principals to bring these elements and techniques into the daily experience of the classroom,” the report says.

https://thefederalist.com/2022/02/07/report-red-state-public-schools-encourage-kids-to-go-transgender-behind-their-parents-backs/

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Cambridge's Jesus College is guilty of double standards

An event took place in Cambridge last week that was rare enough to reach the national press: a public hearing by the Diocese of Ely Consistorial Court in Jesus College chapel. It was brought about by a group of alumni who were opposing a move by the Master and Fellows of the College to remove a commemorative plaque to one of their greatest benefactors, the 17thcentury courtier and financier Tobias Rustat. His financial bequest was equivalent to over £4 million in present values, and his munificence is – or rather, was – celebrated in an annual College feast.

I attended much of the hearing, spread over three days. It was calm, exquisitely courteous, decorous in wigs and gowns, and occasionally enlivened by the sort of ponderous legal repartee that readers of Rumpole of the Bailey would have savoured. Both sides presented their arguments in detail, with care, and at considerable length. Some might have thought it much ado (and much expense) about nothing. But as the hearing proceeded the points at issue, which at first sight appear arcane, became increasingly clear and significant. Sometimes embarrassingly so.

Undeniably the College have a substantial case, which revolves round one simple point. Rustat was an investor in a slave trading company. For that reason, his memorial – a unique and artistically important three-and-a-half ton marble carving from the workshop of Grinling Gibbons – is now offensive to students, Fellows and not least the Master, Sonita Alleyne (the first black female head of a Cambridge college). They want it gone. They are supported by the Bishop of Ely himself, the Rt Revd Stephen Conway, and the Dean and Chaplain of the College. The case is now to be determined by the Deputy Chancellor of the diocese, sitting as judge.

Perhaps the College will get their way. But I do not think they emerge from the process with credit. So convinced were they of their moral probity and intellectual self-sufficiency that they were not really interested in anyone else’s opinion or expertise. Having made up their collective mind, they were not inclined to confuse it by facts. Alumni who wrote reasoned counter-arguments (including a distinguished black academic) or offered detailed information about the sources of Rustat’s fortune, were ignored or brushed off. Requests for information about the College’s own research into the subject were denied on a variety of pretexts.

Was Rustat truly a ‘slave trader’? Was his fortune derived from the trade? Did any of the money he gave to the College come from trading in human beings? That last possibility, said one witness, was ‘vanishingly small’.

What about the rest of his long and respectable life? Was it all tarnished by his investments in the Royal African Company, and association with a trade that was then almost universal? Were the emotions expressed by some students whipped up by misinformation circulated by the College itself? Should students not be informed of the complexities of the issue, rather than being fed what one of them called ‘inflammatory language’?

Such considerations were swept aside by the College. Was the Master not concerned, she was asked, that students who had written to support the removal of the memorial had used identical phraseology, and that this phraseology was fallacious? It didn’t appear so. ‘I’m talking as a person of colour with lived experience’, Sonita Alleyne told the hearing.

When Professor Lawrence Goldman, speaking as an opposing alumnus, mildly suggested she was not the only person with such lived experience (he is Jewish), she replied that this was not at all the same thing. A Whoopi Goldberg moment? Anyway, as the College’s barrister put it, any association with slavery, however slight, was ‘sufficient of itself’ to make a memorial ‘problematic’, if not ‘an abomination’. If this is accepted as a precedent, ecclesiastical lawyers may look forward to much profitable employment.

Behind the sometimes tedious legal pedantry lie several significant issues. One, as the Bishop of Ely put it with admirable directness, is ‘who owns our history?’ For him and Jesus College, the answer seems clear: those who can stake the loudest claim to victimhood – in this case, some Cambridge students and academics who to most people lead highly privileged lives. Thus is decided, in the words of the Bishop (who is chair of the Church of England’s National Board of Education), what is suitable for ‘celebration’ in our history. This in a nutshell is what our present culture wars are about. They who control the past control the future.

Another issue is what university education, including religious education, should involve. Should it provide reassurance, a safe space in which students are not expected to face uncomfortable views? Or should it confront them with moral and intellectual complexities, and encourage them to examine their own presuppositions? Cambridge students, said the Master, would not accept the latter, nor should they: the Chapel should be ‘an uncontested space’ which students ‘look at with the morality they have now.’ To this, Professor Goldman, an Oxford historian with many years of teaching students, responded that the College pleaded the priority of ‘pastoral care’, but that the real failing of pastoral care was not to educate.

Looming behind all this is the grubby question of double standards. As is now well known, Jesus College has a close relationship with the People’s Republic of China, from which it has received substantial funds. If Rustat’s money was ‘tainted’, is not this money tainted too? If 17thcentury slavery was an abomination, what about 21st century slavery in China?

Dr Véronique Mottier, chair of the College’s legacy of slavery working party pleaded ignorance on this. ‘I’m not an expert,’ she said. As it happens, she is not an expert on 17th century slavery either, being a social scientist specialising in theory, gender and sexuality – adequate, apparently, for judging Tobias Rustat, though not for judging Xi Jinping.

How much money had the College received from China? ‘Ask the Master’, replied Dr Mottier. The barrister duly did, and the Master replied that the College had an ethics committee and followed University policy. This was not a reassuring answer. When asked whether she would denounce human rights abuses today with the same energy as those three centuries ago, she ventured that violations in China ‘should concern us’.

But all this, declared the College’s barrister impatiently, was ‘tilting at windmills’. The issue was a very narrow one: moving a commemorative plaque. Talk of cancel culture, tainted money and relations with China were a ‘complete irrelevance’. So there we have it. The College hopes to win its case by excluding wider ethical considerations. If I were a member of Jesus College, I would not be feeling very proud. ‘Hypocrisy is not a Christian virtue,’ observed the opposing barrister in his closing remarks. Many eminent authorities seem to disagree.

https://spectator.com.au/2022/02/cambridges-jesus-college-is-guilty-of-double-standards/

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International students should be encouraged to come back to Australia

The Prime Minister has announced a number of excellent initiatives to encourage the return of international students to Australia now that our borders have reopened, from extending working rights to rebates on visas. Behind these initiatives is a recognition that international students are critical contributors to our economic prosperity and crucial to filling workforce shortages in key industries.

This is equally true at a state level. Pre-COVID, spending by international students and their visiting families helped to support more than 95,000 full-time equivalent jobs in NSW, not just in education but also in sectors such as hospitality and tourism, pouring $30 million a day into the NSW economy. And the vibrancy of the diverse cultural life international students bring underpins the character of a globally connected community.

International students hold our education system and qualifications in high regard – nearly 90 per cent are satisfied with their study experience at an Australian university, according to government surveys. They also see Australia as a safe and enjoyable destination.

But during the past two years, many international students who would otherwise have studied in NSW have instead gone to countries with fewer border restrictions like the United States, Britain and Canada. Or they have simply decided to study at home. That meant a $5 billion hit to the NSW economy in 2021, and potentially another $6 billion this year.

Even though our borders are now open, the rate of student return is very slow. Given the proven benefit of our international students to our communities and to NSW, what more can be done by universities, government and business to hasten their return?

In order to restore their confidence in us and put us ahead of competitor destinations, government, business and the education sector should work together to provide a suite of targeted incentives for students to come to NSW.

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/give-international-students-more-perks-to-win-them-back-to-nsw-like-the-united-states-britain-and-canada-20220206-p59u7o.html

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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9 February, 2022

 

Why This Texas Mom Started a Co-Op to Teach Her Kids

Natalie Simmons, a single stay-at-home mom, says she has no idea what public school her two children would attend in McKinney, Texas, a suburb of Dallas.

She chose another way to provide a good education to her daughters, Harlow, 7, and Harper, 5.

“Being a stay-at-home mom is hard enough because you never say goodbye to your children, but then being a single stay-at-home mom [means] you never really get five seconds,” Simmons says.

Simmons, now 40, began sending her two kids to Castle Montessori of McKinney when Harper was only 18 months old.

She says she liked the Montessori school’s child-led, unstructured environment and its emphasis on science, technology, engineering, and math projects.

Simmons then sent the children to Mom’s Day Out, an affordable day school at Cottonwood Creek Church in Allen, Texas, another suburb near McKinney.

The children’s last stop in brick-and-mortar schooling in the fall of 2019 and spring of 2020 was The Children’s Workshop, a Montessori-themed school in Plano. The school closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Simmons says.

In March 2020, when schools throughout Texas sent children home to do remote learning, Simmons says, her attitude toward traditional education—even Montessori-themed schooling—changed.

“We never went back after spring break,” she recalls.

Simmons says that school requirements that children wear masks during the pandemic became a “nonnegotiable” for her.

Specifically, in September 2020, McKinney Independent School District released a statement saying that the public school system would have to comply with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s statewide mask mandate.

As a grown woman, Simmons says, she had trouble wearing a mask for a lengthy amount of time.

“What do you think a child is going to do?” she asks. “Sending my children back [to school] with masks on was unacceptable and not going to happen.”

Searching for a Co-Op

In July 2020, Simmons signed up her children for a co-op meeting at Obstacle Warrior Kids, a Dallas-based recreational facility.

A co-op is a group of moms who get together to teach each other’s children. A co-op typically acts as a supplemental “social learning” option for homeschooled children.

Obstacle Warrior Kids “is a perfect place for a co-op because in between classes, kids can go blow off steam,” Simmons says. “I signed up immediately.”

The moms were “crunchy, hippie, and homeopathic and adopted a gentle parenting lifestyle,” Simmons says, which resonated with own lifestyle.

“That community felt really great,” Simmons says. “The woman who started the co-op made it look effortless.”

But after exploring several co-ops, Simmons says, she felt compelled to surround her family with like-minded people.

For instance, when the new coronavirus first erupted in the U.S., it was wise to be on high alert, she says. But as time passed and more information about COVID-19 was revealed in summer 2020, she recalls, she felt alone in questioning the media’s narrative about the disease.

Harlow and Harper had not seen their best friends from their previous school in about six months, because their moms were quarantining them, Simmons says.

“Back then, you were kind of seen as an outcast because you were fighting back [against] the system,” Simmons said. “I myself was not going to wear a mask because the mainstream media’s narrative wasn’t adding up. It wasn’t logical.”

Inspired to act, Simmons started her own co-op, called Silva, in fall 2020.

Growing Silva

The first semester, Simmons aimed to sign up about 30 families in Collin County, Texas—totaling about 60 children. Silva ended up attracting 45 families, or about 90 kids.  

Within three semesters, Silva’s size nearly tripled to about 240 children, and the co-op now has four chapters in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

Silva—Latin for forest—focuses on permaculture, which Simmons calls “a pretty hot topic right now.”

Permaculture is a natural approach to land management that adopts what are called slow and simple principles.

“No herbicides, no pesticides, using commonsense logic as opposed to big [agriculture] farming,” Simmons explains.

After meeting Nicholas Burtner, founder of the School of Permaculture in Plano, Texas, Simmons began taking 40 online courses there to obtain a certificate in permaculture design. Burtner provided her with a scholarship.

In spring 2020, Simmons’ two children helped with a project at Grateful Farmstead, a property owned by a friend of Burtner’s in the Dallas suburb of Greenville. In exchange, Burtner taught the children about permaculture.

Permaculture’s 12 principles focus on logic and “slow and steady” solutions, Simmons says.

“I don’t want my kids to grow up on instant gratification,” she says, noting how quickly Amazon packages can arrive.

“I want to teach these kids not to suck,” Simmons says, laughing. “I want to teach these kids what hard work is. I want my kids to get dirty. I want my kids to work hard. I want my kids to do favors because they love somebody, not because they’re expecting anything in return.”

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/01/20/why-this-texas-mom-started-a-co-op-to-teach-her-kids/

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Chicago Students Forced To Leave School For Not Masking Up

What science does Chicago Public Schools have on mask efficacy and protective benefits that other schools across the nation and the CDC itself don’t have? Let’s call it the $340,000 question – Superintendent Pedro Martinez’s base salary.

It’s more than a fair question. Some states and locales have not required masks all year and are doing just fine. Even more pointedly, though, on the same day that hard-left Covidian Phil Murphy released his state’s government schools from oppressive mask mandates, Chicago still continues to move in the other direction, this time by actually exiting students from the building for refusing to diaper up.

First off, kudos to these young people for having more courage than most adults in America. Spineless doctors and medical professionals could take a page out of whatever textbook these young lovers of medical truth and personal freedom are reading. We can be assured that it is not a school-issued book.

Second, and more to the point, how much longer does this go on? Just like the fact that we now know conclusively lockdowns had almost no direct Covid-mitigating impact (which says nothing about the veritable social, financial, and other medical impacts we suffered), enormous cohort studies have offered finality on the issue of masking as well. They simply don’t work. We see this in masked versus maskless states. We see this in the CDC’s own studies and the Biden White House’s bizarre push to muzzle everyone with N95s. The cognitive dissonance of leftism is always there, but how can teachers simultaneously worship Fauci and ignore his new mask rules at the same time?

