Assault on education

[China]

Teachers are leaving and few people want to join the field. Experts are sounding the alarm

 

Lauren Reynolds started crying when she found out her university was shuttering the early childhood and elementary education program she was in. One of the last three students in the program, she will graduate in spring.

 

Oklahoma City University officials announced they were suspending the programs in 2020 after a worrying pattern of declining enrollment -- one that's part of a national trend.

US teacher prep programs have reported shrinking enrollment numbers over at least the past decade. Experts are sounding the alarm: The educator profession -- a critical cornerstone of American life -- is in crisis.

"As more and more teachers retire, we need to have others fill that role and right now, the numbers are not looking good for us," said Heather Sparks, director of Teacher Education at Oklahoma City University. "It's heartbreaking to watch."

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

Unfortunately we don't value education very highly in this country.  We should be paying teachers more and incentivizing more people to become teachers.  But, combine low pay, long hours, Kevin and Karen parents, the COVID-19 pandemic and the politicization of education with book banning and false anti-CRT crap, it's no wonder nobody wants to be a teacher.

[Cooked Crack]

 

Quote

Amelia McMillan, a parent in the Pennsylvania district, recognized the four people. They’d supported Central York’s recent (and now overturned) ban on certain school books, many of them about race. After the mid-January meeting ended, McMillan said she saw the group corner a local father in a hallway.

 

“They were yelling at him about his kid being a furry,” McMillan told The Daily Beast. The group cited “an email someone sent to the board about furries. I heard him say, ‘Leave my kid out of this.’ Two administrators from the school broke up this interaction and shuffled the four aggressors out of the building, and then asked the father if he was alright. He told everyone standing there (myself included) that they were calling his child a furry and he asked them to stop.”

 

Furries are a subculture of people who craft alter-egos as anthropomorphized animals. A furry might draw himself as a cartoon tiger, or dress up as a dragon at a convention for fellow enthusiasts. It’s a decades-old genre and, relative to other available subcultures, fairly wholesome.

 

[China]

^^^^There's this report from a couple of weeks ago that some people actually believe that the schools have installed litter boxes in the school bathrooms for the furry children:

 

 

[China]

The Conservative Assault on Education Claims Its Latest Victim

 

In a move reflecting the increasing dysfunction and political polarization plaguing American public education, the recently elected conservative majority of a Colorado county school board has voted to oust a district leader who supported policies, including masking and a DEI initiative, they had overturned. Corey Wise, the superintendent for Douglas County, Colorado, was dismissed on Friday by a 4-3 vote with two years remaining in his contract.

 

According to the Denver Post, on Monday the board’s three liberal members said they had uncovered that the conservatives had privately issued an ultimatum to Wise in January: either resign or be voted out. The liberals claimed that the move violated Colorado’s open-meeting laws, which can bar officials from acting without adequately informing their colleagues or the public. 

 

The allegation of an ultimatum triggered a fierce backlash this week from parents, teachers, and students in the county, approximately 1,000 of whom gathered Thursday for a protest in support of Wise. Enough teachers called out of work to attend the demonstration that the district was forced to cancel the day’s classes. But on Friday evening, in a heated and at times hostile meeting, the conservative school board members went ahead and voted to replace Wise.

 

Click on the link for the full story

[China]

 

[Larry]

Had a thought. (Always a dangerous thing.). 
 

We need to invent something. I'm thinking "Racist Dogwhistle Theory". I don't really have a definition for it. But then, that's not required, anyway. And I think that anybody who teaches it, makes me feel embarrassed for my race. 
 

I'm not sure of the exact definition. (And I reserve the right to make it up at any time.)  But I'm certain that it includes any effort to claim that:  

 

The Civil War wasn't about slavery. 
Slavery really didn't hurt the black folks, because hey, it brought them to the US. 
Racism doesn't exist any more. 
The "confederate flag" isn't intentionally used to signal racism. 
 

I'm certain there's others. I'll sue when I see one. 

[China]

Parents sue Madison City Schools over mask mandate, say they cause bloody noses

 

A group of parents filed a lawsuit last week against Madison City Schools officials seeking to overturn the system’s mask mandate.

