Washington State University apparently has acted in a repulsive manner, penalizing a right-wing student for his politics.
Gosh, I hate agreeing with John Leo.
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I wonder what precisely he got the failing “PDE”s for?
If he got them because his politics were opposed to the faculty’s, that’s just wrong.
If he got them because he made bigoted c omments in class that upset other students, I’m not sure that is wrong.
Thinking about half-a-dozen varied opponents of same-sex marriage, if I were in a classroom with them:
Robert and Maggie I have no problem with. We’d disagree, but I hope we’d do so in a polite and mannerly way.
Jose Solano (regular contributor to Family Scholars Blog) comes across as arrogant and condescending, but a reasonably fair debater.
John Howard, while initially polite, would spook the hell out of me: he genuinely believes (it appears) that being gay is a mental illness and gay people ought to be “cured”, and he has no qualms about saying so.
Marty and On Lawn seem to think that if you can’t win at logic, spit out insults and lie about your opponent: and On Lawn in particular seems to feel he can’t let anyone have a debate on topic without trolling it.
So what I’d want to know is: did he get the PDEs for expressing ideas politely like Robert and Maggie, impolitely like Jose, or for gross failures in politeness to other people in his classes like Marty and On Lawn? (If he’s like John Howard, I don’t quite know what to think: the presence of someone like John in the same class as me would freak the hell out of me, but so long as he stayed polite and on topic, I suppose one could stay polite and the hell away.)
I kind of agree – I think there are ‘political’ issues where it’s OK to judge students. I’d never pass police college (for example), and that’s OK, and I’ll never go.
For instance if a racist or sexist teacher was failed by a school that was committed to social justice, then I wouldn’t call that objecting to their politics, but their practices. I think that’s an important distinction.
I’m not saying that’s what happened here, I”m just saying I don’t know enough about the situation to judge.
Look what this student is saying, though. “Diversity is perversity”? Is that discourse? Or is that saying that unless you’re a white Christian male who believes precisely what I believe, I’m going to tell you you’re evil? Don’t professors also need to be gatekeepers? It’s not that we’re thought police: it’s that we are endorsing, or not endorsing, the students we graduate. A guy who thinks that diversity is perversity is not a guy we want teaching in the public schools. I’m sorry, he isn’t.
Delagar, I think you’re right, although it would still depend on how exactly he expressed himself and how he is likely to express himself in the class. It’s still problematic though because
a) it would be hard to apply a sort of standard against hurtful obnoxiousness in a fair, objective way. Only the most obvious kinds of obnoxiousness would be caught, not the equally sinister, insidious kind. Or I could see racism being caught but not sexism, which even many liberal people don’t “believe in” any more. Which does mean that certain views are more prohibited than others.
b) who knows what a teacher will do after s/he has certification! They may have been hiding, or they may have a change of heart that leaves them completely destructive to children.
Better, I think, to have a good way of nurturing, supervising, and *firing* actual teachers whose actual classroom activities can be scrutinized.
But did he say that publicly, or just write it in his textbook?
He wrote it in the textbook.
A guy who thinks that diversity is perversity is not a guy we want teaching in the public schools.
He may not be someone you want teaching, but by virtue of the fact that the public schools are public, you don’t get a vote. The state can’t impose an ideological test; it can require that a teacher (say) treat gay or Muslim or right-wing lunatic students with fairness, but it can’t make him or her like ’em.
Another example-argument for privatization of the school system…
the question is, can a teacher who doesn’t like muslim or right-wing lunatic students treat those students fairly?
They can’t argue for diversity, but curtail it through unfairly applying vague standards; and they can’t claim to value openness, while at the same time failing to meet with this guy or even give him specifics on what’s wrong with his “character”.
I’d like to know more about this, but from here it looks like the faculty acted in an appalling manner.
Being able to be fair to students you don’t like is actually a basic teacher survival skill. I understand why they had reservations about this guy, but they handled it very badly. Maybe they could have evaluated his student teaching and seen if he treated students fairly.
Hmm. I don’t hink I have enough information here to judge whether this was handled badly or not. I’m not a big fan of “politesse”; I don’t care how politely someone expresses his or her views that blacks are inferior, that women should be relegated to strict roles and have no autonomy, or that gays are an abomination. It’s not polite to hold those views. Period.
If indeed, this guy crossed the line—that those professors honestly felt that he would not be able to keep his personal views from crossing into the professional realm, I’d say they have a duty to keep this guy from having a teaching certificate in the public schools! Public schools are obligated to teach the whole public, and treat the whole public fairly. We had a similar incident here in Illinois with Matt Hale, the white supremacist who was barred from practicing law. He failed the ethical standards.
Police officers, firefighters, and many civil servants have to pass psych evaluations in order to get their jobs. Hell, if I wanted to go to work on a job in a nuclear powerhouse, I’d have to submit to a full background check, credit check, and psych evaluation. How is this guy’s situation any different? My daughter attends public school, and I don’t want her being taught that she should suppress her natural intelligence and talents in order to be more “feminine”. And if this guy’s professors felt that he would not only bring, but display attitudes like that in the classroom, then they were correct in their decision. He can hold whatever attitude he wants in his mind. But if those attitudes get in the way of teaching, then there is a problem.
Most public schools have a curriculum devoted to teaching diversity. My daughter’s school does, as well it should—it’s a very diverse school. Can someone who is vehemently opposed to teaching diversity do an adequate job of teaching it? In other words, would he be able to fulfill the obligations of that job? Can someone who firmly believes that men and women were designed for and should have separate roles in society be a person who is willing to educate girls with the same vigor and standards as the boys? As a parent of a daughter who attends the public schools, I have my doubts.
