Cartoon by Mario Piperni on the Texas State Board of Education, on any number of subjects
Have never seen this guy’s work before. Does he publish in a newspaper that is lucky to have him?
SBOE shames Texas, part D: Mario Piperni and unintended consequences
April 10, 2010
1 Comment | 
Cartoons, History, Political cartoons, Social Studies, State school boards, Texas, Texas history | Tagged: Cartoons, History, Political cartoons, Social Studies, Texas, Texas State Board of Education | 
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Posted by Ed Darrell
Education board shames Texas: Social studies follies, part A
March 31, 2010John Sherffius, one of my favorite editorial cartoonists, laid out the problem in his cartoon of March 18:
John Sherffius, Boulder Daily Camera, March 18, 2010
You may purchase a copy of the cartoon — or the original — here.
SBOE isn’t exactly asking that the Bible be rewritten — or at least, not directly. Suggesting we replace Thomas Jefferson as a founder with John Calvin in high school standards, is just as silly.
Tip of the old scrub brush to What Would Jack Do, “Lone Star Laughing Stock,” and Steven Schafersman.
5 Comments | Capitalism, Economics, Geography - Economic, Geography - Physical, Geography - Political, History, Rampant stupidity, Social Studies, State school boards, Texas, Texas Citizens for Science, Texas history | Tagged: Economics Revisionism, Geography Revisionism, History Revisionism, Lone Star Laughing Stock, Rampant stupidity, Social Studies Standards, Texas, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Texas standards: Students in the dark about “capitalism”
March 19, 2010Tony Whitson from Curricublog made the killing observation:
BookTV [C-SPAN] this weekend has Steve Forbes talking about his new book,
With these new Social Studies TEKS, TX students won’t know what such a
book is about.
Small bit of humor from a truly sad situation. One of the leaders of the Texas State Soviet of Education defended the evisceration and defenestration of social studies standards saying they didn’t need to listen to liberal college professors.
In economics, the professor was a conservative, well-respected economics professor from Texas A&M University, one of the most conservative state universities in the nation (with a Corps of Cadets numbering in the thousands and tradition deeper than Palo Duro Canyon and broader than the Gulf of Mexico). Calling these people “liberal” is tantamount to complaining about the communism espoused by Ronald Reagan and Dwight Eisenhower — that is, it demonstrates a divorce from reality and rationality.
In the grand scheme of things it’s not a huge problem, but it’s more than a trifle. It’s difficult, if not impossible, to fully comprehend market economics in the U.S. without understanding what capitalism is, and how it works. Teachers will be left to find their own materials to explain “free enterprise” and, if the students ever make it into a real economics course in college, they will discover “free enterprise” is a quaint, political term that is not discussed in serious economics circles. Texas students will, once again, be pushed to the hindmost by Don McLeroy’s odd views of America and what he doesn’t want Americans to know.
For example, look at the Council for Economic Education — while “capitalism” is not the only word they use for market-based economies, you’ll have a tougher time finding any definition of “free enterprise.” Or, more telling, look at the Advanced Placement courses, or the International Baccalaureate courses. AP and IB courses are the most academically rigorous courses offered in American high schools. The Texas TEKS step away from such rigor, however (while the Texas Education Agency rides Texas schools to add rigor — go figure). IB courses talk a lot about enterprise, but they don’t censor “capitalism,” nor do they pretend it’s not an important concept.
At the very conservative and very good Library of Economics and Liberty (which every social studies teacher should have bookmarked and should use extensively), a search for “free enterprise” produces 77 entries (today). “Capitalism” produces almost ten times as much, with more than 750 listings.
Which phrase do you think is more useful in studying American economics, history and politics?
Teachers will deal with it. It’s one more hurdle to overcome on the path to trying to educate Texas students. It’s one more roadblock to their learning what they need to keep the freedom in America.
Capitalism - Warren Buffett - BusinessWeek image
Free Enterprise - Bernie Madoff
The real difference? Literature on capitalism frequently address the issue of moral investments, and the need for some regulation to bolster the Invisible Hand in producing discipline to steer markets from immoral and harmful investments. The essential history politics economic question of the 20th and 21st centuries is, can economic freedom exist without political freedom, and which one is more crucial to the other? We know from every period of chaos in history when governments did not function well, but bandits did, that free enterprise can exist without either political freedom or economic freedom. I think of it like this:
Capitalism |
Free Enterprise |
| Adam Smith | Blackbeard the Pirate |
| Warren Buffett | Bernie Madoff |
| Investing | Spending |
| Building institutions | Taking profits |
| Retail | Robbery |
| Wholesale | Extortion |
| Save for a rainy day | debt-equity swap |
| Antitrust enforcement to keep markets fair | Don’t get caught, hope for acquittal |
| Milton Friedman | P. T. Barnum |
| Ludwig von Mises | Charles Ponzi |
| Friedrich von Hayek | Richard Cheney, “deficits don’t matter” |
| Paul Krugman | Kato Kaelin |
| Stockholders | Victims and suckers |
Leave a Comment » | Accuracy, Business, Business Ethics, Capitalism, Economics, Education, Education reform, Freedom - Economic, History, Rampant stupidity, Social Studies, State school boards, TEKS, Texas | Tagged: Capitalism, Economics, Free Enterprise, Rampant stupidity, Social Studies, Texas, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Encore post, new coda: Worldview of Texas education policy makers
March 18, 2010From a post many weeks ago, “Speaking of Texas education policy,” made more salient by events of the past month:
from Funnyjunk
This is a troubling piece of humor. From Funnyjunk.