 

The parents cite physical hardships faced by their children as grounds for ending the requirement to wear face coverings due to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as maintain that the school officials have overstepped their authority in implementing the mandate.

 

The parents listed as plaintiffs on the lawsuit: Shema Rizo, William and Sara Parker, Mike and Carrie Giles, Paul and Michelle Lambertson, Joseph and Ashley Dennis, Desiree Rosch, Erik and Michele Splawn, Theresa Miller and Richard and Candida Andrews.

 

In the Madison suit, filed by Huntsville attorney Lowell Becraft Jr., parents said their children complained of headaches and sustained bloody noses due to wearing the masks.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Christian revival at school prompts student walkout in W.Va.

 

Between calculus and European history classes at a West Virginia public high school, 16-year-old Cameron Mays and his classmates were told by their teacher to go to an evangelical Christian revival assembly.

 

When students arrived at the event in the school's auditorium, they were instructed to close their eyes and raise their arms in prayer, Mays said. The teens were asked to give their lives over to Jesus to find purpose and salvation. Those who did not follow the Bible would go to hell when they died, they were told.

 

The Huntington High School junior sent a text to his father.

 

“Is this legal?” he asked.

 

The answer, according to the U.S. Constitution, is no. In fact, the separation of church and state is one of the country’s founding basic tenets, noted Huntington High School senior Max Nibert.

 

“Just to see that defamed and ignored in such a blatant way, it’s disheartening,” he said.

 

Nibert and other Huntington students staged a walkout during their homeroom period Wednesday to protest the assembly. More than 100 students left their classrooms chanting, “Separate the church and state" and, “My faith, my choice.”

 

School security turned away reporters who tried to cover the demonstration.

 

“I don’t think any kind of religious official should be hosted in a taxpayer-funded building with the express purpose of trying to convince minors to become baptized after school hours,” Nibert said. During the walkout, he held a sign reading, “My rights are non-negotiable.”

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

On 2/6/2022 at 4:43 PM, Cooked Crack said:

 

 

 

On 2/6/2022 at 6:16 PM, China said:

^^^^There's this report from a couple of weeks ago that some people actually believe that the schools have installed litter boxes in the school bathrooms for the furry children:

 

 

 

And again...

 

Carroll superintendent dispels rumors of litter boxes in bathrooms

 

The Carroll Community School District is denying rumors that they are providing litterboxes in their school bathrooms.

 

Carroll School Superintendent Casey Burlau sent a letter to students and parents Monday. He writes, "The rumor is that our schools have litter boxes in the restrooms to accommodate individuals who are self-identifying as animals. This is simply and emphatically not true."

 

Mary Jane Cobb, director of the Iowa State Education Association, claims that the rumors started in Michigan when a parent spoke out to a school board. Since then, multiple high schools in the country have been targeted by similar rumors, all of which are false.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[LD0506]

[Renegade7]

I talked to my mom about this, who was also a teacher, I don't mind banning books from public schools, I'm jus not in uproar about it.

 

My concern would be trying to ban them from public libraries, or Amazon, or Barnes and Noble, etc.

 

School isn't meant to teach you about everything you might experience in life, and banning books from public schools doesn't hide these topics from students who pretty much all have smart phones and thus access to Google.

 

Having said that, if a parent wants so much control over what their kids are taught in public schools that they feel the need to ban it from being taught to anyone in public schools, they should jus pull their kids out of public schools instead.

[China]

GOP pushes US schools to post all class materials online

 

Republican state lawmakers across the U.S. are trying to require schools to post all course materials online so parents can review them, part of a broader national push by the GOP for a sweeping parents bill of rights ahead of the midterm congressional elections.

 

At least one proposal would give parents with no expertise power over curriculum choices. Parents also could file complaints about certain lessons and in some cases sue school districts.

Teachers say parents already have easy access to what their children learn. They worry that the mandates would create an unnecessary burden and potentially threaten their professional independence — all while dragging them into a culture war.

 

The bill “insinuates there’s some hiding happening,” said Katie Peters, a high school English teacher in Toledo. “It makes me a little defensive, because I’m like — no, wait a minute, we’re not hiding anything. The transparency is always there, and the parents who have cared to look have always had access.”

