Category Archives: Education
UT Prof: Liberals actively trying to shut down education and debate on campus.
Professor of Philosophy at the University of Texas Danial Bonevac says that political activists show up in his classroom and try to shut down discussion and debate.
Tucker Carlson vs. Professor who says Trump is WhitePowah…
Academics are taught about evidence, what it is and what it isn’t, and yet our universities have become so politically radicalized that all of that training is tossed out the window. For the far left, truth simply isn’t a value and as we have written about several times, they say as much in their own writings repeatedly.
This is the kind of person that your children are exposed to on campus every day. SUNY Geneseo Professor Tony Macula:
Brave student under fire for recording professor’s unhinged anti-Trump tirade
A teacher in a classroom has no expectation of privacy from what they teach/preach during class.
This kind of nonsense from teachers who know next to nothing about politics happens regularly in classrooms across the country.
The True Meaning of Thanksgiving
The true meaning of Thanksgiving is no longer taught in public schools.
A review of the history shows that it starts with a search for religious freedom, a rejection of collectivism and thanks to God Almighty for his blessings. Governor William Bradford’s journal and other documents reveal it all.
Every year Rush Limbaugh read s the passages from Gov. Bradford’s journal and explains it from the point of view of those who were there. Listen to the audio HERE. Read the transcript HERE.
Thanksgiving Proclamation
Issued by President George Washington, at the request of Congress, on October 3, 1789
By the President of the United States of America, a Proclamation.
Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor; and—Whereas both Houses of Congress have, by their joint committee, requested me “to recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness:”
Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation; for the signal and manifold mercies and the favor, able interpositions of His providence in the course and conclusion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquillity, union, and plenty which we have since enjoyed; for the peaceable and rational manner in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national one now lately instituted; for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and, in general, for all the great and various favors which He has been pleased to confer upon us.
And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations, and beseech Him to pardon our national and other trangressions; to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually; to render our National Government a blessing to all the people by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed; to protect and guide all sovereigns and nations (especially such as have shown kindness to us), and to bless them with good governments, peace, and concord; to promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and us; and, generally, to grant unto all mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as He alone knows to be best.
Given under my hand at the City of New York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.
Go. Washington
Prager University: Things to think about before you cast your vote (video)
Short, five minute long videos to help get you informed on key issues.
Can YOU trust the press?
Why do American companies leave America?
This is the double taxation that Donald Trump wants to end.
The dark art of political intimidation.
It goes on much, much more than you know.
Survey Shows Trump Voters Have More Political Knowledge
A new survey provides evidence that supporters of Donald Trump tend to be more knowledgeable than Hillary Clinton supporters.
The survey, conducted by Conquest Communications Group and published by Just Facts, asked respondents 23 questions regarding education, taxes, spending, national debt, global warming, pollution, energy, hunger, Social Security and health care. Overall, the success rate for Trump supporters in correctly answering the questions was 43 percent, compared to only 31 percent for Clinton supporters.
In total, the rates at which voters gave the correct answers varied from a high of 43% for Trump voters to a low of 31% for Clinton voters:
- 43% for Trump voters.
- 37% for 35 to 64 year olds.
- 37% for males.
- 35% for undecided voters.
- 34% for females.
- 34% for 65+ year olds.
- 31% for Clinton voters.
Milo’s 12 Steps to Destroy the Alt Right (video)
Milo Yiannopoulos
Just How Bad is Common Core Curriculum?
This is a long video but well worth your time. Pay special attention to Bill Evers who is on the Trump Education Transition Team. This is so enlightening.
To learn about how sloppy the math curriculum is that Washington DC is cramming down our throats, Evers starts explaining it at 11:06 into the video.
If you are interested in reading more about just where this Common Core nonsense started, politicians and activists who want centralized control of education, a few far left billionaires and big education companies came together and decided to cram it down your throats. The talking points from those pushing Common Core about how it started are mostly demonstrable lies exposed by a couple of hours researching the topic using any search engine.
Clinton’s Get Millions From World’s Biggest Sharia Law Education Firm
Like Hillary is going to lead any positive education reforms….
If people only knew how corrupt the education cartel is…..
Via the Daily Caller:
Former President Bill Clinton collected $5.6 million in fees from GEMS Education, a Dubai-based company that teaches Sharia Law through its network of more than 100 schools in the Middle East, Asia and Africa, according to a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation.
The company’s finances strictly adhere to “Sharia Finance,” which includes giving “zakat,” a religious tax of which one-eighth of the proceeds is dedicated to funding Islamic jihad.
The company also contributed millions of dollars to the Clinton Foundation.
His biggest paycheck from the closely-held company — which is incorporated in the Cayman Islands — was in 2014 when he pocketed $2.1 million. It is unclear if Bill received income from the Middle Eastern firm in 2015, since Hillary has not yet released her tax return for that year.
