Category Archives: Education

The Constitution and Christmas

Posted on by
4

Last Sunday the wife’s Sunday school class on making Christmas less stressful and more meaningful went really well. At least for the first fifty minutes. During the last ten it devolved into a gripe session about public school and state government political correctness. Then on Monday a grad student of mine sent me an email conveying the same things. Here’s an excerpt. “At the top of the Senate, there arose such a clatter to eliminate Jesus, in all public matter. And we spoke not a word, as they took away our faith. Forbidden to speak of salvation and grace. The true Gift of Christmas was exchanged and discarded. The reason for the season , stopped before it started.”

At the end of the Sunday school class I sat in silence because I knew there was nothing I could say in a few minutes that would change anyone’s mind. Good thing probably because the teach may not have appreciated my stirring the pot. But that pot needs to be stirred.

Here’s what my conservative evangelical Christian friends would have me believe. The “founding fathers” were Christians and we are a Christian nation, a shining city upon a hill. As a result, public schools and other public places should allow the public expression of Christian faith whatever the form: the posting of the Ten Commandments, group prayer, the singing of Christian songs at Christmas, or the display of nativities or crosses. For the majority, Christianity is our common heritage, the national default if you will. People of other faiths should go ahead and celebrate in whatever ways they want in private, but as a distinct minority, they shouldn’t expect public schools and public places to accommodate their preferences.

In contrast, I believe the following.

1) We are a religiously pluralistic nation made up of many Christians mixed together with Jews, Moslems, Buddhists, atheists, and on and on.

2) Our greatest strength is our Constitution which protects minority rights against majority rule and creates a level playing field with respect to citizens’ diverse religious beliefs. Mutual respect undergirds that neutrality and enables us to peacefully co-exist.

3) Selflessness is a central tenet of Christianity; as a result, Christians should take some time to think about what it would be like if public schools and places were primarily Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, or anti-religious. The alternative is for Christians to forgo selflessness, devalue Christianity, and continue to insist on a “majority wins” approach to governing public places.

4) The “wall of separation between church and state” principle is misunderstood by Christians who instinctively view it as problematic. Christianity can be taught in public schools as long as it’s done in a comparative, non-evangelical way. Many Christians conflate religious neutrality and anti-religiousness.

5) One Sunday schooler took a swipe at Kwanza and “other minor religious celebrations.” Christians who complain about religious neutrality in public schools and public spaces are struggling to come to grips with the fact that demographics have changed in the United States and they resent that they have to change any aspect of how they grew up experiencing Christmas. It’s difficult to exaggerate the deep symbolic meaning Christmas-oriented language and music in public schools from yesteryear has on many middle-aged and elderly Christians.

6) It’s utterly and completely ludicrous for Christians to suggest anyone is “forbidden to speak of salvation and grace”. It compromises their credibility as thinking people. How much of an adult Christian’s life is spent in public schools and spaces, five percent? Ninety-five percent of the time there’s absolute freedom to speak of one’s religious beliefs and convictions in whatever way one chooses. The “forbidden” argument couldn’t be more disingenuous and it makes a mockery of believers of different faiths who are truly persecuted by their governments.

7) The historical Jesus lived in a religiously diverse world. Instead of complaining that the first century world in which he lived wasn’t explicitly Christian enough, he focused on spreading his message through example, and in essence, competing on a level playing field. Christians today should do the same.

Right to Bear Arms

Posted on by
7

The “Washington sniper” has been executed and Fort Hood’s Hasan is probably next. IF I understand correctly, here’s what the right would have us believe about these heinous crimes and how best to prevent future tragedies of their ilk. Mental illness is an excuse concocted by public defenders simply trying to save the lives of their clients. We’d greatly reduce violent crimes if we’d apply the second amendment right to bear arms so that private citizens (or members of the military on bases) can defend themselves from criminals who carry high powered guns. For every violent criminal there would be thousands of private citizens capable of shooting them dead in their tracks at the first signs of their weapons. We’d further reduce violent crimes (and save money and provide relief to the victim’s families) if we’d put these violent criminals to death more often. Increase executions and make violent criminals think twice before they kill innocent people.

