Systems of education and its discontents

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The sole U.S. history course ends in 1877.

The Western humanities courses only go up to 1950. Western History II is graciously permitted to reach the year 2000 so that the fall of the Soviet Union can be included.

The act would also destroy shared governance and remove faculty influence from any part of the faculty hiring process, giving the dean of a new School of General Education sole power to appoint all faculty and staff members

The dictatorial power of this dean goes far beyond faculty hiring to encompass massive authority over graduate students across the entire university: “The dean may offer teaching and research positions, stipends, fellowships, awards, and any other form of remuneration to graduate students in any academic unit.”

the GEA would legally compel colleges to fire one existing professor for every professor hired to teach in the new right-wing school

Existing faculty are eligible for joint appointment in the School of General Education, but such appointments are temporary and at the sole discretion of the school’s dean.

(make all faculty adjuncts plan! who knew that ignoring the hellscape of contingent faculty employment could result is problems for the tenured set! /s)

Tv Land What GIF by YoungerTV

AHA will issue a sternly worded letter any time now… /s

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This is nonsense. The people who sneer at "book larnin’ " aren’t going to stop sneering and embrace edumacation just because… they will be assigned to read Cicero? C’mon.

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the point is to make sure that only the “right” people can get or give an education. The point is to destroy public education for anyone who isn’t an elite white male and make sure the rest of us are ignorant of the past, have no access to culture that reflects our own experiences, and that we’re all instead working for them for peanuts (if that).

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This one is interesting:

So, Oklahoma M4L is saying no to Scholastic due to the books they offer. My Michigan district is saying no to Scholastic due to their making it easy to exclude certain books, and we don’t want to support a company that supports silencing voices. Same action, different reasons. The action isn’t widespread right now, but it easily could be. Scholastic is having a hell of a year, but I’m here scratching my head over my district and book banners coming to the same conclusion.

(Meanwhile, I had to read in a local paper that my district is partnering with a local bookstore for the next book fair. I don’t know when this is happening, though. I love this particular bookstore and I’m looking forward to it…but I question my role as the book fair chair at this point.)

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So long as they aren’t being tested on English skillls, amirite?

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Schlämmer__Schätzelein__Isch seh wat du gemaaht hest

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I guess this is the ultimate Republican “parent’s rights” goal. If you can pay a feww hundred dollars, you can have a diploma. Thanks, i hate it.

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I keep saying people promoting actual education need to make it clear to parents who do this that they’re setting up their kids for future financial failure. If they think most kids finish college and get jobs that pay well enough to leave home or support their own families, it’s time for a reality check. They seem to be as disconnected from the costs of living as some GOP pols they keep in office for decades. The adults buying for themselves should learn the names of mills are easily found online and used to reject applications.

PSAs for parents could start discussing rent and minimum wage, before offering a vague wish they’ve got enough room in the basement plus retirement income to support everyone (especially grandchildren). A few hundred dollars isn’t going to be enough to buy their way out of decades of bad choices. Since they vote for GOP policies, we should remind them their reps plan to eliminate Social Security, too. So they shouldn’t plan on taking that instead of working hard and making ends meet. :woman_shrugging:t4:

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But wait, not because they are sick. No, because they are Black, or disabled, or ornery.

Last year, children were handcuffed and sent to the emergency room at least 117 times from Wicomico schools, about once per every 100 students, according to data obtained from public records requests to the Wicomico County Sheriff’s Office.

1% of kids had this done to them. I cannot even imagine the trauma this engenders in them. Mistrust and hatred of authority figures, the system, everything. I hate this timeline.

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“I am prejudiced against…”
WTF language is he speaking? It ain’t the Queen’s English. Must be rich white billionaire-ish. Also, is there any other kind of billionaire than “rich?” Redundant Man is redundant.

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If you’re in Yale you are smarter and better than other people so an A is only fair. /s

Unrelated: do Ivy League colleges still avoid similarity detection software in case they find their students plagiarism (though, from what I heard, wealthy students simply paying people to do their work was actually a bigger issue)?

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Probably unpopular opinion incoming. Honestly, I would love to see all universities go to a pass/fail grading system. If the point really is to educate people, then focus on that, and as long as someone demonstrates that they’ve done the work, and learned it to some acceptable level, they pass. If they blow the class off, skip every class, and fail miserably on assessment tests and do none of the homework, then they fail and get no credit. This is how all of my classes in law school were in the spring semester of 2020, as were most law schools and many universities. The world did not end because of it. It eliminated the pressure to get a good grade in the class and allowed me to focus on actually learning the shit. Sure, employers won’t be able to use GPA as a hiring criteria anymore, but that’s a dubious metric anyway.

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A is the new Gentleman C.

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