- “America. A country where people believe the moon landing is fake, but wrestling is real.”
And now we can add even more captions:
- A country where state curriculum officials go to churches that warn against belief in ghosts, but who believe Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin came back from the grave to wrestle the quill from Jefferson and write the Declaration of Independence.
[Heh. Wouldn’t you love to see Aquinas and Calvin in the same room, trying to come to agreement on anything?] - A country with Barack Obama as president and where women’s basketball is a joy to watch during March Madness thanks to the the Civil Rights Act of 1964 Title IX, but Cynthia Dunbar believes the Civil Rights Act itself was a mistake.
- A country where Barbara McClintock did the research that showed how evolution works and won her a Nobel, but where Texans deny that a woman should do such work, and deny evolution.
- A capitalist nation where Jack Kilby invented the printed circuit and had a good life, but where the Texas SSOE thinks “capitalism” is a dirty word.
(No, ma’am, I couldn’t make that up. They did it. They took out the word “capitalism” because they say those “liberal economists” like Milton Friedman can’t be trusted. Seriously. No, really. Go look it up.) - Home of Thomas Jefferson, whose words in the Declaration of Independence so sting tyrants and dictators that today, in the most repressive nations, even oppressive systems must pretend to follow Jefferson — hence, the “Peoples Republic of Korea,” “the Democratic Republic of the Congo,” “Peoples Republic of China,” and the provisions of the old Soviet Union’s Constitution that “guaranteed” freedom of speech and freedom of religion; but where Thomas Jefferson is held in contempt, and John Calvin and Thomas Aquinas claimed as the authors of American freedom. [I wonder what the Society of the Cincinnati have to say about that?]
- Where Mark Twain’s profound, greatest American novel Huckleberry Finn made clear the case against racism and oppression of former slaves, but where school kids don’t read it because their misguided parents think it’s racist.
- A nation where Cynthia Dunbar thinks Thomas Jefferson gets too much credit, but Barack Obama is a foreign terrorist
- A nation where conservatives complain that the Supreme Court should never look at foreign laws for advice, wisdom, or precedent, but believe that Thomas Aquinas, a Dominican friar from Italy, and John Calvin, a French dissident who fled to Switzerland, pulled a religious coup d’etat and is infamous for executing people who disagreed with his religious views, wrote the Declaration of Independence.
I’ll wager there are more, more annoying, more inaccurate statements from the Texas SSOE members in the Texas Education Follies, which will make much briefer complaints and better bumper stickers.
Other posts at the Bathtub you should read, mostly featuring Ms. Dunbar:
- “SSOE member Dunbar: Aquinas led American revolution, not Jefferson”
- “Sour grapes of wrath at the Texas State Board of Education”
- “Perry to Texas Education: Drop dead [again]”
- “Creationist as Texan of the Year”
- “More on McLeroy’s war on Texas English students”
Also:
- Be sure to see Cynthia Dunbar with Chris Matthews on “Hardball.” (Why is Dunbar in front of a screen that says “Cornell” on it? Does Cornell know?)
Leave a Comment » | Education, Education quality, First Amendment, Historic documents, History, History Revisionism, State school boards, Texas, U.S. Constitution, War on Education, War on the Constitution | Tagged: Aquinas, Cynthia Dunbar, Education, History Revisionism, John Calvin, Rampant stupidity, Texas, Texas State Board of Education, Thomas Jefferson, U.S. Constitution, Voodoo history, War on Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Happy Madison’s birthday! Nation expresses revulsion at Texas education follies, Part 1
March 17, 2010Tuesday, March 16 was the 259th anniversary of the birth of James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, the sponsor of the Bill of Rights, the life-long campaigner for good government based on knowledge of the errors of history, especially in the area of religious freedom.
Under social studies standards proposed by the Texas State Board of Education, Texas students will never study Madison’s views, or Madison’s Constitution, without intervention by their parents or good teachers who run some risk to teach the glories of American history to students.