Polling shows U.S. citizens are almost equally divided on the death penalty. I can’t imagine any scenario in which the “right to bear arms/death penalty hawks” are going to convince the “gun control/life in prison doves” to alter their thinking and vice-versa.

What to do?

Maybe we should just divide the country into 25 “hawk” and 25 “dove” states. Pick one representative of each view and have them take turns picking states for everyone else. Since I disagree with almost everything in paragraph one, I nominate myself for the doves, and my first pick is Washington State. Clint Eastwood, representing the Hawks, will no doubt take California which I’m not happy about at all. My second pick, Oregon.

For practical reasons, residents of hawk and dove states will be allowed to travel freely into ideological enemy territory; however, they will have to agree to adapt to life in ideological enemy territory. For example, Clint will have to leave his gun at home when he flies to Seattle and I will have to avoid committing a violent crime when visiting California lest I be fired upon by private citizens and/or executed by Ahrnold. Social scientists can do longitudinal studies on the quality of life in each set of states.

Problem solved. Happy to help.

Word Play

Posted on by
4

Much to the chagrin of traditionalists, the English language is dynamic as annual updates to dictionaries illustrate. The numerous ways we engage with the internet is one catalyst for change.

In my blogging I’ve recently discovered an important language gap. What do you call it when a commenter’s (e.g. Francis’s, Michael’s) reply is more insightful and engaging than the original post? Exactly, there’s no such word. So, unless any of you have a better idea, from now on I will refer to such comments as “sops”, which stands for “supersedes original post”. Here’s some possible forms it might take. “Man, the recent run-up in sops has been a bit  embarrassing.” Or “Yo dude, better raise your game, you’ve been getting mega-sopped lately.” Or “Stop sopping me or start your own damn blog.”

Shifting gears, what’s with the egregious overuse of “nation” to demarcate group identity? The Colbert Nation, Raider Nation, Bruin Nation, fill-in-the-blank Nation. (When describing the current administration’s policies, my right-wing friends forgo the space and just go with Obamanation.) Maybe I should rename the blog “Ron Nation”, “Byrnes Nation”, or “A, L, to the Dizzle Nation”. Maybe this “nation” overload is a reaction to every nation’s ebbing sovereignty. As a global citizen I hereby declare myself a member of the United Nations Nation, a sometimes maligned group, but they have a much better record than Raider Nation.

Unless you’re sleepwalking through this post, you noticed a little hip hop somethin’ somethin’ smack dab in the middle of the previous paragraph. That’s right, a new nickname, thanks to ‘dra. I call Alexandra, one of my daughter’s friends, ‘dra because when you’re my age and an endurance athlete you have to conserve energy. Calling my daughters’ friends by their nicknames drives said daughter crazy, so being semi-stuck in adolescence, I do it more. Fortunately, ‘dra doesn’t mind and she’s one of my favs. The other day in the middle of swim practice she gave me a new nickname. That’s right, from Ronald, “A,L, to the dizzle.”

Nicknames are funny. They’re given to you and there’s nothing you can do about it. I’ve had some I’ve liked over the years, Rook (from an older friend), Rhode Island Red, H.D. (for Heavy Duty), and now, “A, L, to the dizzle.” Let me pause here and ask the best editor on the planet a question. Mom, should I be capitalizing the “D”? I’ve reluctantly embraced other nicknames like “Slip” and some that are not appropriate for the family audience. Slip stems from my tendency to sometimes lie down on the street and rest when running in the winter. I admit, I can be vertically challenged.

As a parting gift, a word for you to begin dropping into conversation, bifurcate, split or divide into two. It’s important to ease into it’s use though. Once it rolls off your tongue you can proceed to bifurcated, bifurcation, and if you’re really feeling it, bifurcating. It’s a perfectly balanced word in that your use of it won’t cause the guy on the stool next to you to call you a “pretentious, elitist ass,” but at the same time he’ll know you read more than the sports page. Sample sentence. Saturday’s bifurcated run included a longer, steady segment, followed by a shorter, faster one.

