Monday, September 23, 2019



UNC Board Steps Up to Defend Civil Discourse on Campus

An important new front in the culture war has opened up at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, one with major implications about intellectual diversity and how universities in North Carolina are to be governed.

The controversy concerns plans for a new “Program on Civic Virtue and Civil Discourse,” scheduled to begin in the Fall of 2021. The idea initiated with the UNC system’s Board of Governors and was further developed in discussions with Princeton University professor Robert George, who heads the James Madison Program in American Ideals at Princeton. George has been influential in the program’s creation, giving one address to the UNC system’s Board of Governors, and engaging in a public discussion about the importance of maintaining civil discourse with his colleague Cornel West at Duke University.

George has consulted on the matter regularly with Chris Clemens, another principal actor in the new program. Clemens, who now serves as the senior associate dean for research and innovation at the UNC-Chapel Hill College of Arts and Sciences, will be the program’s inaugural director until a full-time director is hired. Funding has been offered by anonymous donors, whose identities are being protected by the UNC Foundation.

It sounds like a very positive development for UNC-Chapel Hill. Knowledge of citizenship appears to be diminishing nationally, and the crucial concept of civil discourse seems to be in disarray in academia. Students’ inability to engage in civil discourse has led to such phenomena as “safe spaces,” and “trigger warnings.” Even moderate conservative invited speakers are shouted down and chased away. “Twitter mobs” hound any student who voices an unpopular opinion.

On the UNC campus, civil discourse is indeed threatened. Consider that the last major campus controversy—the removal of Silent Sam, a statue of a Confederate soldier—was essentially settled by the actions of a violent mob rather than through due process. And that authorities feel so threatened by even mentioning the topic that they have continually postponed its final resolution.

The new program appears to make an extremely important statement about the public dialogue, that civic virtue and civil discourse are essential values that will be given considerable attention. This is in accord with the mission statement and other fundamental documents.

Even so, the program has drawn the ire of some faculty. In a recent Raleigh News & Observer op-ed piece, UNC-Chapel Hill history professor Jay Smith and gender studies professor Karen Booth argued for a “resolution” against the new program that, at latest count, has been signed by over 100 faculty members. (The resolution has since failed to advance). Among the reasons they list why development of the program should cease are a perceived lack of transparency, the perception that the program’s courses are redundant with course offerings already in place, and the conservative leanings of the main drivers of the program.

But their major point of contention cuts to the heart of university governance—who really controls the main product of the university, its intellectual content? For decades, there has been the concept of “shared governance,” in which the faculty controls the curriculum, supposedly with board oversight (which, although statutory, is rarely used by the board except for reducing programs with low enrollment).  This arrangement is supported by both the American Association of University Professors and the Association of Governing Boards.

Smith and Booth described two ways in which the new program’s development conflicts with this shared governance tradition. One is that the board initiated the idea for the program rather than the faculty. The other is the exclusion of the UNC faculty from the decision to create such a program and from its subsequent development.

Smith and Booth treated these board actions as a threat to faculty control of the curriculum and treated as some sort of violation of shared governance.

Furthermore, their legitimate concerns about the lack of transparency seem to suggest the board’s conduct is nefarious; the perceived redundancy suggests that the program is unnecessary or arbitrary; and the conservative political beliefs of Clemens and George make the program appear to be politically motivated.

But Smith and Booth are wrong on most counts. Most important, there is no violation of governance. The BOG is the final authority in the university system. According to State Law #116-11:

The Board shall determine the functions, educational activities and academic programs of the constituent institutions.

According to the Association of Governing Boards:

Governing boards are stewards of the whole of the institution, not just its financial components or strategic plan…a central responsibility of an institution’s governing board is to define and uphold that institution’s educational mission.

Surely no value in higher education is more important than the spirit of free inquiry—the search for truth without restrictions (academic freedom). As such it is the board’s duty to defend that spirit. One of the biggest mistakes the faculty objectors are making is they are treating their dominance in the shared governance arrangement as an end, not a means. The true end—perhaps the most important one of all in higher education—is that the university should maintain the spirit of free inquiry.

SOURCE 





Education Department says Duke-UNC Middle East studies program favors Islam over Christianity, Judaism

The US Department of Education is threatening to revoke a university Middle East studies program's federal funding, alleging -- among other complaints -- that its curriculum fails to address the plight of the region's Christians and Jews.

In a letter to Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which jointly run the Consortium for Middle East Studies, Assistant Secretary Robert King says the program lacks balance.

It offers "few, if any, programs focused on the historic discrimination faced by, and current circumstances of, religious minorities in the Middle East, including Christians, Jews, Baha'is, Yadizis, Kurds, Druze, and others," King writes.

The letter, published in the Federal Register, says that in materials for elementary and secondary students and teachers, "there is a considerable emphasis placed on ... understanding the positive aspects of Islam, while there is an absolute absence of any similar focus on the positive aspects of Christianity, Judaism, or any other religion or belief system in the Middle East.

"This lack of balance of perspectives is troubling and strongly suggests that Duke-UNC CMES is not meeting (the) legal requirement" to provide a "full understanding" of the region, the letter states. King also accused the program of failing to adequately prioritize language instruction.

CNN has reached out for comment to the consortium's centers at both universities, the UNC Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies and the Duke University Middle East Studies Center.
The Education Department declined to discuss the letter when contacted for comment.

The consortium receives funding under Title VI, whose funds are meant for cultural and language programs designed to develop experts.

King instructed the program to prove that it will restructure its materials in accordance with funding requirements.

"As a condition for future Title VI funding, the Duke-UNC CMES is directed to provide a revised schedule of activities that it plans to support for the coming year, including a description demonstrating how each activity promotes foreign language learning and advances the national security interests and economic stability of the United States," the letter says.

SOURCE 





Australia: Elite Brisbane college shunning kids with learning problems

There have always been separate classes for gifted children and backward students so why has this furore arisen?  It is the rage of parents who are forced for the first time to face the fact that their kid is not bright and therefore has limited prospects.  There are many private schools in Brisbane and some would undoubtedy be ready to accept the  rejected  enrolees from Churchie. It appears that some have

ONE of Queensland's most prestigious schools is under fire over claims by parents that children with poor grades and learning difficulties are being excluded in a ruthless bid to boost academic performance.

Furious parents, including big financial donors and third-generation old boys, have slammed Anglican Church Grammar School (known as Churchie) as discriminatory and elitist. Speaking on condition of anonymity, they have told of distressed children made to feel "dumb" and inferior.

They claim that students as young as five are being denied enrolment, while those in older primary are being asked to find another high school.

This fresh scandal comes after The Courier-Mail revealed lower-performing seniors were pressured to stay home from the Queensland Core Skills Test (which helps decide OP scores) this month.

A third-generation parent said the East Brisbane school claimed to be non-selective but was turning away boys with dyslexia or deemed "not bright enough, even for Prep". "It's about lifting academic performance, but it's wrong," said the man, whose son does not have learning issues.

Another father said he was "shell-shocked" when his younger boy was "rejected". "My older son was already at the school and I, my father, my grandfather and my cousins all boarded there," he said

"We were going through the normal enrolment procedure and I said, 'by the way, this boy has dyslexic tendencies, how do we go forward?' "Never in our wildest dreams did we think he'd be discriminated against, to be told Churchie was not the school for him; I was in tears."

Emails seen by The Courier-Mail confirm the parents were told the school could not accommodate the child. "My boy was devastated," the father said. "We know of at least a dozen other families this has happened to, but we are speaking out because we want change."

 Dyslexia affects one in five people and creates problems with reading and language, however, experts agree when traditional learning is replaced with other strategies, children can achieve well.

Frustrated parents have even offered to fund a Churchie program to assist dyslexic children, but it's understood this has been refused.

Many have withdrawn their children and sent them elsewhere, including Brisbane Boys' College (BBC), St Joseph's Nudgee College and The Southport School (TSS), which offer boarding.

A second-generation old boy, who boarded at Churchie in the 1980s, described the situation as "disgusting". The western Queensland man refused to send his three sons to the school after his eldest, then in Year 6, was "ruled out" due to dyslexia.

"We had an interview and they basically said he's not smart enough; it was pretty degrading," he said. "Who are they to think they can take the cream of the crop?

From the Courier Mail 21/9/19



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