Category Archives: education

Bullying

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You can’t wear the clothes you can afford to buy, that are good quality, and that look nice without being ostentatious (you can’t wear your ostentatious rags, either, come to that).  That’s bullying, don’t you know.

That’s the attitude of the Church of England’s Woodchurch High School in northwestern England (it’s across the Mersey from Liverpool—yes, that Mersey).  They’re pretending to “poverty proof” their school, so they sent a letter to their students’ significant overseers (the institution actually refered to “parents/carers”:

As you are all aware from an email that was sent out yesterday, pupils will not be permitted to bring in Canadian (sic) Goose and Monclair (sic) coats after the Christmas break.

In the name of anti-bullying, then, this school’s management is going to bully a different group of kids.  Because clothes make the child, not what he’s taught about character.

Their hypocrisy stinks.

Hillary Clinton, School Curriculum, and Censorship

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The Texas State Board of Education had been considering dropping ex-Presidential candidate (among other accomplishments) Hillary Clinton (D) from its social studies curriculum.  Last Tuesday, the board voted 12-2 (plus one abstention) to keep her in the curriculum, for now.  The two nay voters had their reasons.

I just do not respect the woman.  As far as I’m concerned, she’s done a lot of detrimental things to our country.

And

The Benghazi thing did it for me.

I agree with those sentiments and more.  In addition to her handling of the Benghazi murders, her mishandling of classified material while using nearly exclusively a personal email server for official business in order to avoid being on the record and her slur against millions of Americans she considered racist and stupid for not considering voting for her stand out for me.

But that’s no reason to commit censorship.  On the contrary, that emphasizes the importance of teaching about Clinton, her misbehaviors, and her position as a political leader of a major political party.  Our children need to see how badly our politics—our nation—can go awry when we don’t think carefully about those we’re considering for leadership positions.  Our children need to see how badly we can go wrong when we select leaders based on gender or skin color rather than on merit and the requirements of the position for which we’re selecting someone.

Hillary Clinton presents, as the phrasing goes, a teaching opportunity.  She, especially, shouldn’t be ignored.

Race and College Admission

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During final arguments in the civil suit against Harvard over its use of race in its admission decisions, Harvard’s lawyers insisted that

plaintiffs had to prove admissions officers were motivated by racial animus….

This is a disingenuous argument, though. Racial animus isn’t necessary to get a disparate impact ruling.  With disparate impact established in the courts, for the time being, it’s clear that racial animus doesn’t have to be proved in Harvard’s bias case, either.

The Harvard lawyers weren’t through, though.

Harvard’s lawyers said race is only used as a preference among the most competitive applicants, in the same way exceptional musical talent can make a difference in admissions.

Here is the lie of the Harvard personnel. They deny race plays a role, yet they admit using race to play a role.

Beyond that, applicants’ musical talent (for instance) is entirely under those applicants’ control to acquire. Their race, however, is an accident of birth over which they have no control.  It’s an entirely irrelevant and valueless characteristic in determining merit.

Right Answer, Wrong Dissent

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The Washington State Supreme Court issued a ruling favorable to the State’s charter schools last Thursday.  The question before the court was whether those charter schools were violating the State’s constitution by receiving funding from the State’s lottery facilities.  Writing for the court, Justice Mary Yu wrote in plain words,

Charter schools are not rendered unconstitutional just because they do not operate identically to common school[.]

She expanded on that in addressing the plaintiffs’ argument that the charter schools lacked voter control, holding that, as The Seattle Times paraphrased her,

…”it makes sense” for charter schools not have local voter control because their funding source, unlike traditional schools, does not include local property tax levies.

Justice Barbara Madsen in dissent, wrote

They [charter schools] are not subject to local voter control and lack any direct accountability to the communities they purport to serve….

This is mistaken.  Charter schools are especially accountable to the communities “they purport to serve” because, unlike the case with public schools, those parents, those members of the served communities, those voters, easily can remove their children from a charter school and enroll them elsewhere.

Discrimination

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The discrimination suit against Harvard is underway, and the first day produced some interesting claims.

William Fitzsimmons, Harvard’s admissions dean since 1986, defended the policy [of favoring some applicants over others on the basis of race] by saying the letters to white students in more rural states help the school recruit from areas where students may be less aware of Harvard.

This is nonsense. If student awareness were the goal, instead of sending letters to favored individuals, Harvard would advertise, would communicate with the junior high schools and high schools of those rural areas.

Race is never the reason a student is admitted or rejected from Harvard, he [William Lee, a WilmerHale partner representing Harvard] said, adding the school considers race as one of many factors, in line with Supreme Court precedents.

This is disingenuous at best. If race is never a reason, it wouldn’t be missed if it were eliminated from consideration.

In addition, there is a clear designed-in disparate impact at work here, but since it’s not an impact against a favored group of Americans, it’s not discussed.