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bfp · 03-20-04, 07:05 PM

I find this intresting...

T Sowell

Parents in Fairfax, Virginia, have succeeded in getting rid of one of the endless series of fad programs that distract American public schools from real education in real subjects. Like most fad programs, this one had a high-sounding name: The International Baccalaureate Curriculum.

It also has a left-wing hidden agenda, as so many other fad programs do. One of the program's supporters gushed that it teaches students "how to think globally" and "how to make us part of the world."

One of the parents critical of the program put it quite differently. She said it "promotes socialism, disarmament, radical environmentalism, and moral relativism, while attempting to undermine Christian religious values and national sovereignty."

None of this is new. This kind of indoctrination has been going on for decades, and the kind of thinking behind it goes back a hundred years, when education guru John Dewey began promoting the idea that schools should be instruments of "social change."

By substituting back-door indoctrination in place of education, John Dewey has done more damage than anyone without an army.

What is new is that some parents are finally waking up and fighting back. They refuse to be conned by pious rhetoric or pacified by bumper stickers that say things like "My child was student of the month at Jordan Middle School" or even intimidated by the standard line, "You are the only one who has complained."

Education bureaucrats will use that line even if you are not even among the first 20 who have complained about some program or practice locally or among the first thousand nationally. There may be court cases all across the country over some program or practice, and they will still tell you that you are the only one who has complained.

While the parents in Fairfax have had the backbone to get this junk program thrown out of their school, largely because it displaced so much real education that their children would have trouble getting into quality colleges, the battle is still raging in nearby Reston, Virginia, where the education bureaucrats are determined to create a generation of internationalists.

"After all," a school spokesmen said, "it is our students who will change the world."

That the kinds of shallow, ill-educated and fad-ridden people who run our public schools should take it upon themselves to decide how the world needs changing is truly staggering. On the other hand, it has long been said that fools rush in where angels fear to tread.

A very different battle has been going on in the District of Columbia. Here the issue is whether any of the predominantly black students will be allowed to escape the failing and dangerous public schools by having vouchers to go elsewhere.

The teachers unions say no — and the teachers unions are the 800-pound gorilla of the Democratic Party, whom they supply with money and with people to walk the precincts on election days. Some Republicans are also afraid to get on the bad side of the teachers union, even if that means watching another whole generation of poor kids go down the drain for lack of a decent education.

Among the parents who have not been intimidated is a black woman named Virginia Walden-Ford. She has not only confronted members of Congress in hearings, her organization of parents has taken out ads in the states represented by Congressmen who voted against vouchers.

These ads point out that liberal politicians who send their own children to private schools are preventing black parents from having that same choice. These parents don't hesitate to compare liberals like Ted Kennedy to Southern segregationists of the past like George Wallace and Bull Connor, who tried to block the advancement of blacks.

It would never occur to our more delicate Republicans to say such a thing. But their children are not at risk.

The time is long overdue for more parents to show some backbone if their children are not to continue to be used for classroom indoctrination or as pawns in the games of teachers unions.

Import · 03-20-04, 07:38 PM

Its actually a great program even though it has been seen as elitist. It provides a level of education more consistent with european standards (higher than US). It has also been well adopted by many european countries in place of national education systems.

Plano ISD used the IB program in conjunction with TEA standards and has proven very successful. But PISD is one of the only districts that offers both IB and Advanced Placement classes. Maybe thats why its ranked as one of the top 10 school districts in the US

03-21-04, 12:22 AM

I dunno what everyone's getting pissy about; I.B.'s affect on the kids who go through the program is probably more positive than negative. The classes are much more difficult than anything you will encounter at other levels, and they pretty much leave you overprepared for college(or a highly skilled cheater!) I guess it is a tad liberal leaning, but most students didn't take most of the theories behind morality or the ideologies proposed by the teachers anyhow;most just wanted the prestige that they thought I.B. would confer on them, so relax...people should be far more concerned about the few media oligarchs who influence kids and parents unduly via their control of media outlets.

Krash · 03-21-04, 06:51 AM

Why is it a bad thing to educate children in a global context?

Would you prefer they were more "american" than "human"?

psyon · 03-21-04, 07:55 AM

Thomas Sowell....can fuck off!!!!

I went and read alot of his stuff, his view on liberalism is laughable, the guy is practically dilusional.

"hidden left wing agenda"....what a joke.

he is worse than the left wing conspriracy theorists

all the liberals are secrectly working together to end conservative thought and destroy the world...its fucking stupid

what is this hidden agenda...and where are the secret meetings...cause I'd sure like to be in on it

03-21-04, 02:33 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Krash
Why is it a bad thing to educate children in a global context?