Newspaper stories across the nation concentrated on Madison’s birthday expressed revulsion and rejection of the crabbed and cramped views of the Texas SBOE, and the cup of revulsion runneth over.
For example, the attempted evisceration and hobbling of science standards occurred last year, but the editorial cartoon in USA Today reached back to remind us just what is going on in Austin.
By Scott Stantis, Chicago Tribune, for USA TODAY, March 16, 2010
More comment to come.
Tip of the old scrub brush to Christina Castillo Comer.
2 Comments | Accuracy, America's founding, American Revolution, Economics, Education, Education quality, Evolution, History, Science, Social Studies, State school boards, Texas | Tagged: Economics, Education, education standards, Evolution, History, Science, Social Studies, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Sour grapes of wrath at the Texas State Board of Education
March 10, 2010A couple of months can make a big difference. Can.
A difference which way?
Two months ago the Texas State Board of Education suspended its revamping of social studies standards — the efforts to grind the standards into a right-wing crutch were so controversial that hearings, discussion and amending proposed standards took up more time than allotted. SBOE delayed final votes until March 10.
Today.
Last week Texas voted in primary elections. Several board members’ terms are up. Two incumbents lost primary challenges, Don McLeroy, the Boss Tweed of the right wing cultural war ring, and Geraldine Miller, a long-term veteran from Dallas, whose very conservative views cast her as a moderate among SBOE members. Both are Republicans.
How will those primary losses affect them and their work on the board?
In addition, other members of the culture war ring are retiring, including Cynthia Dunbar. Will the lame ducks be content to vote up the changes urged by history and economic professionals and professional educators, or will they do as McLeroy suggested they need to do earlier, and fight against the recommendations of experts?
How will the lame ducks walk and quack?
Stakes are high. New York Times Magazine featured the culture wars on the cover on Valentine’s Day (you should read the article). Texas Monthly weighed in against the culture wars, too — a surprise to many Texans.
Cynicism is difficult to swim against. I expect McLeroy to try as best he can to make social studies standards a monument to right wing bigotry and craziness. We’ve already seen SBOE vote to delete a wonderful children’s book from even being mentioned because the text author shares a name with a guy who wrote a book on socialism earlier.
Most of us watching from outside of Austin (somebody has to stay back and grade the papers and teach to the test . . .) expect embarrassments. On English and science standards before, the culture war ring tactics were to make a flurry of last-minute, unprinted and undiscussed, unannounced amendments apparently conspired to gut the standards of accuracy (which would not make the right wing political statements they want) and, too often, rigor. Moderates on the board have not had the support mechanisms to combat these tactics successfully — secret e-mail and telephone-available friends standing by to lend advice and language on amendments. In at least two votes opponents of the culture war voted with the ring, not knowing that innocent-sounding amendments came loaded.
In a test of the No True Scotsman argument, religious people will be praying for Texas kids and Texas education. Meanwhile, culture warriors at SBOE will work to frustrate those prayers.
Oy.
Thomas Jefferson toyed with the idea of amendment the U.S. Constitution to provide a formal role for the federal government in guaranteeing education, which he regarded as the cornerstone of freedom and a free, democratic-style republic. Instead, American primary and secondary education are governed by more than 15,000 locally-elected school boards with no guidance from the national government on what should be taught. Alone among the industrial and free nations of the world, the U.S. has no mechanism for rigorous national standards on what should be taught.
For well over a century a combined commitment to educating kids better than their parents helped keep standards high and achievement rising. Public education got the nation through two world wars, and created a workforce that could perform without peer on Earth in producing a vibrant and strong economy.
That shared commitment to quality education now appears lost. Instead we have culture warriors hammering teachers and administrators, insisting that inaccurate views of Jefferson and history be taught to children, perhaps to prevent them from ever understanding what the drive for education meant to freedom, but surely to end Jeffersonian-style influences in the future.
Texas’s SBOE may make the case today that states cannot be trusted with our children’s future, and that we need a national body to create academic rigor to preserve our freedom. Or they will do the right thing.
Voters last week expressed their views that SBOE can’t be trusted to do the right thing. We’re only waiting to see how hard McLeroy is willing to work to put his thumb in the eye of Big Tex.
More:
- Steve Schafersman will live blog the meeting today at http://www.texasobserver.org/stevenschafersman/ . Social studies agenda doesn’t start until 11:00 a.m. Central
- Curricublog from Tony Whitson discusses Texas’s sorry standards, and how the right spins them. Watch this blog generally for good and incisive comments from the meeting; Tony often follows the webcasts, and his writings are always, always informative.
