Assault on education

[PokerPacker]

6 hours ago, Destino said:

My daughter is eight.  She gets some books from her school library, but mostly she also borrows ebooks, and audio books, from the county library on the Libby App.  She also gets me to buy her graphic novels from Barnes and noble. 

You should really nip this reading thing in the bud.  She might grow up to be a nerd.

[Larry]

1 hour ago, PokerPacker said:

You should really nip this reading thing in the bud.  She might grow up to be a nerd.

Nah. She's a girl. 

[China]

 

[Destino]

I have no issue with parents wanting to see all teaching materials.  Parents should know what their kids are being taught and they should have a say.  How else do we know where we have to chime in?  

[China]

9 minutes ago, Destino said:

I have no issue with parents wanting to see all teaching materials.  Parents should know what their kids are being taught and they should have a say.  How else do we know where we have to chime in?  

 

Except that they're not asking to see all teaching materials.  Their request is centered on CRT.  It's more of the same nonsense from people that don't even know what CRT is.

[Destino]

44 minutes ago, China said:

 

Except that they're not asking to see all teaching materials.  Their request is centered on CRT.  It's more of the same nonsense from people that don't even know what CRT is.

I see that.  The school should respond by making all teaching materials available.  Let them dig through it.  Maybe it will get them interested in their kids education.  
 

Besides it would be foolish for schools to try to sort through it anyway, there’s no telling what these idiots consider CRT.  They’re working with their own definitions, that change hourly.  

[Larry]

Ideally, the response is that a Google search of their records shows no records at all containing that phrase.  

 

[Elessar78]

On 11/11/2021 at 7:33 AM, Jabbyrwock said:

 

The republican party has done a marvelous job of identifying fears and exploiting them...

Pretty much this for decades now. Be afraid of something. When demographics is shifting away from you, when your policies don’t work.

[bcl05]

I live in Rochester, MN.  My kids attend public high school here.  The schools are fine, fair, and doing their best.  The schools are generally underfunded and overcrowded, but not as bad as a lot of areas.  They would hardly be described by any honest person as controversial or agenda-driven.   Of course there are issues, but CRT is absolutely not one of them.  The people behind this lawsuit (especially the lead lawyer) are the craziest, stupidest, most malignant members of this otherwise great community.  This is a giant hassle and a big embarrassment.  

[China]

‘Trigger Alert’ Device For Classrooms And Parties Sounds An Alarm When It Detects Offensive Language

 

A new trigger warning detector has been unveiled during Dubai Design Week that will sound an alarm when it detects offensive speech.

 

The Themis is a lamp-sized device intended to ‘moderate’ debate in classrooms and universities and ‘manifest’ ‘political correctness’ in a product.

 

The tiny device could even be used to check language at dinner parties and family gatherings, and the developers have said it hopes Themis will encourage “self-criticism.”

 

The Themis makes annoying noises when it detects offensive speech has been said around it

 

Zinah Issa, who unveiled the device in Dubai, told The Telegraph: “By using speech recognition and sound sensors, we were able to program Themis to detect offensive terms – racist remarks, offensive jokes – through the microphone.

 

“Extremely annoying alarms last about two minutes, after which Themis switches off, allowing for an open, understanding discussion between people about the possible trigger and the possible reasons behind the activation of Themis.”

 

The device is named after Themis, the Greek goddess of justice and social order.

 

Themis is currently being trialled for use in classrooms and universities to ‘moderate’ the debate.

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

[Larry]

We are discussing an automated device for detecting "trigger language". On a message board that will not let us refer to an aircraft's ****pit, or the author of the "southern strategy", Lee A****er. 

[Jabbyrwock]

1 hour ago, China said:

‘Trigger Alert’ Device For Classrooms And Parties Sounds An Alarm When It Detects Offensive Language

 

[NoCalMike]

When there is no "CRT" to be found, then will begin the labeling of whatever they feel like as "CRT" which has already been going on.  These people are being used as pawns in a larger political goal by the right.   You can go watch videos by outlets like Prager U which want to convince people that slavery in America wasn't so bad and once that kind of trash becomes the prevailing opinion amongst the GOP base of voters, guess what they will decide is just as bad as "CRT?"   

 

The media always gets sucked into these short term scuffles over culture war issues instead of looking into the long term goals of how a seed gets planted and then gets morphed into many different things before it becomes too big to stop.   

