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EDUCATION

The Great Society and Opportunity Lost By Lindsey M. Burke & Jonathan Butcher

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/the-great-society-and-opportunity-lost/

Lyndon Johnson’s 1960s spending initiatives have not paid off with any improvement in education.

In 1964, most people would have been excited to receive a signed picture from the president. But a woman known to history as “Mrs. Marlow” did not want Lyndon Johnson’s autograph.

She wanted clothes for her family. And food. “All we want is a decent chance for our children,” Marlow wrote to Johnson. Marlow felt she deserved as much because Johnson made a much-publicized visit to her family earlier that year, using the Marlows as an example of an impoverished family that Johnson’s “Great Society” programs could help.

If money was the answer, she was in luck. Johnson was about to open the spigots of federal spending like never before in the areas of education, health care, and welfare, promising that Washington would improve schools and lift families out of poverty.

Today, decades and trillions of dollars later, parents like Mrs. Marlow are still waiting for results. Johnson’s programs and their legacy have proved to be a curse on taxpayers and low-income families.

Head Start, the federal pre-kindergarten program for low-income children launched under Johnson, has had no lasting learning gains for enrolled students. What’s more, a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found Head Start centers inflating enrollment numbers by doctoring student applications. Taxpayers have spent more than $240 billion on the initiative since its launch in 1965.

The Developing Dystopia of Dumbed-down America By Anthony J. DeBlasi

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/10/the_developing_dystopia_of_dumbeddown_america.html

A song called “Lost My Marbles” by Pixie Lower & Friends (British, I believe, current around 1987), was a hint of the condition of the mainstream, approaching the turn of the century. It was a cute number with the line “Too much confusion in my brain” and begged out from making sense out of anything. A propos of that sentiment, a young man at that time told me that he didn’t like to think. Of the shocks I’ve had in life, this new one flew off the chart. Was choosing to think now something like choosing a flavor of ice cream?

It set me thinking. A scenario of the future spun in my head . . .

The 21st Century will make confusion a thing of the past. Hey, what are think tanks and the Internet for? Why sweat it when all the ideas and opinions you need are ready-made and delivered to your TV, computer, tablet or phone “for about a dollar a day” (a refrain in commercials, years ago)?

“Thinking syndrome” (TS) is what this disorder would be called, a vestigial malfunction of the brain still prevalent in some lines of evolution. While there are mitigating drugs for TS, none overcomes entirely an inherent resistance of the thinking tendency to act up in some individuals, causing confusion, indecision, bad decision, and sometimes violence, and worse, crime. But that will change when a non-invasive procedure permanently alters certain synaptic centers of the brain with a tiny implanted interactive chip that will cause rogue paths of thought to cancel out and be redirected to specified centers of cognition and confidence.

2019 Survey of Campus Speech Experts By Nathan Harden

The Best and Worst Schools for Free Speech and Viewpoint Diversity

https://www.realcleareducation.com/articles/2019/10/24/2019_survey_of_campus_speech_experts.html

Controversies over free speech on college campuses are in the news seemingly every week, whether it’s an unpopular guest speaker being shouted down, a voluntary student group being banned from campus, or a professor losing his job over something he said in the classroom. While most Americans consider open inquiry and academic freedom essential to the mission of a university, the debate over what can or cannot be said on campus is far from settled at most schools today.

How serious is the speech problem in higher education? Is the problem widespread or just relegated to a small group of campuses? Which colleges and universities are doing a good job of protecting speech? RealClearEducation conducted a survey of experts on the campus speech climate in order to explore these questions.

About This Survey

This survey is designed to show how schools stack up in the opinions of experts who are concerned about free speech on campus. It’s a small sample of opinions and is not, to be clear, a scientific poll. If you look closely at our survey respondents, it’s evident that conservatives outnumber liberals. We originally invited 70 academics, pundits, and policy experts to participate. About half were recognizably on the left end of the political spectrum. Some of them accepted. Panelists such as Jonathan Haidt, Gregory Lukianoff, and Jeffrey A. Sachs, for instance, are certainly not political conservatives.