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Renegade7]

I agree with posting all the curriculum online, parents have the right to know and I believe a lot of people are going to be shocked to see how inconsistent this is from county to county (people that move a lot already know).

 

I don't agree with parents having the final say, most don't have the same leave of expertise in any of these fields being taught as the people teaching them or making the curriculum. 

 

Again, if you got that much of a problem with public schools, take your kids out. Don't punish everyone else.

Edited February 13, 2022 by Renegade7

[China]

I think the point is, the curriculum isn't currently hidden.  Good parents can find out their child's curriculum at any time.  Most of the people complaining don't know what their child's curriculum is because they aren't good parents and don't interact with the teachers.  They've probably never been to a parent-teacher conference.

[Cooked Crack]

 

[NoCalMike]

The irony about the CRT thing is (and I know this will be a broad generalization, but I bet there is truth to it) that it is giving this false idea that all these parents were involved in being a part of their children's education in the first place.  Quite telling that a made up thing like CRT in the classrooms was what finally got them to ever pay attention to public education when there are so many actual things that need to be addressed in order to improve the education and public school experience for their kids.  If they were actively involved in their children's home work and monitoring it all, they'd have already known that this entire CRT in the class stuff is bogus, but because they probably never looked through their school books, lesson plans, or syllabuses before it was very easy to dupe them into a fake cause.

[Renegade7]

On 2/13/2022 at 4:42 PM, China said:

I think the point is, the curriculum isn't currently hidden.  Good parents can find out their child's curriculum at any time.  Most of the people complaining don't know what their child's curriculum is because they aren't good parents and don't interact with the teachers.  They've probably never been to a parent-teacher conference.

 

Is it actually and in all school districts?

 

I remember in one of the school board threads I went looking for Loudoun County's elementary school curriculum, and the best I could find was a general list of classes per grade.

 

Are you saying that if you are a parent you already have access to the syllabus for each of their kids classes online, even elementary school?  I find it debatable that's consistent among all school districts, need to see the carfax on that one.

Edited February 16, 2022 by Renegade7

[Ball Security]

46 minutes ago, Renegade7 said:

 

Is it actually and in all school districts?

 

I remember in one of the school board threads I went looking for Loudoun County's elementary school curriculum, and the best I could find was a general list of classes per grade.

 

Are you saying that if you are a parent you already have access to the syllabus for each of their kids classes online, even elementary school?  I find it debatable that's consistent among all school districts, need to see the carfax on that one.

My two kids go to two different elementary schools and every back to school night the curriculum is shared.  The assignments are posted on Blackboard or Schoology.  Additionally, the teachers send emails weekly with what they did and what they plan to do the next week.  If anything, they over communicate.  Now how many of those emails actually get read?

If I was a teacher, I’d send the emails through something like Constant Contact and track the interactions.  Then I’d go to every school board meeting and be prepared to share it.  

[Renegade7]

2 minutes ago, Ball Security said:

My two kids go to two different elementary schools and every back to school night the curriculum is shared.  The assignments are posted on Blackboard or Schoology.  Additionally, the teachers send emails weekly with what they did and what they plan to do the next week.  If anything, they over communicate.  Now how many of those emails actually get read?

If I was a teacher, I’d send the emails through something like Constant Contact and track the interactions.  Then I’d go to every school board meeting and be prepared to share it.  

 

I see. 

 

This is either a web portal for current students, handed out to parents with children already enrolled, or emails sent to parents who's kids are already in school.

 

Is this same information available to parents before they enroll their kids?  What school district are your kids in?

 

It's tough for me to comment as my only child is one and when I went to school (Fairfax, DC, Prince William County, and Stafford), none of those online options you are talking about was available or happening to my knowledge.

 

Going back to the article, one of the mothers interview from Ohio claims their kids stopped getting physical books and getting the curriculum became harder if it was happening at all anymore.

 

The problem I have with the some of the Bills being proposed isn't the transparency requests (nothing to hide, nothing to worry about), it's the opening up of avenues to challenge what's being taught by any parent in the impacted school district.  That's going to be impossible to keep up with, every parent and child is different, there's no way to make all of them happy.

