Let the brainwashing of TX students begin

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/13/education/13texas.html

 

Texas Approves Curriculum Revised by Conservatives

By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.

Published: March 12, 2010

 

AUSTIN, Tex. — After three days of turbulent meetings, the Texas Board of Education on Friday voted to approve a social studies curriculum that will put a conservative stamp on history and economics textbooks, stressing the superiority of American capitalism, questioning the Founding Father’s commitment to a purely secular government and presenting Republican political philosophies in a more positive light.

 

The vote was 11 to 4, with 10 Republicans and one Democrat voting for the curriculum, and four Democrats voting against.

 

The board, whose members are elected, has influence beyond Texas because the state is one of the largest purchasers of textbooks. In the digital age, however, that influence has been diminished as technological advances have made it possible for publishers to tailor books to individual states.

 

In recent years, board members have been locked in an ideological battle between a bloc of conservatives who question Darwin’s theory of evolution and believe the Founding Fathers were guided by Christian principles and a handful of Democrats and moderate Republicans who have fought to preserve the teaching of Darwinism and the separation of church and state.

 

Since January, Republicans on the board have passed more than 160 amendments to the 120-page curriculum standards affecting history, sociology and economics courses from elementary to high school. The standards were proposed by a board of teachers.

 

Efforts by Hispanic board members to include more Latino figures as role models for the state’s large Hispanic population were consistently defeated, prompting one member, Mary Helen Berlanga, to storm out of a meeting late Thursday night, saying, “They can just pretend this is a white America and Hispanics don’t exist.”

 

“They are going overboard, they are not experts, they are not historians,” she said. “They are rewriting history, not only of Texas but of the United States and the world.”

 

The curriculum standards will now be published in a state register, opening them up for 30 days of public comment. A final vote will be taken in May, but given the Republican dominance of the board, it is unlikely many changes will be made.

 

The standards, reviewed every decade, serve as a template for publishers of textbooks, who must come before the board next year with drafts of their books. The board’s makeup will have changed by then because the leader of the conservative faction, Dr. Don McLeroy, lost in a primary to a more moderate Republican, and two others — one Democrat and one conservative Republican — have announced they are not seeking re-election.

 

There are seven members of the conservative bloc on the board, but they are often joined by one of the other three Republicans on crucial votes. There were no historians, sociologists or economists consulted at the meetings, though some members of the conservative bloc held themselves out as experts on certain topics.

 

The conservative members maintain that they are trying to correct what they see as a liberal bias among the teachers who proposed the curriculum. To that end, they made dozens of minor changes aimed at calling into question, among other things, concepts like the separation of church and state and the secular nature of the American Revolution.

 

“I reject the notion by the left of a constitutional separation of church and state,” said David Bradley, a conservative from Beaumont who works in real estate. “I have $1,000 for the charity of your choice if you can find it in the Constitution.”

 

They also included a plank to ensure that students learn about “the conservative resurgence of the 1980s and 1990s, including Phyllis Schalfly, the Contract With America, the Heritage Foundation, the Moral Majority and the National Rifle Association.”

 

Dr. McLeroy pushed through a change to the teaching of the civil rights movement to ensure that students study the violent philosophy of the Black Panthers in addition to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s nonviolent approach. He also made sure that textbooks would mention the votes in Congress on civil rights legislation, which Republicans supported.

 

“Republicans need a little credit for that,” he said. “I think it’s going to surprise some students.”

 

Mr. Bradley won approval for an amendment saying students should study “the unintended consequences” of the Great Society legislation, affirmative action and Title IX legislation. He also won approval for an amendment stressing that Germans and Italians were interned in the United States as well as the Japanese during World War II, to counter the idea that the internment of Japanese was motivated by racism.

 

Other changes seem aimed at tamping down criticism of the right. Conservatives passed one amendment, for instance, requiring that the history of McCarthyism include “how the later release of the Venona papers confirmed suspicions of communist infiltration in U.S. government.” The Venona papers were transcripts of some 3,000 communications between the Soviet Union and its agents in the United States.

 

In economics, the revisions add Milton Friedman and Friedrich von Hayek, two champions of free-market economic theory, among the usual list of economists to be studied, like Adam Smith, Karl Marx and John Maynard Keynes. They also replaced the word “capitalism” throughout their texts with the “free-enterprise system.”

 

“Let’s face it, capitalism does have a negative connotation,” said one conservative member, Terri Leo. “You know, ‘capitalist pig!’ ”

 

In the field of sociology, another conservative member, Barbara Cargill, won passage of an amendment requiring the teaching of “the importance of personal responsibility for life choices” in a section on teen suicide, dating violence, sexuality, drug use and eating disorders.

 

“The topic of sociology tends to blame society for everything,” Ms. Cargill said.

 

Even the course on World History did not escape the board’s scalpel.

 

Cynthia Dunbar, a lawyer from Richmond who is a strict constitutionalist and thinks the nation was founded on Christian beliefs, managed to cut Thomas Jefferson from a list of figures whose writings inspired revolutions in the late 18th century and 19th century, replacing him with St. Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin and William Blackstone. (Jefferson is not well liked among the conservatives on the board because he coined the term “separation between church and state.”)

 

“The Enlightenment was not the only philosophy on which these revolutions were based,” Ms. Dunbar said.

 

Mavis B. Knight, a Democrat from Dallas, introduced an amendment requiring that students study the reasons “the founding fathers protected religious freedom in America by barring the government from promoting or disfavoring any particular religion above all others.”

 

It was defeated on a party-line vote.

 

 

[HowboutthemCowboys]

[Chief Dick]

Someway, somehow this will be Obama's fault.

Edited March 12, 2010 by Chief Dick

[westvirginia]

Some of the stuff in here actually makes sense. The MLK/Malcom X thing for instance - the older I get the more I agree with X. If I saw my kids being treated like that I'd wanna whip somebody's ass too, if that's what it took to change things.

 

But then the McCarthyism stuff - that was straight out of Goebels handbook right there. Whether he was later proven right isn't the point. And how people can say "The puritans came here for religious freedom" and then turn around and add "But they didn't want it in their government" surely baffles the bounds of reason. And then to take Jefferson out, probably the single greatest political writer of that period

 

You see why I home school my kids? The right in control=creationism/McCarthyism/etc. The left in control=socialism/earth day/etc. And neither one gives a damn about the real reason this country was founded - the fact that you own you. Not a king or a government. And your bad decisions don't give you a mortgage on the rest of society.

[westvirginia]

Someway, somehow this will be Obama's fault.

 

Dude - shrub's fault. Totally...

[montster]

there was a very good (and lengthy) new york times magazine story on this.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/magazine...?pagewanted=all

[jetsfan]

“History is written by the victors.” - Winston Churchill

 

My kids are in 1st and 3rd grade and already we have had discussions about the civil war being about money instead of ideology. The tripe that is taught in school today is no different than the crap I got in NY in the 1970/80's.

[Azazello1313]

guh, that is just awful. I would point out that 90% of the time, the indoctrination pushes in the opposite direction, but that sort of thinking is what leads to this kind of garbage in the first place. the antidote to liberal indoctrination isn't conservative indoctrination, it's getting these damn school board politicians out of these kinds of decisions. these moran politicos don't give a DAMN about science or history, they just want to dictate how it is spoon fed to kids.

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

guh, that is just awful. I would point out that 90% of the time, the indoctrination pushes in the opposite direction, but that sort of thinking is what leads to this kind of garbage in the first place. the antidote to liberal indoctrination isn't conservative indoctrination, it's getting these damn school board politicians out of these kinds of decisions. these moran politicos don't give a DAMN about science or history, they just want to dictate how it is spoon fed to kids.

 

+bazillions

[yo mama]

“History is written by the victors.” - Winston Churchill

Strange that so many historical writers have the same name.

[Chavez]

But then the McCarthyism stuff - that was straight out of Goebels handbook right there. Whether he was later proven right isn't the point.

McCarthy was on the right track, but I don't think he really cared all that much what track he was on or where it led ideologically as long is the end result was good for Tailgunner Joe.