Would you prefer they were more "american" than "human"?

There is a strong presumption that localities decide curriculum in public schools.

The policy is to provide local control and decision making for one's children.

I think one objection is a sense of usurpation of local sensibilities and a substitution of 'foreign' ideals. Hi-jacking of the school board by those whose goals are not in keeping with the community.

Parents often think they are the best source of educating their children as to right and wrong....and they'd be right. I think another objection is the sense that these programs come into conflict with that.

03-21-04, 02:35 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by psyon
and destroy the world...its fucking stupid

what is this hidden agenda...and where are the secret meetings...cause I'd sure like to be in on it

down the hall to the left of the secret "vast right wing conspriracy" meetings

03-21-04, 04:27 PM

my roommate here at sfa came out of the ib program at garland. she's probably the smartest person i've ever met. a math and theatre double major. she also came into college already having 30 credits because of the ib program. she's so smart and she really enjoys learning, but she doesn't agree with grades. even though her gpa is just about perfect. she doesn't agree that grades are indicators of intelligence. it gave her a real motivation to push for high education, and she's got some of the best studying skills and self discipline when it comes to getting all her work done. the people she had teaching her at garland were all professionals working in the fields that they taught. not teachers fresh out of college. i wish my school had had the ib program, and not just advanced placement stuff. i'd have taken it.

03-21-04, 04:34 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by TrixieBella
my roommate here at sfa came out of the ib program at garland. she's probably the smartest person i've ever met. a math and theatre double major. she also came into college already having 30 credits because of the ib program. she's so smart and she really enjoys learning, but she doesn't agree with grades. even though her gpa is just about perfect. she doesn't agree that grades are indicators of intelligence.

Grades measure performance not intelligence.

Quote:

Originally posted by TrixieBella
it gave her a real motivation to push for high education, and she's got some of the best studying skills and self discipline when it comes to getting all her work done. the people she had teaching her at garland were all professionals working in the fields that they taught. not teachers fresh out of college. i wish my school had had the ib program, and not just advanced placement stuff. i'd have taken it.

How many of the wonderful attributes you've noted in your friend are directly traceable to the program? How many to her parents? How many to her for being a hard working person?

Krash · 03-21-04, 04:51 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by xiannaix
Parents often think they are the best source of educating their children as to right and wrong....and they'd be right.

I can show you millions of examples where that statement is false.

03-21-04, 05:01 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by xiannaix
Grades measure performance not intelligence.

How many of the wonderful attributes you've noted in your friend are directly traceable to the program? How many to her parents? How many to her for being a hard working person?

unfortunately, the public school system tends to think that grades are a direct indicator of intelligence. i just read an article the other day about a slightly dyslexic girl who's got an incredible iq, but she cna't seem to make above average on her sat's and her act's. and because of it, she can't get into the colleges she wants. yet her iq was huge. yeah, it was her performance being measured. but i'm sure the colleges weren't sitting around going "oh, it's ok that her sat scores were horrible. i'm sure she's still very smart."

my roommate, marie, was actually picked up for the ib program when she was pretty young. she was in the one of the first experiment groups. she was targeted for it when she was about 11. she then traveled with the same group of kids until she graduated. they all went to the same public high school, but they were in classes only with each other. she IS a hard working person. but i think that being in the ib program for so long probably contributed to it. how many high school juniors do you know that had to write a 30 page, single spaced paper on the politics of russian theatre for an exit exam? i'm in college, and i still havne't had to do that. in fact, i've met a lot of her friends from hs who were in the same program. they're all off at cal-tech or other high profile engineering schools. and none of them are rich or from incredibly unique backgrounds. they just showed some signs of being smart and were nurtured.

as for her family. her mother never went to college. her father went to exciter (a prep school) and then to yale, but dropped out after a year because he didn't agree with organized and structured education. so then he traveled around the country and did a lot of acid for a few years, met her mom, and got married. he then taught himself how to install skylights and now owns his own installation business in dallas. oh yeah, and he's currently rewriting geometry. =P but he actually discouraged marie from going to college. he thought it would ruin her. but here she is.

Big Andy · 03-21-04, 05:04 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by bfp
I find this intresting...

T Sowell

Parents in Fairfax, Virginia, have succeeded in getting rid of one of the endless series of fad programs that distract American public schools from real education in real subjects. Like most fad programs, this one had a high-sounding name: The International Baccalaureate Curriculum.

It also has a left-wing hidden agenda, as so many other fad programs do. One of the program's supporters gushed that it teaches students "how to think globally" and "how to make us part of the world."