So, despite the science saying otherwise, CPS insists on ruining young peoples’ lives by disappearing them behind useless fabric.

The senseless mask mandates for children and students are not free of negative side effects. Therefore, when they don’t stop Covid, they don’t just not do anything else. There are very real consequences to masking young people, not least of all the detrimental effect of being unable to watch other speakers to learn mouth movement and language. There is already an epidemic of speech language pathology. More destructive is the bond that has been broken between peers and friends. People, especially young people, need and require human interaction. Masks are a literal physical barrier to that arrangement. Not only can young people not read facial cues, depending on their age they will never learn to do so properly anyways.

Rand Paul is absolutely correct when he says that masks are not about medicine but rather control. Given that no rational medical argument can be offered at this point, the only remaining option is that petty tyrants are inflicting as much damage on freedom as possible. The same could be said about vaccine passports, considering vaccination status matters little in whether or not a person spreads the virus.

As it relates to the thousands of students in Chicago’s failed government educational system, the only other fair question to ask at this point is why anyone still sends their kids there? Government schools were never great to begin with and now the ones in Chicago demand a religious observance to the Branch Covidians. Parents will you listen yet? Pull them out now!

https://trendingpolitics.com/watch-chicago-students-forced-to-leave-school-for-not-masking-up/

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Australia: Single-sex schools may discriminate against trans pupils

Single-sex schools will still be allowed to discriminate against transgender students under the government’s amendment to the Sex Discrimination Act, amid concerns that boys’ and girls’ schools would be ill-equipped to cater to the needs of the opposite sex.

Attorney-General Michaelia Cash has referred the matter, along with exemptions to discriminate against staff, to the Australian Law Reform Commission which is reviewing all religious exemptions in anti-discrimination law.

In a situation where a student transitions while enrolled at a single-sex college, a religious school would need to address issues including uniforms, bathrooms and the wishes of other parents to send their children to a single-sex school.

“If subsection 38(3) of the Sex Discrimination Act were amended to remove the exemption for religious schools to discriminate against a student on the basis of their gender identity, it could have the potential to effectively nullify the intention and ethos of religious single-sex schools,” Senator Cash said.

“Striking the balance between any individuals right to want to change their sexual identity and other parents’ and childrens’ wishes to go to a single sex-sex school must be sensitively managed.

“For example, if a current student transitioned whilst enrolled at a single-sex school, a religious single-sex school would not be adequately equipped to cater to the needs of the opposite sex. Matters such as uniforms, bathrooms, as well as the wishes of other parents to send their children to a single-sex schools would need to be addressed.”

Senator Cash said the ALRC would carefully consider changes to the SDA to “allow for these issues to managed and addressed correctly”.

“This is an important and crucial step that cannot be rushed. Let me be very clear, the government believes that discrimination against students is unacceptable,” she said.

LGBTI groups have raised concerns about whether transgender children would be included in an amendment to the SDA, prohibiting religious schools from discriminating against gay students.

Swimming legend Ian Thorpe, who is in Canberra campaigning against the reform, on Tuesday said transgender children would be further marginalised by the bill.

“This is a group of people that should be protecting,” Mr Thorpe said.

“When it comes to the biggest killer of people that are in their youth, it is suicide. And then, it is exponentially increased if you happen to be gay. And it’s even worse when we look at the statistics of someone who is part of a trans community.

“With this bill, we want to see it disappear. What this is, it becomes state sanctioned discrimination.”

Manager of opposition business Tony Burke on Tuesday said “the Prime Minister said he would end discrimination for all students”.

“He said he would end it for all students, that that’s what he said, full stop, and he should be true to his word,” Mr Burke told the ABC.

The Australian understands Labor’s major issue with the religious discrimination bill, which is separate to the SDA amendment, relates to constitutional issues around the overriding of state and territory laws, which the Victorian Labor government opposes.

Finance Minister Simon Birmingham said the government was not, at this time, removing exemptions in the Sex Discrimination Act allowing educational institutions to discriminate against transgender students because it could undermine their ability to run single sex schools.

He said this was why the government had referred broader changes to the Sex Discrimination Act to the Australian Law Reform Commission.

“I understand the proposal that is put forward is to repeal the exemption as it relates to students who are being exempted from the Sex Discrimination Act on the basis of their sexual orientation,” Mr Birmingham told the ABC.

“Now it doesn’t go further than that. Those other matters, as I understand it, would still be subject to a relatively quick, within 12 month, review by the Australian Law Reform Commission to try to address the best way to be able to enact any other changes without undermining certain issues around same sex schools or other matters that are there.”

University of Notre Dame adjunct associate professor Mark Fowler said the government’s proposal to “remove the ability to expel a gay student would be consistent with what peak bodies have said – no school seeks a right to expel a student because they are gay”.

Mr Fowler said significant “complexity arises when this apparently simple proposition is placed within the framework of the Sex Discrimination Act”.

“This is why the referral to the Australian Law Reform Commission was a reasonable way to address this issue. What if a group of students within a school starts a media campaign requesting that the school discard its traditional view of marriage,” Mr Fowler said.

“Would the school be prevented from refusing that request because its actions were on the basis not only of the students’ actions, but also their orientation? If the proposal does not take account of these issues, the amendment may undermine the ability of religious schools to maintain their distinct ethos.”

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/singlesex-schools-may-discriminate-against-trans-pupils/news-story/a75456ce82fc0e8d856e47b1ad929f54

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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8 February, 2022

Has Cambridge University broken out of its woke straightjacket? College refuses to fly ‘divisive’ Pride flag

The fourth-oldest Cambridge college has sparked outrage after ditching the LGBTQ+ flag in favour of its own one.

Gonville and Caius College Cambridge, also known as Keys College, was founded in 1348 and is one of the wealthiest at the revered university.

The College said while it was committed to ending discrimination it felt just flying one flag would avoid having to fly a different standard for every good cause.

It said its own flag was already 'a symbol which unites all in the Caius community'.

Yet students hit out at the decision, saying it left them feeling 'betrayed' by the 673-year-old college. 

The multicoloured LGBTQ+ flag had only just been raised at the start of February to mark LGBT History Month.

Natasha Naidu, a Masters student at Gonville and Caius, said she was left 'feeling betrayed' by the decision.

She added it was 'not the great start to LGBT History Month I anticipated at Caius'.

Anthony Bridgen, a queer PhD student at Gonville and Caius, said he was 'bitterly disappointed' at the announcement.

He added: 'This regressive decision is of huge detriment to work to improve access, diversity and equality at Caius over the past years.

'It is symbolic of an entrenched, majority cis male, majority white, majority fusty fellowship who neither know nor want to know about the injustices faced by minorities.'

At the start of the month the College posted on social media: 'The Progress Pride Flag is flying above Caius to mark the first day of LGBT History Month'.

After Thursday's announcement, Gonville and Caius PhD student Juliana Cudini replied: 'Not proud to be a Caian today.. 

'I don't join the celebration in this post when it is so rife with hypocrisy and cowardly, thinly veiled prejudice.'

Students were quick to voice their displeasure at the decision by the College. Masters student Natasha Naidu said it left her 'feeling betrayed' while PhD student Anthony Bridgen said he was 'bitterly disappointed' at the announcement

Students were quick to voice their displeasure at the decision by the College. Masters student Natasha Naidu said it left her 'feeling betrayed' while PhD student Anthony Bridgen said he was 'bitterly disappointed' at the announcement

The Master of the College, Professor Pippa Rogerson, said: 'Gonville and Caius College remains firmly committed to making College a place where everyone feels welcome, and where everyone can thrive. 

'It is incumbent on us all to make changes to improve diversity and eradicate discrimination and we are working as a community at Caius to support and boost representation.' 

In a statement, the college said: 'Gonville and Caius College is committed to improving diversity and eradicating discrimination. 

'The College flag is a symbol which unites all in the Caius community. 'Choosing to fly only the College flag avoids concerns regarding political neutrality and the difficulty of choosing between the plurality of good causes for which a flag could be flown.'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10477719/Pride-row-Keys-College-Cambridge-announces-wont-fly-LGBTQ-flag.html

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Tennessee university reinstates professor acquitted of ties to China

The University of Tennessee at Knoxville has reinstated a professor who was acquitted of federal charges that had accused him of hiding his relationship with a Chinese university while receiving NASA research grants.

Nanotechnology expert Anming Hu returned to UT this week with tenure, his lawyer Phil Lomonaco told the Knoxville News Sentinel. He received $300,000 worth of funding to restart his research program and has been provided similar lab space.

Hu was arrested in February 2020, charged with wire fraud and making false statements. The case went to trial last June, but the jury deadlocked. Prosecutors had filed a notice that they intended to retry the case, but the judge acquitted Hu in September.

The arrest was part of a broader Justice Department crackdown under then-President Donald Trump’s administration against university researchers suspected of concealing their ties to Chinese institutions.

Hu began working for UT Knoxville in 2013 and later was invited by another professor to help apply for a research grant from NASA. That grant application was not successful, but two later applications were. A 2012 law forbids NASA from collaborating with China or Chinese companies. The government has interpreted that prohibition to include Chinese universities, and Hu was a faculty member at the Beijing University of Technology in addition to his position at UT.

Prosecutors tried to show that Hu deliberately hid his position at the Chinese university when applying for the NASA-funded research grants. Hu’s attorney, Philip Lomonaco, argued at trial that Hu didn’t think he needed to list his part-time summer job on a disclosure form and said no one at UT ever told him otherwise.

The judge ruled that, even assuming Hu intended to deceive about his affiliation with that second university, there is no evidence that Hu intended to harm NASA. The judge also noted that NASA got the research from Hu that it paid for, and there was no evidence that Hu took any money from China or had anyone in China work on the projects.

Additionally, the judge cited evidence that NASA’s funding restrictions were unclear.

Lomonaco told the Knoxville News Sentinel after the acquittal that Hu wanted his job back.

https://www.foxnews.com/us/tennessee-university-reinstates-professor-acquitted-china

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Why colleges don’t care about free speech

Georgetown University’s law school violated its own speech policy last week when it placed Ilya Shapiro, a newly hired administrator, on leave over a tweet that offended some students. Why do universities make grandiloquent commitments to freedom of speech, then fail to honour them? It isn’t so much an issue of ideology as a problem of incentives.

Georgetown’s policy states that speech “may not be suppressed because the ideas put forth are thought by some or even by most members of the University community to be offensive, unwise, immoral, or ill conceived.”

Yet that’s what happened when Mr. Shapiro tweeted that the candidate he viewed as “objectively” most qualified for the Supreme Court “alas doesn’t fit into latest intersectionality hierarchy so we’ll get lesser black woman.”

The dean of Georgetown Law, William Treanor, announced that Mr. Shapiro’s comment was “at odds with everything we stand for at Georgetown Law” and ordered “an investigation into whether he violated our policies and expectations on professional conduct, non-discrimination, and anti-harassment.”

Regardless of Mr. Treanor’s political views, he has every reason to do this. University administrators get no reward for upholding abstract principles. Their incentive is to quell on-campus outrage and bad press as quickly as possible. Success is widely praised, but there is no punishment for failing to uphold the university’s commitment to free speech.

The solution is to create an incentive for schools to protect open inquiry — the fear of lawsuits. First, universities should add a “safe harbour” provision to their speech policies stating: “The university will summarily dismiss any allegation that an individual or group has violated a university policy if the allegation is based solely on the individual’s or group’s expression of religious, philosophical, literary, artistic, political, or scientific viewpoints.”

This language would be contractually binding. Second, free-speech advocates should organise pro bono legal groups to sue schools that violate the safe-harbour provision. This would make it affordable for suppressed parties to bring suits over the violation of their contractual rights.

University counsel, whose primary job is to protect the institution from being sued, would then have incentive to curb administrators’ behaviour. They might require that a

legations of harassment be reviewed by a member of the counsel’s office who knows how to distinguish complaints about speech from genuine harassment. They almost certainly would revise the university’s antiharassment training to stress that students and faculty shouldn’t file complaints based solely on the content of the viewpoint being expressed. These and other steps they might take would give universities’ abstract commitments to freedom of speech some real bite.

In the absence of damage awards, university administrators won’t act against their own interests merely to uphold an abstract commitment to free speech. The threat of such awards would make universities like Georgetown put their money where their mouths are.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/the-wall-street-journal/why-colleges-dont-care-about-free-speech/news-story/4250b2fe729da1e5527413e8d9b4d54a?type=curated&position=6&overallPos=6

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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7 February, 2022

Woke teacher exposed for forcing white kids apologize to black kids for skin color

Racism is something people should be able to discuss openly. There truly are situations in our society where racial bias still exists. However, our great nation is not systemically racist. What little racism that does exist is isolated. Normal, everyday Americans are not racists.

