AN EMAIL FROM A FLORIDA SCHOOL TEACHER ON CHARACTERISTIC BLACK BEHAVIOUR

From a teacher with an academic psychology background:

"I would like to enumerate a few observations I have made as this stealth social anthropologist, teaching in the science classrooms of a ****** middle school:

1- The black child (largely referring to males here) is highly driven by "rules of the 'gangsta' (read: black gangster) culture". A 'gangsta' is a label a white such as a teacher like me cannot apply to any black child, because it is almost a devilish notoriety that the child considers to be an insult. However, at the same time, they tacitly attempt to reach a kind of 'gangsta stature' among peers. Such a stature means you are viewed as exceedingly tough.

2- Toughness is the ultimate attainment. At the same time, I have heard no informal accolades bestowed upon others in the peer group to reflect this high status. At the same time, those determined to be weak or vulnerable are labeled "soft". Another title deserves mention. A friend among peers is called "my niggah". A black female student who apparently has some degree of admiration for me saw me in the halls one day and gave me the ultimate compliment by saying "Hi, my niggah." Sociologically, I would imagine that "my niggah" is the bond between those who perceive themselves to be oppressed or those who seem to acknowledge empathy/sympathy, some alignment with them. However, as you might imagine, it is absolutely taboo for a white teacher to call any black student "niggah" or "my niggah". In fact, the students often cite in the middle of verbal attacks on one another the prohibition for any teacher to say "damn, hell, you stupid, you jerk" or other such relatively benign name calling. A few times, I have let words slip out that warrant immediate red flags by students often in the middle of calling each other four letter words, or more often simply calling one another bitch, "ho", garbage or stupid "niggah".

3- The toughness battle is waged via verbal wars and physical encounters. This is often between the sexes, although a black girl is in my view quietly understood to be popular or in some way successful by being a frequent target of abuse and attacking back in some way physically or verbally. Most common content of attacks from males to females include: 1) You are "a ho", 2) Your "momma is a ho" 3) You're "very poor and I'm not" and 4) Brief sexual grabbings or whispered sexual insults only from boy to girl, not the other way around.. I'm usually not able to see the grabbing or hear the insults, but what I do see is a young black girl running after a black boy in the class slapping him.

4- I have seen a few real punches thrown between boy and girl, and a few between girls, but the most common physical encounter one sees is between boys, that is, in the vast majority of times a kind of rough-housing involving head locks, wrestling and punching in the mid- section. Usually there is mock anger. Rarely there is squaring off in serious sparring. This kind of fighting is extremely common and involves 90% of the boys in any one classroom, particularly in the low end of the IQ spectrum. There is also a Hollywood Western kind of simulation to the jousting, with make believe landed punches, but no shortage of real tackling and then stomping on the tackled one by several at once, as hunters over a nearly killed fallen deer. This is classroom behavior mind you. When I have tried to break up fights by simply pulling on a child's clothing, I am immediately cited for doing a proscribed act by the child. The child may be in the throes of being beaten up, in one case being thrown by several into a large garbage can, but when I made an attempt to intervene by trying to lift the child out of the can, he yelled at me "Don't touch me. Don't touch me. You can't touch me."

5- Aspersions boy to boy over each other's sexual prowess are very common. This kind of ranking is coupled with a frequent attempt to self-aggrandize one's status vis a vis the girls in the class. However, when I enter the fray with "I would agree, Wally here is no real object of any girl's affection", I am ignored by the same girls who had just laughed their head off at him. Wally, I might add, is a class clown and rabble rouser who actually enjoys some degree of begrudged popularity. Again, this is by way of simply being involved in many interactions with many different children in the class, rather than ever hearing any one boy or girl say anything nice about him.

6- I have seen many different white, hispanic and black children in various secondary school settings where I have taught here in *****, often as a substitute teacher. Since November, I have been a regular science teacher at the middle school I refer to in the above comments. It is 95% black, with the rest a smattering of white, Asian and Hispanic. What is very overwhelming to me is the racial difference in the degree of fighting, particularly physical fighting noted compared to non-black classroom settings. (In other schools dominated by blacks, in the case of my experience poor blacks such as my present location, there is again a culture of heavy physical fighting.) What is very intriguing to me is the answer to the question you have pondered through a great body of research, "To what degree is this physicality purely genetic?""

