Tag Archives: education

The Heckler’s Veto

Speaking of “framing,” as I did a few days back, Jamelle Bouie had a recent column in the New York Times that addressed Republican efforts to re-brand censorship as “parental rights.”

The official name of Florida’s infamous “Don’t Say Gay” bill, prohibiting “classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity,” is the Parental Rights in Education Act. And the state’s Stop WOKE (short for Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees) Act, which outlaws any school instruction that classifies individuals as “inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously,” was framed, similarly, as a victory for the rights of parents.

As Bouie points out, these bills certainly do empower certain parents–those who want to remove books, films, and even whole classes that they believe will expose their children to material with which they disagree, or to those parts of history about which they’d prefer their children remain unaware.

In Pinellas County, for example, a single complaint about the Disney film “Ruby Bridges” — about the 6-year-old girl who integrated an all-white New Orleans school in 1960 — led to its removal from an elementary school.

Lest we shake our heads and mentally write off Florida as an aberration, Bouie reminds readers that these efforts are not limited to Florida under the increasingly autocratic rule of the appalling Ron DeSantis.

In his 2021 campaign for the Virginia governor’s mansion, Glenn Youngkin made “parents matter” his slogan, and he has asserted “parents’ rights” in his effort to regulate the treatment of transgender children and end “divisive concepts” such as “critical race theory” in schools. His early moves included new history standards that removed discussions of racism and downplayed the role of slavery in causing the Civil War.

And at this moment, Texas Republicans are debating a bill — backed by Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick — that, according to The Texas Tribune, “would severely restrict classroom lessons, school activities and teacher guidance about sexual orientation and gender identity in all public and charter schools up to 12th grade.” Texas parents, The Tribune notes, already have the right to “remove their child temporarily from a class or activity that conflicts with their beliefs or review all instructional materials.” This bill would further empower parents to object to books, lessons and entire curriculums.

These efforts certainly do “empower” a subset of racist and homophobic parents. They don’t empower the majority of parents who want their children to learn about–and learn from– accurate American history. And they run roughshod over the rights of parents who want schools to educate their children by offering them a wide library of thought-provoking, age-appropriate books and materials.

Bouie says these laws amount to the institutionalization of the “heckler’s veto,” an observation with which I fully agree.

What is the heckler’s veto?

The term originated as a judicial response to arguments often made when unpopular speakers came to town–think Martin Luther King in the South during the Civil Rights movement, or the KKK planning an “event” on Indiana’s Statehouse steps, or similarly contentious presentations that raise a non-trivial possibility of violence and protest. Those who wish to shut the speaker down use that threat of conflict to argue that allowing the speech to take place will be too dangerous.

If successful, that’s an argument that permits the “hecklers”–those who disagree with the message– to  mute the speaker, to “veto” his First Amendment Free Speech rights. The Courts have seen through that tactic, ordering localities to respond to the threat by deploying a police presence sufficient to ensure the public safety– not by disallowing the speech or rally.

“Parents’ rights,” is just another form of the heckler’s veto, giving some parents the right to deny a similar right to the parents who disagree with them. It is, as Bouie writes, a movement is that is meant “to empower a conservative and reactionary minority of parents” allowing them to dictate education and curriculums to the rest of the community.

It is part of a wider assault.

The culture war that conservatives are currently waging over education is, like the culture wars in other areas of American society, a cover for a more material and ideological agenda. The screaming over “wokeness” and “D.E.I.” is just another Trojan horse for a relentless effort to dismantle a pillar of American democracy that, for all of its flaws, is still one of the country’s most powerful engines for economic and social mobility.

The only parents these hecklers are “empowering” are the parents who are soldiers in the GOP’s war on intellectual honesty and public education.

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First Things First

A recent essay from the Brookings Institution began with a point about the current  attacks on education that should be obvious–but clearly isn’t.