Systemic racism is a leftist lie. The little racism we do have is a problem unique to fringe groups. Racism is not rampant. But radical liberals will try to convince you otherwise. From Joe Biden all the way down to our children’s teachers, the left constantly wants to play this race card.

According to the left, the names of our roads are racist. Statues honoring American heroes are somehow racist. Fictional cartoon characters, books, and the lyrics to cherished songs are racist. The problem with this whole insane theory is that none of these things are racist.

The real racists are those who keep trying to make everything that’s not about ethnicity into some type of racial narrative. At its core, this ideology will lead young Americans to believe they’re racist when they’re not. Kids don’t even appreciate what it means to be racist.

However, one crazy elementary teacher in the North Penn School District wants to make sure they do. This fifth-grade teacher used a hideous game to try to convince kids that there was something wrong with them because of the color of their skin.

Other parents said their kids told them of more degrading tactics used by teachers at the school. Kids were targeted for having college-educated parents. In one instance, students were asked to announce if their mom and dad were married. We’re not certain whose business that is.

Children were even told to reveal if they had an in-ground swimming pool. Like CRT, these things have nothing to do with educating young students. One mother was irate. She pulled her child out of AM Kulp Elementary School after she found out what was happening.

Her child came home, distraught and confused. This child said that her teacher lined up all the kids in order, from the whitest down to the darkest skin tone. The teacher then forced the white children to turn and apologize to the black kids. But what were they apologizing for?

This lunatic teacher was forcing these young, impressionable children to believe something was wrong with them because of the color of their skin. They were saying they were sorry for being born white. It’s lunacy. Of course, school board officials denied anything was happening.

But this is the same school district where a teacher taped a COVID mask to a child’s face. The newest revelation exposes the radical and demeaning tactic that is at the core of Critical Race Theory (CRT). CRT is based on a racist ideology. This is how you keep a racist belief alive.

It defies logic. To ask a child to apologize to another child because of the color of their skin automatically ingrains racism into our next generation. Kids are taught to look first at skin color and then at gender. This radical belief system is indoctrinating our youth to ignore character.

Our society, and how we perceive ourselves as part of that society, will be based on race. This is how you teach children to focus on race and ignore character. You’re bad if you’re white. You’re even worse off if you’re a white boy. God forbid you’re a white boy with a swimming pool.

An ideology that says it’s wants to stop racism is making it worse. It’s not a coincidence. This is a masterful plan. The target is the white race. This insane philosophy is trying to instill in white children an inherent sense that there is something wrong with them.

The CRT-based curriculum teaches kids to feel guilty because of their skin color. CRT is the theory with the racism problem. The left’s attempt to improve discrimination through CRT is making matters worse.

Thankfully, parents across the United States are now aware. Teachers like this radical Pennsylvania elementary school teacher must be held accountable. Parents have had enough. Even the threats of federal hawking by U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland haven’t worked.

https://steadfastclash.com/the-latest/woke-teacher-exposed-for-forcing-white-kids-apologize-to-black-kids-for-skin-color/

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FIRE calls on SUNY Fredonia to end suspension, investigation of professor for philosophical discussion of sex with minors

SUNY Fredonia philosophy professor Stephen Kershnar is known for his pointed, Socratic questions about morality. Like many philosophy professors, Kershnar asks difficult questions to get to the heart of why we think things are bad or immoral. 

Perhaps unlike most philosophy professors, Kershnar has made it his niche to deliberately question conventional views on issues like slavery, torture, discrimination, abortion, affirmative action, venerating veterans, whether God exists, and so on. He also teaches a course — “Sex and Love” — that discusses “sexual ethics” and asks “Which kinds of sexual activity are morally permissible under what sort of circumstances?” 

But this week, those questions became too tough for SUNY Fredonia, as it suspended Kershnar after his on-brand hypothesizing about the morality of “adult-child sex” on two podcasts went viral. 

Despite the ensuing swift and heated criticism of Kershnar, many others — including those who strongly disagree with what he had to say — are speaking up in defense of his academic freedom to pose difficult questions. 

While undoubtedly offensive to many, Kershnar’s speech is protected by the First Amendment.

The Daily Nous, a publication “for and about the philosophy profession” run by philosophy professor Justin Weinberg, noted this controversy is just the latest in a recurring cycle of backlash to Kershnar’s work and the charged topics he frequently explores. Weinberg correctly explained that “his work is professional and protected by academic freedom and freedom of speech” and concluded that “he quite clearly ought not be fired.” 

We agree. FIRE sent a letter to SUNY Fredonia yesterday informing the university of its obligations under the First Amendment and urging it to return Kershnar to the classroom immediately. FIRE coordinated a letter signed by more than 30 faculty members supporting Kershnar’s rights to speak on controversial topics as an academic philosopher. The Academic Freedom Alliance also wrote SUNY Fredonia in support of Kershnar. 

Even if you accept Kershnar’s critics’ framing — that his statements could lead to erosion of laws criminalizing sexual abuse of minors — his views are still protected by the First Amendment. As we wrote in our letter to SUNY Fredonia: 

While the law provides no shelter for incitement, that exception is limited to speech “directed to” inciting “imminent lawless action” and likely to result in that action. The Supreme Court has made clear that this exception does not extend to the “mere advocacy” of unlawful conduct, the “abstract teaching” of unlawful conduct, or arguments about the “moral propriety or even moral necessity” for unlawful action, leaving all such speech within the protection of the First Amendment.

Kershnar’s controversial research interests and statements should not be news to SUNY Fredonia. For years, it recognized that academic freedom protected those research interests. In fact, Kershnar’s bio on the SUNY Fredonia website notes that he “has written one hundred articles and book chapters on such diverse topics as abortion, adult-child sex, hell, most valuable player, pornography, punishment, sexual fantasies, slavery, and torture.” The university didn’t have a problem with Kershnar’s patented devil’s advocacy and Socratic questioning until the online outrage machine manufactured a problem.

What changed?

The university didn’t have a problem with Kershnar’s patented devil’s advocacy and Socratic questioning until the online outrage machine manufactured a problem.

Yesterday, the university said the “volume” of “specific threats” it is receiving leaves them unable to “compile a list” to provide to Kershnar. That’s not surprising; when videos of academics’ controversial speech go viral, the vociferous public response — itself largely composed of protected speech — far too often includes some form of threatened violence. But taking action against an unpopular speaker serves only to reward such threats. 

In so doing, SUNY Fredonia facilitates an impermissible heckler’s veto, which incentivizes more threats in the future. And when universities respond to threats by taking action against the speaker — as opposed to taking other steps to address security risks, or temporarily allowing classes to meet via videoconferencing — they send the message that speech in higher education is protected as long as it’s popular with people who would threaten violence. (See, for example, Dartmouth’s recent retreat from freedom of expression due to threats against conservative journalist Andy Ngo.) 

While undoubtedly offensive to many, Kershnar’s speech is protected by the First Amendment. FIRE has provided Kershnar an attorney via our Faculty Legal Defense Fund. We will continue to watch this situation closely.

https://www.thefire.org/fire-calls-on-suny-fredonia-to-end-suspension-investigation-of-professor-for-philosophical-discussion-of-sex-with-minors/

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Strange scholarship at the University of Melbourne

<i>Insanity is everywhere these days.  The aggressive Left have cowed people into adopting their ideas</i>

The University of Melbourne advertises itself as Australia’s best university—the first and only member of the Australian Ivy League. This isn’t an unreasonable claim. The Times Higher Education World University Rankings for 2019 put the University of Melbourne 32nd in the world, 17 spots ahead of Australian National University, its nearest Australian rival. Numerous other figures seem to demonstrate the school’s excellence at preparing students for prosperous employment and at developing their critical thinking skills.

Naturally, I was pleased and even proud to have been accepted into the University of Melbourne’s 2017 Master of Journalism program. I believed, without really thinking about it, that I was in for a challenging year and a half at a school far more rigorous than the one from which I received my baccalaureate. (The University of Oklahoma consistently lands somewhere in the 400s on the Times Higher Education index.)

Of course, I was aware of the complaints directed at Australian universities—that the integrity of their curricula had gradually been compromised to appease social justice activists. Ubiquitous Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson expresses these concerns somewhat apocalyptically:

You may not realize it, but you are currently funding some dangerous people. They are indoctrinating young minds throughout the West with their resentment-ridden ideology… They produce the mobs that violently shut down campus speakers, the language police who enshrine into law use of fabricated gender pronouns and the deans whose livelihoods depend on madly rooting out discrimination where little or none exists… And now we rack up education-related debt, not so that our children learn to think critically, write clearly or speak properly, but so they can model their mentors’ destructive agenda.

It’s natural that these denunciations should sound wildly hyperbolic—a bit like Joseph McCarthy’s claim that there were 81 Communists lurking in the State Department. Who but a political cultist would be willing to believe something like that without seeing it for himself?

The first indication I received that something had gone awry at Australia’s best university was in a criminology class titled “Violence, Trauma, and Reconciliation.” According to the University of Melbourne handbook, this class “considers the forms of trauma people experience as a response to… forms of violence and explores how this trauma propels calls for apologies, truth commissions, retribution, and torture.”

The instructor, Dr. Juliet Rogers, devoted a lecture to female genital mutilation—a natural enough topic for a class on trauma. In Rogers’s view, however, the true source of trauma was not the practice of FGM itself, but the “violence” of anti-FGM laws. After all, Western societies pressure women into body modification in the form of ear piercings—so who are we to pass judgment on those who practice clitorectomies and infibulations on children? And isn’t it true that legislators’ supposed concern with FGM is actually motivated by “Islamophobia”?

In the article “The First Case Addressing Female Genital Mutilation in Australia: Where is the Harm?” Rogers takes issue with Australian “prejudice” against the practice of clitoral “nicking”:

For each claim that a woman’s sexual health is impacted, there is a study which suggests it is not, and others which suggest it is enhanced. For each claim of trauma, there is another which claims empowerment. However, it is the violent images which are played and replayed, on airport shelves, in documentaries and in fiction that form opinion. These, “through repetition” have come in Obermeyer’s terms again “to gain authority as truth.” Similarly, in the FLC’s [Family Law Court’s] Report the image of violence is only presented and then repeated, with the name “female genital mutilation” always attached. There is no discussion of the benefits of the practices, the increases in sexual enjoyment that women report, the cultural empowerment that women experience, the desires of many to undergo the practices or the rage that many women have at being called ‘mutilated’ when so many clearly feel that they are not.

While working with the US Peace Corps in rural Gambia, I encountered the practice of female genital mutilation firsthand. The empowering effect of having one’s clitoris razored off was not readily apparent.

It was clear from the tone of Rogers’s lecture that she regarded these ideas as quite subversive and challenging. However, most of the room nodded along quite comfortably. If we didn’t actually find these ideas challenging, we could at least derive some satisfaction from the thought of how challenged a less enlightened third party might be.

Another peculiar class was Terror, Law, and War, ostensibly a survey of legal and military responses to terrorism. In practice, the class focused almost exclusively on American, European, and Israeli misbehavior, and on the perceived ridiculousness of Australian anti-terrorism measures. Islamist terrorism was left unconsidered except as a hallucination of xenophobic Westerners. As if to drive the point home, one presentation on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict referred to Palestinian suicide bombings as “terrorism,” in scare quotes.

We spent a period discussing a televised interview with Wassim Doureihi, spokesman for the Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir. During the interview, Lateline host Emma Alberici took a combative stance, demanding that Doureihi either clearly denounce the Islamic State’s tactics or admit that he condoned them. Doureihi refused to cooperate, instead pushing the conversation toward Australian mistreatment of Muslims.

The subsequent class discussion became something like a rally: we unanimously acclaimed Doureihi’s dignity and courage and took turns mocking Alberici’s hypocrisy and ill-concealed racism. The teaching assistant declared with apparent pride that she was friends with Doureihi and that he had confided in her that the interview was a trying experience, but necessary. Some of the students who rose to voice their support for Doureihi were so agitated that their voices shook. Somehow, throughout this bacchanal of self-righteousness, the fact that Hizb ut-Tahrir is an explicitly anti-democratic organization that supports the killing of apostates and whose leaders describe Jews as “the most evil creatures of Allah” escaped mention. Evidently, one can’t take sides between liberalism and totalitarianism without knowing the pigmentations of those involved.