- Texas Freedom Network gives you the background; watch TFN’s blog, TFN Insider, for more timely updates (heck, head over there now and learn a lot about today’s meeting). When you read the New York Times piece, you noted incisive comments by Kathy Miller — she’s the director of TFN. TFN is the tape that has held together the good parts of education standards so far, against the swords of the culture warriors. TFN’s blog will probably be updated through the meeting.
- National Center for Science Education is the always stalwart, working-for-the-good organization on Texas education standards — alas, we’re talking social studies now
- Paul Burka’s story on the culture war, at Texas Monthly
- Fox News’s Shannon Bream cites Jay Sekulow of the Pat Robertson forces urging more cultural war before the will of Texas voters can change things.
- McLeroy won the first annual UpChucky Award from NCSE
- The new, online newspaper, Texas Tribune, covers SBOE very well; watch that space
- Kelly Shackleford’s religious issues group will live blog at their site
1 Comment | Cargo Cults, Economics, Education, Education quality, Education reform, Government, History, History Revisionism, Rampant stupidity, Social Studies, State school boards, Texas, Texas Freedom Network, Voodoo history, War on Education | Tagged: Culture Wars, Don McLeroy, Economics, Education, Education reform, Government, History, Rampant stupidity, Social Studies, Texas, Texas State Board of Education, War on Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Hope in Texas: McLeroy voted off of state school board
March 3, 2010Two earthquakes ravage American nations, tsunamis, freakishly large snowstorms, still trouble in Iraq and Afghanistan, Iran in turmoil and ruled by some sort of crazy, North Koreans still starve so the nation can make a nuclear sabre to rattle.
Good news?
Texas State Board of Education member Don McLeroy lost a primary election challenge to attorney Tom Ratliff, representing the area around Beaumont, Texas. The news is that McLeroy is out — notice that the Texas Tribune doesn’t name the winner until the seventh paragraph.
Another prominent, but much more reasonable Republican member of the SBOE also lost: Geraldine “Tincy” Miller, in Dallas. Miller was so expected to win that race that almost no one was watching, and little is in public about the winner of the race.
Election results from Tuesday’s primary election in Texas mean that the State Board of Education will change dramatically. It would be almost impossible for any of the changes to be bad ones. McLeroy led the anti-evolution force on the board. McLeroy was the ringleader to gut and racialize English standards earlier, and he’s been the point man in the attempt to gut and de-secularize social studies standards.
Board member Cynthia Dunbar, another “social conservative,” did not run for re-election.
In the governor’s race, anti-education, anti-science Gov. Rick Perry won big over the state’s popular Republican U.S. Sen. Kay Hutchison. Third place in that race went to the Teabagger candidate.
No Teabagger won any race in Texas.
It’s not that Texas has suddenly gained reason. The dissension on the SBOE, demonstrated by the Texas Senate’s rejection of McLeroy’s renomination to be chairman of the body, just got to be too much. Texans like their crazies to be sane enough to get things done, and not so noisily crazy as to attract attention to the state’s shared insanity.
Sunlight cast on the actions of the board, especially by groups like the Texas Freedom Network, informed Texans. And now the people of Texas have spoken.
More:
- “McLeroy, Miller upset in SBOE elections,” Austin American-Statesman
- “Social conservatives could lose grip on state board,” Houston Chronicle
- Previous posts featuring McLeroy at Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub here, and here, and here, and here, and here.
5 Comments | Education, Education quality, Evolution, literacy, Literature, State school boards, Texas, Texas Freedom Network, Texas history | Tagged: Biology, Don McLeroy, Education, Evolution, Science, Social Studies, Texas Freedom Network, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Texas Education Board candidate campaigns against science
February 9, 2010Do you need to know that Texas Citizens for Better Science is a right-wing, anti-science group, in order to see through this campaign stuff from Randy Rives?
Does this photo, with caption, qualify as witch hunt material?
Caption from Randy Rives's campaign: "Left to right: Area ACLU secretary Steve Schafersman (in back, barely visible in this picture); arch-Darwinist Eugenie Scott of Berkeley, California; TFN's Kathy Miller (white coat); SBOE member Tincy Miller (in back, facing others); SBOE member Bob Craig of Lubbock. (Taken while the five were huddled in a strategy session to promote evolution being taught without weaknesses language. Do you have this sort of influence with your SBOE members?)"
Steve Schafersman, by the way, is president of Texas Citizens for Science, the pro-science group active in Texas education issues. You know Eugenie Scott.
Rives is running against pro-science incumbent Bob Craig. You who love education, Texas and the U.S., you know which way to vote.
