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| 'History' Teacher Asks 14-Year-Olds to Renounce U.S. Citizenship | ||||||||||
| 2007-09-16 | ||||||||||
| H/T Newsbuster.org Bidwell Junior High School administrators said a letter sent home with students in an eighth-grade class Tuesday was a good idea for a history lesson, with bad execution. The letter, which appeared to ask parents to renounce their U.S. citizenship, prompted phone calls to the school from several irate recipients. Principal Joanne Parsley said teacher Mike Brooks never intended to have parents sign the letters, or forward them on to President Bush, to whom they are addressed. "It was a well-intended lesson that didn't shake out too well," she said, adding that Brooks would not be subject to disciplinary action.
"The point was, I wanted to ask parents if they would sign such a letter if conditions that existed prior to the Revolution were happening now," he said. "I just wanted to start a discussion."
She said several parents reacted adversely to the letter, but a few sent them back signed.
He said his daughter broke into tears when she talked about Brooks mentioning illegal wiretaps and other surveillance directed against innocent people. "I think I was more irritated by the classroom discussion than the letter," he said.
Parsley and Chico Unified School District Assistant Superintendent Bob Feaster said they were shocked when they first saw the letter, which had gone out with no administrative approval, but wanted to give Brooks a chance to explain. Parsley said he came up with good arguments for the unusual lesson plan, but would do things a little differently next time.
Parsley said she doesn't believe Brooks has any political agenda to advance.
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| Posted by:Sherry |
| #6 Parsley said she doesn't believe Brooks has any political agenda to advance. Word has it that Parsley is buying a bridge. Her IQ matches her name. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-09-16 23:41 |
| #5 There's reason to believe that when it comes to the all-important issue of teaching worldviews and moral frameworks, American public schools are so sharply and consistently biased, they disqualify themselves for the core task of educating citizens. There are many ways to see the school establishment's bias. One is to look at the SATs--the standard tests that virtually all college-bound high school students take, that deeply influence high school teaching. Reading The Official SAT Study Guide ("#1 Best Seller," "The only book with SAT practice tests created by the maker") is one way to get some idea of the state of mind in the education world. Here's a sentence from a passage that students are quizzed on. "The First World War is a classic case of the dissonance between official, male-centered history and unofficial female history." You might object that the idea of "official history" is a sham and a crock, unless you refer specifically to accounts commissioned by the combatant governments themselves. But this silly assertion is presented as if it were fact. Or: "The reluctance in accepting this obvious fact comes from the Eurocentric conviction that the West holds a monopoly on science, logic, and clear thinking. To admit that other, culturally divergent viewpoints are equally plausible is to cast doubt on the monolithic center of Judeo-Christian belief: that there is but one of everything--God, right way, truth--and Europeans alone knew what it was." Breathtakingly absurd, breathtakingly offensive. "Europeans alone" were sufficiently interested in foreign cultures to find out what they were about. Europeans have been subject to periodic bouts of obsession with non-European cultures, from medieval fascination with Muslim philosophy and architecture through Picasso and his colleagues' 20th-century fixation on African art and onward to the present. Does Christianity hold that there is one Testament, one virtue, one sin, one Gospel, one martyr, one saint, one great man, one art, one science, one planet? Are Rousseau and Shelley part of "European culture," and all the aggressive radicals who came after? And what will Jewish, Christian, and Muslim parents think of an exam that describes monotheism as a "Eurocentric" conceit? What kind of imbecile could write such a passage?--and offer it to unwitting high school students as fact? Naturally there are countless passages about downtrodden women and minorities, and famous women and members of minorities. One set of questions mentions these names: Duke Ellington, Margaret Atwood, one "Lois" (a student), Maya Angelou, and Rilke (who doesn't rate having his first name mentioned). It often seems as if white men just barely exist. Psychoanalysis, for example, is apparently mentioned once in this big book, in this question: "Anna Freud's impact on psychoanalysis was------, coming not from one brilliant discovery but from a lifetime of first-rate work." Her father might have had some "impact" on psychoanalysis too, but evidently it isn't worth speaking of. Gelernter: A World Without Public Schools |
| Posted by: KBK 2007-09-16 22:40 |
| #4 "After careful consideration of the facts of our current situation, I have decided to announce to everyone that I am no longer a citizen of the United States, but a free and independent member of the |
| Posted by: Excalibur 2007-09-16 18:47 |
| #3 "After careful consideration of the facts of our current situation, We have decided to announce to everyone that you are no longer an employee of the Chico Unified School District, but a free and independent member of the unemployed community." Sincerely the Parents and School Board That Declaration of Independence from Traitors and a frogmarch out of the school in front of the student body is the only response needed. But alas, California is infested by a curious species of poisonous, spineless, bloodless jellyfish. |
| Posted by: ed 2007-09-16 17:01 |
| #2 "It was a well-intended lesson that didn't shake out too well," Kinda like the road to hell... I am no longer a citizen of the United States, but a free and independent member of the global community. I think Our Mr. Brooks could achieve his utopia much sooner if he...didn't have a job, maybe? Gaia will provide... Parsley said she doesn't believe Brooks has any political agenda to advance. Well, it sounds like Our Mr. Brooks isn't the biggest idiot at Bidwell Junior High... |
| Posted by: tu3031 2007-09-16 16:45 |
| #1 Hey its just the beginning of the school year...chairman's red book next month, mein kampf next and maybe by winter we'll study the Koran. |
| Posted by: Boss Craising2882 2007-09-16 16:02 |