To hear Australia’s most privileged youth praise a theocrat like Doureihi was unsettling, but classes equally often took a turn for the comical. On one occasion, Rogers interrupted a Violence, Trauma and Reconciliation lecture to tell us about Lego’s “criminal” figure (right). The figure is about what you might expect: a child-friendly depiction of a burglar, sporting a sinister grin, a stocking cap and a black-and-white-striped prison uniform. What this piece of Lego has to do with either violence, trauma or reconciliation may not be immediately obvious: the criminal, you see, is depicted with visible chest hair. This chest hair is a coded indication that the criminal is nonwhite, thereby implying that people of color are criminals and terrorists. Oddly enough, another of my instructors also brought up this Lego figure and its racist chest hair during her own class. I suppose it had been doing the rounds among the faculty.

Students were always instructed to question their assumptions rather than acquiescing mindlessly to the status quo. At the University of Melbourne, however, the assumption that racial identification is of paramount significance, that Western societies are uniquely malignant and oppressive, that Islamist theocrats are victims and not perpetrators, et cetera, is the status quo. What does it signify when the authorities tell you to dissent?

In some classes, the frantic obsession with demographics was spearheaded by the students, against the apparent wishes of their instructors. In one nonfiction writing class, discussion of Gay Talese’s influential 1966 profile of Frank Sinatra centered not on Talese’s quippy yet unhurried scene-setting, or on his vivid portraiture of a subject he’d never actually interviewed, but on Talese’s misogyny. (One student said that Talese’s description of two Sinatra groupies as “attractive but fading blondes” was “chilling.”) David Foster Wallace’s essay “Tense Present” was subjected to a similarly myopic “discussion” of Wallace’s whiteness and his failure to acknowledge English as an “imperial language.” Any technical lessons we might have taken from Talese or Wallace were lost altogether—instead, we enumerated the things they might have learned from us.

During these Two Minutes Hate sessions, the instructor often stood back, grimacing uncomfortably and sometimes trying to steer the discussion back toward the piece of writing at hand. He was a gentle man with a clear love for long-form journalism, and I suspect he sometimes wondered why his class discussions had grown so frenzied.

What if I’d heard about this from someone else? I asked myself from time to time. What if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes? I knew the answer—I wouldn’t have believed a word of it. I would have assumed the narrator of these outlandish events to be a right-wing doomsayer ready to contort the truth however necessary to vilify his opponents. Can I reasonably expect more charity from you, the reader of this article? Hard to say.

Perhaps the most unexpected part of life at the University of Melbourne was how easy the actual work was. In Terror, Law and War, the essays I submitted consisted of structureless, deliberately turgid summaries of class readings, enlivened with the odd anti-Western cliché and handed in without proofreading or revision. This seemed to be the level of seriousness appropriate to the class. My diploma is proof that this material, produced almost without conscious effort, was up to the standards of Australia’s top university.

During one and a half years attending journalism classes, I was exposed to surprisingly little information on the actual craft of journalism. Recipients of the University of Melbourne’s Master of Journalism degree will know about the inverted pyramid model and other basic concepts. Deeper questions, however, are left mostly unexamined. When should an interviewer rely on a list of questions and when should he improvise? How does one efficiently cut a news story down to 125 words?  How does news writing differ from other prose in grammar and punctuation? It is possible to obtain a 150-point journalism degree from the University of Melbourne without learning the answers to these questions. Of course, who has time for such trivialities when there’s a revolution on? University of Melbourne students may matriculate unprepared to produce clear and accurate news articles, but they will understand their political objectives.

I graduated in December 2018, amidst rallies against “fascism on campus.” (Given that, in 18 months on campus, I encountered no fascists, these rallies seem to have been very effective.) Behaving compliantly throughout these peculiar antics was a mistake. The most I can do after the fact is relay my observations without inventing a heroic role for myself.

Was pursuing a degree at Australia’s top university a waste of time? Not necessarily. The name of an institution whose superiority is supported by so many statistics surely helps beautify my résumé. And I was granted the chance to dip into a strange emerging culture, one whose existence I probably would not have accepted if I hadn’t seen it for myself. It seems the doomsayers are sometimes correct.

https://quillette.com/2019/05/22/when-the-authorities-tell-you-to-dissent/

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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6 February, 2022

Georgia ‘Parents’ Bill of Rights’ Holds Schools Accountable to Parents

A bill introduced in the Georgia General Assembly on Wednesday would enact a new set of rules regarding transparency in the state’s public schools.

The legislation, termed the “Parents’ Bill of Rights” by its supporters, would create a process by which parents can request information from schools regarding curriculum, the Cordele Dispatch reported.

State Sen. Clint Dixon and state Rep. Josh Bonner, both Republicans, introduced two slightly different versions of the bill in their respective chambers.

One of the stated purposes of the bill is “to require school and school system governing bodies to adopt policies or regulations that promote parental involvement in public schools.”

School systems would have to answer requests for information from parents within three days.

“If the principal or superintendent is unable to share the information within that timeframe, they must provide the parent a written description of the material and a timeline for its delivery, not to exceed 30 days,” according to the Dispatch.

Under the bill, schools would also be required to notify parents of their intent to teach sex education curriculum. Parents would have the option to withdraw their children from such classes.

Public school curricula have become the subject of national controversy with the rise of critical race theory, which posits that the U.S. is fundamentally racist and defined by white supremacy. Many parents have opposed the use of CRT in classrooms.

Education policy proved a game-changing political issue in Virginia’s gubernatorial election in November, with Republican Glenn Youngkin defeating Democrat Terry McAuliffe.

Youngkin pledged to introduce reforms to eliminate the teaching of CRT in schools, with McAuliffe tying himself to left-wing teachers’ unions and arguing that parents should not be “telling schools what they should teach.”

Gov. Brian Kemp touted the proposed Georgia legislation in a statement.

“At a time when our nation is more divided than ever, we’re leading the fight to ensure parents do not have any barriers which prevent them from playing an active role in their child’s education,” Kemp said.

“Students do best when their parents have a seat at the table and their voices are heard and respected.

“At its core, [the bill] is about transparency, access, and promoting an engaged partnership between the parent and educators to the ultimate benefit of the student.”

Republicans have strong majorities in both chambers of the Georgia General Assembly, making it likely that the “Parents’ Bill of Rights” will be sent to the governor’s desk.

https://flagandcross.com/georgia-parents-bill-of-rights-holds-schools-accountable-to-parents/

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CONTROVERSIAL 5th Grade Test Question Sparks An ONLINE OUTRAGE

The Fayette County (KY) school district definitely has a lot of explaining to do, namely to the Kentucky Peace Officers Association. They heard some news regarding a test question on a 5th Grade exam where the question read, “What is the relationship between Breonna Taylor and Jacob Blake?” Now, the Kentucky Peace Officers Association is demanding an explanation for why this question was there in the first place.

If you don’t think that the question alone is a bit biased, then all you have to do is to look at the first choice in the list of possible answers. It reads, “Both of these individuals were victims of police brutality and violence, and that sparks nationwide protests against racial injustices.” 

The Kentucky Peace Officers Association declined to do an on-camera interview with the news organization that broke the story, LEX 18. However, KPOA President Chip Nowlin did send in a statement: 

“Yes, it is the responsibility of all educational leaders to appropriately mold the minds of young people and shape their futures, it definitely isn’t their right to do this in a manner that negatively influences them and promotes a political agenda.”

Fayette County Schools spokesperson Lisa Deffendall said that these questions had been taken out of context. They said that the questions were simply from an article taken from a website called Newsela, and that they didn’t have the faintest ill-intention behind them. They said that one of the main goals of the school is to help understudies become fully involved in their communities and that they have the ability to fully analyze whatever their general surroundings might bring. 

However, KPOA continued to reprimand the Kentucky Department of Education. They made several counterarguments, including the fact that they thought that some of the proclamations on the KDE website were “incendiary and biased.” 

President Nowlin went even further, pointing out that the KDE has recently been showing a clear pattern of insulting distributions to their schools regarding law enforcement. Indeed, they appear to be explicitly focusing on law enforcement agencies to the detriment of anything else.

Kentucky Department of Education representative Toni Konz Tatman made sure that the public knew that the KDE has already had a meeting with Nowlin where he outlined all of his concerns regarding this resource guide. She noted that KDE has always been dedicated to addressing systemic and race-related traumatic events with their faculty, staff, and students. 

Unfortunately, Tatman and other KDE representatives said that they are still waiting for a response from the email they sent to Nowlin. They feel that he is simply seeing what he wants to see and just ignoring the problem, and just doing that is only going to exacerbate the situation and continue to create a “persistent negative impact.” 

https://thepatriotnation.net/controversial-5th-grade-test-question-sparks-an-online-outrage-2/

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Meet Mom Fighting Schools’ Mask Mandates

My name is Merianne Jensen and I am a mother of four children. I’m located in Prince William County. COVID has really affected my children’s education. A mask has its purpose. Masks are not effective in the classrooms. COVID-19 is not being spread in the classrooms. It is not being spread by children, and the emotional damage that is being done by masks far, far outweighs getting COVID-19.

My son came home the first day of school with an extreme headache, and went to bed with a stomachache because he was so anxious. I told him it was just the first day jitters. The second day, he came home from school with a splitting headache. For two weeks, he came home with a headache. We took him to the doctor. It was all because of the mask.

We play politics with kids’ faces by placing restrictive fabric over their noses and mouths, that the CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] itself has said don’t do anything, and it’s for their safety.

Dr. [LaTanya D.] McDade is the superintendent of the Prince William County education system. When I attended a critical race theory training meeting, I just grabbed her and said, “Hey, Dr. McDade. I’m Merianne Jensen, and when will our kids get out of masks?” And she looked at me in the eye and she said that she would, if she could, but that her hands were tied by then Gov. [Ralph] Northam’s executive order mandating face coverings, and if it weren’t for that, things would be different.

When Gov. Glenn Youngkin was elected, we were ecstatic. When the order came, I was very hopeful that Dr. McDade would keep her promise, so then we heard that these seven counties were suing Gov. Youngkin, regarding his executive order, which was shocking to me, when I had been told by Dr. McDade personally that they would be waiting for guidance from Richmond.

This is asinine. This is blatant political theater and it needs to end.

The board meeting was incredible. We had a lot of charged parents, bipartisan parents that want their children to be able to have a choice. Many of us have emailed board members hundreds and thousands of emails, and we get nothing back in response.

I’ve attended many school board meetings in the past, and every time I’ve signed up to get a spot, I’ve gotten denied, and I finally got a spot this time. It was the only way that I was able to communicate how I felt and how so many other parents felt. I’m asking all of you to step up the way other leaders who have and are ending COVID restrictions by the day. When will you? What will it take?

The only way out of this was to sign up for a religious exemption. The county has fought tooth and nail, and they’ve made it really difficult for our children. I let them choose what they wanted to do. I gave them the options, and they chose the mitigations, because they hate the mask so much. It’s killing them emotionally.

My children have to sit six feet away from their peers. If they are doing a group project, they have to put on a face shield, which is a face covering. If they cannot sit six feet away, they have to have a plexiglass shield around their desk, so they are at story time or in library and they have to sit far away and cannot be with their friends. They cannot see the pictures in the books. They are being targeted.

They are being bullied by their leaders, by their principals, by their superintendent, by their teachers. They’re being shamed and punished.

I would like to say to the school board members, listen to your constituents. You need to stop using our children as pawns in your political games. You were nominated. You were elected for our children and not for your politics. You are on the losing side of history and it’s time to make that right before these children now.

Thank you.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/02/04/meet-mom-fighting-schools-mask-mandates/

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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4 February, 2022

Why They FIRED A Teacher For Not Meowing At A Student

A substitute teacher claims she was fired from her job because she refused to “meow” back at a child who believes they are a cat.

The substitute teacher posted a video on TikTok going by the handle @crazynamebridgetmichael alleging she was fired by school officials for not “identifying with” a student who “identifies as a cat” after she refused to meow back at the child in class.

During roll call, the teacher said she heard meowing as she walked up and down the aisles of students.

“I get to the third row and I hear this ‘meow!’ Uhhh, excuse me? Excuse me?” she narrates on a TikTok video she posted detailing the bizarre incident.

“I start looking on the ground, through the fourth row—everything’s good. Go to the fifth row—everybody’s there. Then I hear ‘meow!’ I’m like, ‘Okay, what’s up with that? Who’s doing it?’ And this little girl in the very front row says, ‘You have to meow back at him; he identifies as a cat.’”

The teacher responded by asking, “Is there a litter box in here somewhere?”

The ‘cat’ child “storms out of the classroom,” she continued.

Although she said she thought better of it afterward, she followed up with a “RUFF” as he walked out, making the rest of the children laugh.

At the end of the day, she said she was let go from her position for a failure to “identify with all the students.”

“We no longer need your services if you can’t identify with all the children in the classroom,” the school allegedly told the teacher after the incident.

“I didn’t know cats were considered people; I thought they were pets,” she told the office staff.

“And you wonder why they don’t have any subs!” she exclaimed.

“Another school off my list,” she concluded.