What is missing from the larger discussion on systems transformation is an intentional and candid dialogue on how societies and institutions are defining the purpose of education. When the topic is discussed, it often misses the mark or proposes an intervention that takes for granted that there is a shared purpose among policymakers, educators, families, students, and other actors.

Eleanor Roosevelt argued for education that builds “good citizenship.” Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote that education transmits “not only the accumulated knowledge of the race but also the accumulated experience of social living..”  E.D. Hirsch added cultural literacy– knowledge of a given culture’s signs and symbols, as well as its language, allows culturally-literate people to communicate with each other.

Privatizers ignore any emphasis on these civic and social benefits; they define education  solely as  a consumer good– the transmittal of skills individuals need to operate successfully in the marketplace. I have previously argued two things: that education is an essential element of democracy via the creation of an informed and engaged citizenry–and that a broad liberal arts education enables human flourishing.

Beliefs about the purposes of education will rather obviously inform approaches to education policy. 

If, as the privatizers and voucher advocates insist, education is simply the transmittal of skills that will allow individuals to succeed in the economy, there’s no particular reason to give government the job. (On the other hand, you might think evidence that private schools don’t transmit those skills as well as public schools would lead to some re-thinking, but evidently not.)

If you are Ron DeSantis, Florida’s “anti-woke” Governor, and you see education as indoctrination, your primary goal will be to substitute yourself as the indoctrinator–to control the educational institutions in your state in order to protect your ideological and/or religious beliefs from examination and the possibility that they–and you–will be discarded.

If you are a college like Marymount,  and education is just a product you are offering, you move to eliminate undergraduate majors in English, history, philosophy and other subjects when your analysis suggests they are less profitable than the job training subjects on offer.

Even the major in theology and religious studies — a staple at many colleges but especially those with Catholic affiliation — would be cut. The plan, which has spurred fierce faculty protest, represents a pivotal moment for a 3,700-student institution in Arlington that describes itself as a “comprehensive Catholic university.”
 
Marymount President Irma Becerra endorsed the cuts in a Feb. 15 letter to the university’s Faculty Council. In all, the plan calls for phasing out nine bachelor’s degree programs. Among other majors that would be eliminated: art, mathematics, secondary education and sociology. For economics, the Bachelor of Arts would be cut, but the Bachelor of Science would remain. Also proposed to be cut: a master’s program in English and humanities.

Marymount points to the small number of students majoring in these subjects as justification for eliminating them. Opponents of the plan point out that those courses continue to draw substantial enrollment from students majoring in other disciplines.

Among the university’s larger programs are nursing, business administration and information technology. As one faculty member accurately noted,
“What it looks like we’re going to be doing is focusing on majors that are training you for a very specific job. That’s a real change from the mission and identity of the university.”

Marymount and similar institutions are substituting a focus on the bottom line for fidelity to an educational mission. 

Meanwhile, lawmakers’ widespread disrespect for education has led a significant number of K-12  teachers to leave the profession. In Indiana, nearly 95% of Indiana school superintendents say they are contending with a shortage of qualified candidates for teacher openings. Districts are responding to the shortage by issuing emergency permits and using  teachers outside their licensed areas, among other stop-gap measures.

A number of those “emergency” permits are going to people who could not qualify under existing state standards–a situation that members of the World’s Worst Legislature consider irrelevant.After all, if education is just job training, anyone who can impart a set of limited skills can teach.

Who cares if the science instructor has ever read Shakespeare–or anything else? So what if the math teacher is ignorant of history and civics? For that matter, do the schools really need to teach science? A number of the voucher schools don’t–they teach creationism instead, and they still “qualify” as educational institutions entitled to receive our tax dollars.

Bottom line, baby!

It is past time for America to have a conversation about the purpose–for that matter, the definition– of education.

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Well, I Guess We Know What “Wokeness” Is

If we ever thought the current war on “wokeness” isn’t an effort to dumb America down–to keep the kids from learning about times when the country failed to live up to its principles, to keep them from reading books that might stretch their horizons or (horrors!) make them aware of the existence of folks unlike Ma and Pa–Florida is disabusing us of that error.

