Forget about free speech. There's not even freedom of thought for prospective teachers at the University of Minnesota
We read:
"A branch of the University of Minnesota may require all education students at the school to understand and accept that they are either privileged or oppressed and that they be well-versed in issues like "white privilege," "institutional racism” and the "myth of meritocracy in the United States."
Critics are condemning the Race, Culture, Class and Gender Task Group at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, which proposes making race, class and gender issues the "overarching framework" of all teaching courses.
The task group, formed as part of the Teacher Education Redesign Initiative at the state university, aims to change how future teachers are trained, based on the assertion that the teachers' lack of "cultural competence" contributes to minority students' poor grades.
But the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) says the Race, Culture, Class and Gender group is going beyond addressing how teachers are educated and is trying instead to mandate their beliefs and values. "Unlike what many schools of education have in terms of cultural competence, this task group really wants to invade the minds of future teachers and demand that they hold the 'right' values attitudes and beliefs about society, about themselves, and about race, class, culture, and gender, to a degree to which it really violates the freedom of conscience of future teachers," Adam Kissel, Director of FIRE's Individual Rights Defense Program, told FoxNews.com.
Kissel wrote a letter last week urging the university to reject the group's proposal on the premise that "as a public university bound by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, the university is both legally and morally obligated to uphold this fundamental right."
Source
27 comments:
They need a better acronym for the task force. It should be renamed to
Teachers
Undergoing
Review
Decisions
Can't let the white guilt die. Slavery ended 145 years or so and white people must be reminded all the time how guilty they should feel least they forget. Stormewaters
Seldom has action by our education institutions dismayed and angered me to the degree this has.
Those in charge of teaching teachers have long been of the opinion that schools need to tell students what to think, rather than teach them how to think. But this is their most blatant action yet in their efforts to transform education into indoctrination.
There is only one ray of hope: this is merely a recommendation at this point. With enough resistance from educators, students and the general public this extremist liberal agenda could be defeated.
If this policy is enacted one could only hope that those electing to become teachers will choose other educational institutions, leaving the University of Minnesota with nobody to indoctrinate.
One last question, one often asked but never answered: why does education seem to attract such a bunch of liberal fanatics, especially at the post-secondary level?
Anonymous said...
"They need a better acronym for the task force. It should be renamed to"
How about, Gestapo? No, it's not an acronym, but it's surly appropriate.
Apparently, the theory at this communist indoctrination camp is, you can't effectively brainwash students unless you first brainwash their teachers.
For the last several generations, while parents have been distracted and asleep, public education, including the so-called "centers of higher learning" have been taken over by socialists, Marxists, and communist unions, which then create the atmosphere (and curriculum) for their teachers. Karl Marx would be very proud.
The result? That almost every anti-government, anti-majority position that is attacked, is attacked by the young. (students) In fact, this is common around the world, in case you thought this was just an American problem.
I hope every white person in that class stands up and says they are the ones being oppressed.
Nobody alive today is guilty of owning slaves or perpetrating slavery in the U.S., so there is nothing to feel guilty for. We only need to know it once existed, and be on our guard against it being brought back, including in the trojan horse of government-controlled access to health care.
This craziness from Minnehaha is another reason to shun public schooling and homeschool. If you homeschool, it won't matter for your kid if the public school teachers have been brainwashed.
"If you homeschool, it won't matter for your kid if the public school teachers have been brainwashed"
---It's extremely hard to homeschool, Robert. I admire the parents who can do it, but it's not a solution that's going to work for everyone.
What does work is the following.
1. Elect school board members that have common-sense views.
2. Send your kid to a private school if you can afford it.
3. Be mindful of what your kids learns in public school, teach them your values and prepare them to fight for them.
4. Sue the school when they cross the line.
Dean said;
"One last question, one often asked but never answered: why does education seem to attract such a bunch of liberal fanatics, especially at the post-secondary level?"
Dean, it was Karl Marx who said, "to take control of a nation without the use of military force, one must first control the minds of their young."
One of the very first things communists and Leftists took control of in this country, (after the labor unions) was education. Labor to control the working masses. Education to control the young. Marx was apparently right, because both have worked very well for them.
taking control of young minds is what religious people excel at, particularly Roman Catholics, and particularly in their institutions (and it's not only the kids' minds they take contol of!!).
why does education seem to attract such a bunch of liberal fanatics, especially at the post-secondary level?
Liberals are smart; conservatives are dumb, especially the religious right.
MP: "Liberals are smart; conservatives are dumb . . ."
Interesting stereotyping there. More likely J.Birch has a better take on the situation. Liberals have an agenda to push and find the educational system an ideal means to indoctrinate youth.
Conservatives appear to take a live-and-let-live attitude toward life and others. Liberals seem more inclined to decide how they want to live, and then try to force those choices on everyone else.
It's doubtful that intelligence has a lot to do with those choices.