Here are some comments from folks online:

“We have lost our ever-loving minds. You can now get fired if you don’t believe a child should identify as an animal? Lord, help us!”

“Leftist insanity is destroying our children,”

“This is beyond INSANITY!”

“A society that accommodates insanity can not long survive as it can no longer rightly distinguish between reality & falsehood. #AntonioGramsci #subversion #truth #mindcontrol,”

https://theinformedamerican.net/why-they-fired-a-teacher-for-not-meowing-at-a-student-will-make/

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Strange scholarship at the University of Melbourne

The University of Melbourne advertises itself as Australia’s best university—the first and only member of the Australian Ivy League. This isn’t an unreasonable claim. The Times Higher Education World University Rankings for 2019 put the University of Melbourne 32nd in the world, 17 spots ahead of Australian National University, its nearest Australian rival. Numerous other figures seem to demonstrate the school’s excellence at preparing students for prosperous employment and at developing their critical thinking skills.

Naturally, I was pleased and even proud to have been accepted into the University of Melbourne’s 2017 Master of Journalism program. I believed, without really thinking about it, that I was in for a challenging year and a half at a school far more rigorous than the one from which I received my baccalaureate. (The University of Oklahoma consistently lands somewhere in the 400s on the Times Higher Education index.)

Of course, I was aware of the complaints directed at Australian universities—that the integrity of their curricula had gradually been compromised to appease social justice activists. Ubiquitous Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson expresses these concerns somewhat apocalyptically:

You may not realize it, but you are currently funding some dangerous people. They are indoctrinating young minds throughout the West with their resentment-ridden ideology… They produce the mobs that violently shut down campus speakers, the language police who enshrine into law use of fabricated gender pronouns and the deans whose livelihoods depend on madly rooting out discrimination where little or none exists… And now we rack up education-related debt, not so that our children learn to think critically, write clearly or speak properly, but so they can model their mentors’ destructive agenda.

It’s natural that these denunciations should sound wildly hyperbolic—a bit like Joseph McCarthy’s claim that there were 81 Communists lurking in the State Department. Who but a political cultist would be willing to believe something like that without seeing it for himself?

The first indication I received that something had gone awry at Australia’s best university was in a criminology class titled “Violence, Trauma, and Reconciliation.” According to the University of Melbourne handbook, this class “considers the forms of trauma people experience as a response to… forms of violence and explores how this trauma propels calls for apologies, truth commissions, retribution, and torture.”

The instructor, Dr. Juliet Rogers, devoted a lecture to female genital mutilation—a natural enough topic for a class on trauma. In Rogers’s view, however, the true source of trauma was not the practice of FGM itself, but the “violence” of anti-FGM laws. After all, Western societies pressure women into body modification in the form of ear piercings—so who are we to pass judgment on those who practice clitorectomies and infibulations on children? And isn’t it true that legislators’ supposed concern with FGM is actually motivated by “Islamophobia”?

In the article “The First Case Addressing Female Genital Mutilation in Australia: Where is the Harm?” Rogers takes issue with Australian “prejudice” against the practice of clitoral “nicking”:

For each claim that a woman’s sexual health is impacted, there is a study which suggests it is not, and others which suggest it is enhanced. For each claim of trauma, there is another which claims empowerment. However, it is the violent images which are played and replayed, on airport shelves, in documentaries and in fiction that form opinion. These, “through repetition” have come in Obermeyer’s terms again “to gain authority as truth.” Similarly, in the FLC’s [Family Law Court’s] Report the image of violence is only presented and then repeated, with the name “female genital mutilation” always attached. There is no discussion of the benefits of the practices, the increases in sexual enjoyment that women report, the cultural empowerment that women experience, the desires of many to undergo the practices or the rage that many women have at being called ‘mutilated’ when so many clearly feel that they are not.

While working with the US Peace Corps in rural Gambia, I encountered the practice of female genital mutilation firsthand. The empowering effect of having one’s clitoris razored off was not readily apparent.

It was clear from the tone of Rogers’s lecture that she regarded these ideas as quite subversive and challenging. However, most of the room nodded along quite comfortably. If we didn’t actually find these ideas challenging, we could at least derive some satisfaction from the thought of how challenged a less enlightened third party might be.

Another peculiar class was Terror, Law, and War, ostensibly a survey of legal and military responses to terrorism. In practice, the class focused almost exclusively on American, European, and Israeli misbehavior, and on the perceived ridiculousness of Australian anti-terrorism measures. Islamist terrorism was left unconsidered except as a hallucination of xenophobic Westerners. As if to drive the point home, one presentation on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict referred to Palestinian suicide bombings as “terrorism,” in scare quotes.

We spent a period discussing a televised interview with Wassim Doureihi, spokesman for the Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir. During the interview, Lateline host Emma Alberici took a combative stance, demanding that Doureihi either clearly denounce the Islamic State’s tactics or admit that he condoned them. Doureihi refused to cooperate, instead pushing the conversation toward Australian mistreatment of Muslims.

The subsequent class discussion became something like a rally: we unanimously acclaimed Doureihi’s dignity and courage and took turns mocking Alberici’s hypocrisy and ill-concealed racism. The teaching assistant declared with apparent pride that she was friends with Doureihi and that he had confided in her that the interview was a trying experience, but necessary. Some of the students who rose to voice their support for Doureihi were so agitated that their voices shook. Somehow, throughout this bacchanal of self-righteousness, the fact that Hizb ut-Tahrir is an explicitly anti-democratic organization that supports the killing of apostates and whose leaders describe Jews as “the most evil creatures of Allah” escaped mention. Evidently, one can’t take sides between liberalism and totalitarianism without knowing the pigmentations of those involved.

To hear Australia’s most privileged youth praise a theocrat like Doureihi was unsettling, but classes equally often took a turn for the comical. On one occasion, Rogers interrupted a Violence, Trauma and Reconciliation lecture to tell us about Lego’s “criminal” figure (right). The figure is about what you might expect: a child-friendly depiction of a burglar, sporting a sinister grin, a stocking cap and a black-and-white-striped prison uniform. What this piece of Lego has to do with either violence, trauma or reconciliation may not be immediately obvious: the criminal, you see, is depicted with visible chest hair. This chest hair is a coded indication that the criminal is nonwhite, thereby implying that people of color are criminals and terrorists. Oddly enough, another of my instructors also brought up this Lego figure and its racist chest hair during her own class. I suppose it had been doing the rounds among the faculty.

Students were always instructed to question their assumptions rather than acquiescing mindlessly to the status quo. At the University of Melbourne, however, the assumption that racial identification is of paramount significance, that Western societies are uniquely malignant and oppressive, that Islamist theocrats are victims and not perpetrators, et cetera, is the status quo. What does it signify when the authorities tell you to dissent?

In some classes, the frantic obsession with demographics was spearheaded by the students, against the apparent wishes of their instructors. In one nonfiction writing class, discussion of Gay Talese’s influential 1966 profile of Frank Sinatra centered not on Talese’s quippy yet unhurried scene-setting, or on his vivid portraiture of a subject he’d never actually interviewed, but on Talese’s misogyny. (One student said that Talese’s description of two Sinatra groupies as “attractive but fading blondes” was “chilling.”) David Foster Wallace’s essay “Tense Present” was subjected to a similarly myopic “discussion” of Wallace’s whiteness and his failure to acknowledge English as an “imperial language.” Any technical lessons we might have taken from Talese or Wallace were lost altogether—instead, we enumerated the things they might have learned from us.

During these Two Minutes Hate sessions, the instructor often stood back, grimacing uncomfortably and sometimes trying to steer the discussion back toward the piece of writing at hand. He was a gentle man with a clear love for long-form journalism, and I suspect he sometimes wondered why his class discussions had grown so frenzied.

What if I’d heard about this from someone else? I asked myself from time to time. What if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes? I knew the answer—I wouldn’t have believed a word of it. I would have assumed the narrator of these outlandish events to be a right-wing doomsayer ready to contort the truth however necessary to vilify his opponents. Can I reasonably expect more charity from you, the reader of this article? Hard to say.

Perhaps the most unexpected part of life at the University of Melbourne was how easy the actual work was. In Terror, Law and War, the essays I submitted consisted of structureless, deliberately turgid summaries of class readings, enlivened with the odd anti-Western cliché and handed in without proofreading or revision. This seemed to be the level of seriousness appropriate to the class. My diploma is proof that this material, produced almost without conscious effort, was up to the standards of Australia’s top university.

During one and a half years attending journalism classes, I was exposed to surprisingly little information on the actual craft of journalism. Recipients of the University of Melbourne’s Master of Journalism degree will know about the inverted pyramid model and other basic concepts. Deeper questions, however, are left mostly unexamined. When should an interviewer rely on a list of questions and when should he improvise? How does one efficiently cut a news story down to 125 words?  How does news writing differ from other prose in grammar and punctuation? It is possible to obtain a 150-point journalism degree from the University of Melbourne without learning the answers to these questions. Of course, who has time for such trivialities when there’s a revolution on? University of Melbourne students may matriculate unprepared to produce clear and accurate news articles, but they will understand their political objectives.

I graduated in December 2018, amidst rallies against “fascism on campus.” (Given that, in 18 months on campus, I encountered no fascists, these rallies seem to have been very effective.) Behaving compliantly throughout these peculiar antics was a mistake. The most I can do after the fact is relay my observations without inventing a heroic role for myself.

Was pursuing a degree at Australia’s top university a waste of time? Not necessarily. The name of an institution whose superiority is supported by so many statistics surely helps beautify my résumé. And I was granted the chance to dip into a strange emerging culture, one whose existence I probably would not have accepted if I hadn’t seen it for myself. It seems the doomsayers are sometimes correct.

https://quillette.com/2019/05/22/when-the-authorities-tell-you-to-dissent/

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Ex-UCLA lecturer facing charges for threat-laced video, ‘manifesto’

A former UCLA lecturer was slapped with federal charges for emailing students and faculty a threatening video and an unhinged “manifesto” that temporarily shut down the college’s campus this week.

Matthew Harris, 31, allegedly sent out a rambling 803-page manifesto to members of the philosophy department that mentioned the words “kill,” “bomb” and “shoot” 12,000 times.

He was arrested in Boulder, Colorado on Tuesday and appeared in US District Court in Denver on Thursday, according to the Los Angeles Times.

“Burn and attack Boulder outside by the university,” the manifesto said, according to an FBI agent’s affidavit cited by the Times.

”Hunt them where they work … Kill their children at freshman orientation. Shoot them at the opening weekend, Bombs at middle schools, no threats, Shot gun columbine university slaying, Kill the board of trustees at every university.”

Harris had been a postdoctoral fellow in philosophy at UCLA before he was booted from the program last year amid increasingly bizarre behavior that unnerved colleagues and led to a restraining order from the University of California, reports said.

A former UCLA lecturer was slapped with federal charges for emailing students and faculty a threatening video and an unhinged “manifesto” that temporarily shut down the college’s campus this week.

Former UCLA lecturer Matthew Harris allegedly emailed a menacing manifesto to faculty members. In his manifesto, Harris said ”hunt them where they work … Kill their children at freshman orientation.”

CBS4

On Monday, the ex-lecturer sent an email received by about 35 people, linking the so-called manifesto as well as videos — including one titled “UCLA PHILOSOPHY (MASS SHOOTING),” the Associated Press reported. The video spliced footage from a mass shooting in Las Vegas and scenes from a 2003 movie depicting a mass shooting called “Zero Day.”

The UCLA campus was shut Tuesday in the aftermath. Harris, who was found to have moved to Boulder last year, was arrested later that day at his apartment complex after he barricaded himself inside for a time, Boulder police said in a news release.

Harris had been put on leave as a fellow from UCLA in March after he sent some disturbing and inappropriate emails to women in his research group, according to the AP. The next month, he visited his mother in North Carolina but she feared for her life and slept with a knife near her bed, the complaint against him said.

The University of California had previously known about Harris’s disturbing behavior toward faculty members.

CBS4

UCLA closed its campus on Feb. 2 after Harris emailed a video promising a mass shooting against students.

CBS4

He was committed to a psychiatric hospital but later released. In May, UCLA got a protection order against him for threats he had made to a professor at UC Irvine, the affidavit said. After moving to Colorado in 2021, he tried to buy a gun but was rejected, Boulder police said.

Harris is facing charges of transmission of threats in interstate commerce and is being held without bail pending a hearing on Tuesday.

https://nypost.com/2022/02/03/ex-ucla-lecturer-facing-charges-for-threat-laced-video/

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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3 February, 2022

Yet Another History Professor Says Collin College Fired Him Over Free Speech Concerns

For months, Collin College history professor Michael Phillips had advocated for colleagues who claimed they were fired in violation of their rights. Now, it appears he’s next on the chopping block.

