“Culturally responsive” Illinois teacher training
Here’s the situation in Illinois regarding the education of teachers across the entire state:
…[I]n December, the Illinois State Board of Education, or ISBE, passed a new rule that would require culturally responsive teaching and leading standards to be incorporated in all Illinois teacher preparation programs. Critics of the proposed standards have said they require educators to embrace left-leaning ideology and prioritize political and social activism in classrooms at a time when Illinois students are underperforming on basic skills tests…
Critics have pointed out that the requirements essentially impose an ideological litmus test on educators, making any teacher who does not espouse certain views unwelcome in Illinois schools. In their original form, the provisions were explicitly left-leaning, and educators were required to “embrace and encourage progressive viewpoints and perspectives.” After opponents of the new rule brought public attention to the language, the word “progressive” was replaced with “inclusive,” but this has not alleviated the concern that the standard is aimed at pushing a political agenda on Illinois educators and schools.
Yes, changing the language does not change the intent.
Critics of the new rule have also expressed concern that at a time when so many Illinois students are failing to achieve basic competency in reading and math – exacerbated by pandemic-related learning loss – pushing regulations on “politically-charged topics, including race, gender identity and the role of power, privilege and student activism” is not the proper focus of Illinois’ education establishment. As of 2019, only 38% of Illinois students in grades 3 through 8 met or exceeded Illinois Assessment of Readiness standards for English language arts, according to ISBE, and a mere 32% of students met or exceeded standards in math.
Ah, but first things first, and indoctrination in leftism is more important. In fact, the more ignorant the children are, the easier it will be to indoctrinate them. So the situation is win-win for the left.
Note also the predominance in the regulations of jargon that obfuscates the message, and probably bores most readers to tears. I would wager both things are purposeful:
Similarly, “leveraging student advocacy” is not necessarily a commonly accepted purpose of PreK-12 education among parents of schoolchildren, particularly when basic reading and computational skills are not being uniformly transmitted. The original version used the term “activism” rather than “advocacy” in this section, but “advocacy” is used as a synonym for activism elsewhere – for example, where the rule admonishes educators to be “aware of the effects of power and privilege and the need for social advocacy and social action.”
Nor are most parents likely aware that under the rule, teachers would be called on to “curate the curriculum” and work with students to “co-create content to include a counternarrative to dominant culture.” The standard further directs educators to “implement and integrate the wide spectrum and fluidity of identities in the curriculum” but does not provide specifics to give parents an indication of what this might mean for their children’s instruction.
On February 16, there was a vote in which the Illinois General Assembly’s Joint Committee on Administrative Rules had a chance to reject this program. You may be unsurprised at what happened:
Eight of the committee’s 12 members would have needed to vote to suspend the rule to prevent its implementation, and only the six Republican members voted to do so.
So all the Republicans voted “no” and all the Democrats voted “yes.”
I wonder what the teachers in Illinois who are not onboard with this leftism will do. Will they find another profession? Will they pretend to comply but sneak in a little heresy once they get into the classroom as teachers? And if so, what will happen to them then?
Compare and contrast:
New Hampshire lawmakers are debating a bill that would prevent educators from teaching about systemic racism and sexism in public schools and state-funded programs.
HB 544, titled an act “relative to the propagation of divisive topics,” seeks to limit public schools, organizations or state contractors from discussing topics related to racism and sexism, and would specifically ban teaching that the state of New Hampshire or the U.S. is racist or sexist. Lawmakers discussed the bill in a hearing of the Executive Departments and Administration Committee that began Feb. 11 and continued Thursday.
“This puts guidelines on what are the limits, especially under the auspices of the state apparatus, what are the limits in presuming that someone was born to be an oppressor or someone was born to be oppressed because of their sex,” said Rep. Keith Ammon, a Republican from New Boston, who introduced the bill. “If that’s the assumption we are going to make as a society, then we are never going to get to unity.”
New Hampshire is currently a purple state that votes Democrat on the national level (presidency, House representatives, and senators) and Republican on the state level (governor, state legislators). This sort of split personality means that it’s possible that the state will have voted for Biden, who rescinded Trump’s order banning the teaching of Critical Race Theory in federal agencies, and yet the New Hampshire state legislature may vote to ban it in the state’s public schools. I can’t find anything that indicates the vote has occurred yet, so I don’t know what actually will happen, but there is a GOP majority right now in the NH legislature.
West Virginia is considering a similar bill to that of New Hampshire.