[China]

22 minutes ago, Renegade7 said:

 

I see. 

 

This is either a web portal for current students, handed out to parents with children already enrolled, or emails sent to parents who's kids are already in school.

 

Is this same information available to parents before they enroll their kids?  What school district are your kids in?

 

It's tough for me to comment as my only child is one and when I went to school (Fairfax, DC, Prince William County, and Stafford), none of those online options you are talking about was available or happening to my knowledge.

 

Going back to the article, one of the mothers interview from Ohio claims their kids stopped getting physical books and getting the curriculum became harder if it was happening at all anymore.

 

The problem I have with the some of the Bills being proposed isn't the transparency requests (nothing to hide, nothing to worry about), it's the opening up of avenues to challenge what's being taught by any parent in the impacted school district.  That's going to be impossible to keep up with, every parent and child is different, there's no way to make all of them happy.

 

My kids are/were in the City of Falls Church, and years ago we'd get the curriculum in person, but now you can get it online.  Teachers are still available via video meetings if you have specific questions about the curriculum.  There are probably some backwards areas of the country (I'm looking at you Mississippi) where it's difficult to get information, but if you ask, the teachers will provide it.  I'm saying these people aren't asking because they aren't actively parenting until somebody on social media fearmongers them into it (just look at the people railing against CRT who don't even know what it is).

[Renegade7]

28 minutes ago, China said:

 

My kids are/were in the City of Falls Church, and years ago we'd get the curriculum in person, but now you can get it online.  Teachers are still available via video meetings if you have specific questions about the curriculum.  There are probably some backwards areas of the country (I'm looking at you Mississippi) where it's difficult to get information, but if you ask, the teachers will provide it.  I'm saying these people aren't asking because they aren't actively parenting until somebody on social media fearmongers them into it (just look at the people railing against CRT who don't even know what it is).

 

We should not demonize everyone proposing these bills or asking these questions, this isn't jus about CRT.

 

What I'm seeing in multiple responses now is that if your kid is in school you can get the curriculum. 

 

Cool. Makes sense.

 

If your kid is NOT in that school district, how can you get the curriculum?  Why shouldn't it be online for everyone to see?  It will help cut down on a lot of this crap because it would be easy for anyone to validate how many school districts, like the entire state of Viriginia, does not and never did teach teach CRT.

 

Making them easily accessible to everyone, child in their school or not, would be huge in helping to point the mass inconsistencies among the curriculum of all the different schools districts in the country, and hopefully opening the door for the need to make them more uniform.  I moved so many times as a kid I never took a physics or civics class in public school, each district had either already taught it by time I got there, or I moved before they taught it.

 

Let's step back for a second and separate these two issues:

 

1. Making the curriculum as easy as possible for anyone to find, kid in school or not.

2. Making it too damn easy to challenge curriculum or worse giving parents final say.

 

1 should be an easy yes, even for folks that believe a lot of parents are idiots and are just looking for something to complain about. So what, make it easy, get it over with, it's right thing to do.

 

2 on the other hand I believe we are all in agreement is a horrible fn idea.

 

I get what the GOP is doing in response to trying to cater to parents in regards to public education.  This will backfire on them as more and more can see the stark differences in public school curriculum for a place like Kansas compared to a place like Fairfax, so let them do it and watch it blow up in their face.

 

Edited February 16, 2022 by Renegade7

[The Sisko]

On 2/3/2022 at 7:48 PM, The Evil Genius said:

 

 

I really wish I was a teacher in one of these states. I’d immediately start teaching Song of Solomon, among other Biblical stories parents would love to talk to their kids about. When the uproar happens, I’d innocently proclaim my love of Jebus and complain that heathens are persecuting Xtians again. 
 

On 2/4/2022 at 6:00 PM, China said:

Oklahoma bill would fine teachers $10k for teaching anything that contradicts religion

 

Oklahoma Republican Senator Rob Standridge has introduced a bill that would allow people to sue teachers if they offer an opposing view from the religious beliefs held by students.