I think the question about him potentially teaching in a public schools system is a valid one; a teacher that writes “diversity is perversity” on his books is likely to have issues with children or parents that do not fit his view of what is normal. I went to a public high school and it is quite obvious that teachers have their prejudices most teachers are poor at hiding these things. Someone who writes such on notebooks would be a worrisome candidate for a public school teacher. It does not sound like they went about it correctly, and I am not sure his character is what they should have questioned. What obviously needs to be addressed with this student is his deep seated beliefs and how they would affect his role as a public school teacher. One can supposedly have beliefs such as he has and still be of sound character so that is not really the issue.
This is where the rubber meets the road, folks. Do we defend freedom of thought and expression only when we agree with the thoughts expressed, or all the time?
The Bushies of this world have no problem with people who agree with them. (Who does?) It’s when someone disagrees that we separate the men from the boys.
Metaphorically speaking, of course. :)
Susan: This is where the rubber meets the road, folks. Do we defend freedom of thought and expression only when we agree with the thoughts expressed, or all the time?
It’s a difficulty for me, because I think a teacher professionally ought to set limits on freedom of expression in the classroom. That is, a teacher may be racist, may be sexist, may be homophobic, may be sectarian – but no good teacher will permit any of their students to figure this out. Especially not the black students, the women, the gay students, the students-from-the-wrong-religion – but actually, any student. I am all in favor of it being illegal for teachers to insult or abuse students, whether as individuals or by attacking the group they belong to. That is a limitation of the teacher’s right to freedom of expression, but it’s a necessary limitation for the teacher to do their job right.
Outside the classroom, or rather in the teacher’s private life, they should be able to say whatever the hell they want.
I agree with Amp. This was the wrong thing to do.
I mean, the guy was, and probably is an asshole, but that’s not a measure of how he would act, just what he thinks. If he acts like an asshole to GLBT students or demeans women in a class he’s teaching, throw him out, but until then, he gets the chance to prove himself.
Another example-argument for privatization of the school system
Have you ever had a kid in a private school?!
Sure. I went to a private school myself, a couple of times. My own kids have gone to private and public schools, depending on location, needs, availability, etc.
Ah, so it’s ideological rather than practical.
Bob, is it your opinion that idealogical bias couldn’t happen at a private university?
Also, assuming that this article’s summation of the case is accurate, I think Mr. Swan was treated badly by the University, and it’s good that the Uni was forced to back down. At a private University, I’m not sure Mr. Swan would have had any recourse, since it’s much harder to sue private universities for this sort of treatment.
Y’all are missing the point. Which, since I didn’t actually state the point, I can’t blame you.
If you have a private school, you can put whatever test for teachers in place that you like. Doesn’t approve of SSM? Out he goes. Thinks Jesus wasn’t historically real? Fire him, and stone him on the way out. And so forth.
Whereas if it’s a public school, you can’t do any of that. Private schools let people have their prejudices – in all directions – subject to decisions made by private bodies.
And that’s a Good Thing ™.
Yes, well, rivatizing the entire US school system *would* make sure that the poor got a consistantly lower quality of education.
Given GOP budget cuts for medicaid, scholarships, grants, low income housing, the environment, etc…. I can only assume that raising the amount of people in poverty and making it harder to get out is a GOP goal. I mean, how else will they pay for the war in Iraq *AND* eliminate as many taxes on the rich as they can?
Except that if we ‘privatize the schools,’ we will eliminate parents’ rights to move their child to a more ideologically amenable school. Certain markets simply aren’t going to be able to support enough schools to please everyone, so if you’re not in the majority, you’re stuck with open bigotry (in whatever direction) unless you can buy your way out.
I’m also baffled at the idea that it’s a Good Thing â„¢ that public schools insist teachers STFU about their prejudices and just freakin’ teach already.
“If indeed, this guy crossed the line…that those professors honestly felt that he would not be able to keep his personal views from crossing into the professional realm, I’d say they have a duty to keep this guy from having a teaching certificate in the public schools!”
But, in doing so, haven’t they themselves failed this test? He is being judged based on his personal views, rather than his actual classroom performance. All of this done in a public school.
“Public schools are obligated to teach the whole public, and treat the whole public fairly.”
Exactly.
” We had a similar incident here in Illinois with Matt Hale, the white supremacist who was barred from practicing law. He failed the ethical standards.”
Do you really consider this to be a “similar incident”? Matt Hale is an avowed bigot- man who lectures publicly on white supremacy and incites violence- a guy who was convicted for conspiracy to murder a federal judge.
This is one of the big problems that I have with this case, the notion that’s it’s a very slippery slope from penning, in one’s own book, that “diversity is perversity” to being a leader in the KKK or something. Given the facts so far, it doesn’t appear that the guy really done anything wrong other than
“I am all in favor of it being illegal for teachers to insult or abuse students, whether as individuals or by attacking the group they belong to. That is a limitation of the teacher’s right to freedom of expression, but it’s a necessary limitation for the teacher to do their job right.”
Again, if this is really the case, then it is the University that has committed the crime, as they have behaved in this very same matter. This guy has done none of these things.
I’m wondering (and excuse me if somebody else already said this), did he fail the character test because he possesses those views or because he acts on them in ways that would (in the evalutators’ opinion) interfere with the impartiality required of teachers? Believing something is fine if he can overcome it enough to treat all his students in the same manner (if Ann Coulter were in a class I taught, I could manage to treat her fairly); however if he acts differently toward people who conflict with his beliefs (say, if he discourages classroom participation in women in a professional class because “they don’t need to be here/shouldn’t be here, this class is for career men, and women should be housewives,” or docks points from a paper with a liberal viewpoint, or shuts up a gay man who’s talking during break about the child he and his partner are adopting), then he shouldn’t teach. Thing is, is the character study making that assessment, or just canvassing people’s views?