As so often happens, this news regarding education reminds me of a passage from Allan Bloom’s The Closing of the American Mind, published in 1987 [emphasis mine]:
Every educational system has a moral goal that it tries to attain and that informs its curriculum. It wants to produce a certain kind of human being. This intention is more or less explicit, more or less a result of reflection,; but even the neutral subject, like reading and writing and arithmetic, take their place in a vision of the educated person…Over the history of our republic, there have obviously been changes of opinion as to what kind of man is best for our regime…A powerful attachment to the letter and spirit of the Declaration of Independence gently conveyed, appealing to each man’s reason, was the goal of the education of democratic man…
But openness…eventually won out over natural rights, partly through a theoretical critique, partly because of a political rebellion against nature’s last constraints. Civic education turned away from concentrating on the Founding to concentrating on openness based on history and social science. There was even a general tendency to debunk the Founding, to prove the beginnings were flawed in order to license a greater openness to the new. What began in Charles Beard’s Marxism and Carl Becker’s historicism became routine. We are used to hearing the Founders being charged with being racists, murderers of Indians, representatives of class interests. I asked my first history professor in the university, a very famous scholar, whether the picture he gave us of George Washington did not have the effect of making us despise our regime. “Not at all,” he said, “it doesn’t depend on individuals but on our having good democratic values.” To which I rejoined, “But you just showed us that Washington was only using those values to further the class interests of the Virginia squirearchy.” He got angry, and that was the end of it. He was comforted by a gentle assurance that the values of democracy are part of the movement of history and did not require his elucidation or defense. He could carry on his historical studies with the moral certitude that they would lead to greater openness and hence more democracy. The lessons of fascism and the vulnerability of democracy, which we had all just experienced, had no effect on him.
Bloom was in college during the late 1940s. And that passage makes it obvious that, by the 1980s, the current leftist anti-American trends were already firmly in place.
But not so firmly as they are today, and as they will be tomorrow, if the left has anything to say about it.
The Federalist recently posted a very good piece about the terrible situation in Illinois, written by Joy Pullmann and entitled “Your Kids Would Be Better Off Feral (In Their Backyards) Than Going To Schools That Make Them Anti-American Racists”, while, last month, Stanley Kurtz wrote an excellent (and very alarming) essay for National Review arguing that “Ultra-Woke Illinois Mandates are the Top Threat to U.S. Education.” The pernicious campaign of woke “anti-racist” indoctrination in K-12 across the country (as documented by Chris Rufo) is divisive and toxic, as well as predicated on falsehoods, nor is there the slightest chance of any improvement under the current illegitimate regime.
In an Open Thread a couple of days ago, I wrote that [I]n “Math: The Latest Battleground in the War Against Truth” on AmericanThinker.com that “The [Bill and Melinda Gates] [F]oundation is providing more than $140 million to A ‘Pathway to Equitable Math Instruction,’ an organization of 25 educational institutions that contend that math is synonymous with white supremacy and upholds “capitalist, imperialistic and racist” views. Pathway offers a five-part toolkit and videoconferences to make educators “reflect on their own biases” and commit to advance math “equity” by understanding that students of color use math differently than do white students.”
This is a serious endeavor by these people. According to the Pathway’s website, equitable math.org, the Lawrence Hall of Science at UC Berkeley is on a list of “dedicated partners and collaborating organizations in this project”. . . . the Lawrence Hall at UC Berkeley . . . .
Woke Mathematics.
Yoke Mathematics. (No, that’s not a misprint of “Joke”)
Diversity [dogma] and color judgments, not limited to racism, processed under the Rainbow of inclusion exclusive of black, brown, and featuring a gay pleasure in the shredded remains of white.
Semantic games, conceptual corruption, conflation of logical domains. Once you go Pro-Choice, it’s a progressive path and grade.
Wanna’ know what’s going on in NH? Legislature, education, politics, colleges?
https://granitegrok.com/
Minta. That assault on math and science started about 8 years ago. I think they just feel the time is ripe; just like all the other crazy left ideas. If I was a CCP member I can’t think of a better way to destroy the US technological dominance than by making its math and science useless. We are going to have a generation of math/science illiterates with PhDs.
Even sadder, there are almost certainly three or fewer counties in Illinois where more than 25% of the citizens would vote for such malarkey in the curriculum, but because Cook County has the biggest population, by far, they pull the rest of the state under.
Occasionally I catch a whiff of what’s going on in the local extremely expensive international school, the local moderately expensive international school, and the local just not too cheap Chinese-medium Anglican primary school.
