Sunday, August 07, 2022


The teachers union’s cynical bid to steal NYC school control from Mayor Adams

If Judge Lyle Frank goes ahead and voids the city’s already enacted schools budget, it’ll be just another power play in the United Federation of Teachers’ bid to bring Mayor Eric Adams and Chancellor David Banks to heel, at kids’ expense.

The idea that minor trims to some schools’ budgets portends the apocalypse is, as we’ve noted, baloney. Anyway, Adams has already given the noisemakers what they say they want: The Department of Education announced Wednesday that schools can now use available funds to retain the teachers they were going to have to let go.

So the UFT and its pawns and allies, by refusing to drop the case before Judge Frank, are demanding that he void the entire system’s budget — risking major chaos when schools open in the fall — on a ludicrous technicality: that Team Adams declared an emergency to push through its spending plan before the city Panel for Education Policy got public comments and voted on it.

Never mind that school spending plans are often passed this way, or that such “emergencies” are routine in New York government. Or that the cuts are to schools whose enrollments have fallen dramatically.

Adams and Banks are trying to save the city’s public schools after the utterly disastrous de Blasio years triggered an exodus of furious and/or fearful families. But the UFT cares only about its own short-term interests and its continued power to veto anything it dislikes.

Hence, its willingness to belabor this fight, at kids’ (and most teachers’) expense, even though the mayor’s already conceded the immediate point.

This isn’t about school funding, the law or good government, but who runs the schools: The mayor, on behalf of kids and taxpayers? Or the union, on behalf of itself?

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Parents push back on American colleges promoting DEI initiatives: 'DEI is dangerous'

Some universities across America are requiring compliance from faculty in the form of signed diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) statements, as conditions for tenure or promotion — arguing that DEI across college campuses is a top priority.

However, there may be growing pushback in some areas from faculty as well as from parents — who claim that the DEI agenda actually challenges the diversity of viewpoints and opinions of students within the college environment.

Some say it also promotes a culture of fear and intimidation.

In the city of Seattle, for example, roughly 40% of the University of Washington's faculty recently rejected — or abstained from voting on — a measure that would have required faculty members seeking advancement to provide a statement demonstrating their support of DEI.

"The fact that [the vote] was stopped is unprecedented," Cliff Mass, a professor of atmospheric sciences at the university and an advocate for viewpoint diversity, told Fox News Digital in a phone interview.

Fox News Digital reached out to the University of Washington for comment.

Victor Balta, senior director of media relations at the school, said, "My understanding is that the legislation failed despite earning over 63 'yes' votes among those cast, which was a margin of 26 points over the ‘no’ votes."

Balta noted that faculty code requires that "Class A legislation earn a two-thirds supermajority of votes in instances where fewer than 50% of the faculty actually cast ballots."

Students who hold even moderate viewpoints are often afraid to express themselves on campus today, one professor says.

"Viewpoint diversity is part of diversity, equity and inclusion, and we don’t believe they are in conflict," he also told Fox News Digital.

"Our campuses should be, and are, places for thoughtful and rigorous exchanges of ideas."

"Placing value on diversity, equity and inclusion introduces more perspectives to these discussions, not fewer," Balta added.

Yet for Mass and others who say they desire a true diversity of thought restored in the college campus environment, the failed measure appears to be a win.

"One political viewpoint is being pushed very hard by the administration and by a number of others," said Mass, who is also a meteorologist.

To him, "diversity statements" appear very much like "the anti-communist loyalty oaths of the late 1940s and early 1950s."

Students who hold even moderate viewpoints are often afraid to express themselves, he said.

"Requiring all faculty members to support a social/political agenda favored by one segment of society not only politicizes the university, but represents ‘compelled speech,’" he noted recently in a blog post.

It's "a violation of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution at a public university," he added.

That blog post has received more than 70,000 page views since early July 2022.

DEI advocates are said to focus not on equal opportunity, but on the ideology of equal outcomes or equity.

Fox News Digital reached out to two other colleges that seem to endorse DEI initiatives, according to their websites.

"I suspect most parents don’t understand what’s happening here."

Mass addressed the DEI agenda of many of them.

"They believe that the university should be biased in its admissions and resources to ensure equal outcomes for all groups, with particular attention to a small number of favored ‘unrepresented’ groups," Mass told Fox News Digital.

"I suspect most parents don’t understand what’s happening here," he said. "Parents that we serve are from the whole state. There’s a wide variety of political views from people who send their kids here."

"Then there’s people from outside. We have a lot of foreign students," he added. "They're coming here to get a good education."

Mass said he believes that parents have a huge role to play in limiting the DEI agenda on campus.

"There’s a lot that parents can do," Mass said, noting that parents can decide not to make contributions to their child's college.

"There are a lot of tools to pressure the university — and if they did, it would have an impact," Mass predicted.

DEI advocates 'misuse our trusted words,' says one mom
Rebecca Friedrichs, a California-based mother of two grown sons, told Fox News Digital that parents may be "unaware of the destructive nature of DEI."

She said that "DEI proponents (and their allies) use linguistic gymnastics to change the very meaning of words, in order to manipulate the masses into believing propaganda."

"DEI is dangerous … and many parents don’t discover this destructive agenda until it’s too late."

"We collectively understand the word 'diversity' to include respectful debate of diverse opinions, open and honest discussion, respect for others, even when we disagree."

"So, when the university announces it is 'diverse,' we think, ‘That’s positive,'" noted Friedrichs, a co-founder of For Kids and Country, a national movement of parents, teachers and citizens.

