I remember how it was -- JR
Sunday, July 09, 2023
University rescinds reprimand for professor who failed student for using term ‘biological woman’
I guess it's very wrong of me but I see this as a case of an ugly b*tch of a professr trying to hurt a good-looking student
The University of Cincinnati [UC] on Thursday reversed its reprimand for a professor who failed a student for using the term “biological woman.”
The reprimand was issued on June 14 by the head of the Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at UC, to penalize gender studies professor Melanie Nipper after she failed student Olivia Krolczyk’s assignment for citing biological science.
According to the Cincinnati Enquirer, Nipper’s reprimand will be removed from her personnel file. Nipper is still required to complete training about the university’s free speech policy and submit a syllabus to her department head.
Per the Cincinnati Enquirer, Nipper filed an appeal request and met on-campus with administrators. After the appeal request was filed, the UC decided that the reprimand was “issued in error.”
Nipper argued that failing the student was not in violation of UC’s free speech policy.
Krolczyk sent a statement to the Cincinnati Enquirer about UC rescinding the reprimand.
“UC is affirming that professors will have no consequences for failing students with dissenting opinions… they will not uphold a student’s rights to free speech and will take no action to ensure that the educators hired are acting in a professional manner,” Krolczyk said.
Fox News Digital previously reported on Krolczyk posting a TikTok video last month explaining that she received a zero on her project proposal about transgender athletes competing in women’s sports because she used the term “biological women.”
The gender studies professor, Nipper, had told her that “the terms ‘biological women’ are exclusionary and are not allowed in this course as they further reinforce heteronormativity. Please reassess your topic and edit it to focus on women’s rights (not just “females”) and I’ll regrade.”
“How am I supposed to do my project if I can’t use the term ‘biological women?’” Krolczyk asked in her TikTok video.
Nipper was ordered to complete free speech training after she penalized a student for citing biological science.
Since then, Krolczyk has received a new grade and finished her class with an A, but her former professor has faced a less flattering fate.
The Cincinnati Enquirer obtained a copy of a formal reprimand from UC informing Nipper that she violated school policy. According to the paper, “The reprimand directs adjunct instructor Melanie Nipper to complete training about UC’s free speech policy and submit her syllabi for the coming school year to her department head.”
The Cincinnati Enquirer obtained a copy of a formal reprimand from UC informing Nipper that she violated school policy. According to the paper, “The reprimand directs adjunct instructor Melanie Nipper to complete training about UC’s free speech policy and submit her syllabi for the coming school year to her department head.”
The letter also demanded that “you must complete training on the requirements of the Campus Free Speech Policy” and that she “submit all syllabi” for review and approval “at least two weeks prior to the beginning of classes.”
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School principal leaves job to home-school her children, says education system suffering 'deep rooted' issues
A former private school principal, Mandy Davis, shared her concerns about the exodus of well-qualified teachers leading to unfit educators in public schools.
Parents should worry that the ongoing exodus of experienced teachers will harm their kids' education since under-qualified applicants could start filling vacancies, a former private school principal told Fox News.
"Every time one of those amazing, qualified and caring educators leaves the field, it just it gets you a little bit because you know how many kids they were serving," Mandy Davis, a private school principal turned home-school mom, told Fox News. "If our solution is 'let's just bring in somebody,' I'm not sure that's an environment we want our children staying in."
School districts nationwide have struggled with teachers fleeing the profession since the COVID-19 pandemic, with 45% of public schools operating without a full teaching staff in October 2022, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. Some states have amended or considered amending state laws to relax teacher certification requirements to alleviate the shortage.
"There are teachers that are burning out and are saying ‘the classroom is not a safe place for me, the classroom is not somewhere where I can do what I set out to do and teach and have accountability over my classroom,’" Davis said. "Those are concerning."
Davis began teaching in 2008 and advanced her education career all the way to becoming a private school principal in Central Oregon. But the former principal quit in June 2022 to home-school her three kids.
"Initially, that's what got me into education, was wanting to be a change for as many students as I could," Davis said. "Coming to the realization that there are just these deeper rooted issues throughout the system that can prevent even teachers still today from doing their job and doing what they set out to do, it ultimately did lead me to leave."
Former school principal responds to teacher shortage
Davis says many factors led to her decision to home-school her kids, including a lack of child-led learning and concerns over well-qualified teachers exiting the workforce among other reasons. (Fox News Digital)
The former educator told Fox News that declining student behavior and the inability to change outdated curricula and policies were some of the many reasons she left the traditional school system. For her own kids, she said the exodus of well-qualified teachers, one-on-one instruction and political bias in classroom discussions also played roles in her decision to home-school.
Davis first switched her two oldest kids to private school in 2019 before moving them to home education. Her youngest is only 18 months old but will join his siblings when he's old enough.
"I saw a lot of gaps in our school system and the direction that the schools are moving, both with student behavior and teacher shortages and what's happening inside the classroom," Davis said. "It was not an environment that I thought promoted learning and promoted the life that I wanted my children to experience."
Between February 2020 and May 2022, 300,000 public school teachers and other staff left the field, The Wall Street Journal reported last year. Even after a hiring spree, there's still 165,000 fewer staff than at the onset of the pandemic, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
The majority of vacancies reported in March 2022 were a result of resignations rather than layoffs or retirement, according to the National Center of Education Statistics. Meanwhile, more than one-third of teachers said they’re likely to quit in the next two years, according to the Merrimack College Teacher Survey, which polled 1,200 teachers in January 2023.