Full-on Woke Rainbow-hued Globohomo Poz in the former two K-12/13 IB Mills. Their Managerialist Bugmen Parents / Karen Wives are fully on-board with the program anyway — especially the Karens. As we know from other articles and threads, whether it’s Eton or Philips Exeter the Über-Bugpeople are more than OK with their own offspring getting this treatment. So why wouldn’t they want it given good and proper and with less lubricant to the kids of the Peasantry?
What the Teachers think is another story. My guess is that well over half would positively get off on any drama and trouble it created for their colleagues and even themselves up to a point. News Flash: Women and Gays love Drama. Embolden and embiggen that Capital D a bit more if you can. Most of the remainder will grit their teeth, grin and bear it. It’s not as if most ‘Teachers’ in Current Year are employable in any other white collar ‘profession’ — Intellectual non-capacity of Education Students on campuses has been a standing joke for nearly two generations now.
Oh… the funny little Chinky Episcopalian primary school? You know the *cheap* one where all those cute little clones in perfectly-pressed uniforms lugging big backpacks of books go…. In there they do wrote learning and chanting and learn to function in three spoken languages and two written languages – one not noted for its ease of acquisition. Sure the local branch of the Anglicans knows more about Gleichschaltung than Heidegger’s university common room and is part of the local United Front in the Current Year… but send your daughter there and she won’t come home with blue hair, tattoos and a penis. So there’s that.
The teachers in those two International Schools are paid very well. Still it’s easy to spot them in a crowd of Upper-middle-management Bugmen and Karens – The former wear their wokeness with a certain level of deportment. Brave Educationalists look like unkempt degenerates, Angela Merkel on a bad day, pedos or eunuchs.
It’s Sunday morning, so I’ve tried to be charitable in my descriptions.
@Rufus:
Chicago really is something.
I guess that’s one constant in an ever-changing world.
The little darlings actually imagine that the tsunami they are creating will not break upon their shores and sweep them to their richly deserved fate.
Ideological fanaticism requires willfull blindness to reality.
To the degree that an ideology rejects fundamental aspects of human nature and principles that govern the external reality within which humanity exists is the degree to which it embraces error.
Error, writ large enough is indistinguishable from evil.
What the left is imposing upon America… easily qualifies as evil.
Nice comment Zaphod. I think you nailed it. X-boy went to international schools, having grown up abroad. I know the drill very well. Turned out to be a right good Citizen of the World.
Brace yerselves: We may have reached rock bottom:
https://www.foxnews.com/us/loudoun-county-public-schools-dr-seuss-racial-undertones
On the other hand….
Read David Horowitz’s “Destructive Generation.” They just want to destroy America. Not well-intentioned.
My HS senior at a suburban parochial school was just required to undergo a “critical rage theory” training session (they did not call it that but it’s an apt description of the product they rolled out). I had the benefit of participating since they conducted it via Zoom given the COVID restrictions in IL (the school has been operating a hybrid model since starting in August). There is no escape in IL any longer. My wife and I have said a number of times that, were we just starting the education journey rather than being at the tail end, we would likely be looking to homeschooling options these days. And we are strongly encouraging our kids to look at other states when seeking their first jobs as they begin planning their futures.
Unfortunately not the BabylonBee, but their Not the Bee page:
https://notthebee.com/article/boston-public-schools-cancels-advanced-classes-for-high-performing-students-because-too-many-of-the-kids-were-white
Burton M,
That is truly sad, and, as always, those with the fewest resources will be damaged the most.
As usual, good analysis but no action. A lot of very intelligent posters reduced to tut-tutting and saying how outrageous this is. What are you going to do about this outrage? Neo, how about a post on how to counter the indoctrination in schools? Websites like PragerU are doing a good job but the job is overwhelming. It is discouraging to see conservatives clamoring for the government schools to open and to send their children to receive this brainwashing. Another good topic for a post is why are so few people homeschooling? Instead people deliver their children to the Left through online Zoom indoctrination.
Bob, I fought the good fight at the college level for 15 years. But when it’s 130 vs 3 you’re always going to lose. And that doesn’t count the administration. So add another 100 or so. I frankly have no idea of a solution.
“Sure the local branch of the Anglicans knows more about Gleichschaltung than Heidegger’s university common room and is part of the local United Front in the Current Year… but send your daughter there and she won’t come home with blue hair, tattoos and a penis. So there’s that.