[Perchoutofwater]

Cynthia Dunbar, a lawyer from Richmond who is a strict constitutionalist and thinks the nation was founded on Christian beliefs, managed to cut Thomas Jefferson from a list of figures whose writings inspired revolutions in the late 18th century and 19th century, replacing him with St. Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin and William Blackstone. (Jefferson is not well liked among the conservatives on the board because he coined the term “separation between church and state.”)

 

This is terrible, and shows just how screwed up our education system is when Jefferson's "separation of church and state" is so misconstrued that they believe like so many liberals that the government was not to have any reference to god. Jefferson didn't have a problem with religion in government, he just wanted to keep government out of religion, and to make sure that we never developed a state religion. So really it is sad that the people making these decisions really don't know what Jefferson was talking about, but is also sad that the primarily liberal education they received made them believe this.

 

On a good note, they did not allow Famous Amos to take the place of Edison and Einstein, which was what some of the libs on the board wanted.

[Chief Dick]

On a good note, they did not allow Famous Amos to take the place of Edison and Einstein, which was what some of the libs on the board wanted.

 

Now he makes a great cookie.

[Perchoutofwater]

Now he makes a great cookie.

 

Absolutely but he shouldn't replace Edison and Einstein for diversities sake.

[Ursa Majoris]

Jefferson didn't have a problem with religion in government, he just wanted to keep government out of religion, and to make sure that we never developed a state religion.

Jefferson wanted the two things completely separate so your assertion that he didn't have a problem with religion in government is flat wrong. Religion should not be confused with God - these are two different things.

[Perchoutofwater]

Jefferson wanted the two things completely separate so your assertion that he didn't have a problem with religion in government is flat wrong. Religion should not be confused with God - these are two different things.

 

True.

[Azazello1313]

Jefferson didn't have a problem with religion in government, he just wanted to keep government out of religion, and to make sure that we never developed a state religion.

 

eh, he talked about a "wall of separation" between the two. I think you badly misread him if you think he had a problem with influence in one direction but not the other. he was very much a critic of the religious establishment.

[Chavez]

I'd love for big gov't to get its mitts on religion. That would be terrific.

[Perchoutofwater]

eh, he talked about a "wall of separation" between the two. I think you badly misread him if you think he had a problem with influence in one direction but not the other. he was very much a critic of the religious establishment.

 

Jefferson wrote about the wall of separation between church and state in his letter to the Dansbury Baptist Association. It was in response to their fears of the government getting involved in religion. Interestingly enough 3 days after writing the letter Jefferson attended church in the largest congregation in North America at the time. This church held its weekly worship services on government property, in the House Chambers of the U.S. Capital Building. Also interesting to note is to this day every session of congress is opened by a prayer by a paid clergyman.

 

Here are a bunch of quotes on religion from Jefferson.

[Clubfoothead]

Anyone who thinks Jefferson didn't mind religion being involved in goverment needs to read two things:

 

1. Jefferson's tombstone;

2. Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom

 

I'd personall be reluctant to use a Thomas Jefferson quote in support of any argument I intended to make because no matter what side of an issue you are on, you can find a quote from Jefferson. He was a politician.

 

Here's another pretty famous Jefferson quote

 

The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter."

 

Jefferson seemed very disturbed by man's ability to manipulate religion to me. I think he would have been opposed to religion being involved in any facet of the government he was so instrumental in creating. Jefferson may have been a personally religious man but I've never had the impression he was a fan of any organized religion.

[Big F'n Dave]

The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter."

 

I'd give Perch's left nut for the opportunity to smoke a fat spliff with TJ.

[muck]

Some of these changes are pretty good, many are pretty stupid.

 

Anyone else begin to understand why homeschooling is becoming more popular each year?

[WaterMan]

Take politics out of school?

[Clubfoothead]

Anyone else begin to understand why homeschooling is becoming more popular each year?

 

No.

[Jimmy Neutron]

I'd personall be reluctant to use a Thomas Jefferson quote in support of any argument I intended to make because no matter what side of an issue you are on, you can find a quote from Jefferson. He was a politician.

 

Very true. Reading a list of his most famous quotes, one would come to the conclusion he was schizophrenic.