This guy has done none of these things.
We don’t know that. Not from the information presented so far. It is possible that he hasn’t. It is also possible that he has.
I’ll admit, I have a bias here. I grew up in central Illinois, so I was taught by several teachers who not only had strong feelings that men and women were created with and for different roles in society, that women should not work outside the home, that women should not be allowed to work in certain professions, etc., but who had free rein to use the bully pulpit of the classroom to express these views. I had one memorable social studies teacher who used to present a daily screed of his ultraconservative views, complete with encouraging the boys in the classroom to taunt and insult those of us girls who dared to think that we could ever hope to reach for the intellectual stars. He filled in with John Birch Society standards, too. My algebra teacher was a man who never had the time to work with female students who needed a little extra help—just the males—with the explanation that “girls aren’t good at this sort of stuff anyway.”
No, it did not help my education to have these teachers. It did even less to help the education of the girls with antifeminist parents; the girls whose parents agreed that sending a girl to college was a waste of money, or that girls would lose their femininity if they got “too smart”.
With what I’ve read of this story so far, I’m not confident that this particular guy would be keeping his ideology to himself in front of a classroom full of kids. I’m not confident that he would work hard to teach female students who envision themselves as being college-bound, and employed as adults. I’m not confident that he would be amenable to outspoken, confident young women. I’m not convinced that he would treat LGBT students equitably. I’m not convinced he would stifle sexist or homophobic commentary by the other students in the classroom. I’m not convinced he would practice fair grading.
And if he was hoping for a job as a police officer, he’d already be out of the running—in most places. Even in my conservative neck of the woods. Why should it be any different for a teacher? Is that not a sensitive public occupation also?
I stand by the Matt Hale analogy. He was denied a license to practice law long before he was convicted of any violent offenses. He was denied based on his racist views. He tried to claim that he could represent the public on an equal basis despite his racism, and that he was being discriminated against on the basis of his religion—that white supremacy was part and parcel of his religious beliefs and that rejection of him on that basis was unconstitutional. It didn’t work.
“We don’t know that. Not from the information presented so far. It is possible that he hasn’t. It is also possible that he has.”
We absolutely do know that. The guy isn’t even a teacher yet. And if he had insulted or abused students as a student teacher(the article doesn’t indicate he has been), I should think the University would be pretty quick to point that out in their defense.
“I stand by the Matt Hale analogy. He was denied a license to practice law long before he was convicted of any violent offenses.”
Well, I still think it’s rather ridiculous. And the chronology is irrelevant. Hale is a sociopath.
Then again, at least Hale was afforded the opportunity to have a license to lose.
The university hasn’t made any statement for privacy reasons, in its defense or otherwise. We don’t have the full facts of the issue, there are some circumstances where there is a cross over between attitude towards students and ‘politics’. I don’t know if this man’s situation fell into that category because we only his description of what happened.
I also don’t agree that you have to wait until someone is in front of students before you can know how they’d react to students. If, for example, he’d written ‘diversity is perversity’ in response to a question that said ‘what would you say to a student who came to you to talk about a worry that another student was gay”, then I think it would be entirely justifiable for the school to have concerns.
I may be too simplisitic, but I find these professional disposition evaluations a little creepy. The idea that professors who have strong opinions of their own are required to judge the values and “dispositions” of students is an invitation for trouble. Promoting social justice and diversity (which I uphold, BTW), universities are pushing for a liberally minded student body. Although I sincerely wish that students would become liberally minded throughout the course of their college years, they shouldn’t be forced. A diversified student body is best for everyone involved. This includes a diversity in beliefs. Great ideas come from healthy discourse.
Now, this student is going to be removed from this discourse altogether because of his bad experience at school. He is not going to rethink his beliefs but hold them more strongly. He will not see the inherent inconsistency in his statements that he thinks that all people should be equal under the law but that gay couples should not be allowed to adopt children. He will go through life being disrespectful of other people’s opinions because the university was disrespectful to his.
I don’t know how the university’s goal in this matter is achieved by its action. It will have cranked out someone who is still intolerant but now is also bitter.
It sounds as if the faculty weren’t comfortable having him around and did their best to deep-six him.
1. He hasn’t had his student teaching rotation yet, so they don’t know how he will do in front of students. There are plenty of education students who do just fine on the theoretical textbook stuff who crash and burn when they get in front of a class, and he might very well be one of those.
2. With his views as stated in the article, he is more likely to apply for a job to private schools than to public schools, and he needs a teaching certificate for that. If they feel he shouldn’t be teaching in a public school, they can write something to that effect in the PDE (which the hiring school is obliged to take into consideration until he gets his permanent teaching certificate).
3. According to the article, only one of the four professors who failed him met with him, which is also against the rules as I understand them – in order to write a PDE, a professor is supposed to have at least one meeting with the student (some schools have minimum time requirements for these meetings). If any professor had bothered to talk to him about their perceptions of his views, s/he would have found out, for instance, that he has four biracial children.
4. Most PDEs have several sections that he probably did not do well on, from the professors’ point of view (e.g., exhibiting an understanding of the complexities of race, power, gender, class, sexual orientation, and privilege; or reflecting shared goals and values of the group), but those sections only make up maybe one or two of 10-12 evaluation areas, so even if he failed those outright, he shouldn’t have failed the whole PDE.