One of the parents critical of the program put it quite differently. She said it "promotes socialism, disarmament, radical environmentalism, and moral relativism, while attempting to undermine Christian religious values and national sovereignty."

What a load of crap. Having gone to an IB school and taken classes at the regulars, honors, AP, and IB levels, I can say that there is absolutely NOTHING in the curriculum that promotes any of that. Radical enviormentalism?!?! Maybe some crazy hippie is teaching an IB class somewhere with that kind of emphasis, but it's not part of the curriculum!

IB classes are fast paced, detail oriented, and involve hours of homework studying all the core subjects. I know of plenty of complaints about the IB program, but this is the first I've seen complaining that the program is too liberal.

What? Did an IB official get blown in his office or something?

03-21-04, 05:05 PM

also, i'm gonna admit. i'm probably biased when it comes to programs like that. i think they're a good example. maybe because i'm a product of one. i went to a special public elementary school for gifted kids. i mean, i had japanese, spanish, and creative writing classes EVERY DAY. in addition to regular classes. and i feel like it's opened doors for me, because of the study and writing skills that i learned. however, at my old school, i was considered slow because i didn't pay attention and didn't do the work. i was just really really bored.

if you take a truly smart kid and put them in with a whole bunch of average kids, the stuff being taught will always have to stay average to suit the majority. and the smart kid's intellect will be wasted.

Big Andy · 03-21-04, 06:22 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by TrixieBella
also, i'm gonna admit. i'm probably biased when it comes to programs like that. i think they're a good example. maybe because i'm a product of one. i went to a special public elementary school for gifted kids. i mean, i had japanese, spanish, and creative writing classes EVERY DAY. in addition to regular classes. and i feel like it's opened doors for me, because of the study and writing skills that i learned. however, at my old school, i was considered slow because i didn't pay attention and didn't do the work. i was just really really bored.

if you take a truly smart kid and put them in with a whole bunch of average kids, the stuff being taught will always have to stay average to suit the majority. and the smart kid's intellect will be wasted.

YEP!

03-23-04, 07:42 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by TrixieBella
also, i'm gonna admit. i'm probably biased when it comes to programs like that. i think they're a good example. maybe because i'm a product of one. i went to a special public elementary school for gifted kids. i mean, i had japanese, spanish, and creative writing classes EVERY DAY. in addition to regular classes. and i feel like it's opened doors for me, because of the study and writing skills that i learned. however, at my old school, i was considered slow because i didn't pay attention and didn't do the work. i was just really really bored.

if you take a truly smart kid and put them in with a whole bunch of average kids, the stuff being taught will always have to stay average to suit the majority. and the smart kid's intellect will be wasted.

would have to agree with you there...as a product of the IB curriculum and AP classes...I was thrown into these type of classes at around 2nd grade...well not IB and AP per se, but a Gifted and Talented program through the acadamies set in place...in garland...Walnut Glen, Kimberlin, Austin Academy...and I think I'm missing some....

well I didn't think that it helped...but apparently...it has seemed to work

03-20-04, 07:05 PM	#1 (permalink)
bfp Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: McKidney Posts: 4,278	Parents with Backbone I find this intresting... T Sowell Parents in Fairfax, Virginia, have succeeded in getting rid of one of the endless series of fad programs that distract American public schools from real education in real subjects. Like most fad programs, this one had a high-sounding name: The International Baccalaureate Curriculum. It also has a left-wing hidden agenda, as so many other fad programs do. One of the program's supporters gushed that it teaches students "how to think globally" and "how to make us part of the world." One of the parents critical of the program put it quite differently. She said it "promotes socialism, disarmament, radical environmentalism, and moral relativism, while attempting to undermine Christian religious values and national sovereignty." None of this is new. This kind of indoctrination has been going on for decades, and the kind of thinking behind it goes back a hundred years, when education guru John Dewey began promoting the idea that schools should be instruments of "social change." By substituting back-door indoctrination in place of education, John Dewey has done more damage than anyone without an army. What is new is that some parents are finally waking up and fighting back. They refuse to be conned by pious rhetoric or pacified by bumper stickers that say things like "My child was student of the month at Jordan Middle School" or even intimidated by the standard line, "You are the only one who has complained." Education bureaucrats will use that line even if you are not even among the first 20 who have complained about some program or practice locally or among the first thousand nationally. There may be court cases all across the country over some program or practice, and they will still tell you that you are the only one who has complained. While the parents in Fairfax have had the backbone to get this junk program thrown out of their school, largely because it displaced so much real education that their children would have trouble getting into quality colleges, the battle is still raging in nearby Reston, Virginia, where the education bureaucrats are determined to create a generation of internationalists. "After all," a school spokesmen said, "it is our students who will change the world." That the kinds of shallow, ill-educated and fad-ridden people who run our public schools should take it upon themselves to decide how the world needs changing is truly staggering. On the other hand, it has long been said that fools rush in where angels fear to tread. A very different battle has been going on in the District of Columbia. Here the issue is whether any of the predominantly black students will be allowed to escape the failing and dangerous public schools by having vouchers to go elsewhere. The teachers unions say no — and the teachers unions are the 800-pound gorilla of the Democratic Party, whom they supply with money and with people to walk the precincts on election days. Some Republicans are also afraid to get on the bad side of the teachers union, even if that means watching another whole generation of poor kids go down the drain for lack of a decent education. Among the parents who have not been intimidated is a black woman named Virginia Walden-Ford. She has not only confronted members of Congress in hearings, her organization of parents has taken out ads in the states represented by Congressmen who voted against vouchers. These ads point out that liberal politicians who send their own children to private schools are preventing black parents from having that same choice. These parents don't hesitate to compare liberals like Ted Kennedy to Southern segregationists of the past like George Wallace and Bull Connor, who tried to block the advancement of blacks. It would never occur to our more delicate Republicans to say such a thing. But their children are not at risk. The time is long overdue for more parents to show some backbone if their children are not to continue to be used for classroom indoctrination or as pawns in the games of teachers unions.