This was never about having a real discussion about CRT, it's merits, it's faults etc etc....it was about creating an unstoppable frenzy of people who could really care less to learn about what CRT actually is and/or the fact that it isn't taught in their kids classrooms to begin with.

[PokerPacker]

41 minutes ago, NoCalMike said:

When there is no "CRT" to be found, then will begin the labeling of whatever they feel like as "CRT" which has already been going on.  These people are being used as pawns in a larger political goal by the right.   You can go watch videos by outlets like Prager U which want to convince people that slavery in America wasn't so bad and once that kind of trash becomes the prevailing opinion amongst the GOP base of voters, guess what they will decide is just as bad as "CRT?"   

 

The media always gets sucked into these short term scuffles over culture war issues instead of looking into the long term goals of how a seed gets planted and then gets morphed into many different things before it becomes too big to stop.   

This was never about having a real discussion about CRT, it's merits, it's faults etc etc....it was about creating an unstoppable frenzy of people who could really care less to learn about what CRT actually is and/or the fact that it isn't taught in their kids classrooms to begin with.

And by getting other media outlets to start talking about Critical Race Theory to counter them, they've found their sparring partner to which amplifies the effects of their culture war on their lemmings.

[gbear]

I was surprised when my son's freshman U.S. history book had a section on the increase in KKK membership in the 1920's.  I was surprised because there was no mention of the events going on around that time.  There was a mention of fear of spreading communism.

 

However, there was no mention of the Tulsa race massacre  or the red summer of 1919.  There was no mention of men coming back from WW I as a fuel for the racial tensions.  It was as if there was no real context for how the events go together to show how things escalated, getting further and further out of control.

 

I cringe when history is taught as a series of unrelated events.  Of course, my mentioning these omissions would probably bring up charges of CRT because it might lead to talking about things like redlining and its impact on today.  So instead we will simply mention discrete dates and events without linkage.

Edited November 16, 2021 by gbear

[China]

Parents protesting 'critical race theory' identify another target: Mental health programs

 

At a September school board meeting in Southlake, Texas, a parent named Tara Eddins strode to the lectern during the public comment period and demanded to know why the Carroll Independent School District was paying counselors “at $90K a pop” to give students lessons on suicide prevention.

 

“At Carroll ISD, you are actually advertising suicide,” Eddins said, arguing that many parents in the affluent suburban school system have hired tutors because the district’s counselors are too focused on mental health instead of helping students prepare for college.

 

“Some of these kids, they’re just trying to get through the day, get through compacted math, get through algebra, go to cotillion on Sunday,” Eddins said. “They are not thinking about these issues.”

 

Two days after Eddins made the remarks, Southlake Families PAC — a group that has fought to stop a diversity plan at Carroll — sent an email to supporters calling on the school district to “Leave mental health and parenting to parents.”

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

 

[Cooked Crack]

 

 

[Destino]

I agree that kids should be taught history accurately, which inevitably includes the effects of racism.  There’s no running from reality and attempts to do so just make it worse.  That being said, not every approach on this is as easily agreed upon.  That’s what republicans are trying to turn to their advantage. 
 

this argument over a kids book Not My Idea, that republicans have seized upon, highlights this situation.

 

Quote

Higginbotham: You write, “Many systems in America are clearly neither violent nor white supremacist.” But that’s not how whiteness works. Any place where there are white people has violent white supremacy embedded into it because it is embedded in us. Do I kill people? No. Does my call to 911? It might. So long as we give the lies and distortions of whiteness space inside our bodies and minds, we are its hosts. We bring it into every room, interaction, classroom, and child we raise unprepared to question it.

 

Friedersdorf: Racism is ridiculous. My favorite thing about Not My Idea is teaching kids that they can reject the absurdity of evaluating others by their skin tone. But don’t we perpetuate that same pernicious lie of race by teaching 6-year-olds that some of them literally embody a trait called “whiteness” that takes up space in their brains, brings danger to any location they visit, and is also the cause of police murders? You make their race sound like original sin. Though it is not your intention, I fear formulations like that will make white kids feel prejudged and bad and dangerous.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/06/anastasia-higginbotham-not-my-idea-children-police-killings/619087/

 

Republicans want to hang the former argument on democratic state and national candidates.  They want to tell white mothers that schools are teaching their kids that they are infected and dangerous.  This isn’t true, obviously.  The book in question is only taught in a handful of schools and no where near being endorsed by the Democratic Party.  Lies have never given the GOP pause.

