Breaking The Monopoly

I won't be posting for the next few days; I plan on taking a trip around the state to visit friends some friends. On this trip, I will also be attending a barbecue at the home of Jack McHugh, from the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. This barbecue for bloggers follows a forum on teacher quality, hosted by Marc Holley of the University of Arkansas Department of Education Reform. Although I can't attend the forum, I hope to glean whatever information I can at the barbecue. To whet your appetites, gentle readers, a column by David Keene on school choice, from TheHill.com.

Indoctrination High

(I'm back! Sorry for the long cessation of blogging, but I've been extremely busy post-graduation. I should now be back for regular blogging.)

This one really burns me.

My sister, a junior in high school, was watching another of our sisters in her spring play, when a classmate started goading her about why she didn't believe in global warming. After giving an answer, several other students started berating her about it. Finally, when she tried to leave, one asked her, "Why are you a Republican?" Sick of the whole thing, my sister said--awesomely--"Because I have eyes to see!" They continued to accost her, and she said that she'd tried to explain it to them for years. The teacher who was in charge of the play walked in at that moment and said, "That's the problem with rational arguments; you can't stand up under them."

This is a fantastic statement considering the anti-rational means of spreading the religious faith and zealotry of liberalism employed by this guy: a few students boisterously gang up on another--and, by the way, much better--student, then a teacher walks in and backs up those other students without recourse to rational debate. This is the same teacher that has been spouting his opinions and (often wrong) facts in class as though they were true: global warming is real, corporations are evil, religion's got it all wrong, and Alger Hiss was innocent. (That last one is especially hilarious, considering that the great Whittaker Chambers used Soviet documents to prove that he was in fact guilty of spying for the Soviets.)

This sort of behavior--and, to be completely frank, historical ignorance--is unacceptable in a high school teacher.

The Revolution Comes To Your Schools

Michelle Malkin notes that Bill Ayers is not just a former terrorist who wishes he would have blown up more American buildings. He is also a professor of education in Chicago, and the readings he assigns borrow heavily from Marxists of all stripes. He himself models his political beliefs on such humanitarians as Ho Chi Minh and Che Guevara, and talks openly about going to the anti-war Camp Casey because he thought that might be the site of the beginning of the "revolution."

This shouldn't be surprising. It isn't just Bill Ayers who is pushing Marxism on future educators; every single education school in the country--Michigan State's is no exception--indoctrinates prospective teachers to believe that their job is to mold students' ideologies and to fix social inequities between classes, races, and genders. No wonder the quality of our education is declining--teachers aren't being taught that their main job is to teach. If you don't think that there is a concerted effort to use schools to indoctrinate students, well...you just aren't paying attention.

What can we do? Well, first and most basic, participate in your local school board meetings and elections. Best of all, run for that office yourself. Pressure your congresshumans to eliminate the requirement that teachers join the local teachers' union, as these unions are working to promote this agenda. We need to dismantle a significant portion of the current education establishment, including the Department of Education. There should be no more government money for schools of education that promote radical left-wing indoctrination of future teachers.

Creeping Health Tyranny

The Detroit Free Press prints the AP story: an eighth-grader in Connecticut has been thrown off the student council, banned from an honors dinner, and suspended from school for a day. Must've cheated on a test or plagiarized a paper, right? Worse: He encouraged poor eating habits.

This kid bought a bag of Skittles from a candy pusher in the hallways of his own school. (Parents: this is the danger your kids face every day.)

Now, I realize that nobody died here and it's not an incredibly serious issue (although when it comes time to apply to colleges, a suspension never looks good). Even so, I ask you to witness the danger that comes with assigning responsibility for physical health to government entities. The school's policy was an infringement of the students' freedom for the sake of their health. Go on and keep thinking that universal health care will be different.

Your Tax Dollars At Work, Education Edition

(Hat tip: Michelle Malkin)

(Warning: The link is to a news article containing some vulgar language and sexual content.)

Ugh:

Parents in Deerfield, Ill., are upset that a local high school is using books in advanced English classes this spring that they say are laced with graphic sexual content, pervasive expletives and mockery of religion.

Worse, the books - "Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes (Parts 1 & 2)" - are required reading for advanced placement English students at Deerfield High School, but a parents' group wants them removed.

"Who would have ever thought that we would be handing out pornography in public schools?" asked Lora Sue Hauser, executive director of North Shore Student Advocacy, and a Deerfield parent.

Double ugh:

Hauser noted that this isn't the first time that Deerfield High School and the school district have come at cross-purposes to parents. The district ordered 14-year-old freshmen to take a seminar that amounted to homosexual indoctrination, she said, and had them sign a confidentiality agreement promising not to tell their parents.

The Left long ago realized that its best shot at winning the debate in America was to go after the children. Children are wonderfully impressionable, and they're a better investment in future voting cycles than people in their thirties and forties. Rush Limbaugh and others cite the the influence of Antonio Gramsci, an early 20th century Italian socialist who advocated for a gradual takeover of social institutions in order to advance the socialist agenda, and that's really where this has come from.

Homeschooling and private and charter schooling are not attempts by rich people to isolate their children from poor people or by religious people to isolate their children from reason. It's just an inevitable step in the culture war; what recourse do parents have if they don't want their children to be indoctrinated? Dinesh D'Souza's wonderful book What's So Great About Christianity documents the admission by several on the Left that turning students against their parents' beliefs is their avowed goal. Vigilance is terribly important at this time, so let us be thankful for groups like the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, which keeps these people on their toes.