03-20-04, 07:38 PM	#2 (permalink)
Import Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: Sometimes here, sometimes there, always around. Posts: 207	Its actually a great program even though it has been seen as elitist. It provides a level of education more consistent with european standards (higher than US). It has also been well adopted by many european countries in place of national education systems. Plano ISD used the IB program in conjunction with TEA standards and has proven very successful. But PISD is one of the only districts that offers both IB and Advanced Placement classes. Maybe thats why its ranked as one of the top 10 school districts in the US __________________ Go ahead and fly your kite, just don't let go of the string myspace

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03-21-04, 12:22 AM	#3 (permalink)
nada_clue Guest Posts: n/a	I dunno what everyone's getting pissy about; I.B.'s affect on the kids who go through the program is probably more positive than negative. The classes are much more difficult than anything you will encounter at other levels, and they pretty much leave you overprepared for college(or a highly skilled cheater!) I guess it is a tad liberal leaning, but most students didn't take most of the theories behind morality or the ideologies proposed by the teachers anyhow;most just wanted the prestige that they thought I.B. would confer on them, so relax...people should be far more concerned about the few media oligarchs who influence kids and parents unduly via their control of media outlets.

03-21-04, 07:55 AM	#5 (permalink)
psyon Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: anywhere but here Posts: 518	Thomas Sowell....can fuck off!!!! I went and read alot of his stuff, his view on liberalism is laughable, the guy is practically dilusional. "hidden left wing agenda"....what a joke. he is worse than the left wing conspriracy theorists all the liberals are secrectly working together to end conservative thought and destroy the world...its fucking stupid what is this hidden agenda...and where are the secret meetings...cause I'd sure like to be in on it

03-21-04, 04:27 PM	#8 (permalink)
TrixieBella Guest Posts: n/a	my roommate here at sfa came out of the ib program at garland. she's probably the smartest person i've ever met. a math and theatre double major. she also came into college already having 30 credits because of the ib program. she's so smart and she really enjoys learning, but she doesn't agree with grades. even though her gpa is just about perfect. she doesn't agree that grades are indicators of intelligence. it gave her a real motivation to push for high education, and she's got some of the best studying skills and self discipline when it comes to getting all her work done. the people she had teaching her at garland were all professionals working in the fields that they taught. not teachers fresh out of college. i wish my school had had the ib program, and not just advanced placement stuff. i'd have taken it.

03-21-04, 05:05 PM	#13 (permalink)
TrixieBella Guest Posts: n/a	also, i'm gonna admit. i'm probably biased when it comes to programs like that. i think they're a good example. maybe because i'm a product of one. i went to a special public elementary school for gifted kids. i mean, i had japanese, spanish, and creative writing classes EVERY DAY. in addition to regular classes. and i feel like it's opened doors for me, because of the study and writing skills that i learned. however, at my old school, i was considered slow because i didn't pay attention and didn't do the work. i was just really really bored. if you take a truly smart kid and put them in with a whole bunch of average kids, the stuff being taught will always have to stay average to suit the majority. and the smart kid's intellect will be wasted.