Leading Schoolbook Publisher Bans Sausage, Pork, & Pigs from Books to Avoid Offending Muslims
This is an informative example of why our public school textbooks are rife with inaccuracies. The textbook printers want to sell as many books as possible. In order to do that they give in to every omission, change, and full blown censorship demanded by almost any pressure group. Squeaky pressure groups are bad for business.
As long as government bureaucrats are running schools this will continue to be a problem.
A leading publisher of schoolbooks has banned its authors from mentioning pigs, sausages, and anything pork related in their books, lest the words offend Muslims and Jews. The ban was criticized as “utter nonsense” by a Muslim Member of Parliament, but the publishers have defended their decision as their books are sold around the world.
The edict emerged during a discussion on Radio 4’s Today program on free speech, the Daily Mail has reported. Presenter James Naughtie, whose author wife is currently in discussion with Oxford University Press (OUP) regarding an educational series of books, brandished a letter saying: “I’ve got a letter here that was sent out by OUP to an author doing something for young people.
“Among the things prohibited in the text that was commissioned by OUP was the following: Pigs plus sausages, or anything else which could be perceived as pork.
“Now, if a respectable publisher, tied to an academic institution, is saying you’ve got to write a book in which you cannot mention pigs because some people might be offended, it’s just ludicrous. It is just a joke.”
His guest, Labour MP Khalid Mahmood responded “I absolutely agree. That’s absolute utter nonsense. And when people go too far, that brings the whole discussion into disrepute.”
Gallup: 70% of K-12 teachers ‘not engaged’ or ‘actively disengaged’
Anyone surprised?
EAG:
WASHINGTON, D.C. – A recent Gallup survey found that K-12 teachers who are “not engaged” or “actively disengaged” – about 70 percent of all teachers – miss a combined 2.3 million workdays than their “engaged” colleagues.
In Gallup Daily tracking surveys between Jan. 3, 2013 and Sept. 30, 2014, the polling firm used “responses to questions about workplace elements with proven links to performance outcomes” to place teachers into three categories: engaged, not engaged and actively disengaged.
Engaged teachers are enthusiastic and committed to their work, and represent about 30 percent of teachers. Not engaged teachers are satisfied but not connected to their jobs, and rarely go above and beyond for students. They represent about 57 percent of teachers.
Actively disengaged teachers not only hate their work, they find ways to undermine their coworkers or schools. Those teachers account for about 13 percent of U.S. educators, according to Gallup.com.
Ohio public school textbook: Rights come from who?
In case you are unaware, the Declaration of Independence as well as countless writings from the Founders state that human rights are God given and thus man and government have no authority to deny them. This kind of mistake is no accident.
Via EAG News:
FAIRFIELD, Ohio – According to a citizenship lesson for 8-year-olds, rights are given to Americans by their government.
Parent Andrew Washburn posted a picture on Facebook of a handout titled “Being a Good Citizen” by Phyllis Naegeli.
“So Emma brought home a very interesting handout from school the other day. So informative! I didn’t know that our rights come from the government! Thank you, government!” he sarcastically wrote.
“And thank you, (Butler County school district), for teaching my eight year old daughter all about her rights!” he added.
Washburn tells EAGnews his daughter attends a Butler County, Ohio district.
Among other things, the worksheet claims:
* Rights are special privileges the government gives you.
* Because the government gives us rights, we have the duty to be good citizens.
* Someday you will be given the right to vote.
Washburn posted the entire worksheet on the social media site.
Continue reading HERE.
Texas-Tech Students Know Nothing About History & Government (video)
One can do this at almost any school or college campus and what you see here is no accident. The best way to undermine the idea that America is all about is to make sure the next generation forgets it.
Amherst Mass School District Goals: Social Transformation, Social Justice, Transforming Society…
..not reading, writing, science, math, literature, and the other subjects they are abysmal at teaching. The school district’s new curriculum shifts balance ‘away from the individual and towards the social whole’.
The buzz words you see below are the popular euphemisms for communist/Marxist propaganda and indoctrination.
EAG:
AMHERST, Mass. – While many school districts slyly implement far-left social justice reforms behind closed doors, others are flying the red flag proudly.
The Amherst-Pelham Regional School District, which recently subjected middle school students to a social justice assembly that left children sobbing and traumatized, penned a 63 page document in 2008 detailing their intent to socially transform America, via your children.
The document, titled Social Justice Commitment, clearly outlines Amherst-Pelham’s fervent dedication to an all-encompassing and radically progressive social justice curriculum.
The district’s “philosophy and rationale” for the commitment states:
A cultural shift in our school system is indicated… which targets the collective and visible implementation of “a curriculum for social responsibility in which the balance shifts away from the individual and towards the social whole.”