Lee: It sounds as if the faculty weren’t comfortable having him around and did their best to deep-six him
If everything you say is true, then certainly the university handled the situation very badly.
“I asked one of my professors if I should say what I think in class, or if I should say more what they wanted me to say,” Swan said in an interview this week. “She said to say what I really feel, so I did.”
I wonder if that professor did so because she believed that Mr. Swan would provide some diversity of political viewpoints that this school needed, or if she did so because she figured that would be the best way to force him to leave? On the basis of evaluating her character, I would hope it was the former.
One instructor wrote in a letter attached to her PDE form that Swan was a “White Supremacist,” and that he wore a camouflage hunting cap to class and talked about hunting, both of which alarmed her, also according to photocopies provided by Swan.
Why would wearing a cammo cap to class and talking about hunting alarm anyone? What kind of person would find that alarming? Interesting that apparently you can make allegations like “White Supremacist” in a file like this without any backup. Seems like this evaluator’s character could use some investigating.
Swan admits he is a hunter but rejects the idea he is a racist.
He admits he is a hunter? Being a hunter is something that one admits to, like it’s a crime or something anti-social? This is a term used by the journalist and allowed by the editor. Do they both think that’s objective? What kind of news organization is this?
Personal note: I don’t hunt. I’ve never shot anything other than paper or clay targets with a gun or rifle. I have nothing against the practice, I just wasn’t brought up a hunter and don’t know any hunters well enough to go out hunting. I have on occasion fished, and a few times I’ve been lucky enough to catch something worth eating. I have done so with great enjoyment – if you don’t think you like fish, try eating one that was swimming around an hour beforehand. You may change your mind. My wife did.
“There’s no right to a state job, like being a public school teacher,” said faculty member Cornell Clayton. “It’s a benefit, not a privilege.
Gee, seems like Mr. Clayton thinks non-discrimination laws shouldn’t apply to state jobs. After all, unlike gender, sexual orientation, etc., political views are expressly protected by the Constitution. If you can discriminate on the basis of those, you can discriminate on the basis of anything, I should think. So much for gays getting teaching jobs anymore in rural or suburban areas.
“The state can impose a character test – and beliefs can be part of that test. But you can’t keep people from state jobs because their beliefs may not be what you’d like,” Clayton said.
Hm. Which beliefs are part of a character test? And which are not? And who gets to decide?
or that gays are an abomination. It’s not polite to hold those views. Period.
Many people would dispute that. I’d agree that tolerance of homosexuality is a majority opinion, but acceptance or approval is something else. I’d like to see any survey results where the distinction was made.
Except that if we ‘privatize the schools,’ we will eliminate parents’ rights to move their child to a more ideologically amenable school. Certain markets simply aren’t going to be able to support enough schools to please everyone, so if you’re not in the majority, you’re stuck with open bigotry (in whatever direction) unless you can buy your way out.
Right now, most parents pay thousands of dollars a year to the State in order to provide for schools that in many cases present ideological viewpoints (“Heather Has Two Mommies” and creationism having an equivalent authority to evolution being two examples) that a great many people find objectionable and immoral; in some cases, the majority. Because of this, the amount of money that people have to spare for private education is limited. If public schools were gotten rid of (a step I do not advocate), then that would free up thousands of dollars in family budgets that could be use to spend on private school tuitions. Seems to me that a market where people now have a) no public schools to send their kids to and b) have more money in their pockets would be able to support more private schools, not fewer.
I’d be interested what he meant by “Diversity is perversity”. I’d hate to have my character judged by a phrase or two that I’d scribbled in a book cover.
Here’s a blog about an article on educating teachers, referring specifically to an article written about Brooklyn College. This is an extract from that article:
The program at my own institution, Brooklyn College, exemplifies how application of NCATE’s new approach can easily be used to screen out potential public school teachers who hold undesirable political beliefs. Brooklyn’s education faculty, which assumes as fact that “an education centered on social justice prepares the highest quality of future teachers,” recently launched a pilot initiative to assess all education students on whether they are “knowledgeable about, sensitive to and responsive to issues of diversity and social justice as these influence curriculum and pedagogy, school culture, relationships with colleagues and members of the school community, and candidates’ analysis of student work and behavior.”
At the undergraduate level, these high-sounding principles have been translated into practice through a required class called “Language and Literacy Development in Secondary Education.” According to numerous students, the course’s instructor demanded that they recognize “white English” as the “oppressors’ language.” Without explanation, the class spent its session before Election Day screening Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11. When several students complained to the professor about the course’s politicized content, they were informed that their previous education had left them “brainwashed” on matters relating to race and social justice.
An extreme example, to be sure. But you have to wonder what a public institution is doing using techniques like this to educate teachers, and what other public institutions are applying principles of diversity to reduce the diversity of political and social thought among professional primary and secondary educators.
I’m going to second La Lubu here, because I had very similiar experiences. I find it impossible to believe this guy will be able to teach anybody but straight white boys, and even then he’s going to teach them bigotry.
I agree with La Lubu. I would tend to put this guy’s views prominently in whatever passes as the “Dean’s Letter” of recommendation, and comment that his views make it unlikely that he would be willing to be fair to girl students and that this makes him a lawsuit risk in any other situation than a conservative sectarian school.
I was a bit troubled by the personal evaluations which apparently were done without meeting with Ed Swan, and I’d be curious to see how he would handle the student-teaching part of the curriculem. The hunting thing by itself doesn’t bother me and I don’t know about doing an evaluation based on what was written in a textbook. I would have liked to have seen the evaluations but I would guess, they are confidential. How well or poorly they were done, what they were based on, were they in accordance to regulations. It’s frustrating b/c that’s a lot of the meat and no one can see it.