"Conservatives appear to take a live-and-let-live attitude toward life and others."
Except of course for women's reproductive rights.
"Reproductive rights" vs. "Right to Life"
Hmm. I think the right to not be murdered is a little more obvious and forceful. Heck, it was number one in the list in the Declaration of Independence.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
BTW, "unalienable" means that the rights are inherent to human beings and cannot be separated from us, only violated.
"Liberals have an agenda to push and find the educational system an ideal means to indoctrinate youth."
Some do, but I don't think J. Birch got it entirely right. I suspect this is a significant minority.
Generally speaking, you will find far more conservatives than leftists in the "hard sciences" such as physics, engineering, etc. Meanwhile, leftists seem to prefer the "squishy sciences" such as sociology, art, education, etc. I've heard stories of college math teachers recruiting engineering students to help tutor education majors on basic math because they are apparently ill equipped to handle the intellectual rigors of the careful use of logic. (Note: I suspect this is due more to a lack of training and experience in logic than an inherent defect.)
Use the Name: You are correct. It seems to be the 'squishy sciences' that tend to attract leftists. I stand corrected, and thank you for doing so.
Your comment as to ability to reason and use logic brings to the fore another thought: is it an inability to use logic and reason that leads liberals to want someone (government)to control society? Are they unable, or less able, to deal with the rapidly changing situations that arise when everyone is allowed to live their lives as they wish, and so yearn for government provided stability? Are they unable to reason out the logical end of a socialistic society? Hmmmm. Interesting thought.
"Conservatives appear to take a live-and-let-live attitude toward life and others."
Except of course for gays.
"Except of course for gays."
---30% of gays vote republican, look it up.
Conservatives are happy to even let gay "Live and let live". Their problem with the gays is the "in your face" attitude and the "You must never criticize us" attitude. In fact that's the same problem conservatives have with most groups.
Studies consistently show that those who engage in the homosexual lifestyle die an average of 20 years sooner than heterosexuals. And for those who will claim that the researchers who produced this study were biased, well, they were:
"The Vancouver study was conducted by a team of pro-gay researchers"
In other words, they wanted to support homosexuality, not undermine it. But they couldn't deny reality.
Homosexuals are human beings too. Are you saying that conservatives should not care about those caught up in the lifestyle? Are you saying that conservatives should not oppose the lie that homosexuality is just as valid as heterosexuality?
I thought Conservatives didn't believe in nannying people and that people should decide for themselves how to live - even if it's risky to health, so why should there be a special interest in saving homosexuals from themselves, or is that just double-speak by Conservatives.
If someone is fully informed of the risks of a vice or vicious lifestyle, and chooses to engage in it anyway, well, then it's their choice, and as long as they don't go harming other people, it's their business and nobody else's. When people go pushing a destructive lifestyle on impressionable children, who strongly tend to trust anything an adult tells them, and have not yet learned and figured out that people may have less-than-honorable reasons for saying something, and try to tell impressionable kids that a destructive lifestyle is normal and something to be celebrated, then we put our feet down to stop such fraud, as teaching a destructive lie DOES harm others, to the extent it is believed. I hope this clarifies our stance.
I have served in the U.S. Army for the past 16 years and have attended the Army's Equal Oppurtunity Leader's course. In that course I was taught about white priveledge. It was explained that because I am white then life is so much easier for me than for any minority, and this is what justifies affirmatve action.
Thankfully my wife and I currently homeschool our two children, on of which is almost 14, and understands that government run health care is a bad idea.
The excuse that some course of action is to "protect children" is often used to justify censorship or suppression of views, beliefs or practices of some other group or body that one doesn't like or approve of.
A 14 year-old kid may be impressed by what his parents believe, even over some specific government proposal like a health plan, but it's to be hoped the parents aren't actually indoctrinating him just because they feel strongly about something. It's better to teach a child how to think rather than what to think.
"Recently I read a movie review about "The Blind Side" which is a true story of how a white conservative woman rescues a black teenager from dire circumstances and helps him become a great quaterback."
Michael Ohers, is a right tackle, not a "quaterback". Get your facts straight, Bobby. Is that too much to ask? And use a spell checker.
"Michael Ohers, is a right tackle, not a "quaterback". Get your facts straight, Bobby. Is that too much to ask? And use a spell checker."
---So you're nitpicking, eh? Look, I'm not a football player, I don't play football, I don't even watch the sports. If this was a ESPN forum, then fine, you can make a big deal about it.
But what's important here is not whether the kid right tackle, quaterback or a freaking cheerleader, what's important is that he was black and a white woman saved him, and inspite of that some people complain the film is racist.
Seriously, if I ever adopt I'm gonna make sure my kids are white, that way nobody can accuse me of being a racist.
Bobby, you stated what was purported to be a fact. You made a statement that was not true. I called you on it and you give me back crap. If you do not check your so-called facts, how can anyone believe what you say? Get your act together, boy.
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