Ron DeSantis is updating the old lyrics. Remember “How will we keep them down on the farm after they’ve seen Paree”? In Florida, it’s now “How will we keep them in the GOP after they’ve learned to think?” (Indiana’s legislators are singing along…)

Talking Points Memo has the most recent abomination emanating from the sunshine state.

The Florida statehouse launched another strike in Gov. Ron DeSantis’s “anti-woke” war with a new bill this week aiming to hand more control of school administration over to the governor and his political appointees.

House Bill 999, introduced on Tuesday by Rep. Alex Andrade (R-Pensacola), proposes to give boards of trustees nearly unanimous power over state university faculty hiring, allow professors’ tenure to be reevaluated “at any time,” remove critical race theory and gender studies from college curricula, and bar spending on diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

The bill also digs in on DeSantis’ obsession with shutting down any educational instruction on race and systemic racism, stating that general education courses must not “suppress or distort” historical events, reference identity politics like critical race theory, or define U.S. history in ways that contradict “universal principles stated in the Declaration of Independence.” Instead, the courses must “promote the philosophical underpinnings of Western civilization and include studies of this nation’s historical documents, including the United States Constitution, the Bill of Rights and subsequent amendments thereto, and the Federalist Papers.”

Of course, “suppressing and distorting American history” is precisely what this bill–and the “anti-woke” movement– would do.

DeSantis’ administration has actually threatened teachers that they will be charged with felonies if they allow students to check out unapproved library books. His rejection of an AP African American Studies course for “lack[ing] educational merit” (!!) made national headlines (as did the disgraceful acquiescence of the College Board that “corrected” its curriculum.)

Decisions that are typically made with university presidents and boards of trustees in cooperation with faculty and staff – like setting up core curricula and deciding which departments should close, would be handed exclusively over to the board – members of which are appointed by the governor.

What Daniel Gordon, a historian at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and author on academic freedom , finds “particularly striking” about the bill is that it doesn’t require trustees to consult university faculty before hiring new professors. “This contradicts a principle, well established by the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), that [sic] professors in a given discipline have the expertise needed to select a new faculty member in the discipline,” he told TPM. “Math professors are the people best equipped to assess applications for a professorship in math!”

In January, DeSantis announced plans to defund diversity, equity and inclusion programs in every public university in the state.

If these appalling measures were limited to Florida–if this out-and-proud racism and anti-intellectualism were limited to just one arguably deranged office-holder– it would be bad enough. But as the linked article notes, DeSantis’ “anti-woke” proposals are clearly intended to appeal to a “very specific breed of Trump voter as he mulls a 2024 bid.”

We all know what that “specific breed” believes.

DeSantis is evil, but not stupid. He clearly intends to ride the tide of White Supremacy to the White House, and he just as clearly believes that there are enough voters who share his racism, misogyny and homophobia to put him there.

A 1939 article from the Atlantic said it best.

THE early Americans were determined that education should be free from political control. Being liberals in the original and true sense of the term, they believed in the integrity of the individual as opposed to the despotism of the state. This integrity or dignity of the individual was, of course, basic in democracy. Among other things, it implied the right of the citizenry to think independently, to seek truth honestly, and to determine without political interference what should constitute the education of their children….

It was the experienced judgment of these early liberals that education, religion, and the press should be free from political domination. These were the institutions of thought. They had to be untrammeled if the individual was to be free. Hence it came about that early America produced a peculiar system of education, its outstanding characteristic that it was to be supported and controlled by the people, by parents, by citizens — but not by the state.

I guess our Founders were woke.

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Some Encouraging News

Despite my constant negative rants, I have always considered myself an optimist.  That optimism, struggling though it is, leads me to believe that the current cycle of racist backlash and the frantic efforts to turn back the clock by Christian Nationalists is beginning to abate.