(kind of like not being able to read a law enforcement officer’s evaluations when he’s assigned to work in your neighborhood.)
I went to a conservative state university and met my share of right-wing, pro-life keep-women-barefoot-and-getting-me-a-beer type of college students. Good debating practice, and good at teaching me what I didn’t want to be. That’s where my progressive roots formed, probably in part b/c I found the right-wing repulsive.
Teaching is a different area than this, however. You influence young minds, is what is usually said so it matters more what you tell them. I don’t think political belief systems should be passed down. I don’t think racism, sexism, homophobia, nonableist should be either.
I also very much agree with the following as being important.
And that would mean regardless of your own personal belief systems, you should not as someone said, reveal them in a class room setting though if someone is racist, sexist and/or homophobic, etc. in belief, then will they be so in action? Will they knowingly or unknowingly act on those belief systems. to or with the students?
All is well, when beliefs and actions are two entirely separate entities. In reality however, they often mesh. I wouldn’t want any cops who were racist, sexist or homophobic, and I feel the same way about teachers and other “primary responders” professions whether they rely on education or public safety as their focus.
As a grown woman, I would kick the ass of any teacher who was sexist to me. As a young girl, I don’t think I would. Would I internalize sexist attitudes by a teacher, into my own life and self-examination?
Then there’s the fact that a lot of ‘isms already exist in our school systems on a good day.
Racism and sexism are common in our society among Whites, to varying degrees. You have more overt behaviors and beliefs by people, then you have varying degrees of lessor behaviors or beliefs(often what’s labeled, more subtle) that can be every bit as harmful to students in the racial groups or gender as well as those who are not, by example.
Public schools have a lot of racism and sexism all ready even if you have teachers who are not acting out in racist or sexist ways that are more obvious. Tracting systems in public schools and how special education is allotted, is biased against Black and Hispanic students. Black students are more likely to be tracted into vocational, than White students and less into college prepatory programs. Hispanic students here are more likely to be placed in Special Ed for learning disabilities, even though what they are experiencing are language difficulties. So the system itself even though there are many excellent progressive teachers in it, is part of the problem anyway.
As far as Ed Swan not being able to work as a police officer, he could come to my city and get a job easily. And law enforcement is a clear example of how prejudices and ‘isms are not just belief systems kept to themselves but are often practiced on the job. That’s why most agencies now have extensive background screening for among other things, racism and sexism. However, in actuality, it’s not really effective to screen these behaviors out, when you’re hiring people into an agency that is rife with them already.
Right now, most parents pay thousands of dollars a year to the State in order to provide for schools that in many cases present ideological viewpoints
Do “most parents” pay thousands of dollars a year in property taxes? There are really three groups in this example: Parents who can afford to send their kids to private schools regardless of their taxes, parents who would be able to send their kids to private schools but for their property taxes, and parents who couldn’t afford to send their kids to private school. Do you really believe that group #2 is in the majority?
By the way, schools aren’t allowed to teach creationism because of the Establishment Clause, not because it’s non-PC or unpopular.
Actually Mythago is correct; “most parents” don’t pay nearly the full freight for their kids’ education. It’s all the non-current-parents who pay the bulk of it. For any kind of voucher system to keep our current level of funding for schooling, we’d still be taxing non-parents.
Man, me and Mythago on the same side in two threads. Let’s go over to Feministe and neck publicly and really freak everybody out.
Nah, too obvious. They’d assume I’d spiked your Ovaltine or something.
Racism and sexism are common in our society among Whites
I’m curious as to why you qualifiy this statement with “among Whites”?
Do “most parents” pay thousands of dollars a year in property taxes?
Well, I have to confess that I don’t know what tax rates are around the country. Where I live they do. Include in your own consideration that renters pay their landlord’s property taxes in their rent.
There are really three groups in this example: Parents who can afford to send their kids to private schools regardless of their taxes, parents who would be able to send their kids to private schools but for their property taxes, and parents who couldn’t afford to send their kids to private school. Do you really believe that group #2 is in the majority?
Don’t know if they are an outright majority, but I’d guess that they are at least a strong plurality. I will say it describes me. There are probably enough of them that they would create a sizable market for additional private schools. You don’t have to have everyone to be able to afford to send their kids to private schools for the diversity of those schools to increase; you only need to have enough to more than fill the spaces in the existing ones.
If public schools were completely eliminated, it would be against the public interest to leave lower-income people to shift for themselves as far as being able to send their kids to school. There would likely be some kind of voucher system that would go right back to being funded by taxes. It’s certainly possible to set up such a system. Some people would call for the complete elimination of any government Departments of Education. Others would have them no longer operate schools, but simply do quality control on what the private schools are teaching, as they do now.
Getting rid of any support of education is one thing. But providing school funding to parents while getting the State out of the school operations business could be done. It is in the public interest to support public education. But for purposes of discussion, why is it so much in the public interest to actually operate schools that it’s worthwhile to tax us to do it?
By the way, schools aren’t allowed to teach creationism because of the Establishment Clause, not because it’s non-PC or unpopular.
Well, there are school systems that have downgraded the teaching of evolution so as to not offend their constituients (sp?). So public opinion regarding evolution has already affected the actual teaching of evolution.
I’m still wondering about the inherent bias in a journalistic enterprise that presents someone describing themselves as a hunter as making an “admission”. And the disposition of someone who is frightened by someone wearing a cammo cap and talking about hunting.
Where I live they do. Include in your own consideration that renters pay their landlord’s property taxes in their rent.
They don’t pay thousands of dollars a year, again. Nor do all property taxes go right to the schools. Robert is correct–public school costs to parents is not an equivalent of what those parents would pay for private-school tuition.