 

 

[China]

Read the whole thread:

 

 

[China]

Sask. students disciplined for clothing say staff should focus on education, not their bodies

 

Kadence Hodgson is pushing for change at her northern Saskatchewan high school, where staff are disciplining teens for dress code violations. 

 

Hodgson, 17, said the discipline isn't warranted. She's one of several students at Rossignol High school in Île-à-la-Crosse, about 375 kilometres northwest of Saskatoon, raising concerns about what students are being sent home for and the reasons provided by staff. 

 

"[Staff] said nothing that shows skin should be worn because it jeopardizes male teachers and it makes them uncomfortable."

 

That rationale makes the Grade 12 student uncomfortable. 

 

Pictured are outfits students were wearing when they were 'dress-coded' at Rossignol High School last week. (Submitted by Kadence Hodgson)
 

"It makes me feel like I'm sexualized. I'm not an object and they're treating me like one." 

 

Hodgson said several students have been sent home for wearing tight-fitting clothing, tank tops that show their shoulders or shirts that show a bit of their stomachs.

 

She said students are upset about how staff members are speaking to them about their clothing. Hodgson and other students said staff have made comments that the girls look like they are going to "bar," or that their breasts and bodies were "distracting."

 

A student in Grade 9 who has been dress-coded said "if our bodies and clothing are distracting to the males in our school, they shouldn't be teaching."

 

She didn't want to be named for fear of repercussions, but said "telling girls to cover their bodies just as they become young teens teaches them that their bodies are inappropriate … subject to constant scrutiny and judgment including by adults we are supposed to trust." 

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Larry]

I'm thinking, if her clothing makes the teacher uncomfortably aroused, then we don't need to be sending the student home.  

[China]

Spotsylvania Sheriff's Office responds to book burning event promoted on Facebook

 

The Spotsylvania Sheriff’s Office and fire department will maintain a presence at the next School Board meeting as a response to a book burning event scheduled by a local Facebook group, Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Troy Skebo said Wednesday.

 

The anonymously run page Spotsy 411 posted the event Nov. 22, urging Spotsylvania parents to have their children check out books from the school library that they want to see removed, and bring them to the Dec. 13 School Board meeting, where “we will burn every last one of them.”

 

The event disappeared from the page Nov. 25 and the page was no longer published on Facebook as of Nov. 28.

 

Skebo said the Sheriff’s Office met with the county Fire Marshal’s Office this week to discuss the event and have notified the school division that a book burning would be in violation of state and local fire codes.

 

Spotsy 411 also posted the names and workplaces of all school division employees who spoke at the Nov. 15 School Board meeting in opposition to the board’s decision to remove “sexually explicit” books from library shelves without following established policy for challenging library materials.

 

The board rescinded the vote to pull the books at its Nov. 15 meeting.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Washington police investigate 'deeply disturbing' school board meeting incident as hate crime

 

A Washington school district is reeling after a school board meeting led by a Black superintendent was interrupted by virtual attendees — one displaying an image of George Floyd as a looped recording of racial slurs played.

 

Police in Enumclaw, a city about 50 miles southeast of Seattle, are now investigating the "deeply disturbing" Nov. 22 incident of what is often referred to as "Zoom-bombing" as a possible hate crime, the department said in a Wednesday statement.

 

Two Zoom attendees interrupted the hybrid virtual and in-person meeting by repeating racial slurs, the Enumclaw School District said in a statement. One of the individuals had in their frame an image of Floyd, whose murder by a Minneapolis police officer last year led to nationwide protests demanding police accountability and reform. The other appeared to be an elderly white man, the district said.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Cooked Crack]

 

[gbear]

I wish there was no reason to ever teach those terms.    

 

Unfortunately, the move to ban the teaching what those terms represent probably proves the need for teaching the ideas behind them.

 

I can only hope Republicans banning those terms/subjects has the same effect Catholic Church banning books and movies had.  Let's have people actually look at why is being banned to figure out why it is being banned. 

 

Nothing says "Look here!" like saying "Don't look here!" 

 

Please ignore the man behind the curtain!