DEI advocates "misuse our trusted words," according to Friedrichs.

"Their definition of ‘diversity' is twisted and is the exact opposite of our understanding," she said. "Their ‘diversity’ accepts only their group-think opinions, their stifling of true debate, their silencing of diverse ideas and their tyrannical control of all content."

"DEI is dangerous," she said, expressing her opinion — "and many parents don’t discover this destructive agenda until it’s too late."

Friedrichs encouraged parents to boycott universities that promote the DEI agenda to "stop the madness."

"Trades are a great alternative for many students," she said, as opposed to the four-year university degree — "and can lead to much satisfaction and high wages without the burden of school debt and indoctrination."

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Australian universities set low bar to take subpar students

This is grossly irresponsible. Universities are clearly doing anything to get their numbers up. And it is the poorer and less able students who will be penalized. Many will fail but will still have to pay for their courses. Money for nothing.

There was a much more defensible system in my day. Under the Commonwealth Scholarship Scheme, only the top third of high school passes earned government help


Struggling students who left school at the bottom of the class are being accepted into prestigious university degrees including engineering, architecture and psychology.

Universities made offers to students with Australian Tertiary Admission Rank (ATAR) scores below 50 – the bottom 10 per cent of high school leavers – for 221 different bachelor degrees this year, placing them at higher risk of failure and financial risk.

The revelation of the low bars being set for academic entry comes as the federal government cracked down on cheating by blocking 40 of the most visited academic cheating websites on Friday.

Federation University Australia, the University of Tasmania, and La Trobe University both accepted students with an ATAR in the 30s – the bottom two per cent of school leavers.

Aspiring teachers can access seven different education degrees with ATAR scores 50 and below, sparking protests from the teachers’ union on Friday.

Australian Education Union president Correna Haythorpe warned that students with an ATAR lower than the average of 70 were likely to fail a teaching degree.

“Low university-entry scores for teaching degrees is a growing concern,’’ she said.

“Evidence suggests that students admitted with low ATARs are likely to be less successful at university and are less likely to complete their course.

“The bar must be raised by ­setting minimum entry requirements and making teaching a two-year postgraduate degree.’’

A Federation University spokeswoman blamed an “administrative error’’ for admitting a student with an ATAR of 37 to a teaching degree this year.

“We have investigated this matter with the Victorian Teaching Institute, and we are both satisfied that the student is doing well and should be allowed to complete the course,’’ she said.

Alarmingly low academic requirements are revealed in ATAR cut-off scores for university ­admissions this year, published on the federal government’s Course Seeker website using ­official data from universities and tertiary admission centres. Starting this year, students who fail to pass at least half their subjects will lose taxpayer subsidies and be forced to pay the full cost of their degree, switch to an easier course or drop out of university.

The federal Education ­Department said it did not yet know how many students were failing, and losing taxpayer funding, as a result of the former ­Coalition government’s Job-Ready Graduates legislation that will be reviewed by the new Labor government later this year.

If students fail a course and are kicked out, they will still have to repay the student loans they borrowed through the Higher Education Loan Program (HELP), possibly leaving them with a lifelong debt.

“For a bachelor degree the rule applies if a student does not complete or fails more than 50 per cent of at least eight units until the end of the degree,’’ a spokes­person said.

“If this occurs students lose access to Commonwealth Supported Places (government subsidy) and to HELP. They can regain access by changing to another course that, for example, might better suit them.

“If a student has failed or not completed units because of illness, or other unusual stresses or things out of their control in their life, their university can exempt those units from the rule.’’

Federal Education Department data shows that more than 13,000 students with below-50 ATAR scores applied for university last year, with 55 per cent ­accepted.

Another 30,000 students ­applied with ATARs between 50 and 70, with three-quarters ­accepted, while nearly all the 29,000 applicants with an ATAR above 90 enrolled in a degree.

Of the students with low ATAR scores, 11 per cent were from poorer backgrounds while only 2 per cent were from wealthy families.

Among the highest achievers, 38 per cent were wealthy and 17 per cent were from poorer families.

Higher education policy ­expert Andrew Norton, professor in the practice of higher education policy at the Centre for ­Social Research and Methods at the Australian National University, warned that students admitted with low academic results were the most likely to drop out of university.

He said half the students with an ATAR below 50 would fail to complete their course.

“Often they are equity students admitted under special ­arrangements,’’ he said. “Nevertheless, they are coming in with what looks like poor academic preparation. “I am concerned that some students will be expose to financial risk because they have a high chance of not completing their degree.’’

The Course Seeker data shows that the University of Tasmania admitted business graduates with an ATAR of 30 this year, while RMIT University set a low threshold of 48.4 for its Bachelor of Psychology.

While the University of NSW accepted only students with an ATAR over 85 for its civil engineering degree, La Trobe University lowered its cut-off to 50.

For an accounting and finance degree, the Australian Catholic University set a cut-off barely below 50, while the University of Tasmania admitted architecture students with an ATAR of just 44.

Federation University Australia this week scrapped its Bachelor of Arts degree, blaming a drop in student enrolments.

“The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has caused a significant ­decline in international enrolments, and we are now in our third year of declining student enrolments,’’ acting vice-chancellor Wendy Cross said on Friday.

“We have also seen a drop in domestic student enrolments generally due to online learning fatigue that continues to significantly impact the university’s ­financial position.”

National Tertiary Education Union Victorian assistant secretary Sarah Roberts said an arts degree was a “bedrock offering for all universities’’. “This is a demoralising day for humanities in Victoria (and) a hammer blow for students who live regionally and want to study arts,” she said.

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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