Update:

My correspondent adds further:

"I can use no legal physical force to stop fighting, a problem complicated by savvy students who cry the equivalent of "white brutality" or "racism" should I lay a finger on them.

I wish I could legally have a hidden camera in the room to show the magnitude of the fighting, and the associated sexual themes so dominant in the classroom. The male bear hugging of one another is almost homosexual in appearance. But there are few if any outwardly homosexual children. Such hugging of females if usually transient, then broken up by me verbally- usually the girl will follow orders; students are much less inclined to give intimate holds to the opposite sex in the classroom.(it's initiated only by boys). And female to female fighting is far less common than the most common interaction-male to male, with male to female holding solidly in second place.

The other day, I brought in a whistle to try and stem the incessant talking and yelling to one another. One student accused me of using it as if to quiet animals. I had no comment.

There are often other "tribal activities"- spontaneous singing of rap songs from artists heard on the radio and hair grooming- usually by girls to other girls but at times girls work on the hair of boys. There are also frequent bursts of group hip hop type dance and at other times spontaneous "drop a beat" sessions, during which one student will drum on a desk, while another raps improvisationally as others gather round nodding or saying the equivalent of periodic "amens"."






California bureaucrat puts unions ahead of schools

One example of where all California's "education" money goes. Cheaper construction costs not allowed. And the unions are now trying to get via a legal interpretation what they could not get via direct legislation

Attorney General Bill Lockyer is forbidding one school district from piggybacking on a second district's contract to buy modular classrooms and install them without seeking separate public bids. Lockyer's recent legal opinion may impose 90-day delays and up to $25 million in extra costs on cash-strapped school districts, said Mike Henning, a board member with the School Facility Manufacturers' Association, a Sacramento-based group that represents a dozen modular building makers. Districts aren't happy, said Thomas G. Duffy, legislative director and lobbyist for the California Coalition for Adequate School Housing. "They'll have to change what they're doing."

California school district administrators have used contract piggybacking for years to skip costly and time-consuming state rules that require them to seek competitive bids. One district uses another's competitive bid contract to quickly add classroom space - perhaps at a volume discount - and ease overcrowding amid enrollment surges. Modular facility builders often win such contracts, angering unionized construction firms and their workers who complain modular structures deny them a chance to bid on school projects.

Lockyer's opinion affects projects where several modular building components (wall and floor systems) are transported to a school and installed on a permanent foundation, not factory-built portable or relocatable classrooms delivered in two pieces and placed on temporary foundations. The opinion does not define what is meant by permanent foundation.

Kirtus Doupnik, co-owner of Gary Doupnik Manufacturing Inc., a Loomis-based family business that makes modular school buildings and other structures, said the opinion appears to favor conventional construction companies. "This could hurt 50 percent of my business, depending on how it plays out," said Doupnik, adding that lawyers are arguing what "permanent foundation" means. Doupnik is concerned the opinion might affect a deal he is discussing with Gilroy Unified School District in Monterey County for the purchase of two modular buildings and the lease of three more.

The California State Building & Construction Trades Council, which represents labor unions engaged in more conventional school construction, has endorsed Lockyer's campaign for state treasurer. Lockyer spokesman Tom Dresslar said Justice Department lawyers research and write opinions and are not influenced by campaign endorsements.

Last fall, Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a Senate bill that tried to resolve the dispute between advocates of modular and traditional school construction, saying restrictions on contract piggybacking would cause delays and cost overruns.

Source







Union rhetoric drives Australian parents from public schools

The community wants its own values taught to children, not necessarily those of teachers, writes Kevin Donnelly

Much of the education debate focuses on issues such as resources, standards and accountability and the respective quality and standing of government and non-government schools. Equally important, evidenced by the way politically correct teacher unions, professional associations and teacher academics define education as a key instrument in reshaping society, is the way the education system is used to promote a one-sided view of society. While it is wrong to say that education should be values-neutral, the traditional approach is one that sees education as impartial and balanced. Education is not indoctrination, and social engineering should not be confused with critical inquiry and searching for the truth.