Don’t know if they are an outright majority, but I’d guess that they are at least a strong plurality.
I’m not really willing to base public policy on “guesses” or “well, I am”. Using that logic, I’d guess that the vast majority of families couldn’t afford private school even if you abolished public schools and the funding that goes with them. After all, those costs are spread across the entire population, not merely parents of children ages 5-18.
Guh, hit Submit by accident.
If you’re instituting vouchers, you’re going right back to involving the government in “school operations”. Who issues those vouchers? Who sets up the system of reimbursement? Who insures that schools meet that ‘public interest’ standard you mention, so that lower-income parents are not having their kids go to schools that are to public schools today as check-cashing entities are to banks?
Well, there are school systems that have downgraded the teaching of evolution so as to not offend their constituients
Hence the lawsuits.
And no, I don’t get the ‘hunter’ thing either.
RonF, what Radfem was a true, if incomplete, statement. Racism and sexism are also common in other sectors of society, but they aren’t relevant to the thread, which is about the allegedly racist, sexist, and homophobic beliefs of Ed Swan (who is a white man).
They don’t pay thousands of dollars a year, again.
I don’t follow. Say you have a 2-bedroom apartment. How much do you pay in rent for that where you live? Around me one that you’d find a middle-class family living in is going to be $1000 a month or more. A healthy percentage of that is bound to be put towards the landlord’s property taxes. Again, it depends on the state, but in Illinois it’s safe to assume that 50% or more of that is towards education. If the landlord didn’t have to pay that, he’d have to drop rents or face competition from someone who did. That would in turn put money into renter’s pockets that could help them fund private schooling for their kids.
I’m not really willing to base public policy on “guesses” or “well, I am”.
Fair enough. Publc policy should be made on real data. But my point was not to prove that elimination of the public schools would enable large numbers of people to be able to afford private schools. The assertion was made that eliminating public schools would limit the diversity of schools available to people, and I was trying to show a reason why that said assertion was not necessarily true.
If you’re instituting vouchers, you’re going right back to involving the government in “school operations”. Who issues those vouchers? Who sets up the system of reimbursement? Who insures that schools meet that ‘public interest’ standard you mention, so that lower-income parents are not having their kids go to schools that are to public schools today as check-cashing entities are to banks?
A State Department of Education would do all this. But those jobs are not school operations. The DoE, and the local school boards it would work though, would no longer have to hire teachers, principals, custodians, food preparation and serving staff; they would not have to negotiate union contracts; they would not have to contract for natural gas or oil or other heating fuel; they would not have to contract for electricity; they would not have to obtain land and hire architects to build or expand schools; and they would not have to do many, many other things that private concerns would be doing instead.
There have definitely been “check cashing entity” scandals in Illinois; trade schools teaching cosmetology, etc. that didn’t really teach the necessary skills that enabled their students to qualify for state licensing, even though the schools promised just that. And nationally, Career Education Corporation has been accused of doing this (do a search, if you’re interested, they’ve been sued by more than one state IIRC). The QC functions to ensure that education standards are met by private schools and by home schools are already in place. They would continue, and would have to be expanded if all schools became private. But that’s not operations.
Well, Lee, I didn’t see a direction connection from that statement to Mr. Swan. And it seems to me that the expression of racism and sexism in schools is harmful no matter who does it, and that there should be no presumption of it’s presence or absence in anyone based on their color. I’m interested in what RadFem meant.
What does diversity mean, anyway?
If you are in a school that has a significant number of Islamic students, does that mean that you should teach that it’s legitmate to believe that women’s place is in the home and that they shouldn’t be seen on the streets unaccompanied by a male relative?
If you are in the Bible Belt, should the school teach that the viewpoint that homosexuality is a condition that can and should be cured has equal legitimacy to the viewpoint that homosexuality is biologically determined and is morally equivalent to heterosexuality?
Does it mean that attaining a racial and gender distribution in the school staff equivalent to the local or state population is more important than hiring the most qualified teachers available regardless of the gender or race of those teachers?
Perhaps Mr. Swan’s “diversity is perversity” statement has a meaning different from what everyone here seems to be assuming. We don’t know. And we can’t be sure that his evaluators know. In fact, given that apparently three of his 4 evaluators didn’t interview him before evaluating him, I think it’s quite likely that they didn’t know what he meant.
Now I’ll go out on a bit of a limb. Let me know if you think I’m going too far. Every time I’ve been in a position to evaluate someone, I’ve been told what the legalities are regarding how and what to evaluate. I’m going to assume that these evaluators were as well. On that basis I consider that the truth and the motivations of any evaluation that was made in knowing contravention of the law/regulations is highly suspect and not to be given credence.
I meant what I said, in the context of this thread. To be racist, you have to combine the belief in the superiority of your own race(and the inferiority of others) with the power to act on it in a way that is detrimental to other races and/or favors the race that is designated superior. Whites can not be institutionally discriminated against, except perhaps in their heads.
Only Whites have the power to engage in institutional racism in the United States, including the public educational system. They are not victims of racism except in isolated cases of more individualized racism. They are not victims simply because they perceive they are, when their numbers become smaller in various political, economic and social arenas.
There can be racism between other racial groups, of which neither are White as well. A gang of one race that targets another race for violence or death simply because of that race, and vice versa, as has happened with some Black and Latino gangs in Southern California who have prison ties with other gangs in state prisons. In a neighborhood, gangs can exercise enough power to intimidate, frighten and kill others of different races. It’s not institutional racism, however, but it is racism.