Ideologues

Posted on by
2

I have some close friends whose politics are almost the complete opposite of mine. Our friendships endure because their personal attributes trump their whacked out politics :). Occasionally, one likes to send me ultra conservative mass emails “just to keep you up to date on what we crazy right-wingers are passing around these days to keep our morale up.”

Sunday’s was a video mocking how successful Barack Obama has been considering he graduated from a “community organizer community college”. Occasionally, I’ll crack a smile. They’re rarely good, but this one was particularly bad.

For satire or comedy to work, there has to be an element of truth in it. President Obama has an impressive education history that I suspect some of my friends on the right would wrongly attribute to affirmative action.

Much of the credit probably goes to his no-nonsense mother who demanded excellence. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and the President and his wife, whose parents were equally demanding apparently, are holding their daughters to the same high standards. The right won’t acknowledge this, but the President hasn’t used race as an excuse for not achieving. What’s more traditional and conservative than two married parents holding their daughters to very high educational expectations? The power of their personal and parenting examples seem lost on the right.

I don’t know, but my guess is my conservative friends can’t bring themselves to acknowledge that Obama’s well-educated and a committed and caring parent because it doesn’t fit into their intensely negative narrative they’ve crafted. Acknowledging these points might lead to a slippery slope of having to concede other things that might compromise their conservative street cred. Short of eliminating taxes, privatizing everything, and doubling the size of the military, there’s nothing Obama can say or do over the next 2.5 or 6.5 years to change their negative opinions.

For someone who sees subtleties, nuance, and ambiguity around every corner, this is exasperating, but I have to concede that for every right-wing ideologue, there’s a left-wing one somewhere that, because of their passionate dislike of his policies, never could bring themself to acknowledge George Bush the man had redeemable qualities.

Somewhat related to this, can’t help but notice an increasing percentage of lefties are becoming disillusioned with the President. He’s brought some of it upon himself by raising expectations so fast on so many fronts. Take all the references to a “post-partisan era” as just one example. And there’s some truth in the overarching criticism that too often he acts as if he’s still in campaign-mode, trying hard not to offend instead of leading boldly. And I still wish he’d narrow his focus.

Our collective expectations for our presidents are probably too high. Maybe our problems have become too complex and our politics too corrupted by special interest money for any president to achieve Lincoln or FDR-like greatness anymore. Maybe we’d be better off pursing personal excellence closer to home, in the ways we listen, parent, educate, care for other others, work, and conduct our lives more generally.

Hyundai’s Military Discount

Posted on by
15

I was on-line shopping for a Hyundai recently when I discovered they offer a $500 discount to members of the military.

Is it possible to question that practice without being labeled ungrateful and un-American? I assume it’s meant as a special “thank you” for those people whose service enables us to exercise civil liberties and enjoy our way of life.

But I’ve always felt that argument was incomplete not just because it exonerates the military from its occasional abuses of power, but because it slights the admittedly more subtle, but equally important contributions some civilian members of society make to our security.

More specifically, why privilege members of the military over my friend that’s taught in a South Central Los Angeles middle school for twenty four years, or my friend that runs a homeless shelter in L.A., or my friend that served as a Peace Corp volunteer for three years in West Africa?

Granted, they haven’t risked their lives in the exact same way, but haven’t they contributed to our security in tangible, powerful, and in the end, equally meaningful ways?

Hyundai is receiving increasing acclaim as the “most improved” car maker. I’m going to wait for them to introduce the educators’, non-profit NGO, and Peace Corp $500 discount before I jump on their bandwagon.

Dear Arne and Obama

Posted on by
3

Dear Arne and Obama,

Read you want to extend the traditional 180 day, 1,146 hour school year because “Young people in other countries are going to school, 25, 30 percent longer than our students here and the challenges of a new century demand more time in the classroom.”  That begs these questions:

• Why do kids in the Asian countries that outscore U.S. students on math and science tests—Singapore, Taiwan, Japan, and Hong Kong—spend fewer total hours in school than U.S. students?