According to a 2011 document providing a “history of equity work” in the district, this “philosophy and rationale” comes from “the Curriculum and Instruction goals of the BAMSS Standards of Practice and the district’s call for equitable instructional action ‘in every classroom, every day.’”
The BAMSS (Becoming a Multicultural School System) Initiative, adopted by the district in 1993, contains a paragraph titled “Our Vision of Multicultural Education,” which states:
Understanding that “schools are essential to laying the foundation for the transformation of society and the elimination of oppression and injustice,” the Amherst Pelham Regional Schools affirm their commitment to becoming a multicultural school system, defined both as “a philosophical concept built on the ideals of freedom, justice, equality, equity, and human dignity as acknowledged in various documents (such as the U.S. Declaration of Independence and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)” and “a process of comprehensive school reform and basic education for all students [which] challenges and rejects racism and other forms of discrimination in schools and society and accepts and affirms the pluralism (ethnic, racial, linguistic, religious, economic, and gender, among others) that students, their communities, and teachers reflect.”
To accomplish this task of training other people’s children in matters of morality, race, religion, and gender, the district has adopted a framework consisting of six key points, that it says, are a must in implementing its social justice commitment.
The framework, as cited by the district, is borrowed from a document whose author describes it as one that “draws on philosophic conservatism” but contains “some of the core values … associated with socialism.”
Specifically, according to Amhert-Pelham’s Social Justice Commitment, which they say is a “work in progress:”
The district’s implementation of a social justice commitment for students and staff must (cited in Pitts, originated with Giddens 1994 and edited for use here):
• repair damaged solidarities and reconcile autonomy and interdependence
• recognize the importance of the discussion of ethics, “life politics”
• encourage individuals and groups to make things happen, “generative politics”
• create a participatory democracy where issues are discussed respectfully and transparently
• develop conditions that empower participants as opposed to merely dispensing
• confront the role violence plays at all levels of human interactions
With regard to the third point listed in the framework – “generative politics” – the district suggests that the curriculum encourage students of all ages to engage in community activities, that might include “political campaigning, community service or improvement,” and further asserts that the school “should not only provide channels for such activities but build them into the K-12 design.”
The Social Justice Commitment provides several resources as “a starting point” for implementation. The resources consist of the writings of various “experts” in psychology and child development, who provide specifics on various stages of moral development in children as well as “goals for social justice values at different ages.”
Included in these resources are the works of humanist psychologists, Abraham Maslow and Jean Piaget, and Marxist psychologist Lev Vygotsky, all of whom have been credited with contributing to constructivist education reforms.
Other resources are recommended for creating a social justice curriculum, including The Earth Charter, a document that calls for global governance in the name of ‘sustainable development’ and Bill Ayers’ Teaching for Social Justice.
At the core of Amhert-Pelham’s Social Justice Commitment, as with all social justice reforms, is a consistent focus on the oppression of minorities by whites and the American “system of advantage.”
To ensure that all ‘isms’ and ‘phobias’ perpetrated by these “systems of advantage” are thoroughly understood and covered within the curriculum, the district provides in its commitment a glossary of definitions of various terms, such as classism, heterosexism, oppression, power, prejudice, privileges, and racism.
The definitions provided are a glaring indication that this district is led by people who foster their own biases and prejudices.
For example, “privileges” is defined as:
Advantages, rewards or benefits given to those in the dominant group (whites, males, Christians, heterosexuals, etc.) without their asking for them. Privileges are bestowed unintentionally, unconsciously and automatically. Often these privileges are invisible to the receiver.
“Racism” is defined as:
A system of advantage based on race.
Involves cultural messages and institutional policies and practices as well as beliefs and actions of individuals.
In the U.S. there is clear advantage to whites and disadvantage to People of Color as noted in social indicators.
According to Amherst-Pelham Schools, social justice transformation requires infusing “content curriculum with uniform and practiced socially just behaviors.” Students and educators engage in “ongoing dialogues” that will “systematically include: “Who am I? How am I connected to others and what are my responsibilities? What is my place in the world? Where am I headed? Who benefits? Who is marginalized? Whose interests are being served? How could things be done differently?”
The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education contracts the Center for Collaborative Education to provide support in professional development, teacher residencies, effective use of data, educator evaluation, and other services.
The Center for Collaborative Education (CCE) is the Boston-based affiliate of the Coalition of Essential Schools, the progressive reform supported by President Obama and communist Bill Ayers through their work on the board of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge in the 1990’s.
The Obama administration recently awarded CCE a 5 year, $4.8 million dollar grant through the US Department of Education’s School Leadership Program.
The Coalition of Essential Schools also directly partners with the Amherst-Pelham Regional School District.