Nevertheless, a majority of the 22 invitees who ultimately completed our survey are recognizably on the right side of the political spectrum. This imbalance is itself instructive. A recent Pew Research Center study showed that Republicans are far more likely than Democrats to be worried about professors bringing their political and social views into the classroom (79% to 17%). Republicans are also far more likely than Democrats to believe that colleges are too concerned with protecting students from views they might find offensive (75% to 31%). The greater number of conservatives who agreed to participate in our panel reflects the greater concern conservatives have about campus speech. There are several identifiable libertarians on our panel as well.

There is an obvious reason for the special concern about the campus speech climate among conservatives. They are often outnumbered and underrepresented among the faculty and administration, particularly at elite schools. However, political liberals are increasingly raising concerns about censure on campus as well. On the other hand, there are those who say the entire notion of a campus speech crisis is overblown.

To gain more insight into this issue, we asked our panelists for their opinions on which U.S. colleges and universities have the best climate for free speech, viewpoint diversity, and open inquiry. We also asked them to tell us which schools they think have the most room for improvement in these areas. Finally, we asked panelists to share their thoughts on how free speech, viewpoint diversity, and open inquiry relate to the proper mission of a university. (Click here to download a full report on the survey in PDF format.)

Best Schools for Campus Speech

We conducted the survey in September 2019. Panelists were asked to name up to five schools that serve as positive role models in the areas of free speech, viewpoint diversity, and open inquiry.

University of Chicago – Best school with respect to campus speech climate according to RealClear’s 2019 survey of campus speech experts. (RealClearEducation)

• The University of Chicago was the clear winner for best speech climate, according to our survey. With its famous “Chicago Statement” guaranteeing students and faculty broad latitude for speech and strong protection of academic freedom, the vast majority of our panelists chose the University of Chicago as one of their top five picks.

• Next were Purdue University, Princeton University, the University of Virginia, Arizona State University, and Claremont McKenna College. These schools stood out to our panelists as positive role models with respect to campus speech climate.

Mathematics a tool of racial oppression, Seattle public schools committee says By Eric Utter

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/10/mathematics_a_tool_of_racial_oppression_seattle_public_schools_committee_says.html

Something called the “K–12 Math Ethnic Studies Framework,” created by a Seattle Public Schools “Ethnic Studies Advisory Committee,” is intended to instruct students that math is intimately connected to racial oppression.  Students will be taught “how technology and/or science have been and continues [sic] to be used to oppress and marginalize people and communities of color.”  The framework, the final draft of which is scheduled to be completed by September 2020, will also attempt to “explain how math dictates economic oppression.”  That’s correct: math.

Tracy Castro-Gill, the ethnic studies program manager at Seattle Public Schools, noted that the framework is intended to redress the fact that the district has not been properly serving minority students.  Castro-Gill said, “The goal is to disrupt the status quo and do something different.”  Disrupting the status quo is the goal — and sacred quest — of all progressives.  She added, “It’s important to break down barriers while valuing our differences.”  Those of her ilk love breaking down barriers.  And fences.  And standards.

The framework curriculum will consist of four themes: Origins, Identity, and Agency; Power and Oppression; History of Resistance and Liberation; and Reflection and Action.  Riddle me this: how is telling minorities that mathematical concepts have historically enslaved them providing them with a great service?  Resist those integers!  Free yourselves from the bonds of multiplication!

NYU Newspaper Pulls Ad for Lowry’s Nationalism Book Out of Concern It Might ‘Marginalize People of Color’ By Jack Crowe

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/nyu-newspaper-pulls-ad-for-lowrys-nationalism-book-out-of-concern-it-might-marginalize-people-of-color/

The editor of New York University’s independent student-run newspaper, Washington Square News, pulled an advertisement for National Review editor Rich Lowry’s upcoming book from the paper because exposure to the ad may have “marginalized people of color,” according to a statement released Thursday.

Lowry purchased the ad in order to promote a talk he will deliver Thursday night at NYU on his new book, The Case for Nationalism: How It Made Us Powerful, United, And Free, which will be released on November 5th.

The paper’s business team accepted the ad and charged Lowry for its placement last week. He found out that it would not appear in the paper’s Monday edition only when he saw that his payment had been refunded.