Granted, those efforts still pose a considerable threat, but there are signs that the war on modernity is slowly losing ground, and we need to acknowledge them.

What was once a political party with a reasonably cohesive agenda is coming apart. For example, the GOP climate change deniers trying to keep companies from investing or otherwise doing business with environmentally and socially “woke” enterprises are angering longtime Republicans whose businesses are responding to reality–not to mention the demands of  environmentally and socially responsible customers.

Other indicators:

Polls of the electorate show that a majority of young voters identify as Democrats, and that the crazed antics of Congressional Republicans have begun to turn off older voters.

Calls for higher taxes on the obscenely undertaxed wealthy are growing.

The ubiquity of cell-phone cameras has brought increasing urgency–and potency– to the longstanding calls to reform policing and address racism.

Foundations, not-for-profits and others have recognized the danger to democracy posed by local “news deserts” and have been sponsoring new efforts at local journalism intended to remedy the dangerous dearth of information that has resulted.

And in the wider society, we may be seeing less resentment of “elites”– defined as educated Americans. I was particularly relieved to come across this article in Axios about an increase in the number of students studying the humanities.

The pro-STEM movement has gutted high school and college humanities programs — but there’s some evidence of a post-pandemic revival afoot, Jennifer A. Kingson reports.

Why it matters: In academic circles, humanities’ decades-long decline is blamed for the proliferation of falsehoods on social media, crass political discourse, the rise in racism and the parlous state of democracy (not to mention our etiolated vocabularies).

Driving the news: When the University of California, Berkeley, reported an uptick in humanities majors this academic year, there was elation — and shock — at the prospect of a trend reversal.

The number of first-year Berkeley students declaring majors in the arts and humanities — which includes English, history, languages, philosophy and media studies — was up 121% over last year.

The number of high schoolers applying to Berkeley with the intention of studying humanities was up 43.2% from five years ago, and up 73% vs. 10 years ago.
Some other schools — such as Arizona State University and the University of Washington — have also seen a rise in students declaring humanities majors.
What they’re saying: “Students are turning to the arts and humanities as a way to make sense of our current moment,” Sara Guyer, dean of Berkeley’s division of arts and humanities and director of the World Humanities Report, told the university’s news service

Why do I believe that study of the humanities and liberal arts is so important?

“Paradigm” is one of our contemporary, and overused, buzzwords, but it is an appropriate word to use in connection with the importance of the liberal arts, because the liberal arts give us the paradigm we need if we are to function in an era of rapid change.

We inhabit a world that is increasingly global and–despised as some people find the term and the reality it describes–multicultural. A familiarity with human history, philosophy, literature, sociology and anthropology prepares us to encounter, appreciate and survive in that world.

The liberal arts teach us to be rational and analytic in an increasingly irrational age. They teach us to be respectful not just of results but of process–to understand that “how” and “why” are just as important as “what.”

Most important, from my perspective, the study of the liberal arts is based upon a profound respect for the importance of genuine human liberty. The life of the mind depends upon the freedom to consider any and all ideas, information, points of view. It cannot flower in a totalitarian environment. Technocrats can live with Big Brother, but poets and philosophers cannot.

It may be trite, but it is nevertheless true that learning how to communicate and learning how to learn are the essential survival skills. If all one learns is a trade–no matter how highly compensated the particular trade might be–he or she is lost when that trade is no longer in demand. But even if that never happens, lack of familiarity with the liberal arts makes it less likely that an individual’s non-work life will be full and rich.

There is a difference between learning a trade and acquiring an education. That difference is the liberal arts.

So–modest as they may be–harbingers of positive change….

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The White Supremacy Party

In a recent newsletter, Robert Hubbell summed up the path Ron DeSantis is pursuing–the path he clearly believes will garner him the GOP’s Presidential nomination.