Is Edward Snowden to blame for damaging our national security?
By Chuck Norton
UPDATE …We told ya so: Obama’s Snooping Excludes Mosques, Missed Boston Bombers – LINK
This story is not about partisanship. It is about the difference between what Palpatine called, “I will make it legal” and what is truly lawful.
For starters we need legislation making third-party records with phone companies, internet, credit card, etc private. Just because technology has out-stepped the 4th Amendment does not mean that we cannot adjust the trajectory of that Amendment to keep up with technology. The “papers and effects” of today are smart phones and computers. The Constitution doesn’t say “you have the 4th Amendment until the moment your papers are in a digital format”. Shall we poll the American people on that one?
Most Americans would be outraged if they knew that Supreme Court once ruled that you have no expectation of privacy on such personal data.
One of the reasons the Founders petitioned the Crown and then wrote the Declaration of Independence is because of unspecific “General Warrants”. The reason that the 4th Amendment was enumerated is because the British issued these general warrants which were essentially legalized ‘fishing expeditions’ into people’s lives. Eventually the Crown gave the Red Coats the ability to write their own warrants. Today we are doing the same with “national security letters“.
They have made it illegal to tell anyone you are targeted, so you can’t even go to court to fight it.
How are we to know who was hurt or whose private information was leaked, or who’s phone and email was tapped and that information was used against them secretly? Since you can’t check and see if you have been snooped upon ever, you technically have no standing in court…. how convenient. This little maneuver is how the Obama Administration has been getting such cases thrown out of court.
The entire purpose of the courts, and especially the FISA Court, is to ensure that government surveillance is not overly broad and it’s actions not heavy-handed. Yet the FISA Court somehow signed off on this unlimited illegal surveillance and the Obama Administration was able to hop from judge to judge until it found one that would sign off on tracking the life of Fox News Reporter James Rosen, his family, and the entire Washington Bureau of the Associated Press. What we are experiencing is a wholesale breakdown of both the system of checks and balances and separation of powers.
The courts have said that the government needs a warrant to put a GPS tag on someone or their car, but meta data, among other things, tracks GPS off your calls and whereabouts instantly, so each and every log entry of an American without probable cause, each case… and there are millions, is a violation of law and people’s 4th Amendment rights. Where are the prosecutions? “I was just following orders” never has flown before, and doesn’t fly now.
What I don’t like is that Edward Snowden was put in the position of having to do this. The overreaches and abuses in the NSA, IRS, EPA and other agencies should have been nipped in the bud a long time ago. The tools the NSA was given were supposed to be used on foreign targets and only those in the USA where probable cause was clear and/or a specific warrant issued.
It seems to me, who Government was targeting certainly were not two brothers in Boston calling Chechnya to speak to their jihadi mother and trainers.
In every election this president has ever been in he has utilized private and sealed records against his opponents.
I used to favor the Patriot Act, I defended it against everyone in my college class on the Patriot Act in a debate – all of them vs me, and I won those debates (according to the prof), but I always gave my support with the caveat “so far as these tools are not abused, and the men using them respect the limits of their office”. Obviously this is no longer the case. Who is it that says the government is violating the restrictions placed in the Patriot Act? None other than Representative James Sensenbrenner, the author of the Patriot Act.
Snowden is not to blame for damaging our national security.
When Carter and Clinton reigned in (some say hobbled) the CIA and our intelligence capability it impacted our ability to stop the 9/11 hijackers, it was an over reaction to the abuse of the FBI, CIA, IRS etc under LBJ and Nixon. While Carter and Clinton should have acted more wisely to be sure, it was those who abused those tools in the first place that endangered our national security by causing the backlash.
Snowden is not to blame for the same reason. Those to blame for impairing our national security in the reign in that is sure to come are those who took this too far, abused the tools of government, lied to us repeatedly, forgot the limits of their office and somehow got it in their head that we are their subjects and not the other way around.
They say “trust us” after we have seen abuse after abuse of private information stored by government. They say They say “trust us” after lying to Congress about what they were doing. They say “trust us” after telling the media that “every member of Congress knew about this when clearly this was not the case. They say “trust us” when they say that “they only collected meta-data” as if somehow that is OK, for us only to discover later that they are collecting more content than they admitted after being caught.
They say that we need to trade-off some of our liberty and privacy because security is all important, and at the same time they invite millions to cross the border illegally, and accuse those of wanting to know who are crossing our borders of being racists. The government won’t even go after jihadists who over stay their student visas. In modern times, government has demonstrated time and time again that politics always trumps security.