When no explanation was forthcoming, Lowry wrote a post informing National Review readers that his ad, which “invited people to learn why their pre-conceptions about nationalism are incorrect,” had been pulled without justification.

In response, the Washington Square News editor explained that she had unilaterally decided to pull the ad in order to shield “people of color on campus” from exposure to the phrase “Nationalism is a good thing,” which, in keeping with the book’s topic, was placed prominently at the top of the page.

Harvard’s Student Newspaper Chooses Ethical Journalism over PC Mob’s Demands By Katherine Timpf

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/harvards-student-newspaper-chooses-ethical-journalism-over-pc-mobs-demands/ 

The Crimson had the audacity to present balanced coverage of an anti-ICE protest.

Harvard University’s student newspaper, the Harvard Crimson, was accused of “cultural insensitivity” and “blatantly endangering undocumented students” last month — all because it had adhered to journalistic ethics.

It’s true: According to an article in the Washington Post, all that the newspaper had done to deserve this was ask U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement representatives for comment on a story about an “Abolish ICE” protest. In other words? The paper’s reporters were attacked because they demonstrated basic journalism skills. It is, after all, not only not controversial to ask both sides for their views in a straight-news piece; it would actually be controversial not to.

Despite this, the Post reports that “hundreds” of students signed a petition calling on the newspaper to stop talking to ICE completely. Their cause was quite obviously absurd, and it depresses me that hundreds of our nation’s (supposedly) best and brightest could actually be ignorant enough to sign something like that.

The good news? Rather than back down from the pressure, the newspaper stood its ground. Earlier this week, Crimson editors Angela N. Fu and Kristine E. Guillaume published a defense of the paper’s work.

Universities Breed Anger, Ignorance, and Ingratitude By Victor Davis Hanson *****

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/universities-breed-anger-ignorance-ingratitude/

In turning out woke and broke graduates, they have a lot to answer for.

What do widely diverse crises such as declining demography, increasing indebtedness, Generation Z’s indifference to religion and patriotism, static rates of home ownership, and a national epidemic of ignorance about American history and traditions all have in common?

In a word, 21st-century higher education.

A pernicious cycle begins even before a student enrolls. A typical college-admission application is loaded with questions to the high-school applicant about gender, equality, and bias rather than about math, language, or science achievements. How have you suffered rather than what you know and wish to learn seems more important for admission. The therapeutic mindset preps the student to consider himself a victim of cosmic forces, past and present, despite belonging to the richest, most leisured, and most technologically advanced generation in history. Without a shred of gratitude, the young student learns to blame his ancestors for what he is told is wrong in his life, without noticing how the dead made sure that almost everything around him would be an improvement over 2,500 years of Western history.

Once admitted, students take classes from faculty who, polls reveal, are roughly 90 percent liberal. According to one recent survey, Democrat professors on average outnumber Republican faculty by a 12-to-1 ratio on the nation’s supposedly diverse campuses. But such political asymmetries are magnified by a certain progressive messianic self-righteousness that turns the lectern into the pulpit, the captive class into a congregation. The rare conservative professor is more resigned to the tragedy of the universe and, in live-and-let-live fashion, vacates the campus arena to the left-wing gladiators who wish to slay any perceived heterodoxy.

Reinstate Racial Preferences? Washington State Voters Will Decide. By Heather Mac Donald

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/racial-preferences-government-washington-state-voters-will-decide/

The state’s voters outlawed such preferences in 1998; legislators tried to bring them back last April. A new ballot initiative lets the people choose.

Voting in Washington has begun on a ballot initiative to overturn that state’s ban on racial preferences in government. Voters outlawed racial preferences in 1998, as part of a mini-wave of eight such state initiatives, led by California anti-preference crusader Ward Connerly in the 1990s. The momentum behind that push for color-blindness in government has long since petered out, as identity politics became ascendant. The advocates of race-neutral government hiring, contracting, and college admissions are now on the defensive, fighting relentless efforts to undo their work.

In April 2019, the Washington state legislature hurriedly passed Initiative 1000 to bring preferences back into government policy. Now voters are facing a confusing choice. Though the referendum currently before them, Referendum 88, was instigated by racial-preference opponents, overwhelmingly Asian, to overturn Initiative 1000, a yes on the referendum would confirm passage of Initiative 1000 and reinstate preferences, and a no vote would preserve the pre-Initiative 1000 color-blind status quo.