 

The proposed act, named the “Students’ Religious Belief Protection Act” means parents can demand the removal of any book with perceived anti-religious content from school. Subjects like LGBT+ issues, evolution, the big bang theory and even birth control could be off the table.

 

Teachers could be sued a minimum of $10,000 “per incident, per individual” and the fines would be paid “from personal resources” not from school funds, from other individuals or groups. If the teacher is unable to pay, they would be fired, under the legislation.

 

The act will be introduced into the Education Committee next week, but it doesn’t specify which religious beliefs will be used to prosecute offending teachers.

 

Click on the link for the full article

Along the same lines as above, I’d love to accommodate them and teach religion in schools. Satanism FTW.😈
 

On 2/13/2022 at 10:02 AM, Renegade7 said:

I talked to my mom about this, who was also a teacher, I don't mind banning books from public schools, I'm jus not in uproar about it.

 

My concern would be trying to ban them from public libraries, or Amazon, or Barnes and Noble, etc.

 

School isn't meant to teach you about everything you might experience in life, and banning books from public schools doesn't hide these topics from students who pretty much all have smart phones and thus access to Google.

 

Having said that, if a parent wants so much control over what their kids are taught in public schools that they feel the need to ban it from being taught to anyone in public schools, they should jus pull their kids out of public schools instead.

The problem with this line of thinking is that they’re not planning to let anyone with any sense do the banning. In their minds It needs to be parents because, don’t they have a god given right to choose the “right” propaganda for their kids to learn? As a black atheist with a German mother, I’m right there with them. I’d immediately object to teaching about WWII (you mean Hitler was bad? You anti-Arayan racist!) math (Arabic numerals? C’mon!) and pretty much all US history because it would make my kid feel bad.

Let them have their cake. Then shove it down their damn throats and make a mockery of all of it. If my kid can’t learn, your kid won’t learn the stuff you want him to either. The Grand Oligarch’s Party needs to understand that if they’re going to do this kind of crap, we’re willing to burn it ALL down.

Edited February 16, 2022 by The Sisko

[Simmsy]

17 hours ago, The Sisko said:

The problem with this line of thinking is that they’re not planning to let anyone with any sense do the banning. In their minds It needs to be parents because, don’t they have a god given right to choose the “right” propaganda for their kids to learn? As a black atheist with a German mother, I’m right there with them. I’d immediately object to teaching about WWII (you mean Hitler was bad? You anti-Arayan racist!) math (Arabic numerals? C’mon!) and pretty much all US history because it would make my kid feel bad.

Let them have their cake. Then shove it down their damn throats and make a mockery of all of it. If my kid can’t learn, your kid won’t learn the stuff you want him to either. The Grand Oligarch’s Party needs to understand that if they’re going to do this kind of crap, we’re willing to burn it ALL down.

 

Thats part of the problem, too many liberals refuse to fight fire with fire. They get elected, play by the "rules", get circles run around them by the GOP (because Dems refuse to fight) and then come back to their constituents and beg for our votes. As soon as the Dems get someone in charge who is willing to shove the GOP's **** back down their throats, you will see people voting for them in droves. Why they don't understand this is beyond me.

[tshile]

I’d be willing to entertain how to change the system so that what’s being taught in schools is easier for people that have no direct interest in what is going on in any particular district to see what’s going on if… the request was coming from someone other than a group of people with a long history of simply attacking education and academics

these are the same people that think the best thing to change about education is to make it a little cheaper to send their children to private school. 
 

But not too much cheaper, trying to get away from certain people remember?

 

[The Sisko]

17 hours ago, Simmsy said:

 

Thats part of the problem, too many liberals refuse to fight fire with fire. They get elected, play by the "rules", get circles run around them by the GOP (because Dems refuse to fight) and then come back to their constituents and beg for our votes. As soon as the Dems get someone in charge who is willing to shove the GOP's **** back down their throats, you will see people voting for them in droves. Why they don't understand this is beyond me.

QFT X 2. The only way the Grand Oligarch's Party sits down and agrees to any kind of reforms is if we get a Dem version of Tя☭mp to go in and just blatantly disregard laws, rules, norms - everything. They're fine with authoritarianism when it works for them but they need to see what it feels like when the shoe is on the other foot.