“A ‘find the target first, then find the crime’ political approach requires access to information of an unprecedented level. Which is exactly what is happening. When everything is a crime, government data mining matters” – Prof. William Jacobsen
President Obama:
This Administration also puts forward a false choice between the liberties we cherish and the security we demand. I will provide our intelligence and law enforcement agencies with the tools they need to track and take out the terrorists without undermining our Constitution and our freedom.
That means no more illegal wire-tapping of American citizens. No more national security letters to spy on citizens who are not suspected of a crime. No more tracking citizens who do nothing more than protest a misguided war. No more ignoring the law when it is inconvenient. That is not who we are.
What does it tell you when a 29-year-old high school drop-out has a better understanding of the 4th Amendment than the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA)?
I have been warning that academia has become so radical that it has become subversive. I am not alone in this line of thinking as Justice Scalia says that academia is largely responsible for these nonsensical, fast & loose interpretations of the Constitution.
There needs to be a massive effort to educate people on the 4th Amendment and that education needs to start with traditionalists, conservatives and republicans. Why? Because if those who claim to embrace the ideals of the nation’s founding don’t get it how can lay people be expected to?
Leftist teachers threaten walk out over Senator Santorum speech…
How far will the left go to crush dissent and assault the First Amendment? How about walking out of class and not teaching the kids.
Read carefully.
A Michigan high school canceled a speech by former Sen. Rick Santorum after teachers became outraged over his opposition to gay marriage and threatened to stage protests and a possible work stoppage.
Santorum had been invited to deliver a upcoming speech on leadership by the Young Americans for Freedom chapter at Gross Pointe South High School. But the speech was canceled on Monday after the school district’s superintendent heard from angry teachers.
Adam Tragone, a spokesman for Young America’s Foundation, told Fox News they were very disappointed in the decision to cancel Santorum’s address.
“Most of the teachers were outraged by some of the senator’s statements about marriage,” he said. “The superintendent took these concerns very seriously and said he found Mr. Santorum’s stances on marriage very divisive and extreme.”
Thomas Harwood, superintendent of the Gross Pointe Public School System, did not return telephone calls seeking comment.
Langston Bowens, 18, the president of the YAF chapter, told Fox News that he’s not surprised by the campus outrage.
“They flooded my principal’s office and complained about how this bigoted, racist homophobic speaker was going to come to our school,” he said. “They were very offended. They threatened protests. They threatened not to show up to work – because he’s a conservative.”
Bowens said the young conservative student worked hard to raise the money to bring Santorum to campus and the school’s principal actually signed off on the address.
It was the superintendent, he said, that pulled the plug.
“Our school is liberal and not very conservative-friendly,” the teenager told Fox News. “We’re called bigoted, racist and stupid because we are conservatives.”
Of course Senator Santorum is none of those things and the vast majority of the country well knows it. So how is it that once again, does such a high concentration of the worst form of radicals all but take control of almost any public school?
Video: Petition to take away guns from the law abiding so that only criminals have them….
And we thought that only Jay Leno found the dumb ones. This is priceless. It also speaks volumes about public education.
Michelle Malkin Blasts MSNBC: Hands Off My Kids!!! (video)
Totally awesome and spot on.
Texas Public University Professor Forced Students to Create Anti-Second Amendment Propaganda
Not a few days go buy when we don’t see a story like this coming from our public schools.
Via Campus Reform:
Midwestern State University Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Betty Stewart confirmed to Campus Reform Friday the school has launched an investigation into professor Jennifer Yucus’ conduct after a student filed an official complaint on Thursday.
According to the complaint, obtained by Campus Reform, the professor compelled students in her graphic design class to create artwork opposing firearms on campus and opposing pro-gun legislation currently pending before the Texas state legislature.
The professor then used the artwork students created online to publicize an anti-gun petition entitled “MSU is anti-Concealed Carry on Campus” and on a now deleted Facebook page opposing firearms, says the complaint.
“On Monday, April 1, around 7 PM (class was 5:30 – 8:20), Jennifer Yucus, Assistant Professor of Graphic Art/Design, compelled students from her Computers For Artists class to advocate in favor of a political petition opposing firearms on campus, in opposition to a pair of bills currently before the Texas legislature, using personal art materials and MSU resources,” reads the complaint.
“Several of my classmates were uncomfortable with the assignment and either quietly or openly expressed this,” it continues. “Professor Yucus asked students to rationalize objections by thinking of it as a job from an employer (or words to that effect).”
The complaint adds that Yucus “did require all works to include the URL to the petition” she had created and adds that students were photographed while crafting the posters to give the illusion of youth support.
“Professor Yucus took photos of her students in the process of drafting and creating the posters, but did not say how these would be used,” says the complaint. “The posters were then hung in the hallways of the Fain Arts building, giving the impression of student support.”
Some of the photos later appeared on an anti-gun Facebook page that appeared to have been created by Yucus. The page appeared to have been deleted after the complaint was filed, but Campus Reform was able to capture the posted images before they were removed.