Initiative 1000 has adopted the specious rhetoric of “holistic” college admissions, rhetoric that the Supreme Court, to its discredit as a supposedly rational jurisprudential body, has embraced. Race cannot be the “sole qualifying factor” in awarding or denying a public benefit, according to the initiative. This requirement allegedly prevents racial preferences from turning into quotas. These are the same claims made on behalf of “holistic admissions,” a supposedly real and definable practice that is meant to keep racial admissions preferences constitutional by avoiding a quota system. We are supposed to believe that admissions offices in a “holistic” regime make highly individualized decisions about applicants that award only the slightest “tip” to candidates on the basis of race. We are supposed to believe that the admissions office has NO idea what number of minorities it is shooting for, even though the racial percentages of any class remain stable from year to year, as was shown in the ongoing litigation over Harvard’s racial preferences.

Trump Administration Calls Out Bias in Middle East Studies Programs by Raymond Ibrahim

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15005/bias-middle-east-studies

“[T]here 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.” — US Department of Education, Notice of a Letter Regarding the Duke-UNC Consortium for Middle East Studies, September 17, 2019.
Virtually all Middle East Studies departments on campuses everywhere can, to varying degrees, be accused of focusing on irrelevant and superficial topics, sidelining language skills, whitewashing Islam — in short, indoctrinating students in highly distorted views.
The letter also raises questions concerning… foreign funding. A 2018 report , for instance, found that “elite U.S. universities took more than half a billion dollars” from Saudi Arabia in gifts and donations “between 2011 and 2017.” Why would a nation that treats women like chattel, teaches Muslims to hate all non-Muslims… that has elite units dedicated to apprehending witches and warlocks — become a leading financial supporter of America’s liberal arts? The answer is regularly on display: so that recipients can show their gratitude by indoctrinating students in a fictitious Middle East and Islam—both of which are supposed victims of America.
The reason U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East has tended towards disaster is arguably because policymakers depend on advisors and analysts who are products of such Middle East studies departments — as are the many scholars and “experts” who insist that Islam is a “religion of peace.” Until such time as Middle East Studies teach their topics with objectivity, balance, and above all, honesty, failure is likely to continue dominating America’s response.

The Trump administration recently called out and threatened to cut federal funding for the Consortium for Middle East Studies (CMES), a program run by Duke University and the University of North Carolina. CMES was accused by the U.S. Department of Education of misusing a federal grant to advance “ideological priorities” and unfairly promote “the positive aspects of Islam,” particularly in comparison to Judaism and Christianity.

The Department of Education summarized its position in an August 29 letter that opens with a reminder that institutions of higher education may receive federal funding via Title VI of the Higher Education Act of 1965:

The Secretary is authorized–

(i) to make grants to institutions of higher education, or combinations thereof, for the purpose of establishing, strengthening, and operating comprehensive foreign language and area or international studies centers and programs; and

(ii) to make grants to such institutions or combinations for the purpose of establishing, strengthening, and operating a diverse network of undergraduate foreign language and area or international studies centers and programs.

Fat black professor of gender studies blames Trump for black female obesity By Thomas Lifson

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/10/fat_black_professor_of_gender_studies_blames_trump_for_black_female_obesity.html

No, this is not from the Babylon Bee.

It actually comes from the Oprah Winfrey Network, and a segment featuring Professor Britney Cooper, who sports a PhD from Emory University and who currently is an associate professor in the Department of Women’s and Gender Studies at Rutgers University. With that sort of background, perhaps it isn’t surprising to eternalize blame for obesity on racism and seem to indict President Trump for it. In fairness, she only mentions Trump before launching her indictment of racism as the cause of black female obesity.

Here are few screen grabs of her subtitled rant, followed by the entire segment embedded in a tweet, in case you want to hear her, the moderator, and the audience all enthusiastically accept the theory that white people in general and President Trump in particular are what make a disproportionate number of black women obese.

While this is all funny, it is also tragic. Obesity is unhealthy and unhappy to endure. Blaming others doesn’t ever lead to change in a positive direction.