In a Twitter thread Monday, Phillips announced that Collin College decided against renewing his contract, which expires May 15.

For one thing, he says, the administration was upset that he’d publicly posted about a policy preventing professors from recommending masks in class. Despite this, Phillips encouraged mask use, discussed anti-mask leagues amid the 1918 influenza pandemic and assigned coursework related to the history of epidemics and pandemics. Soon enough, Phillips said, he received a discipline warning for his social media posts and classroom speech.

Phillips also says he was warned by an administrator that he’d violated school policy after co-authoring a 2017 open letter that called for the removal of Dallas’ Confederate statues. The letter identified him as a professor at Collin College. Another professor there had also signed the letter, which she claims became part of the school's reasoning for her termination.

“The news that I have been fired is heartbreaking to me,” Phillips said in a tweet. “Teaching, mentoring, and getting to know my students and watching them flower into full adulthood has been one of the most rewarding parts of my life.”

Speaking with the Observer, Phillips said the school was upset that he’d made the masking “gag rule” public and spoken to the Board of Trustees.

“It’s just apparent that they feel like college policy trumps the First Amendment, some kind of vague policy that the foundational document of the United States somehow is not relevant anymore,” he said. “It doesn’t say in the First Amendment I have the freedom to petition my government for a redress of grievances — as long as I talk to my associate dean first.”

In his Twitter thread, Phillips says that last week, he was called in for a meeting in which the institution’s senior vice president suggested he make a “graceful exit” from Collin College. Phillips claims that he was asked to work in tandem with the school to “construct a narrative” around his departure, such as by telling others that he would be leaving voluntarily.

“He further said that, with such cooperation, the college could help me in my search for a new position,” Phillips continued. “I declined the offer.”

When asked for comment, Collin College spokesperson Marisela Cadena-Smith sent a statement describing the school’s contract renewal process. She declined to publicly comment on personnel matters “out of respect for the privacy of our faculty members and their respective current and future employment.”

In a separate email, the Observer also specifically asked about Phillips' allegation that he'd been encouraged to say his departure was voluntary, purportedly in exchange for help finding another job. Cadena-Smith reiterated that the school would provide no further comment.

Phillips is the latest Collin College professor who says the school targeted them over free speech. He’s long been a harsh critic of district President Neil Matkin, but he’s far from the only one.

Lora Burnett was a history professor at Collin College until last year, when she says she was let go in violation of her constitutional rights. So, she sued the school, and last Tuesday accepted its offer to pay her $70,000 plus attorneys’ fees.

Burnett said she was “absolutely beside [herself] with righteous indignation” when she learned of her former colleague’s announcement.

Phillips is a beloved employee and longtime advocate for the rights of all North Texas citizens, in addition to being an all-around extraordinary person, Burnett said. For the administrators to suggest that he lie about the circumstances behind his non-renewal is perhaps the most shocking thing she’s ever heard coming out of Collin College, she said, adding that “if that’s not criminal, it should be.”

Moving forward, Burnett said, she’s willing to do everything she can to support Phillips, who tirelessly advocated for her and other professors who were “wrongfully fired.” She will continue to focus public scrutiny on the malfeasance of Collin College, a government entity that has continually violated the citizens’ constitutional rights, she said.

https://www.dallasobserver.com/news/history-professor-michael-phillips-claims-he-was-fired-from-collin-college-in-violation-of-constitutional-rights-13323971

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Virginia's new GOP AG prompts three largest universities to drop vaccine mandate for students

The three largest universities in Virginia have dropped their sweeping vaccine requirements after the state's attorney general issued his legal opinion calling such mandates illegal. 

George Mason University, Virginia Tech and the University of Mary Washington all announced reforms to their previously strict vaccination requirements. The colleges now emphasis recommendations to vaccinate without negative consequences for remaining holdouts.

"Proof of vaccination against COVID-19 is no longer a condition of students’ enrollment or in-person attendance, nor will unvaccinated or eligible unboosted students be subject to separate testing requirements," University of Mary Washington wrote in a memo.

Virginia's newly elected Republican Attorney General Jason Miyares warned the universities they would not be allowed to mandate vaccines for students in a legal opinion published Jan. 26.

"Virginia’s public institutions of higher education are public corporations," Miyares wrote in the opinion. "As such, they are afforded separate corporate status but remain under control of the General Assembly and may only exercise such powers as the General Assembly has expressly conferred or necessarily implied."

The attorney has already taken hard line stances on public policy from education to criminal prosecution, saying that Virginia would be moving forward with "common sense" instead of partisan platforms. Unpopular mask and vaccine mandates at public schools and universities are a focus of both Miyares and Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin.

"All George Mason University students are strongly encouraged to get vaccinated and to submit COVID-19 vaccination documentation and COVID-19 booster documentation," the university now says, though the request for documentation is now rendered toothless.

The university followed up the change with a letter to students from the school's president, Dr. Gregory Washington.

"Given our high vaccination rate, the continued decline of the omicron variant, the Governor’s recent executive orders and directives, and the recent Attorney General’s opinion, we will now strongly encourage vaccination protocols for all Mason students, faculty, and staff, though we no longer require them," Washington wrote. "We also strongly encourage everyone to upload their vaccination status so we can continue to understand the effect of the virus on campus community."

Virginia Tech is also following the new legal opinion, stating that the school "will no longer require students to be vaccinated as a condition of enrollment or in-person instruction, effective immediately."

However, the University of Virginia wrote in an online message, "Attorney general opinions, though they do not have the force of law the way a court ruling does, nonetheless warrant careful consideration."

The university said that because over 99% of its students are already fully vaccinated and boosted, they do not intend to follow the attorney general's opinion, but will not disenroll students who have not received a booster.

Within hours of taking office, Miyares announced investigations into two campaign issues that were prominent topics on the campaign trail, the Loudoun County, Virginia, sexual assault controversy and alleged impropriety within the Virginia Parole Board’s release of dangerous criminals.

Fox News Digital reached out to Miyares' office for comment but has not yet received a response.

https://www.foxnews.com/us/virginias-new-gop-ag-prompts-3-largest-universities-to-drop-vax-mandate-for-students

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Harvard’s Method of Discrimination Is Affront to Individual Dignity

In a move that may finally put an end to race-conscious admissions, the Supreme Court accepted a petition to hear Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard on Jan 24.

The case was filed by a group of Asian Americans who allege, with strong evidence, discrimination by the nation’s most prestigious school, for reasons related to ensuring a diverse “racial mix” in the composition of its student body.

The Supreme Court will now begin debate on whether the value of racial diversity can truly trump the constitutional prerogative to not discriminate on the basis of race.

In the case of Harvard, race is not simply used as a tiebreaker in admissions. A 2013 internal Harvard study revealed by the lawsuit showed that had Harvard only considered academics, Asians would make up 43% of Harvard’s student body. Adding legacy, athlete recruitment, “extracurriculars,” and a “personal” score lowered Asians to 26%. Finally, in the years the internal Harvard study looked at, Asians actually made up only 19% of the student body.

Central to the case is Harvard’s especially distasteful method of discrimination: the creation of a “personal score” that, evidence shows, the school manipulates to give Asian applicants the lowest scores. Although this sort of discrimination avoids the blunt edges of explicit racial quotas, such as President Joe Biden’s explicit insistence that he will nominate a black woman to the Supreme Court following Justice Stephen Breyer’s retirement, it is arguably crueler to those who fall under its exclusion.

Harvard’s discrimination is discrimination via character assassination. For Harvard to suppress the vast quantity of qualified Asians (who make up 50% of the top SAT scores in the nation) from its admissions books, it questions their character and minimizes their accomplishments.

Harvard’s admissions officers conveniently rate Asian Americans lowest in the “personal score,” having never met them, while similarly academically qualified black, Hispanic, and white students respectively score first, second, and third. What is the evidence Asians deserve this sort of treatment in the personality measurement?

The objective evidence points to none. Asian Americans get the highest alumni interview scores, the highest teacher recommendation scores, and the second-highest counselor scores out of all the racial groups. There is simply no objective basis for Harvard’s attack on Asian American “personalities.”

Instead, the admissions officers who make the final judgements on applicants disproportionately label Asians “standard strong,” which is another way of saying “good but not good enough.”

When you get “standard strong” on your Harvard application, “It’s automatic you don’t get in,” says Duke professor Peter Arcidiacono, the expert witness for the plaintiffs who read and analyzed every Harvard application in the case. “And Asian Americans get ‘standard strong’ more often than any other race.”

The use of the personality score for nefarious purposes borrows from Harvard’s history. In 1922, Harvard’s President Abbott Lowell proposed capping Jewish enrollment at 15% of the student body. His proposal was widely criticized and eventually rejected by Harvard’s admissions committee, which opposed an explicit quota. Lowell responded by adding a non-academic “character” evaluation to the admissions process:

To prevent a dangerous increase in the proportion of Jews, I know at present only one way which is at the same time straightforward and effective, and that is a selection by a personal estimate of character on the part of the Admission authorities, based upon the probable value to the candidate, to the college and to the community of his admission.

He targeted Jews with low personal character scores, forcing Jewish Americans to the threshold he desired. Lowell explicitly invented the character evaluation for the sake of racial gatekeeping, and it remains in full force today. Although Harvard moved away from anti-Jewish discrimination, it retains the system and applies it to a new “overrepresented” racial group—Asian Americans.

Harvard’s blueprint of discrimination, if not checked by the U.S. Supreme Court, allows any actor with racially malicious intent to bury their discrimination underneath a fake “character” trait, while gaining full legal immunity in the process. Any lawyer will be able to point to Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard ruling to show that their discrimination is legal.

The primary consequence of Harvard’s discrimination won’t just be Asian American deprivation. It will be the penalization of hard work felt by America’s high-achieving students. Asian American success in education is no secret: They study twice as many hours as the average American and take more challenging courses than other racial groups.

Harvard’s discrimination will teach children not to aspire to be like the highest-achieving kids in their class. Rather, students will get rewarded for playacting a certain victimhood category than they will by working hard and becoming academically competent.

When the Supreme Court hears Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard this year, more will be on the line than just a few admissions spots. The strength of our commitment to the ideals of a colorblind meritocracy, where hard work and drive is rewarded irrespective of one’s background, will be tested.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/01/31/harvards-method-of-discrimination-is-affront-to-individual-dignity/

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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2 February, 2022

Bridgewater College shooting leaves two officers dead; suspect in custody

<I>It'S Hard To Imagine why A Stupid Kid would Blow Up His Future like This.  Maybe he was high on something</I>

A 27-year-old man opened fire at Bridgewater College in Virginia on Tuesday afternoon, killing one police officer and one campus safety officer, according to authorities. 

The two officers were responding to a report of a suspicious person near Memorial Hall on Bridgewater's campus when the suspect opened fire, striking and killing both of them. 

Alexander Wyatt Campbell fled the scene but was apprehended on an island in the North River about half an hour later. 

The liberal arts college, which is home to about 1,500 students, issued a shelter-in-place order that lasted about three hours as police cleared campus buildings. 

Bridgewater College President David Bushman identified the deceased as campus police officer John Painter and safety officer J.J. Jefferson in a letter to the school community. 

"These officers were close friends, known to many of us as the 'dynamic duo,'" Bushman wrote. 

"John was J.J.’s best man in his wedding this year. They were beloved by students, faculty and staff. I hurt for their families and loved ones, as I know we all do."

Campbell, the suspect, also had a non-life-threatening gunshot wound but was treated at a hospital and is now being held at the Rockingham County Jail without bond. He is facing four felonies, including two counts of capital murder. 

Multiple guns were discovered on Bridgewater's campus as law enforcement retraced Campbell's steps. 

Caleb Needle, a senior at Bridgewater College, told WSHV that he was in class when he heard three or four loud bangs outside and everyone dropped to the floor. 

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin ordered the U.S. and Virginia flags to be flown at half-staff on Wednesday in honor of the two slain officers. 

Several other universities around the country are dealing with threats to their campuses this week. 

UCLA canceled in-person classes Tuesday after a mass shooting threat. Multiple historically black colleges and universities reported bomb threats on Monday. 

https://www.foxnews.com/us/virginias-bridgewater-college-issues-shelter-in-place-order-amid-active-shooter-situation

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Ronald Reagan’s favorite Chicago School continues to thrive despite the odds

While education standards in most K-12 schools across America have fallen gradually for several decades, the pace accelerated in recent years due to racial equity initiatives. The stated goal of these initiatives can often be summed up as the elimination of racial disparities between races, especially between blacks and whites. However, this goal is far from noble, and the immorality in this quest to achieve racial equity lies in the belief that lowering standards for blacks is the way forward. But how can stigmatizing blacks as inferiors inspire them to reach great heights?