According to the complaint, Yucus used her official university-issued e-mail address to later forward a URL to her petition to the entire class.
State law in Texas appears to forbid professors at public universities from using their authority to compel others to advocate for political causes.
“A state officer or employee may not use official authority… to interfere with or affect the result of an election or nomination of a candidate or to achieve any other political purpose,” reads subsection C of 556.004 of Government Code, Title 5, entitled “Open Government, Ethics.”
Angry Indoctrinated Leftist At Ohio State Loses It Over Pro-Life Display (video)
Even in the mid-west and more conservative parts of the country this is what academia has managed to accomplish with the most vulnerable students.
More details at The Blaze.
Communist Terrorist Who Killed Three Police Officers Given Professorship At Columbia (video)
And just before she was given the professorship she was “honored” by New York University.
We have been reporting the repeated and unending idiocy coming from the public education sector for some time now. We have more to report when time permits.
Mike Adams’ UNC-Wilmington First Amendment Lawsuit Heads to Trial
It is about time!
Via William Creeley at FIRE:
In April 2007, Professor Mike Adams of the University of North Carolina-Wilmington filed a federal lawsuit against his institution, alleging that he had been denied promotion in part due to political viewpoints he had expressed in columns written for non-university publications. Nearly six years and one successful appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit later, a federal district court has ruled that Adams’ First Amendment claim may proceed to trial.
Adams’ April 2007 complaint, filed with the cooperation of the Alliance Defense Fund (now the Alliance Defending Freedom), accused UNC-Wilmington officials of violating his First Amendment rights by denying his promotion on account of his expression as a conservative columnist. Adams also alleged that he had suffered religious discrimination and an equal protection violation.
Three years later, in a March 2010 ruling, a federal district court rejected Adams’ claim of First Amendment retaliation, finding that the columns constituted speech “made pursuant to his official duties” as a professor and were thus not protected by the First Amendment. The court reached its decision by relying on the Supreme Court’s ruling in Garcetti v. Ceballos, 547 U.S. 410 (2006). In Garcetti, the Court ruled that public employees do not enjoy First Amendment protections when engaging in speech pursuant to their official duties. Applying Garcetti‘s holding to Adams’ case, the district court determined that the columns could not be cited as grounds for retaliation in violation of the First Amendment.
From a faculty speech standpoint, the district court’s ruling was very problematic, as I explained here on The Torch a few years back:
We here at FIRE found the district court’s ruling against Adams deeply worrying. For one, we felt the facts provided significant support for Adams’ First Amendment claim. But even more ominously, the district court’s reliance on Garcetti made the ruling against Adams just the latest in a quickly–growing string of Garcetti-based defeats for public university faculty members. The problem with Garcetti is that in lessening First Amendment protections for public employees generally, it particularly impacts faculty members, whose speech in fulfilling teaching and research duties differs greatly from the speech of, say, district attorneys, police officers, or public administrators. Because while the government as employer may reasonably expect a significant amount of control over the public speech of district attorneys, that same amount of control over the scholarly research and teaching of public university faculty members is inappropriate and amounts to an infringement on academic freedom.
To address this exact concern, Justice Anthony Kennedy inserted a crucial caveat into the majority opinion he penned in Garcetti, writing:
There is some argument that expression related to academic scholarship or classroom instruction implicates additional constitutional interests that are not fully accounted for by this Court’s customary employee-speech jurisprudence. We need not, and for that reason do not, decide whether the analysis we conduct today would apply in the same manner to a case involving speech related to scholarship or teaching.
Justice Kennedy thus specifically and explicitly declined to extend Garcetti‘s analysis to bear on cases involving the speech of public university faculty, reserving the question. Unfortunately, in application, Justice Kennedy’s careful carve-out has been largely disregarded by courts, and Garcetti‘s impact on faculty speech has been so significant in recent years that the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) mounted a campaign to push back against Garcetti and what it has deemed “judicial hostility or indifference” to academic freedom.
Adams appealed the district court’s ruling to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. In support of Adams’ appeal, FIRE joined an amici curiae brief with the AAUP and the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression, asking the Fourth Circuit to recognize Garcetti‘s inapplicability to Adams’ situation.
Thankfully, the Fourth Circuit did just that. Reversing the district court’s dismissal of Adams’ claims, the court wrote that “the district court applied Garcetti without acknowledging, let alone addressing, the clear language in that opinion that casts doubt on whether the Garcetti analysis applies in the academic context of a public university.” Continuing, the Fourth Circuit observed:
Put simply, Adams’ speech was not tied to any more specific or direct employee duty than the general concept that professors will engage in writing, public appearances, and service within their respective fields. For all the reasons discussed above, that thin thread is insufficient to render Adams’ speech “pursuant to [his] official duties” as intended by Garcetti.