"I’m not surprised by that number at all, especially the way that we're trending," Davis said. "I think it's important for parents to not only see it as a concern of why are all these teachers leaving, but to ask who is going to come in, and what's the solution going to be."
In Oregon, where Davis worked, the state allows for emergency licensed teachers to step in during urgent circumstances, leading to 438 such hires statewide during the 2021-2022 school year, up from 181 the year prior, according to the Teacher Standards and Practices Commission. The emergency licensed teachers aren't required to have prior teaching experience or training and can work in a full-time teaching position at a school for up to one year.
"Is that the best environment for our children's education?" Davis said. "For me, that was enough to make that school choice."
"If there are other educators wondering what they should do, I would just say to lean into your family first and think through what your children need," she said. "And if that's being met, then it just becomes more of a personal decision."
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JD Vance Putting Universities on Notice When It Comes to Complying With Affirmative Action Ruling
Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court effectively ended affirmative action with a series of decisions out of Harvard and the University of North Carolina (UNC). To say that the left is not pleased would be putting it politely.
In case any college or university gets the idea to not comply, though, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH) is putting them on notice with a letter he sent on Thursday to the presidents of elite schools, including those in Vance's state of Ohio. Not only did Vance write to "express concern," he also called on those presidents to preserve documents after they expressed "openly defiant and potentially unlawful reaction" to the Harvard decision.
Despite the ruling being as clear as it was, Vance's letter pointed out that "within hours of the decision's pronouncement, you and your institutions expressed open hostility to the decision and seemed to announce an intention to circumvent it."
His letter includes examples from 10 university presidents, including from Princeton, Oberlin, Dartmouth, Harvard. Cornell, Kenyon, Yale, Brown, the University of Pennsylvania, and Columbia.
A Fox News report summarized some of the reactions included in Vance's letter:
"Princeton President [Christopher] Eisgruber complained that the Court’s decision was ‘unwelcome and disappointing’ and vowed to pursue ‘diversity . . . with energy, persistence, and a determination to succeed despite the restrictions imposed by the Supreme Court in its regrettable decision today,’" Vance recounted.
"Oberlin President [Twillie] Ambar felt ‘deeply saddened and concerned for the future of higher education’ when the Supreme Court’s ruling was announced," he continued. "She assured her students and faculty that, rather than dampening her enthusiasm for affirmative action policies, the decision ‘only strengthens our determination to be a welcoming place where diversity is celebrated.’"
"Harvard President [Lawrence] Bacow boasted that ‘[f]or almost a decade, Harvard has vigorously defended an admissions system’ that the Supreme Court ruled unlawful and then ‘reaffirm[ed] the fundamental principle that deep and transformative teaching, learning, and research depend upon a community comprising people of many backgrounds, perspectives and lived experiences[.]’"
Vance's letter makes note of colleagues who "have assured me that they share my concern that colleges and universities, and particularly the elite institutions to whom this letter is addressed, do not respect the Court's judgment and will covertly. defy a landmark civil rights decision with which they disagree."
Speaking of another landmark decision, Vance reminded the presidents of the painful consequences of schools refusing to abide by the Brown v. Board of Education decision from 1954. "In one infamous case" regarding reaction to that case, as Vance pointed to, "Virginia Governor Thomas B. Stanley responded to the decision... by pledging to show 'the rest of the country [that] racial integration is not going to be accepted in the South' and by vowing to organize 'massive resistance' in the Southern States. Violence and racial animosity ensued."
As the senator's letter indicates, his authority is not just limited to strong words. "The United States Senate is prepared to use its full investigative powers to uncover circumvention, covert or otherwise, of the Supreme Court’s ruling. You are advised to retain admissions documents in anticipation of future congressional investigations, including digital communications between admissions officers, any demographic or other data compiled during future admissions cycles, and other relevant materials. As you are aware, a number of federal criminal statutes regulate the destruction of records connected to federal investigations, some of which apply prior to the formal commencement of any inquiry," he pointed out.
The letter concludes by asking several questions of the university presidents to indicate compliance, including:
What procedures will your institution implement to ensure that records are retained in accordance with this letter?
What instructions are you giving staff about their obligations to preserve records in anticipation of a potential investigation? Please inform me of the date and nature of such instructions?
Has your staff ever been advised not to preserve records or to communicate internally in ways that could circumvent future inquiries? If so, please discuss the date and nature of such advisements.
How will your institutions ensure that new admissions practices do not "simply establish ... the regime" that the Supreme Court has held unlawful?
What admissions practices previously employed by your institutions will now be forbidden?
If you have publicly committed to an interest in "diversity," how will you ensure that your commitment to that value does not entail direct or indirect race-based preferences?
Vance expects answers by July 21.
Fox News noted that they reached out to Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Dartmouth, Cornell, Brown, the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia, Oberlin College and Kenyon College about the letter. While a spokesperson for Harvard pointed to a statement that said the university "will certainly comply with the Court’s decision," no other schools had responded.
A report from Cleveland.com, however, did include a statement from Oberlin spokesperson Andrea Simakis who indicated the school is reviewing the decision. "Oberlin will comply with the law," she said in part.
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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)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
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