There is a school on the West Side of Chicago in the middle of the violence and poverty that wholeheartedly rejects this lowly view of blacks. Since 1969, Providence St. Mel School has pursued academic rigor and, in 2019, the school sent the entire senior class to colleges on academic scholarships. 

"Providence St. Mel is a private independent school on the West Side of Chicago — used to be a Catholic school," Ervin said. "In 1978, the archdiocese was going to close the school because of low enrollment, but the principal at the time, Mr. Paul J. Adams III, said he was going to keep it open, and he kept it open. He's kept it open now for 44 years as a private independent school."

When Adams was named principal in 1972, he enacted strict rules that made gang association, drugs, gambling, graffiti, stealing and fighting grounds for expulsion. This zero tolerance policy cleared the way for academics to be the sole focus for all students. 

"We do not lower standards," Ervin continued. "Many of our students also receive college scholarship dollars, and many of our students are accepted to the top 50 colleges in the country."

"One of your biggest early supporters early on was President Ronald Reagan. Can you tell us about that a little bit?" the pastor asked.

"President Reagan visited the school in the early '80s, 1982, I believe. Because he heard about the success of the school, he wanted to come and visit," Ervin said. 

President Ronald Reagan was so impressed he returned for a second visit in 1983 where he was pleased that 44% of the recent graduates wanted to pursue a science-related career. 

Of the school, Reagan was later quoted saying: "Poet Tennyson said, ‘I dipt into the future, as far as the human eye could see, Saw a Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be.’ Well, Providence St. Mel has looked into the future and seen what a wonder it is … So, let us pray that Providence-St. Mel will be a shining example to schools all across this country. The future isn't something to fear, and today's problems can be tomorrow's victories, and that working together, there isn't anything that we can't do."

Reagan would have been pleased to learn that the school has not backed off its mission to this day. 

"Another thing that I don't want to gloss over: 100% of y'all students get scholarships or go to college," the pastor said. 

"Providence St. Mel is located on the West Side of Chicago in East Garfield Park, one of the toughest neighborhoods in the city. Murder and crime rate is very high. Violence is definitely prevalent in the neighborhood and surrounding neighborhoods," Ervin answered. "Our students, when they get to Providence St. Mel, they know they're safe because the school looks like a castle on the outside and it feels like a castle on the inside … And we make sure that we don't have any foolishness going on inside the school, and our students are safe from the time they walk in that building until they get in their car with their parents or if they have to walk to the bus stop."

"For over 40 years, y'all been doing a great job, making sure that students go to college, making sure that students meet the standards," the pastor said. "You're not lowering any standards just to give students a quick fix, but you all keep the discipline intact, the parents involved."

The tragedy of it all is that today’s racial equity educators failed to see what Reagan saw: a school model that proved that blacks could succeed no matter what background they came from. Instead, they chose to see blacks as inferiors and America is paying the price for that.

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/rooftop-revelations-ronald-reagans-favorite-chicago-school-continues-to-thrive-despite-the-oddss

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Many lessons to learn in improving Australian education

Australia’s low ranking in education performance is one of the greatest dangers to our long-term national prosperity as we enter a new skills-based industrial ­revolution.

This national danger has triggered much-needed efforts to reform curriculums. But the NSW Productivity Commissioner Peter Achterstraat’s research reveals an even deeper problem: our systems of recruiting and training teachers are simply not working and he recommends fundamental change.

The Achterstraat plan concentrates on NSW but the teacher recruiting and training mistakes he isolates are duplicated around the nation.

The Achterstraat conclusions were publicised last year but over the new year break the NSW commissioner sent me a personal copy of his massive document entitled “rebooting the economy”. And to make sure I understood what was happening he highlighted key sentences!

And while I was looking at the education sections that dominate Achterstraat’s 370-page productivity document, across my desk came an article from Malcolm Elliott, the president of the Australian Primary Principals Association. Elliott was criticising NAPLAN but the thrust of his remarks showed that those at the top of the teaching profession do not recognise the validity of Achterstraat’s warning.

Accordingly, we are headed for a nation-changing debate that will determine our future. I hope both major political parties address the education crisis at the next federal election.

Around the nation many parents don’t have Achterstraat’s research but recognise that something is wrong in the way their children are being taught the basics.

Some are paying large sums to buy dwellings in selected catchment areas so they can send their children to a government school that they believe has attracted excellent teachers who excel in teaching the basics – reading, writing, science and mathematics. Others with the same view send their children to selected private schools.

Achterstraat does not make detailed evaluation of curriculum issues but says NSW needs to ­redesign and modernise its curriculum, providing strong foundations for lifeline learning. It needs to cut “inessential teacher workloads” so teachers can focus on the core of their jobs: teaching our children.

The NSW experience shows that simply spending money on education does not solve the problem.

Federal and state governments increased spending on each NSW student by 22 per cent in the decade to 2018-19 but not only did NSW performance decline but states like Victoria, where less money was spent, performed better than NSW.

The proportion of NSW students failing to achieve minimum standards across the three PISA (Program for International Student Assessment) domains has risen from 32 per cent in 2006 to 42 per cent in 2018. Achterstraat believes these bad educational outcomes are surface manifestations of fundamental flaws in teacher recruiting and training.

He emphasises that the quality of our schooling system ultimately rests on the quality of classroom instruction by our teachers and school leaders. Learning is usually determined by how teaching is delivered in classrooms and how the curriculum is conveyed to students.

I isolate some of the areas where Achterstraat says the system is failing and then summarise some of the Achterstraat solutions which would revolutionise Australia’s teacher recruitment and training. The faults:

 *  Australia has introduced waves of reform demanding that new teachers must meet increased academic requirements to enter initial teacher education programs.

But these more onerous and longer qualifications for new teachers have unintentionally raised barriers for talented people entering the profession.

Worse, the evidence suggests that the educational gains from longer teaching pathways are minimal or even nil.

 *  Some teachers realise that they are poorly suited to teaching only upon entering the classroom and extra university training delays this discovery. The messages from their bad experience adversely impacts teacher recruitment.

 *  Like any other worker, a teacher cannot improve “without setting goals, striving to achieve them and receiving insightful, regular and constructive feedback plus correctional help”. But currently goals and benchmarks are often poorly defined, making it very difficult to identify relevant evidence and measure performance against them. A teacher with relatively low-performing students may be driving strong improvement while a teacher with high performing students may not be contributing much to their performance.

 *  Australia is not matching the world in high-performing education systems to supplement standardised teaching, with indicators that help show what teachers and schools are contributing to student learning growth.

 *  In many areas of Australia, including NSW, teacher standards and teacher accreditation has seen weak implementation and there is only a loose link between creditation and teacher effectiveness. It becomes difficult to identify relevant evidence and measure performance against them.

The solutions:

 *  Given the teacher entry system is not working as planned, it needs to be reviewed to make it less onerous, but identifying better teaching prospects and broadening the source of quality teachers with employment-based teaching pathways.

 *  Systems of classroom observations including peer-to-peer and supervisor observations need to be implemented.

 *  A separate set of aims should be established for school principals that reflect their unique role and makes them accountable for improving school teaching. They must report annually on the implementation of these performance measures.

Australia’s problem is that we have a substantial number of teachers who have not been trained along these lines and will vigorously oppose it.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/economics/many-lessons-to-learn-in-improving-education/news-story/a489699aea41b28c4f02edd2bb8b2e14

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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1 February, 2022

Fourth School Accused of Secretly Helping Children Turn Transgender

<i>Sometimes Leftism gets really obnoxious</i>

When Bonnie Manchester was told by school administrators to call a female student by “his new gender name” and not to tell the girl’s parents about it, that was the last straw for the Ludlow, Massachusetts, school teacher.

“I did what any teacher would and should do, I told the parents,” Manchester told The Epoch Times.

The child was just 11 at the time and as Manchester learned, the school was not only meeting secretly with the girl but also meeting secretly with her 12-year old brother regarding his alleged interest in regendering as a girl.

Manchester, who was a social studies teacher at the district’s Baird Middle School, was fired for telling the children’s parents about the school’s secretive activity. School principal Stacy Monette called Manchester’s “conduct unbecoming a teacher” referring to her “inappropriate communications with the parents of a student.”

“You shared sensitive confidential information about a student’s expressed gender identity against the wishes of the students,” Monette wrote in an April 16, 2021, letter terminating Manchester.

Monette was named Middle School Principal of the year for the state of Massachusetts by the Massachusetts School Administrators Association in 2020.

She and other school administrators did not respond to requests for comment.

It is one of what appears to be a fast-growing number of similar cases cropping up across the U.S.

On Monday, parents in Jacksonville, Fla., filed a federal lawsuit against their 12-year daughter’s school for having secret meetings with her to encourage her to identify as a boy after she began expressing gender confusion at school. The parents only found out after the child tried to commit suicide by attempting to hang herself in a school bathroom.

Last week, a Salinas, California, parent filed a notice of intent to file a lawsuit against the Buena Vista Middle School for allowing two teachers, who she alleged tried “to secretly brainwash her teenage daughter into identifying as bisexual, and later as transgender.”

And a week earlier in Texas, an anonymous teacher outed her school by releasing documents to a digital media outlet from the district’s training programs that shows teachers were being told to keep parents in the dark about any disclosures their children make at school about gender identity feelings. “DO NOT contact their parents and out them to their families” the training documents advises.

Mary McAlister, senior counsel for The Children and Parental Rights Campaign, said her organization also represents a New York family about to file suit on similar grounds.

“Schools are secretly grooming kids to be gay,” McAlister told The Epoch Times, and “they have outside influences teaching them how to do that. Lesson number one is to cut the parents out of the picture.”

According to the Florida lawsuit, which was filed by McAlister’s organization on behalf of the parents, the school withheld the information because they knew the parents were Catholic and would not agree with the children’s regendering.

The school’s guidance counselor admitted that she had been secretly meeting with the sixth grader on a weekly basis over a span of four months to discuss gender identity issues, the lawsuit alleges.

In the California case, parent Jessica Konen alleged that two teachers “coached” her daughter to change her identity at LGBTQ+ club meetings they held during their lunch hour.

In an exchange of emails, the child asked the teachers what name she should write on her school binders “in light of the fact she was not going by” a boy’s name.

“Write whatever your mother will approve and we’ll fix it when you get to school,” the teacher wrote back.

In another lawsuit filed in November in Florida, the school district admitted it was deliberately not telling parents if their children were having gender identity issues at school because a guidebook warned it could lead to homelessness for them.

The guide book called the LCS Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Gender Nonconforming and Questioning Support Guide, warned that as many as 40 percent of homeless youth are LGBTQ+, largely due to many of them being rejected by their families.

In the Ludlow school case, Manchester said she knew the two kids were being groomed by the school. She had them both in her special education class and knew the family. “I knew there was no way the kids thought this up on their own,” she told The Epoch Times.

Before she was fired, Manchester was also the subject of a sexual harassment complaint the school librarian filed against her for objecting to sexually explicit LGBTQ+ books she ordered and placed in the school library.

Manchester and 18 other teachers submitted a letter to the school administration and school board complaining about the books. The librarian, who identified as “non-binary,” has since resigned. School Superintendent Todd Gazda also resigned over what he called an “intolerance of LGBTQ” individuals.

At the time of the superintendent’s resignation, several parents submitted a letter demanding the school stop promoting transgender and homosexual ideas at and to use a student’s given name and “actual pronouns.”

The parents also demanded the school “stop retribution against teachers who expose these abuses to parents.”

https://www.theepochtimes.com/fourth-school-accused-of-secretly-helping-children-turn-transgender_4243398.html

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Vaccine Mandate ‘Feels Like Coercion,’ Says Boston Teacher Who Fears Being Fired

<i>Arrogant fools</i>

Special needs teacher Angela Jones could be fired from her job with the Boston school system. Why? Because she is unvaccinated. 

Jones teaches elementary students in Boston Public Schools, where she has taught for nearly 20 years. She says she is one of more than 400 teachers there who have declined to take a COVID-19 vaccine. 

Now, Jones and her unvaccinated colleagues face termination. 

The vaccine mandate for Boston teachers “feels like coercion,” Jones, 52, told The Daily Signal during a phone interview Friday. 

“We don’t want to put this [vaccine] in our bodies,” she said, adding that all she and her colleagues want to do is “live our lives and teach children, which is our livelihood.”

“If we are not allowed to choose what goes in our body,” Jones said, “ … that to me is the ultimate loss of freedom.”

Angela Jones isn’t her actual name, but a pseudonym used by The Daily Signal to protect the teacher’s identity.

Last month, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, a Democrat, announced Dec. 20 that all city employees would be required to receive at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine by Jan. 15. Following that order, Boston Public Schools announced that all its staff “will adhere to the announced vaccine policy for City of Boston employees.” 

On Thursday, a Massachusetts Appeals Court judge temporarily suspended Boston’s vaccine mandate for city employees.