[…]
Applying Garcetti to the academic work of a public university faculty member under the facts of this case could place beyond the reach of First Amendment protection many forms of public speech or service a professor engaged in during his employment. That would not appear to be what Garcetti intended, nor is it consistent with our long-standing recognition that no individual loses his ability to speak as a private citizen by virtue of public employment.
The case was remanded back to the district court for further proceedings.
Last Friday, March 22, Senior United States District Judge Malcolm J. Howard issued an order denying the UNC-Wilmington defendants’ motion to dismiss, finding that Adams “has brought forth evidence from which a reasonable jury could find that his speech was a substantial or motivating factor in the decision to deny tenure to plaintiff.”
Salt Lake School Willingly Breaks Law To Ban Boy Scouts
Here we go again, school administrators willingly breaking the law to engage in Frankfurt School cultural marxism. This is not unusual, the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) and the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) see just such law breaking every day as they fight to get radicalized school administrators and faculty to simply obey the law.
The school administrators don’t care if they break the law because when they lose in court it is the taxpayer who pays, not them. This is why FIRE is working to change that so that those in our schools who break the law under “color of law” pay the price personally.
Just as overt communist propaganda managed to get entrenched into the the curriculum of 875 Texas school districts before the state legislature and the elected Texas board of education became aware of it, we have this going on in ultra-conservative Salt Lake City.
At Missouri State the university ordered a Christian student to engage in a homosexual sex act and engage in far left political advocacy…or else:
This is how entrenched the radical left has dug itself into our public schools. Survey: Liberal profs admit they’d discriminate against conservatives in hiring, advancement…
See our Academic Misconduct category.
Todd Starnes at Fox News:
A federal civil rights complaint has been filed against the Salt Lake City School Board after a principal booted a Cub Scout pack from an elementary school.
About 30 eight to 11 year-olds were told they could no longer meet at Mountain View Elementary School because the Boy Scout’s ban on gay members in leaders conflicted with the school district’s anti-bias policy.
The ban drew the ire of Michael Clara, a school board member and lifetime Boy Scout. Clara filed the federal complaint on behalf of two Latino parents.
“I believe it is an assault on the founding principles of our country for school officials to attempt to exclude a voice no less legitimate than its own from public school participation,” Clara told Fox News. “A marketplace of ideas devoid of competitive viewpoints engenders an insidious society of conformity, contrary to the fundamental precepts of our Constitution.”
He claims the school district is violating the Boy Scout Act – a law that requires schools to allow access to the Boy Scouts if they allow access to outside groups.
“It’s unfortunate this principal has the backing of the district to implement their own form of discrimination and racism,” Clara told Fox News. “They are using the resources of the school system to punish students who don’t agree with us.
The scout troop is made up of mostly Latino boys, he said – and the parents who complained are Catholics.
A district spokesperson told local media they had not seen a copy of the complaint.
On March 16 two Latino parents contacted Clara after the principal informed them the Cub Scout pack would no longer be allowed to meet at the school.
Three days later the school board member received a telephone call from the principal confirming that directive.
“(He) confirmed that the Cub Scouts were prohibited from meeting in the building because they will not allow gay scout leaders,” he said.
Clara, who describes himself as a Christian conservative Republican who supports gay rights, said he was very concerned by the ban.
“Why on Earth would we want to remove something positive from the school,” he asked. “Where does this end? It’s a form of discrimination in the name of intolerance.”
70% of Texas school districts adopt curriculum pushing communist indoctrination (video)
And the legislature did not become aware of it until 875 school districts had already adopted the program.
The curriculum, called CSCOPE, includes a list that shows capitalism on the bottom of the list of “just economic systems” along with nazism; with socialism and communism at the top of the most just. Of course those who have taken most any serious political history classes well knows that nazism and communism, in application, are virtually identical.
[Note While the propaganda used to sell communism and nazism/facism is very different, in application, as Professor of Russian and European history Dr. Dmitry Shlapentokh put it, “One is a great white shark and the other is a killer whale, sure one is a fish and the other is a mammal, but as far as their prey are concerned they are one in the same”.]
The curriculum also includes lessons having students design a new communist/socialist flag, pledging allegiance to Mexico, capitalism is “selfish”, the Founders were terrorists, etc. Sen. Larry Taylor (Friendswood) said he found the lesson plan “very egregious as a Texan and an American.”
We, here at Political Arena, have been following this story. When parents first became alarmed went to school boards for answers they were denied access or review of the curriculum. In some school districts students were even told to not tell parents what they were reviewing in class.