There might be outliers but the vast majority of orthodox Jewish parochial schools see their mission as educating the next generation of Jews so most of the progressive nonsense is ignored. Most of those schools regard their religious instruction to be more important than the secular subjects, which tend to be focused on fundamentals. When you’re running a dual curriculum school, you don’t have a lot of time to waste on BS. Some nonsense may seep in from the use of standardized text books, but for the most part those schools are as culturally conservative as you’ll find.
FWIW, my grandsons’ yeshiva has been having in-class instruction since September.
physicsguy how about defunding them? Here’s a thoughtful article by a young man who decided to drop out of college because it wasn’t a good value proposition. The article was written a few years ago. I wonder what happened to him? he was interested in computer science and many programmers and software people do not have degrees or have degrees in non-related areas.
https://quillette.com/2018/11/23/the-case-for-dropping-out-of-college/
@JAM:
I fully approve. And I hope that this state off affairs can continue for you and yours.
In effect you are enjoying Freedom of Association. This is the sine qua non of Freedom.
Now imagine a school system founded for the education of White Christian Children. Give it a dual curriculum. After much consideration, we’ll have to pass on two of the three main legs of yeshiva curriculum, so I’d vote for a boatload of Aquinas with a copious dusting of Newman. A more deplorable academy for Budding Bayou Billy Bathgates might go with Calvin’s Institutes, the A-Z of Baccy Chewing, and the Code Duello. Diversity is Our Strength, anyway. Plus of course, reading, writing, ‘rithmetic, graph theory, topology, and taxidermy.
^^^^—— I might be able to found one small school like this in some backwater and get away with it for some years. If very lucky. Plonk one down in Manhattan, Boston, Chicago (it is to laugh), and we both know what would happen. It would be steamrollered by a viral swarm of NGO — SPLC, anyone? — and state actor antibodies faster than either us could say Tomas de Torquemada three times with a mouth full of nothing. Try to SCALE OUT even the palest semi-pozzed shadow of what I’ve outlined above and all hell would break loose. The National Guard would be called out.
In the longer run it would be good for groups of people who don’t necessarily agree on the finer points of how the Good Life is to be lived to support the rights of each other to enjoy Freedom of Association and do their own things in their own ways — subject of course to some basic common rules governing interactions. A bit, you know, like things used to be in some constitutional republic I’ve read about somewhere.
(Puts on his ill-fitting Lampedusa Hat) Pity we have to always go forwards even if we want to go backwards.
Zaphod,
What you want already exists:
https://thomasaquinas.edu/
https://www.avemaria.edu/
https://wyomingcatholic.edu/academics/the-great-books/
https://shss.franciscan.edu/programs/honors-program/
http://www.cslewiscollege.org/about-us/distinctives/great-books/
https://gutenberg.edu/
https://news.newmanu.edu/great-books/#:~:text=The%20Newman%20University%20School%20of%20Catholic%20Studies%20has,and%20graduate%20programs%20in%20theology,%20diaconate%20and
I’m pretty sure there are a few others I’ve missed; including one or two in the northeast of the U.S.
Also, although not Catholic, Hillsdale College in Michigan does a good job of educating in a Classical, Liberal mode with a strong emphasis on the U.S. Constitution.
a counternarrative to dominant culture
And the only possible reason to do that is to tear down the ‘dominant culture’. And what might that ‘dominant culture’ be? Judeo-Christian Western Civilization. And, for this, we’re supposed to be tolerant?
@Rufus:
No it does not exist. None of these institutions can refuse to hire homosexuals, lesbians, transsexuals, let alone restrict their student intake to (oh, the horror of it!) Straight Caucasian Males.
Were any them to refuse admittance to Muslim or Wiccan students, all hell would break loose.
My point was that Orthodox Schools and Yeshivas are a very niche example of getting by in an increasingly difficult world. Exception does not prove the rule.
Without freedom of association (bluntly, freedom to discriminate) there is no freedom.
This may seem reprehensible and just plain mean, but freedom isn’t a garden party with Fourth of July bunting and Sousa playing on the PA..
I would imagine that the parochial schools will be the next target.
The Jewish and Catholic ones at least.
Quite possibly, the parochial schools on the liberal end of the spectrum may well self-flagellate themselves out of existence…
“…why are so few people homeschooling?”
Because so many mothers are working.
It used to be that a woman expected to marry, have children and raise them. Now that is considered to be a demeaning life, so women have children and send them out to be taught by women who leave their children at home/school so they can work by teaching/caring for other women’s children.
“…why are so few people homeschooling?”
“Because so many mothers are working.” SueK
That was part of the radfemlib plan all along, I suspect.