4 Comments | Creationism, Political Smear, Politics, Science, Texas Citizens for Science | Tagged: Bob Craig, Campaigns, Education, Evolution, Politics, Randy Rives, Texas State Board of Education, Witch Hunt | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Social studies train wreck at Texas State Board of Education: Live! A Nation at Risk
January 13, 2010Steve Schafersman will live blog the hearings on social studies standards before the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) today, at Evo-Sphere. Schafersman is president of Texas Citizens for Science, and a long-time activist for better education in Texas on all topics.
Rapid updates or live-blogging should be available at the blog of the Texas Freedom Network, TFN Insider.
It’s Item #6 on the SBOE agenda, with a title that tips off the trouble:
Item #6 — Public Hearing Regarding Proposed Revisions to 19 TAC Chapter 113, Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for Social Studies, and Chapter 118, Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for Economics with Emphasis on the Free Enterprise System and Its Benefits.
Schafersman e-mailed an introduction to the meeting:
Some say the Social Studies public testimony by the religious right, liberals, etc., then the SBOE debate, motions to amend, votes, etc. is a bigger circus than adopting the science standards. Judge for yourself. You can watch the entire circus, carnival, and sideshow on the webcast video at http://www.texasadm in.com/cgi- bin/tea.cgi
This is Texas democracy in action, when sullen and tight-lipped State Board members listen to public testifiers for 3 minutes each and profoundly ignore them since they already know what they are going to do. But I, at least, feel better after speaking so I don’t later feel responsible for the crappy amendments, changes, and policies that come out of this horrible Board because I did nothing. The proposed Social Studies standards written by the panels composed of teachers and professors are excellent (when have I heard this before), but the SBOE can’t wait to shamelessly impose their own Religious Right agenda on them.
You’ll recall that SBOE has at every possible turn disregarded the advice of famous and serious historians, respected free-market-advocating economists, geographers and educators on these standards. Economists, for example, want Texas kids to learn about “capitalism,” since that’s what it’s called by economists and policy makers, and colleges. SBOE thinks “capitalism” sounds too subversive, and wishes instead to require Texas kids to learn about “free enterprise” instead.
‘A rose by any other name’ you think, until you start thinking of how Texas kids do on standardized tests, college admission exams, and the punchline on the joke, about Texas kids being told not to study capitalism. No siree, no capitalism in the fictional home of J. R. Ewing, never mind the real-life capitalists like T. Boone Pickens or H. Ross Perot (Jr. and Sr.).
In Dallas, the city prepares to name a street after Cesar Chavez, the great Hispanic union organizer and advocate for working Americans. In Austin, SBOE works to strike all mentions of Chavez, because they dislike the politics of heroes of our ethnic minorities (soon to be a majority in Texas). In Washington historians and policy-makers follow the legacy of Thurgood Marshall, the great civil rights attorney and first African-American to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court. In Austin, SBOE thinks Marshall should be left out of history books. Many of us suspect he’s anathema to the white right-wing in Austin: A smart, successful and noble man of color.
Mel and Norma Gabler died years ago, but their history lingers in the halls of education policy in Austin. It’s Shakespearean.
This is a massive battle. David Barton worked for 30 years to gut history standards nationally to teach a history of America that never was, and as the official religionist appointee of the right-wing SBOE members, he stands on the brink of accomplishing much of the revisionism he’s advocated. See the Texas Tribune story on the issue, “Hijacking History.”
Generally we shouldn’t negotiate with terrorists, Ronald Reagan said. At the SBOE, we’ve put the terrorists in charge of history and economic curricula — if not the terrorist themselves, at least the terrorists’ camels’ noses. Texas’s process has earned flashing red-light, claxon-sounding repeating of the words of Ronald Reagan’s Commission on Excellence in Education: If a foreign nation did this to us, we’d consider it an act of war [excerpt below the fold].
Make no mistake about it. SBOE’s goal is to roll back any of the reforms left from Reagan’s Commission’s work. Our nation is more at risk from foreign competition than ever before. SBOE plans to give away a bit more of our future to China, this week.
Our saving grace is the general incompetence of SBOE members to make significant reform in Texas’s wounded schools, reeling from unworkable and damaging requirements under the No Child Left Behind Act and a testing program that severely limits what can be taught in any social studies course other than those bastions of learning left in International Baccalaureate programs and Advanced Placement courses (estimates are that between 5% and 10% of Texas high school students can take one of those good courses). Whatever silliness, craziness or lies SBOE orders to be taught, it can’t be taught and tested well. Inertia preventing change works to save America in this case.
In business, most CEOs at least appreciate the value of having good front-line employees who are the ones who really deliver the service or product and produce the profit of the enterprise (even if they don’t treat those employees so well as the employees deserve). Education may be the last bastion of flogging the horse that should be pulling the cart instead. In this case, having well-trained teachers in the classroom is the last hope for Texas, Texas parents and Texas students — and Texas’s economic future and future in liberty. Teachers are the last defense of freedom in Texas. Today SBOE will make another assault on the ramparts that protect the teachers in their work.
