Sunday, December 05, 2004

Home-schooling is about learning, not teaching "Ignore the individuals who claim that parents need to be certified in order to teach their children at home. What arrogance on the part of any schoolteachers and administrators who speak such nonsense. Are any of those people certified to teach every subject, K-12? How many of them are even certified and qualified to teach the classes to which they are assigned? That last question is the only part of the No Child Left Behind legislation that I find interesting, even comical. Schools are having to report how many teachers are, and have been, teaching classes in subjects they have never studied; never attended training; hold no certification. Sur-prise, Sur-prise!"





NEW SURVEY OF LEFTIST BIAS IN ADADEME

Liberal professors routinely harass conservative students

Most Journal readers over a certain age can remember going all the way through college without politics intruding in the classroom. Until the Vietnam War, for instance, few students knew their professors' views, and even then most politicking took place on parts of the campus where participation was voluntary. That is no longer true--and, as a new survey commissioned by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) documents, it is making many students uneasy.

The ACTA survey was conducted this fall by the Center for Survey Research & Analysis at the University of Connecticut, among students at 50 top U.S. universities and colleges. It sought to ascertain the perceived levels of classroom politicization and of intellectual intolerance among faculty members. The results were striking.

For instance, nearly half said that their professors "frequently comment on politics in class even though it has nothing to do with the course" or use the classroom to present their personal political views. In answers to other questions, the majority acknowledged that liberal views predominate. Most troubling, however, were the responses to the survey item "On my campus, there are courses in which students feel they have to agree with the professor's political or social views in order to get a good grade"--29% agreed.

ACTA's president, Anne Neal, is alarmed. "One case of political intolerance is too many," she says. "But the fact that half the students are reporting [some] abuses is simply unacceptable. If these were reports of sexual harassment in the classroom, they would get people's attention."

A recent informal survey at Yale, where students answered questions about academic freedom posed by the Yale Free Press, the conservative/libertarian student paper, also deserves attention. Although the entire first run of its November issue containing the study was stolen on campus, it can be downloaded at www.yale.edu/yfp. To sum up: While some Yalies said that politics either didn't arise in class or caused no problem because they shared the professor's views, others recounted unpleasant experiences. One example:

"My teacher came into class the day after the election proclaiming, 'That's it. This is the death of America.' The rest of the class was eager to agree, and twenty minutes of Bush-bashing ensued. At one point, one student asked our teacher whether she should be so vocal, lest any students be conservatives. She then asked us whether any of us were Republicans. Naturally, no one volunteered that information, whereupon our teacher turned to the inquisitive student and said, 'See? No one in here would be stupid enough to vote for Bush.' "

Some students undoubtedly find such banter fun. But for others it can be chilling. And just as teachers' freedom of speech must be protected, so must students' freedom to learn, if it is threatened. After all, as ACTA's Anne Neal points out, "The inability to benefit from a robust and free exchange of ideas-- intellectual harassment if you will-- goes to the very heart of the academic enterprise."

Source






LACK OF DISCIPLINE COMES HOME TO ROOST

A primary school head teacher was admitted to hospital after being attacked in a classroom by an eight-year-old pupil. The boy, who has not been named, was at the centre of a police investigation yesterday after the incident last week at a school in Glasgow. Strathclyde police confirmed that an inquiry had begun and the boy would be reported to the children's panel in connection with the alleged assault. It is understood that the incident last Wednesday at Pinewood Primary School in Drumchapel came after an argument between Margaret Henderson, 47, the head teacher, and the boy. It is claimed that Ms Henderson, who was in charge of a class of 33 pupils, was pushed and fell over a table. She was taken by ambulance to Glasgow Royal Infirmary where she received treatment for back injuries. She was later discharged but has yet to return to work. A Glasgow City Council spokesman said the authority would consider what action to take after police inquiries had been completed.

Teaching unions and politicians condemned the incident which came after the publication of a government report showing record levels of violence and lack of discipline in some of Scotland's schools. Willie Hart, the Glasgow area secretary for the Educational Institute of Scotland, the country's biggest teaching union, said: "I very much regret the fact that this has happened. We want a proper inquiry into this."

Figures from the Scottish Executive reveal that in 2004 there has been a significant rise in violence against teachers. The survey of 1,800 Scottish teachers found that 59 per cent believed that discipline in schools was a serious problem, compared with 36 per cent in 1996. The study found that teachers blamed the changing nature of society for a "lack of automatic respect for authority and a greater readiness to challenge adults, as well as a rising awareness of young people's rights which was not matched by a corresponding awareness of their responsibility". Figures showed that 8 per cent of secondary school teachers had experienced aggression from pupils compared with 1 per cent in 1996. Secondary heads reported that they suffered physical aggression from 17 per cent of pupils in 2004 compared with 2 per cent in 1996. In primary schools, teachers reported a drop in aggression among pupils but a rise in aggression directed at staff. The survey revealed that 12 per cent of primary head teachers said that they or their staff had experienced physical or verbal aggression from children.

Ewan Aitken, education spokesman for the local authority umbrella organisation Cosla, said: "Any physical aggression towards teachers is unacceptable but the reasons for this kind of destructive behaviour are much more to do with all of society and not just schools. "Children are only at school 15 per cent of the time so you have to ask what is happening the other 85 per cent of the time to make them behave like this. What we are talking about here when kids are expressing violence is something more deep rooted than school."

Pinewood was built 35 years ago on the Drumchapel estate. Its concrete classrooms are due for demolition and some parents claim that standards at the school have fallen in recent years. It was alleged by one parent that an Asian teacher at the school left after serving just one year because she was subjected to racist insults from children. On one occasion it was claimed that she was stabbed in the hand with a pen. Another parent praised Ms Henderson and said she hoped the head teacher would return to work. "She is really good. She won't tolerate any nonsense. I just hope what has happened won't put her off and she comes back."

A spokesman for Strathclyde Police said: "A 47-year-old woman was injured after an incident at Pinewood Primary in Drumchapel on Wednesday, November . "An eight-year-old boy will be the subject of a report to the children's panel in connection with the incident."

Source

***************************

For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here

***************************

No comments: