I remember how it was -- JR
Progressives Have Captured Another Institution: Commencement Addresses
Time was when many commencement speeches at major universities were about America and its values and what graduates could expect in the future. In recent years, they have become a political capstone on the progressive ideas imposed upon them in their classes and textbooks.
This year has been no different. While an occasional token conservative or Republican is invited, most speakers are liberal in their political beliefs and promote activist causes.
Here are just a few examples from a long list.
Augustana College: Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill.
Bard College: Deb Haaland, secretary of the Department of the Interior.
Brandeis University: Deval Patrick, former governor of Massachusetts.
Clark University: Mary Frances Berry, civil rights activist.
Harvard Law School: Loretta Lynch, former U.S. attorney general.
There are many more you can Google, but the picture is clear. Most major universities, while giving lip service to “diversity,” don’t believe in diversity of opinion.
Perhaps the most troubling of this June’s commencement addresses was not just the main speaker at Harvard’s Law School commencement, but a prominent and soon-to-be powerful and influential person who attended.
The main speaker was New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, whose preferred topic appeared to be “LGBTQ-plus.” She bragged that her deputy is an “openly gay man.” She also touted her country’s approval of same-sex marriage and its progress on “climate change.” This presumably is supposed to inspire graduates to embrace her views, if they don’t already share them. Why wouldn’t they after what they’ve been taught, watched what is promoted in the media, and endured the peer pressure of like-minded students?
Among those attending the ceremony was Supreme Court justice-designate Ketanji Brown Jackson. When Ardern reached the part in her address in which she referenced New Zealand’s ban on “military-style semi-automatics and assault rifles,” Jackson applauded.
As Congress debates which, if any, weapons to ban, this issue could come before the Supreme Court. It was inappropriate for Jackson to seemingly telegraph her opinion in advance. Notice how the justices never applaud at a president’s State of the Union Address. That should be Jackson’s model.
What a contrast between Ardern’s remarks and another commencement address delivered at Harvard on June 8, 1978, by Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn. His speech drew the ire of some faculty and The New York Times editorial page, because it didn’t fit in with their ideological perspectives.
While Solzhenitsyn called Western systems “best,” he indicted the West for its lack of courage: “A decline in courage may be the most striking feature which an outside observer notices in the West in our days. The Western world has lost its civil courage, both as a whole and separately, in each country, each government, each political party, and, of course, in the United Nations.
Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling groups and the intellectual elite, causing an impression of loss of courage by the entire society. Of course, there are many courageous individuals, but they have no determining influence on public life.”
He added: “Should one point out that from ancient times declining courage has been considered the beginning of the end?”
Solzhenitsyn was a modern prophet. Many speakers at recent commencement ceremonies are more pathetic than prophetic.
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De Blasio’s HS-admission lottery could destroy NYC’s public-school system
The cockamamie system imposed during the last mayor’s last days in office no longer put a premium on good grades; it lowered the bar for entry into many competitive high schools and mixed kids with a range of academic achievement into various bingo baskets.
As a result, some of the city’s best students opened their admission letters Thursday only to learn they didn’t get into any of their top choices.
High-achievers of all backgrounds are asking: “What’s the point of striving for all As and perfect attendance? There’s no reward for excellence, and half-stepping can still get you into the best school.”
It’s not just that the nation’s largest — and fast-shrinking — school district is telling kids and parents: “Good grades don’t matter.” Families that care about education will now look outside the DOE system for a high school that will challenge their kids. Many will join the angry mom who told The Post she and her family are now looking at leaving the city entirely.
We warned Chancellor David Banks about this months ago; now he’s stuck with this mess. At a bare minimum, he needs to make it plain that future admissions will be far more like the traditional process Blas blew up.
If the system no longer strongly rewards merit, the flight from DOE schools — and from the city itself — will become a flood.
https://nypost.com/2022/06/09/de-blasios-hs-admission-lottery-could-destroy-nyc-public-schools/
************************************************Star-studded LA high school is sued by Jewish father for its 'racially divisive, anti-Semitic' curriculum which branded Jews 'oppressors'
A star-studded Los Angeles high school is being sued by a parent for its allegedly 'racially divisive, anti-Semitic' curriculum – and may soon face more lawsuits, the parent's lawyer claims.