When will the French fleet arrive to lend aid? Will it arrive at all? And if it arrives, will Texas kids know better than to shoot at the ships?
Carol Haynes, who claims to have a doctorate in some discipline, told the board how to rewrite the standards to completely change the history of the civil rights movement in their last hearing on the topic. According to Haynes, apparently, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was opposed to civil rights and Barry Goldwater was in favor — the Board didn’t offer to correct her revisionism, but instead asked her to go beyond her three minutes in fawning acceptance. This appears to be SBOE’s approval of various Other Universe hypotheses offered by Star Trek, allowing any damned thing at all to be taught as history (except the right stuff). Haynes is scheduled to testify again (#128), probably very late at night, but perhaps in time for the 10:00 p.m. Texas television news broadcasts. Oy.
Excerpt from the Report of the Commission on Excellence in Education, A Nation at Risk, below the fold.
Cover of A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform, the 1983 report that started the education reform mess. AFT graphic.
Stand up for your nation, it’s children and future; sound the alarm:
2 Comments | Economics, Education, Education quality, Free market economics, Freedom - Economic, Freedom - Political, Geography - Economic, Geography - Physical, Geography - Political, History, Politics, Social Studies, State school boards, Testing, Texas, Texas Citizens for Science, Texas Freedom Network, Textbooks | Tagged: A Nation At Risk, Economics, Education, geography, History, Politics, Social Studies, Texas, Texas Citizens for Science, Texas Freedom Network, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Schafersman’s testimony on social studies standards, to Texas SBOE
January 13, 2010Dr. Steve Schafersman will testify on proposed new standards for social studies in Texas public schools, at a hearing before the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) scheduled for today, January 13, 2009.
Schafersman is president of Texas Citizens for Science and its driving force. He’ll also live blog much of the hearing at his blog, Evo-Sphere. You should probably watch TFN Insider, the blog of the Texas Freedom Network, too.
Schafersman’s testimony was released in advance, and reprinted below.
Public Testimony of
Steven D. Schafersman
Texas State Board of Education Public Hearing
Austin, Texas; Wednesday, 2009 January 13I am grateful for the opportunity to address you about Social Studies standards for which I am testifying as a private citizen. Tomorrow you will begin your work to adopt the new Social Studies TEKS. I closely read and evaluated the proposed Grade 8 Social Studies, High School U. S. History, U. S. Government, World History, and World Geography standards and found them to be quite satisfactory. The standards were extremely comprehensive, balanced, fair-minded, and honest. The members of the panels who wrote them did an outstanding job and I was very impressed by their knowledge and professionalism. I urge that you adopt these Social Studies standards without change.
My experience with this Board leads me to suspect that some of you don’t want to adopt these excellent standards–written by social studies curriculum experts and teachers–without change. After all, these standards were written by experts and some of you feel obliged to stand up to the experts. Some of you may want to change some of the standards to correspond to your own political and religious beliefs, such as the mistaken notions that the United States is a Christian nation, that we do not have a secular government, or that separation of church and state is a myth. Some of you may want to add more unnecessary information about Christian documents or Christian history in America. If some of you do wish to make such changes, I request that you restrain yourselves. Please resist the temptation to engage in the same behavior some of you exhibited last year when you perverted the Science standards and embarrassed the citizens of Texas by engaging in pseudoscientific anti-intellectual behavior. While the Texas State Board of Education has a long and proud history of anti-intellectualism, the economic conditions today demand that we stop that practice and return to professionalism and respect for academic achievement so that our children have a future in which they will use their minds to make a living in intellectual pursuits and not their limbs in a service economy.
During the adoption of the science standards, some Board members amended the Biology and Earth and Space Science standards by engaging in fast talking, omitting pertinent information about what was being changed, offering bogus “compromises” that were not really fair compromises, and referring to “experts” who were in fact pseudoscientists and not real experts at all. I hope to not witness the same behavior tomorrow but I am pessimistic. Two pseudo-historians, David Barton and Peter Marshall, were appointed as “experts” and there is plenty of evidence available that demonstrates that these two gentlemen are preachers and polemicists for their radical agendas, not legitimate history experts.
I urge the rational and conservative Board members–whom I hope still make up a majority of this Board–to resist proposed radical amendments that attempt to insert bogus histories of American exceptionalism, America’s presumed Christian heritage as the source of our liberties and Constitutional principles, and other historical myths perpetrated by the American Religious Right. I urge you to vote No to such radical amendments, not Abstain or your radical opponents will gain the same advantage that they enjoyed during the amendment process for the Science standards, where they were delighted when some of you abstained or did not vote since that made it easier for them to obtain majorities which allowed them to win several amendments that made changes detrimental to science education. Unlike last year, when you were prevented from consulting your legitimate Science experts during debate, please consult your genuine Social Studies experts, Texas Professors Kracht, Hodges, and de la Teja. Please try to avoid the same mistakes with the Social Studies adoption process that occurred with the Science standards adoption, so no one will be able to accuse you of being anti-intellectual.