In similar terms, only men have the power in this country to engage in sexism, because men still control the various institutions of power in this country: government, labor, education, politics, judiciary, etc. Women can individually in cases be sexist against men, to some degree, but not institutionally.
I can guess RonF, you aren’t going to like my response. and will act accordingly. Which is cool, but I’m too tired to saber rattle at the moment. I’m exhausted from engaging in the “racism against Whites in situations where Whites hold all the power” arguments right now, with all due respect. Maybe next month.
Consider the example of Kim, Matt, and their two kids. Kim and Matt and kids live in the downstairs of my house, which they pay rent for.
If I recall correctly, the property tax on our house is about $3600 a year.
Let’s assume (falsely) that none of that proprety tax comes from my income or Charles’ income; instead, it all comes out of rent. Since there are two renters in the house aside from Kim and Matt (we also rent out two upstairs bedrooms), and assuming even shares to keep the math simple, that means Kim and Matt pay about $1800 a year in property taxes.
Let’s assume that 75% of property taxes go to schools. 75% of $1800 is $1350. So if we got rid of the property taxes that support public schools, Kim and Matt would save $1350 a year.
At the area Waldorf school (which seems like the sort of hippy school Kim and Matt would favor), tuition is $5800 for Kindergarden and rises to $11,400 for high school. So to send their two kids to private school would cost between $11,600 and $22,800 a year. The money they save would be just barely enough to cover one-tenth of kindergarden tuition, and not even one-tenth of the costs of high school tuition.
Unless Kim and Matt are EXTREME outliers, the idea that anyone could pay private school tuition for thier kids if they only didn’t pay for public schools in property taxes is ridiculous.
Most private schools do not charge nearly that amount of tuition.
Well, my elementary school, Episcopal and private was $250 when I went, and runs $12,000 now, many, many years later. Most private schools in larger cities that are high school are $10,000 to $15,000. My high school, which was boarding, was $10,000 before it closed down five years ago. It was much, much less than that when I went, $2000 including R&B. At the time, day schools in California were higher than that.
But I was in the third graduating class in Elementary and Jr. High and the schools which were obviously new then, I guess gained reputations of sort and became increasingly competitive years later, and their tuitions rose accordingly.
Wow, y’all are getting fucked.
In COS you can get into Colorado Springs Christian Schools (a network of private schools with a solid reputation) and the tuition starts at 4500 for kindergarden and runs up to 6000 or so for high school. Catholic schools are cheaper, but of course, get a larger subsidy from the diocese.
Of course, with public schools filling the void for lower- and middle-income parents in most places, it would make sense that there’s going to be an over-representation of the high-end educational market in the existing private schools. However, there’s nothing that would make one think that an all-private network of schools would cost appreciably more than the mostly-public network we have.
Currently, pretty much everyone pays part of the cost of schools, regardless of if they have kids. In a tuition-payment system, the parents alone would pay the pricetag. Fewer people paying the cost = higher payments per person.
Wow, Maybe that’s why CSCS is still around and Bennet Hill, my school and the boy school are not.
That’s including CSS if it still exists.
If my school had charged what CSCS did, then maybe it’d still be around. But then it wasn’t in the illustrious metropolis of CS, but the desolate valley of Canon City, LOL.
Amp – Yes, I agree. For any kind of voucher system to replace (rather than just supplement) public schooling, then everyone w0uld still have to pay taxes at around the same rate we’re paying now.
Which would produce individual vouchers of around $8000 per student per year, nationally. Ought to be enough.
Yes, but you need to account for things like geographic area (a disproportionate number of children live in urban areas, where expenses are higher) and the costs of educating special needs students.
Actually a disproportionate number of children live in rural areas, relative to the population of those areas, where expenses are lower – but that is washed out by the fact that special needs kids are less efficiently served as densities go down. (Think: more kids per capita in Manhattan, or Kansas?)
There are a number of ways to handle caring for special needs kids. In any event, they can be cared for at least as well in dollar terms as they’re being cared for today, without costing any other kids anything.
Arguing against the feasibility (as opposed to the desirability) of an all-private system basically comes down to arguing that the private sector can’t do things as efficiently as government committees can. Good luck with that. :)
For a voucher system to require as much taxes as the present system, we’d have to see no savings in switching from public to private schools. I trust a lot more in the efficiency of the private sector than I do in the public sector.
I meant what I said, in the context of this thread. To be racist, you have to combine the belief in the superiority of your own race(and the inferiority of others) with the power to act on it in a way that is detrimental to other races and/or favors the race that is designated superior.
Yeah, you’re right. I don’t like your response. I can state my case briefly. Your definition is at variance with every usage of the term I’ve heard or used. It’s also at variance with every dictionary I look up “racism” in. They all read something like this:
“The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.”
and
“A belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race.”
Being a racist has everything to do with your beliefs and nothing to do with your ability to impose on others based on those beliefs. On what basis do you add that additional condition? On what basis do you presume to define racism differently than everyone else?
In similar terms, only men have the power in this country to engage in sexism,
Similarly, being sexist is independent of someone’s having the power to affect others by acting on the basis of their sexist attitudes.
The assumption that only men have power to act on sexist attitudes is not always true. I once worked in a corporation where my boss and my two colleagues who also reported to her were all female. During a team meeting, the discussion came around to personal topics, and various adventures in buying shoes came up. I’m a relatively big guy, and I offered my difficulties in buying size 13 shoes. The women looked at me and my boss said, “Ron, what do you know about shopping, you’re a man.”