In fact, Texas State Board of Education member David Bradley issued the following statement:
…the ten-page CSCOPE contract that teachers are required to sign prior to using the curriculum. It prohibits educators from showing CSCOPE content to parents. This directly conflicts with the state law assuring parents the right to review any and all curriculum used in public schools to instruct their children.
In this same vein, it took the Chairman of our Education Board six months to obtain an access password from CSCOPE developers known as the Texas Education Service Center Curriculum Collaborative (TESCCC). The TESCCC board is comprised of the 20 executive directors of the 20 publicly funded Regional Education Service Centers in Texas. Access to their meetings and minutes was repeatedly denied until the Texas Attorney General insisted that their meetings be posted and open to the public in accordance with the Texas Open Meetings Act.
This behavior indicates that the school administrators know very well what they are pushing on the kids and their efforts to keep it secret have been significant.
Defenders of CSCOPE have come up with a list of talking points to defend the curriculum with talking points that are a pack of lies.
We have reported here at Political Arena that the radicalization of our public education is widespread and not a week goes by where we do not see several heinous examples of this.
Imagine the ideological wolf pack mentality among teachers and school administrators to get this implemented in 875 Texas school districts before parents and the state legislature started to become aware, there was not one teacher or administrator who blew the whistle, not one.
LINKS:
http://eagnews.org/texas-6th-graders-design-flags-for-a-new-socialist-nation/
http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/01/31/4591624/senators-question-creators-of.html
http://www.txcscopereview.com/2013/cscope-myths/
http://www.txcscopereview.com/2012/cscope-rotten-apple-award/
Teacher Union President: I lied to parents all the time… (video)
Documentary: Tax dollars used to push racist ideology on teachers and students (video)
The ideology is Marxism disguised as racism and/or “multi-culturalism”.
The nonsense exposed in this video is crammed down student and teacher’s throats at almost very public school and university, and if you think it isn’t being done at your local public school, you are wrong.
What is seen in this video is exactly the cultural Marxism taught by the Frankfurt School of Marxism (communism)….and, in the case of Wisconsin, they used money that was earmarked for special needs children to pay for it.
Sowell: Public Education Creating a Mindset that Undermines American Society
Dr. Sowell is our greatest living philosopher and he is black, which means of course, that if you disagree with him it automatically makes you a racist.
UPDATE – And here is a small example of what Dr. Sowell is talking about: Fort Collins students read Pledge of Allegiance in Arabic
Many years ago, as a young man, I read a very interesting book about the rise of the Communists to power in China. In the last chapter, the author tried to explain why and how this had happened.
Among the factors he cited were the country’s educators. That struck me as odd, and not very plausible, at the time. But the passing years have made that seem less and less odd, and more and more plausible. Today, I see our own educators playing a similar role in creating a mindset that undermines American society.
Schools were once thought of as places where a society’s knowledge and experience were passed on to the younger generation. But, about a hundred years ago, Professor John Dewey of Columbia University came up with a very different conception of education — one that has spread through American schools of education, and even influenced education in countries overseas.
John Dewey saw the role of the teacher, not as a transmitter of a society’s culture to the young, but as an agent of change — someone strategically placed, with an opportunity to condition students to want a different kind of society.
A century later, we are seeing schools across America indoctrinating students to believe in all sorts of politically correct notions. The history that is taught in too many of our schools is a history that emphasizes everything that has gone bad, or can be made to look bad, in America — and that gives little, if any, attention to the great achievements of this country.
If you think that is an exaggeration, get a copy of “A People’s History of the United States” by Howard Zinn and read it. As someone who used to read translations of official Communist newspapers in the days of the Soviet Union, I know that those papers’ attempts to degrade the United States did not sink quite as low as Howard Zinn’s book.
That book has sold millions of copies, poisoning the minds of millions of students in schools and colleges against their own country. But this book is one of many things that enable teachers to think of themselves as “agents of change,” without having the slightest accountability for whether that change turns out to be for the better or for the worse — or, indeed, utterly catastrophic.
This misuse of schools to undermine one’s own society is not something confined to the United States or even to our own time. It is common in Western countries for educators, the media and the intelligentsia in general, to single out Western civilization for special condemnation for sins that have been common to the human race, in all parts of the world, for thousands of years.
Meanwhile, all sorts of fictitious virtues are attributed to non-Western societies, and their worst crimes are often passed over in silence, or at least shrugged off by saying some such thing as “Who are we to judge?”
Dinesh D’Souza vs Michael Shermer: The Moral Case for Capitalism (video)
Props to progressive liberal Prof. Michael Shermer, who got (figuratively) his butt kicked in debates with Dinesh D’Souza and well knew it. Shermer was well humored about it and was a real good sport. Most liberals would have simply snapped.
Parents to child: You didn’t build that! (awesome video)
A short video speaks a thousands words. Do not miss this.
Political Arena 