2 Comments | Capitalism, Economics, Education, Education quality, Education reform, Politics, Texas, Texas Citizens for Science, Texas Freedom Network, Voodoo history, War on Education | Tagged: Don McLeroy, Economics, Education, education standards, geography, History, SBOE, Social Studies, TEKS, Texas, Texas Citizens for Science, Texas Freedom Network, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Texas social studies standards: Crisis is now
January 6, 2010How bad is it? Washington Monthly features a solid, long story on what is going on in Austin this week and next in Texas social studies standards. I wish that outstanding publication had a much greater circulation.
Even in Minnesota, P. Z. Myers is concerned: “Be afraid” he warns his readers. In comments there, a guy named BlackWolf puts it bluntly:
Once, a guy in a schoolbook storage room was the killer.
Now, the books themselves are becoming dangerous.
You can help. You can testify next week. You can send comments. The Texas Freedom Network can help you be heard.
Please let the State Board of Education know that Texas, and the nation, needs good social studies standards. As we noted last month, it’s time to stand up for education and social studies:
Make Your Voice Heard at January Public Hearing
The process of revising social studies curriculum standards for Texas public schools is moving into a critical stage. And a public hearing the board has scheduled for January may be the only opportunity for you to speak out against the far right’s efforts to corrupt standards for history, government and other social studies classes.
The final drafts of the proposed standards prepared by writing teams made up of teachers, academics and other community members are reflective of mainstream academic scholarship in the various subject areas. It is clear that members of these writing teams largely resisted intense political pressure from far right, rejecting attempts to remove key civil rights figures and make other politically motivated revisions. (See the Background section at the bottom of this e-mail for a more detailed account of the politicization of this curriculum process.)
But as with science and language arts, far-right SBOE members are already plotting to undo the work of the writing teams of social studies.
Take Action
The State Board of Education so far has scheduled only one public hearing on the proposed standards. That hearing is likely to occur either on January 13 or January 14 in Austin.
If you are interested in speaking at the hearing, please click here. TFN will help you register to speak before the board and be an effective voice against efforts to politicize our children’s classrooms.
This may be the only opportunity the board provides for Texans to speak out on the proposed standards. If we are to prevent far-right SBOE members from turning social studies classrooms into tools for promoting political agendas, then it’s critical that the board hears from people like you! Click here to sign up for more information on how to testify in January.
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Background on Social Studies Review Process to Date
Earlier this year, TFN exposed and derailed several attempts by the far right to hijack the social studies curriculum revision process. Members of the state board – or their appointees to review panels and writing teams – tried at various times to:
- Remove civil rights champions like César Chávez and Thurgood Marshall from the standards, calling them poor examples of citizenship
- Turn Joseph McCarthy – who discredited himself and dishonored Congress with his infamous Red-baiting smear campaign in the 1950s – into an American hero
- Rewrite history and portray America’s Founders as intending to establish a Christian nation with laws based on a fundamentalist reading of the Bible
Members of the writing teams largely rejected these fringe ideas in the final drafts of the standards they submitted to the board. Chávez and Marshall remain in the curriculum. The American history standards do not whitewash the damaging history of McCarthyism. And under the proposed standards students would still learn that the Founders created a nation in which all people are free to worship – or not – as they choose without coercion or interference by government.
We must ensure that the board adopts curriculum standards that reflect mainstream academic scholarship in social studies. This is vitally important because the results of this decision will be reflected in the next generation of social studies textbooks around the country.
Click here to let TFN know you are willing to testify at the state board.
2 Comments | Education, Education quality, History, Social Studies, State school boards, Texas, Texas Freedom Network | Tagged: Education, Social Studies, Standards, Texas, Texas Freedom Network, Texas State Board of Education, Textbooks | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Texas Tribune and Texas State Board of Education
January 5, 2010Have you found Texas Tribune yet? It’s a new, on-line newspaper, and generally it’s terrific.
See their collection of stories already about the State Board of Education. The collection can substitute for at least one cup of coffee to get your blood flowing in the morning.
Leave a Comment » | Education, Journalism, News, Newspapers, On-line education, On-line learning, Scandals, State school boards, Texas, Texas Education Agency (TEA) | Tagged: Education, Journalism, Newspapers, Scandals, Texas State Board of Education, Texas Tribune | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
David Barton vs. reality, manners, and scholarship
October 7, 2009As expected, people are finding historical and other errors in David Barton’s critique of the Texas social studies standards.