Celebrity alumni of Brentwood School, a private K-12, include Jonah Hill, Adam Levine and Jack Quaid, and parents of alumni include Arnold Schwarzenegger, Reese Witherspoon and Jack Nicholson.
In a lawsuit filed in a Los Angeles court on Wednesday, a Jewish parent of a former 8th grade student at the $50,000-per-year school said the girl was booted after he complained about alleged anti-semitic discrimination in its new woke curriculum installed after the death of George Floyd.
The school says the claims are 'baseless' and a 'work of whole fiction'.
Frustrated father Jerome Eisenberg is suing the school for breach of contract, violation of the Unruh Civil Rights Act – which protects individuals from discrimination by California businesses – and intentional infliction of emotional distress, among other claims.
The news of the lawsuit being filed was first published by LA site The Ankler.
Eisenberg said he was happy with the school until the summer of 2020, when the death of George Floyd at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer led to an alleged ideological overhaul of the school's policies and teaching.
He accused the school of holding racially segregated meetings, encouraging students to treat Jewish people as 'oppressors', and discriminating against a Jewish group of parents.
'Everything at Brentwood radically changed after the death of George Floyd,' the lawsuit said.
'After accepting parents' tuition payments, Defendants Brentwood and its head of school, Michael Riera, pulled a bait-and-switch with the school's curriculum and culture.'
Eisenberg claimed the school replaced its traditional teaching with 'an identity-based ideology of grievance, resentment, and racial divisiveness' and 'started indoctrinating [students] into what to think, based on Brentwood's preferred political fad of the moment.'
In the girl's literature class, To Kill a Mockingbird and Lord of the Flies were replaced by Ibram X. Kendi's Stamped, which Eisenberg said included 'ahistorical, racially inflammatory perspectives on this country's history with no legitimate pedagogical purpose.'
'[The] English Department told parents that if they wanted their children to read Shakespeare or Hemingway, they should do it in their own free time,' the legal complaint said.
The changes were made secretly and 'withheld from parents', Eisenberg claimed, while Jewish parents were 'prevented from participating in the school's policy-making decisions' due to the school's alleged 'anti-Semitic animus'.
A source close to the dispute told DailyMail.com that 40% of Brentwood students were Jewish and claimed that Eisenberg was in a tiny minority of disgruntled parents.
'The curriculum changes have not affected interest in Brentwood. In fact, more people have wanted to come to Brentwood than ever before,' the source said.
A parent at the school, who also asked to remain anonymous, said: 'It's only a few parents who have a problem with the changes to the curriculum. The students by and large, including my own, have no problem with it.'
The parent said they didn't trust Eisenberg, having discovered he had previous charges for fraud dating back to the 1990s.
According to a 1993 LA Times article, Eisenberg and his realtor client were charged with improperly inflated real estate values in loan transactions allowing them to obtain $6million.
According to federal court records, Eisenberg, a former lawyer, pleaded guilty to mail fraud and bank embezzlement in 2000, was sentenced to a year in prison and resigned from the California bar.
Eisenberg's lawyer claimed that the furious father is just the first in a growing number of parents considering legal action against the school.
'I can tell you for a fact that there are dozens of parents who support what Jerry's doing,' attorney David Pivorak told DailyMail.com in an exclusive interview. 'Jerome Eisenberg is by far not not alone in this.'
He added that other parents had approached him for representation, and that 'it's not out of the question' that Eisenberg's complaint would become a class action lawsuit.
Pivorak added that the girl's removal from Brentwood School was 'devastating' to her.
'For someone her age, 13 or 14, it's jarring and it's devastating, because you're no longer with your friends. You have to completely reorganize your life. It's tough having to make new friends, especially for a young girl,' he said.
'When you're suddenly pulled away from [your community] because your school decides to discriminate against you and single out your group, and you're punished because of that, it's kind of jarring.'
Pivorak said he believes parents are afraid to speak out against woke new curricula for fear of being 'canceled'.
'You have a lot of very unhappy parents who, in woke progressive LA, are terrified to stand up and oppose this stuff,' he said.
'With the cancel culture that's been proliferating throughout the country, standing up and opposing the woke regime is akin to having a scarlet letter on your forehead. You're ostracized from your friend group, you're ostracized from society in general.
'Not only are they afraid to lose their social standing, but they're also afraid of what's going to happen to their kids, their college admissions letters and their ability to proceed in life.'
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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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