I held my tongue. At the end of the day, as we were walking out to our cars together, I reminded her of this discussion and said, “Now, let’s suppose that you were in your boss’s office with his other two male direct reports. Now replay the discussion, only substitute ‘football’ for ‘shopping’. How long would it have taken you to get down to Personnel if someone had said that to you?” To give her credit, she looked at me with wide eyes, stopped dead, and then apologized. But she didn’t have to. She was my boss, and she could have made my life miserable. She definitely had power over me. And she was the representative of the institution we both worked for, a Fortune 100 company.
As far as institutional sexism or racism goes, that’s a little different. Yes, whites and men tend to control most of the institutions in this country. How many of those institutions are racist or sexist, where they are acting on the basis that the people running them believe that people of a certain race or gender are thereby superior is debatable. I doubt that there’s that many sizable private concerns that do so. For a private concern to discriminate on the basis of race or sex instead of on the basis of what the qualifications that candidates for employment or education present themselves with is quite likely to make that institution unable to compete, and employers know it.
Competitve pressure doesn’t count for much in the public sector. It wouldn’t surprise me to find racists and sexists in the public sector that are affecting the actions of the public institution that they control. I would again question how many there are of those now, but I’ll freely grant that there have been some spectacular examples of such.
Whites and men can certainly be subjected to institutional discrimination, though. Any affirmative action program does so. The fact that said discrimination may be judged to be necessary and legal due to past actions does not negate that. Discrimination that is justifiable for one reason or another is still discrimination; it’s just not necessarily illegal or immoral discrimination.
RonF Writes: For a voucher system to require as much taxes as the present system, we’d have to see no savings in switching from public to private schools. I trust a lot more in the efficiency of the private sector than I do in the public sector.
When it comes to educating children, profit-making (which is what the private sector’s “efficiency” is all about) should not only not be the primary goal: it shouldn’t be anywhere on the score card.
The private sector is better at some things than the public sector. But not in any area where “making a profit” is explicitly not an objective. Public services are better when undertaken by the public sector: health, education, transportation, – even the military.
What silliness RonF writes! Private colleges discriminated against various classes all the time, by refusing admission (women) or by having strict quotas for the minority in question (Jews, blacks). Private companies discriminated (and some still discriminate) against women and blacks in management and skilled positions because they could fill such positions with adequate men and get by, not really needing “the best” person for a job, just a functional one. And by discriminating against women and blacks, they depressed the wages for less-skilled or non-management skilled jobs to below the level that would be acceptable to male candidates.
Meritocracy arguments are generally made by those at the top of the social prestige heap. And the truth is, there are plenty of people whose sole qualification for management positions seems to be: white man of upperclass social background. Vide: George W. Bush
In an attempt to pass judgment, most of you are completely sidestepping the bigger issue. The issue is not whether or not one likes the statement, “diversity is perversity,” the issue is the irrefutable right to free speech on a public university…a place that should enjoy all the rights provided by the US Constitution. Without free speech, the university experience would amount to nothing more than indoctrination…regardless of your political perspective or religious affiliation (or lack of). The university is supposed to be a free speech zone. We all herald free speech hustlers that burn flags or hold anti-war vigils; but, when a conservative expresses views opposite those from the liberal mindset, one that pervades the majority of college campuses, he is characterized as a whack-job. I say baloney!
I attend WSU, and am in Ed Swan’s block classes. What is going on here is a tacit attempt to dispel a student from school because his views are different from theirs (faculties). In class, his opinion is obviously paleo-conservative and traditionalist, but he is always respectful when in disagreement. Further, he is rather soft-spoken; I have never heard him raise his voice. What’s funny is, that none of his classmates (me included), even knew that he was in trouble with the university. Nothing was ever alarming about the way he expressed himself. In retrospect, however, when certain professors wanted an alternate opinion, they would look directly at him and ask him to respond. I told him this the other day when this issue finally surfaced. I even asked about the “diversity is perversity” catch-phrase.
As a father of four bi-racial children, he told me that he is all for mutli-ethnicities (as long as they are legal), multi-races, but that he considered a diversity of cultures as detrimental to the stability of the Nation as a whole. And, I sort of agreed once he explained. He cited some historical facts and commented how our curriculum has become Balkanized, and how cultural and linguistic enclaves were threatening life as we know it. He also spoke of the average life span, in historical speak, of the average Nation…something like 200 years. And the reasons that Nations fall. It seems, that many of the views he holds stem from the ability to retain a healthy strong Nation. He said he wrote the controversial statement on a paper though, not his textbook, and that it was prefaced with the details I just described you.
Ed has completed four practicas with nothing but rave reviews; and he has student teaching yet to come, in just a few short weeks from now; I do as well. This should be the deciding factor. Knowing Ed, as I have for the past 2 years, I highly doubt whether he would try to preach to a young impressionable student. I have seen him interact with children of all races and other diversities, and saw not a hint of alarm, but a love of teaching everyone.
So, before you crucify him, get the facts!
The assertion was made that eliminating public schools would limit the diversity of schools available to people, and I was trying to show a reason why that said assertion was not necessarily true.
Which would be OK if you based it on facts rather than guesses and inventions. Presenting numbers as though they have a basis, when in fact you’re just sort of making them up, does not support your argument.
Which would produce individual vouchers of around $8000 per student per year, nationally. Ought to be enough.
Sure, if we pretend that vouchers will have no effect on tuition rates.
I like the coy use of the term “efficiency” to refer to schools, becaues what it really is, is sleight of hand: using “efficiency” first to mean “faster and cheaper” and then pretending it means better. “The private sector can run schools for less cost than the government” != “The private sector will do a better overall job of providing sufficient education to the nation’s children.”
The only reason to favor vouchers and privatization is philosophical (gub’mint BAD!), not practical.