The stay comes after three unions—the International Association of Fire Fighters Local 718, the Boston Police Superior Officers Federation, and the Boston Police Detectives Benevolent Society—filed a lawsuit over the vaccine mandate. 

The city has until Feb. 3 to file a response before the court’s final ruling. The Wu administration paused enforcement of the vaccine mandate while the legal process plays out. 

“The stay decision means the vaccine verification policy is paused, and no educators will be placed on administrative leave or terminated at this time,” Becky Shuster, assistant superintendent of equity for Boston Public Schools, told The Daily Signal in an email Friday. 

Wu said Thursday that 95% of city employees already have been vaccinated. 

The concern for teachers such as Jones is that if the court rules in favor of the city and the vaccine mandate remains in place, they risk losing their jobs because they’re not vaccinated. 

Jones applied for a religious exemption in early January, but it was denied. 

Those denied religious exemptions are not allowed to appeal the decision, the Boston teacher said, but may add information to their request and resubmit the paperwork.

Jones herself did this, only to be denied a second time. 

Jones sent The Daily Signal a copy of the email she received from Shuster denying this second request for a religious exemption. 

“We have not approved any religious accommodations because the safety of students and staff is our highest priority,” Shuster told The Daily Signal. 

Michael King, director of community alliances for Massachusetts Family Institute, says he finds that troubling. 

“Denying the religious exemptions of these teachers is a tragedy not only for these teachers, but for the thousands of students in their care,” King told The Daily Signal.  

Shuster did say that the Boston school system’s Office of Equity “has approved numerous accommodations should the policy ultimately be implemented.” 

Of those asking for a medical exemption to the vaccine, Jones said, she is aware only of some who have received temporary exemptions—such as until the end of a pregnancy. 

Teachers who refuse a COVID-19 shot are “from all races and creeds and walks of life,” Jones said. 

The school system’s vaccine mandate “affects black and Latino teachers more than any other group,” she said. “They’re at a higher rate of not getting the vaccine.”

Asked about the mandate’s adverse effect on Latino and black teachers, Shuster said: “Boston Public Schools has been diligently working to engage its staff to explore their vaccination options and to provide timely information about the vaccine.” 

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/01/28/vaccine-mandate-feels-like-coercion-says-boston-teacher-who-fears-being-fired

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Australia: Citipointe Christian College defends demanding parents sign contract on student gender identity, homosexuality

<i>Why is this controversial?  There are plenty of other schools the sexually abnormal can go to.  Let them choose a school that accepts them and leave Christians free to obey the repeated statements in the Bible about sexual deviance being an abomination to God. See Romans chapter 1.  It's not as if anybody is compelled to go to that school.

And the limits the school imposes could well make it popular with many parents, Christian or not.  Homosexuality is not a lifestyle many parents would want for their children. 

Up until relatively recently, the American Psychoogical Asociation categorized homosexuallity as a mental illness --  until Leftist pressure got that expunged.  The long term adverse consequences of homosexuality remain, however.  There have always been homosexuals in my social circle and I have seen the sadness that eventually comes to them. Women, by contrast, have always been a source of happiness to me.

 

 I sent my son to a Catholic school precisely because I thought he would get Christian teachings there. He did.  Even under Pope Francis, church teachings on homosexuality have remained unwavering in opposition to it</i>

Citipointe Christian College on Brisbane's southside sent families a contract last Friday and said parents must sign the contract or unenrol their child from the school.

More than 26,000 people have signed an online petition demanding the college recall the enrolment contract, with organisers arguing the school is "using their religious beliefs to openly discriminate against queer and trans students".

In an e-mail to parents on Friday, principal Pastor Brian Mulheran said the new clauses in the enrolment contract were included to "ensure that we retain our Christian ethos, which is the foundation of what has made the College what it is today".

The contract states "the college will only enrol the student on the basis of the gender that corresponds to their biological sex" to maintain consistent with the college's "Christian Ethos Requirements".

The contract goes on to state that the college "acknowledges the biological sex of a person as recognised at birth and requires practices consistent with that sex".

Another clause states the college has the right to "exclude a student from the college" should they not adhere to the "doctrinal precepts including those as to biological sex".

To keep their child enrolled at the school, parents must agree with a set of "religious beliefs" laid out in a "Declaration of Faith" attached to the contract.

Part of the declaration states that "any form of sexual immorality (including but not limited to; adultery, fornication, homosexual acts, bisexual acts, bestiality, incest, paedophilia, and pornography) is sinful and offensive to God and is destructive to human relationships and society".

'We weren't given any warning that this was happening'

A parent, who is also a teacher at Citipointe and did not want to be named, said she was "saddened that students who are struggling or going through their journey of finding out who they are were going to be encased in more vocabulary of them being 'other' and not accepted".

"As an educator whose priority it is to look after a child, and as a parent wanting to bring up a young [child] to be a functioning member of this society, I knew I was in trouble as to whether I could sign this document," she said.

She said she was "extremely angry" about the timing of the contract's release because students were starting school today. "I felt very much backed into a corner," she said.

"We, as the staff, weren't told about [the contract amendments]. I only found out about it because I was a parent."

She said she was now looking for another school for her child because she was unable to sign the amended enrolment contract.

"I am having to ask [the child] now to leave their friends through no fault of [their] own. We weren't given any warning that this was happening, and we've been told you either sign it or you have two weeks leeway to go," she said.

"I feel like my options are very, very limited."

She also said this would have a wider impact on the community at Citipointe.

"It is going to be so divisive in the school. It's going to separate people. And that's not my understanding of what the Christian faith is all about," she said.

A 2018 Citipointe alumnus Bree Leitch, who identifies as bisexual, said she was "pretty floored" when her parents received the amended contract on Friday.

She said her brother has been attending the school and he was supposed to start Year 12 today.

"I'm worried about what my brother is going to do and how he's going to get his education and graduate this year, and I'm really wanting to do something about it," Ms Leitch said.

Ms Leitch said she came to terms with her bisexuality when she was in Year 12 at Citipointe.

"I remember when I was in school, I would always think, 'If I was gay, I would never come out' … that would just be so hard. So scary," she said.

"And you just don't know what would happen, whether you'd get kicked out, there was just so much fear there.

"And having to just keep that part of me completely silent, and question it alone without being able to talk to anyone about it is pretty scary."

Ms Leitch said the amended contract was a "horrible thing" but "it means that it's something we can fight directly."

"It's something that's there and it exists, and it's black and white. And we're able to be say 'this is not OK'… we have a platform to build off of now," she said.

Ms Leitch said she wanted queer students at Citipointe, and other schools, to know they were not alone.

"You're valid and these things they're saying is not true. Don't let it change how you see yourself and don't let it make yourself think that you're not worthy. This whole community of people will stand behind you and support you, and we're doing to do everything we can to change this experience for you."

School has 'certain freedoms' under law to include clauses

In a statement to the media, Principal Pastor Brian Mulheran said the college "does not judge students on their sexuality or gender identity and we would not make a decision about their enrolment in the college simply on that basis".

He said the college wants to give parents and students the right to make an "informed choice" about supporting the school's approach to Christian education.

"We have always held these Christian beliefs and we have tried to be fair and transparent to everyone in our community by making them clear in the enrolment contract," he said.

"The college, through the freedoms afforded to it by law, has outlined our common beliefs and practices, so that parents can choose for their children to be educated at Citipointe and join our faith-based community."

Mr Mulheran said the school had sought legal advice in amending the contract, and argued it had "certain freedoms under international law and under Commonwealth and state legislation" which allowed it to include the new clauses.

Independent Schools Queensland chief executive Christopher Mountford told ABC Radio Brisbane independent schools were "their own entities" and could "deliver their own enrolment contract".

"The schools are being transparent and up-front in their enrolment contracts around the issues and beliefs that they have as a school, and that's consistent with other independent schools as well, and those contracts are legal under the current legislation," he said.

"The question of whether or not the school should or could do these things, is best answered by thinking through 'what are the school's ethos and processes they're putting forward to the community?' Is it reasonable and legal, what they're putting forward, and then can parents choose to engage in that school or not?"

He said it was important to have diversity across schools to allow parents to send their child to a school that "aligns with their beliefs and values".

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-31/qld-school-contract-lgbtqi-citipointe-christian-college/100791734

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

Primarily covering events in Australia, the U.K. and the USA -- where the follies are sadly similar.


TERMINOLOGY: The English "A Level" exam is roughly equivalent to a U.S. High School diploma. Rather confusingly, you can get As, Bs or Cs in your "A Level" results. Entrance to the better universities normally requires several As in your "A Levels".


MORE TERMINOLOGY: Many of my posts mention the situation in Australia. Unlike the USA and Britain, there is virtually no local input into education in Australia. Education is mostly a State government responsibility, though the Feds have a lot of influence (via funding) at the university level. So it may be useful to know the usual abbreviations for the Australian States: QLD (Queensland), NSW (New South Wales), WA (Western Australia), VIC (Victoria), TAS (Tasmania), SA (South Australia).


There were two brothers from a famous family. One did very well at school while the other was a duffer. Which one went on the be acclaimed as the "Greatest Briton"? It was the duffer: Winston Churchill.


The current Left-inspired practice of going to great lengths to shield students from experience of failure and to tell students only good things about themselves is an appalling preparation for life. In adulthood, the vast majority of people are going to have to reconcile themselves to mundane jobs and no more than mediocrity in achievement. Illusions of themselves as "special" are going to be sorely disappointed


Perhaps it's some comfort that the idea of shielding kids from failure and having only "winners" is futile anyhow. When my son was about 3 years old he came bursting into the living room, threw himself down on the couch and burst into tears. When I asked what was wrong he said: "I can't always win!". The problem was that we had started him out on educational computer games where persistence only is needed to "win". But he had then started to play "real" computer games -- shootem-ups and the like. And you CAN lose in such games -- which he had just realized and become frustrated by. The upset lasted all of about 10 minutes, however and he has been happily playing computer games ever since. He also now has a degree in mathematics and is socially very pleasant. "Losing" certainly did not hurt him.


Even the famous Marxist theoretician Antonio Gramsci (and the world's most famous Sardine) was a deep opponent of "progressive" educational methods. He wrote: "The most paradoxical aspect is that this new type of school is advocated as being democratic, while in fact it is destined not merely to perpetuate social differences, but to crystallise them." He rightly saw that "progressive" methods were no help to the poor


I am an atheist of Protestant background who sent his son to Catholic schools. Why did I do that? Because I do not personally feel threatened by religion and I think Christianity is a generally good influence. I also felt that religion is a major part of life and that my son should therefore have a good introduction to it. He enjoyed his religion lessons but seems to have acquired minimal convictions from them.


Why have Leftist educators so relentlessly and so long opposed the teaching of phonics as the path to literacy when that opposition has been so enormously destructive of the education of so many? It is because of their addiction to simplistic explanations of everything (as in saying that Islamic hostility is caused by "poverty" -- even though Osama bin Laden is a billionaire!). And the relationship between letters and sounds in English is anything but simple compared to the beautifully simple but very unhelpful formula "look and learn".


For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.


The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"


A a small quote from the past that helps explain the Leftist dominance of education: "When an opponent says: 'I will not come over to your side,' I calmly say, 'Your child belongs to us already. You will pass on. Your descendents, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time, they will know nothing else but this new community.'." Quote from Adolf Hitler. In a speech on 6th November 1933


I am rather pleased to report that I am a lifelong conservative. Out of intellectual curiosity, I did in my youth join organizations from right across the political spectrum so I am certainly not closed-minded and am very familiar with the full spectrum of political thinking. Nonetheless, I did not have to undergo the lurch from Left to Right that so many people undergo. At age 13 I used my pocket-money to subscribe to the "Reader's Digest" -- the main conservative organ available in small town Australia of the 1950s. I have learnt much since but am pleased and amused to note that history has since confirmed most of what I thought at that early age.

I imagine that the the RD is still sending mailouts to my 1950s address!


Discipline: With their love of simple generalizations, this will be Greek to Leftists but I see an important role for discipline in education DESPITE the fact that my father never laid a hand on me once in my entire life nor have I ever laid a hand on my son in his entire life. The plain fact is that people are DIFFERENT, not equal and some kids will not behave themselves in response to persuasion alone. In such cases, realism requires that they be MADE to behave by whatever means that works -- not necessarily for their own benefit but certainly for the benefit of others whose opportunities they disrupt and destroy.


Many newspaper articles are reproduced in full on this blog despite copyright claims attached to them. I believe that such reproductions here are protected by the "fair use" provisions of copyright law. Fair use is a legal doctrine that recognises that the monopoly rights protected by copyright laws are not absolute. The doctrine holds that, when someone uses a creative work in way that does not hurt the market for the original work and advances a public purpose - such as education or scholarship - it might be considered "fair" and not infringing.


Comments above by John Ray



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