Tuesday, August 14, 2018

Teachers In Boston Suburb Emails Prove Bias In History Class And A Call To Defy Unbiased Teaching of History

Ilya Feoktistov over at The Federalist breaks a HUGE story about the utter bias of history teachers at a Newton, MA high school.  You can see their self-contradiction (they want to propagandize their students, while demanding that offering other views would allow for the propaganda they hate). The mentality of these teachers not only shows a very liberal bias, but shows insubordination to the principal (the guidelines required by all teachers) and the school district. You really need to read this article. Here are some excerpts:
Quote:
The guidelines asked teachers to remain objective while teaching about historical and current events; and to treat all students, regardless of political opinion, with respect. Teachers were told: “For current controversial issues (health care, immigration, environmental policies, gun laws), teach students that there are different perspectives and present the reasoning of those who hold those different perspectives.
Ibokette was having none of it. He typed this reply: “I am concerned that the call for ‘objectivity’ may just inadvertently become the most effective destructive weapon against social justice,” and sent it to the members of Newton North’s history department....
Earlier that February day, Bedar sent an email to fellow Newton North history faculty, accusing President Trump and his supporters of “nativism, xenophobia, homophobia, etc.,” and objecting to the following “don’ts” that the Newton North principal had asked teachers to avoid:
  • “Assume that all students agree with us. . . .”
  • “Assume that all students feel comfortable disagreeing with us. . . .”
  • “Present facts or logic that support only one side of a current controversial issue. . . .”
  • “Present our own personal opinion on a current controversial issue as more right than another viewpoint. . . .”
These guidelines seem like Pedagogy 101, and are foundational to correctly applying logic and reason. Yet Bedar, who holds a master’s in teaching from the prestigious Duke University, admitted to his colleagues:
Personally, I’m finding it really difficult in the current climate to teach kids to appreciate other perspectives. . . 

....Newton North guidelines explicitly tell teachers to teach about the reasoning behind different perspectives on immigration.

Yet, in remarkable language, Bedar demanded that the school allow him to propagandize against it, and to do so without any professional consequences: “I have an obligation to teach civic duty and teach kids right and wrong, and about social justice. . . . This will probably be an unpopular opinion, but I don’t actually think we should have the option of not discussing [social justice] issues. I feel responsible for doing so. . . . We can help kids interpret the lessons of the past better than anybody. I feel like a phony when I’m not doing that. . . . But..this is hard. I don’t want to get fired for being a liberal propagandist (emphasis added).
End quote. (bold, red, my emphasis; italics, original)

Feoktisov shares the link to the emails here.

Feoktistov goes on to talk about how their efforts reminded him of 5th grade history class in Siberia a year after the USSR fell, and the teacher one day said there was nothing more to teach because all the textbooks were useless since they were full of  Communist Party lies. He then noted:

"
Undaunted by the failures of their comrades in the Soviet Union and other socialist hell-holes, left-wing activists are dug in at all stages of the American educational process from preschool to graduate school, where they seek to replicate the Soviet Union’s abuse of its children’s minds with lurid lies." (orange, links, original)

Please go here to read the whole article.

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