• If you wanted to learn how to play golf, would you rather spend ten hours on the range with me or five with Tiger Woods? When it comes to your children, would you rather send them to a “traditional 180/1,146 school” with an especially strong faculty or a school with an ordinary faculty and an amped up calendar? Is extending the school year more important than improving instructional quality?

• What good would filling your car’s tank do every morning if it had a leak? The leak is wasted time in the form of teachers who are poor classroom managers and schools that allow endless interruptions to instructional time. Is extending the school year more important than figuring out how best to maximize the time currently available?

• You don’t expect teachers to work 25-30% more without an equivalent increase in salary do you? In a state like California, where’s the extra money for increasing instructional time going to come from?

• You have a vision of “schools as the heart of the community.” What about the argument that the family should be the heart of the community? Granted, many families are struggling and would benefit from excellent schools, but at what point does government programming in the form of more comprehensive public schools usurp what has traditionally been the primary responsibility of parents?

• Why would increased instructional time, independent of serious curriculum reform, better prepare students for the “challenges of a new century?”

Sincerely,

Ron

p.s. Would love to play pick up bball the next time I’m in town.

Deep-seated Fear

Posted on by
2

We’re reading Unequal Childhoods by Annette Lareau in my Soc of Ed class. In the book, her grad students and her report on their findings from having carefully studied several middle, working class, and poor families. The vignettes are centered upon each family’s nine or ten year old child.

She contends that middle class parents practice “concerted cultivation” by which she means they consciously supplement their children’s schooling through numerous extracurricular activities. In contrast, working class and poor families aren’t nearly as “child-centered”. Instead, they let their kids informally play with peers and rely upon, what she terms, the “accomplishment of natural growth”.

Lareau argues there are advantages and disadvantages to both approaches. I agree with a few of my students who have suggested the best approach is probably something in between.

When reading Lareau I can’t help thinking about the parenting approach L and I have taken over the past 17 years. I think we’ve made a good team which is another way of saying I’m proud of the young women our daughters have become.

But Lareau’s analysis has also got me thinking about my childhood. My parents were middle class when I was 9 or 10, but they took more of an “accomplishment of natural growth” approach than a “concerted cultivation” one. Maybe in part because I was the fourth of four, but I don’t think birth order was as significant a variable as the larger ethos of the time.

Even though the Vietnam War was raging (I iced-skated at Kent State once a week and was surprised to see the downtown burned down on one trip to the rink) and the counter-cultural revolution was in full bloom, parents didn’t feel they had to keep an eye on their children all the time.

I spent my summers biking a mile and a half (clubs on handlebars) on fairly busy roads to the nearby nine hole par-3 golf course and Olympic-sized outdoor pool. One summer my friends and I set up a schedule where I taught golf on M-W-F and they taught swimming and tennis Tu-Th.

I played organized baseball, but everything else was “pick up” in the hood.

Flash forward to a swim-meet conversation I had with a friend last week. The more she talked the more obvious it was that she’s afraid for her daughter. Among other revealing statements, she confessed, “I’m just so glad it’s a closed campus.”

Contrast her with my sissy who let her then 17 year old drive across several states with friends one summer. Throw in a ski boat, cabin, and I think boys for good measure. I remember asking her, “Are you crazy?” To which she replied, “She’s never given me a reason not to trust her.” Trip went off without a hitch.

My guess is my friend is far more typical than my sis.

The question is, why? How much of it has to do with nonstop national media coverage of horrific abductions and/or murders? Unlike my sister, maybe my friend spends her evenings watching those handful of cable television channels that cover (and sensationalize) crime nonstop. Is Nancy Grace to blame?

Negligent parents deserve criticism, but why don’t we challenge the increasing number of overprotective , fearful parents, to consider the costs of their sometimes obvious overcompensating?