Amid the torrent of reporting on Ron DeSantis’s attack on critical race theory and intersectionality, the quiet part is often left unsaid. So let me say it: DeSantis’s educational agenda is code for racism and white supremacy. (Other parts of his agenda seek to erase the dignity and humanity of LGBTQ people.) DeSantis’s invocation of “Western tradition” is meant to suppress knowledge regarding the people (and contributions) of Asia, Africa, South America, Oceania, and the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas. See Talking Points Memo, DeSantis Makes 2024 Ambitions Clear As He Pours Gasoline On His ‘Woke’ Education Fire.

 Given DeSantis’s generalized ignorance, his call to focus on “Western tradition” is a slippery slope that will inevitably lead to the discussion of unpleasant truths about America. For example, the enslavement of Black people was a “tradition” in North America for 246 years—and the abolition of that evil practice is relatively recent (155 years ago). So, a college course that honestly addresses the Western “traditions” of North America should include an examination that the role of slavery played in the economic, social, and political development of America.

The New York Times, among other outlets, has covered DeSantis’ various attacks on “woke” instruction, noting that it is part of “An unrelenting assault on truth and freedom of expression in the form of laws that censor and suppress the viewpoints, histories and experiences of historically marginalized groups, especially Black and L.G.B.T.Q. communities.”

The Times didn’t mince words.

Under Gov. Ron DeSantis’s “Stop WOKE” law — which would limit students and teachers from learning and talking about issues related to race and gender — Florida is at the forefront of a nationwide campaign to silence Black voices and erase the full and accurate history and contemporary experiences of Black people….

The same reasons that the “Stop WOKE” law is blocked from enforcement in university settings hold for elementary and secondary schools. As a federal judge ruled in November, the law strikes “at the heart of ‘open-mindedness and critical inquiry,’” such that “the State of Florida has taken over the ‘marketplace of ideas’ to suppress disfavored viewpoints.”

The most important point made by the Times–and confirmed by DeSantis’ obvious belief about the most effective path to the Republican nomination–is that it is nakedly racist and homophobic.

It is no longer plausible to maintain that the GOP base is composed of anything other than White Christian Supremacists.

DeSantis is currently the most shameless panderer to that base, but the evidence is nation-wide–and public education is currently the favored target. After all, if children are taught that all people are human and that America hasn’t always treated “others” that way, they might grow up to be “woke.” 

DeSantis is simply doing publicly what GOP officials in other states are doing somewhat more circumspectly. Examples abound.

Think the voucher movement is about giving children educational options? Think again. There’s a reason that so many of these programs lack accountability–here in Indiana, SB 305 vastly extends the availability of vouchers–but places the program under the “oversight” of the State Treasurer–not the Department of Education. It has no mechanism for assessing educational value.

In Ohio, laws presumably governing home schooling failed to shut down a Nazi home schooling curriculum.

Antifascist researchers known as the Anonymous Comrades Collective first identified the couple, who participated in a neo-Nazi podcast under the names Mr. and Mrs. Saxon, as Logan and Katja Lawrence of Upper Sandusky in Wyandot County. The group’s work was the nexus for a story about the couple in Vice News.

Their Telegram channel, started on Oct. 23, 2021, is called Dissident-Homeschool. It features suggested content that is racist, anti-Semitic and homophobic, as well as factually inaccurate. It includes cursive practice sheets with quotes from Adolf Hitler, suggested content about Confederate General Robert E. Lee and civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., which included an unfounded conspiracy about Jewish people. The Telegram channel offers a suggested math lesson with a story problem attributing crime to different races.

There’s no way to tell how many other “home schoolers” use that channel or similar materials. I see nothing in Indiana’s voucher proposal that would allow the state to monitor for such use–or for that matter, educational value of any kind.

Well-meaning Americans tend to look at the various movements of Proud Boys, Oath Keepers and others as outliers, a few twisted individuals who have succumbed to ignorance and hatreds that nice people largely relegate to the past.  

DeSantis recognizes what those well-meaning folks don’t: ignorance and racism elected Donald Trump, and–if enough votes can be suppressed– may well lift him into the Oval Office too.

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