On reading the 2005 and 2006 Australian Education Union annual general meeting speeches by the union's federal president Pat Byrne, it is clear she is in no doubt on the need to promote certain values and the union's right to shape the social debate and the work of schools. Byrne's 2006 speech attacks what she sees as a federally inspired, backward-looking education agenda, the Government's industrial relations policy and human rights record, the Prime Minister's response to the Cronulla riots, the Government's anti-terrorism legislation and what she sees as its conservative response to the availability of the abortion pill RU-486. Byrne describes 2006 as "the greatest period of social and political change since Australia's federation" and believes the AEU has a special role in influencing Australia's education system and how we define ourselves as a nation. She states: "The Australian union movement has a track record of over 100 years of shaping the very values that we regard as quintessentially Australian" and argues teacher unionists "need to continue to speak out, to fill the growing vacuum in thoughtful public discourse on issues of social justice and human rights".

Byrne's 2005 speech also places the union centre stage in the battle of ideas, when she states: "Through well articulated policies, courage, commitment and campaigning over more than a century, we have significantly influenced the way our society functions." In addition to arguing that unions best reflect Australian values, Byrne also contends, as a result of upholding values such as "empathy, responsibility, protection, fairness, fulfilment, freedom, honesty, trust, co-operation, strength, community", the AEU is the true guardian of the public education system.

Wrong on both accounts. Instead of reflecting mainstream opinions, the AEU, according to Byrne's own admission, champions a left-wing view of the world enmeshed in the culture wars against conservative values. In bemoaning the re-election of the Howard, Bush and Blair governments, the AEU president admits: "This is not a good time to be progressive in Australia; or for that matter anywhere else in the world." Anyone familiar with AEU policies will know the teacher union, along with other cultural elite groups such as the ABC, teacher academics and assorted artists and intellectuals, consistently attacks Australian society as socially unjust and champions a range of left-wing causes.

The union also argues that Australian society is riven with "inequality and social conflict" and that education, instead of representing a ladder of opportunity, reinforces privilege and meritocracy. The result? Given the union's commitment to overthrowing the status quo, the school curriculum is no longer impartial or balanced since teachers are asked to embrace a politically correct approach in areas such as gender, ethnicity and class.

Traditional academic studies, a belief in competition and the right of parents to choose non-government schools are all attacked by the AEU as simply ways by which the more privileged in society are able to maintain power and prestige. Equally as facile as the AEU's argument that it best represents mainstream values is Byrne's argument that the union is the guardian of the public education system. Instead of strengthening the government system, the union has been instrumental in causing the move to non-government schools.

By imposing a politically correct curriculum, in opposition to one with a strong academic focus, by adopting feel-good student reports where all are winners and by failing to hold teachers accountable for performance, the AEU undermines confidence in government schools. By becoming politically active in its support for the ALP, by aligning itself with the trade union movement and by refusing to free government schools from provider capture, the AEU also shows that it cares more about politics than it does about education.

Evidence that the AEU's approach to education is counterproductive is found in a survey carried out by Irving Saulwick and Associates. On being asked why they chose non-government schools, "respondents talked about the reduction, as they saw it, in educational standards -- a lack of rigour in teaching the 'three Rs', a lack of discipline and respect in schools, and poor teaching. "They did not think that all state-employed teachers were poor teachers. Far from it. But many did think that they were teaching under difficult conditions, and that some, who were poor teachers, could not be dismissed."

After reviewing NSW government schools, Tony Vinson, a defender of the public system, reaches a similar conclusion: "Some parents expressed doubts about the environment of such schools, the handling of unsatisfactory teachers, and whether sufficient emphasis is placed upon students' acquisition of good values." If Byrne and the AEU were serious about strengthening government schools, the way forward, as in the US and England, is with innovations such as charter schools and vouchers. Empowering local communities by allowing parents to establish charter schools improves standards and builds the types of values embedded in social capital.

Source

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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.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

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