I noted this in a comment at Texas Freedom Network’s blog, The Insider:
This isn’t exactly an error, but it creeps me out. Barton goes on at length about incorporating the views of a scholar of economics — but he never names the guy, and Barton seems overly affected and concerned about the guy’s residence and Jewishness.
See the section of Barton’s report talking about free enterprise (page 7). The real experts, the social studies teachers and professors whose work the Board appears to have rejected, suggested bringing the economic discussion into the 21st century and use “capitalism” instead of “free enterprise.” This would make the Texas curriculum correlate with the studies in the area done by social scientists, especially economists, and more accurately and precisely describe the system.
That is one reason given for rejecting their work, that the Board doesn’t want to mention capitalism. They don’t want to call capitalism by the name economists use.
But look at Barton’s suggestion. He veers off on a tangent about ethics in capitalism — I would venture that Barton never took any economics courses he can remember, and he’s never read Adam Smith, judging from the nature of his complaint (ethics is very much a discussion in economics). But it just gets weird. He refers to a paper, without citation, by a “Jewish economist” in the “Pacific Northwest.”
Barton doesn’t name the paper. He doesn’t say where it was published, nor offer any other citation by which it might be tracked down. Most creepily, he keeps referring to the “Jewish economist” as if his faith or ethnic background has any relevance, without ever naming the guy.
That isn’t scholarship. He almost makes a good point, but any valuable point is completely overcome by the bigoted lack of scholarship, the mere convention of naming the author of the paper and offering a citation.
Expert? No, certainly not in manifestation. That’s just creepy.
Here is the section I’m talking about:
Comment D: Free-Enterprise & Capitalism
Throughout the TEKS, the term “free enterprise” has been followed by the parenthetical “(free market, capitalism)”.By including the terms capitalism and free-market as synonyms for free-enterprise, perhaps it is now time to consider the merits of an observation concerning capitalism raised by a Jewish economist in the Pacific Northwest.In previous generations, capitalism and the free-market system was universally operated on the unstated but unanimously assumed foundation of general societal virtue – there was a general set of assumed values and ethics that remained at the basis of transactions.
For example, to this day we assume that when a waiter brings us a glass of water that he did not spit in it before he delivered it to us. We assume that when we get the oil in our car changed that the mechanic actually changed the oil rather than just put a new sticker on the windshield. We make many Golden Rule type assumptions in the operation of the free-market system of capitalism.
When these general societal principles of ethics and morality are observed, the Free Enterprise System works as it should; but when these principles are ignored, the FreeEnterprise System breaks down and produces Bernie Madoff, Kenneth Lay, Jeffrey Skilling, Dennis Kozlowski, John Rigas, Joe Nacchio, Gregory Reyes, James McDermott, Sam Waskal, Sam Israel, Bernie Ebbers, and many others recently convicted of fraud, theft, corruption, and other white collar crimes that bilked clients of billions of dollars. The traditional Free Market System will not operate properly if the guiding premise is the egocentric Machiavellian principle that the end justifies the means.
We are now at a point in our history where we can no longer assume that the previously universally understood ethical basis of the Free Enterprise System will still be observed, understood, or embraced. Therefore, the Jewish economist in the Pacific Northwest has proffered that rather than using “Capitalism,” we instead begin using the term “Ethical Capitalism,” for it captures the historical import of the system and identifies an underlying principle without which the free-enterprise system will not work.
Therefore, I recommend that when we have the phrase “free enterprise (free market, capitalism)” that we instead consider using “free enterprise (free market, ethical capitalism).” It is an accurate recognition of what is one of the unspoken but indispensable elements of the free enterprise system. This change also reinforces the long-standing premise of political philosophers across the centuries that the continuation of a republic is predicated upon an educated and a virtuous citizenry.
Who is he talking about? What is he talking about?
More information:
- Steve Schaffersman, the intrepid force behind Texas Citizens for Science, has a longer exposé of Barton’s odd claims and work to frustrate accurate history in Texas at Schaffersman’s Houston Chronicle hosted blog, EvoSphere. It’s well worth the read, just to see how intricately bizarre and erroneous Barton can be about simple facts of history, and how Barton chooses to misinterpret the Constitution, especially the First Amendment, and how he exaggerates little facts of history into gross distortions of the American story. I regret I failed to note this article here, in the first edition.
- Hey, also check out Steve’s other posts on the most recent SBOE meetings, here, and here.
5 Comments | Economics, Education, Education assessment, First Amendment, History, Politics, Texas, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: Constitution, David Barton, Economics, Education, First Amendment, History, Social Studies, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Hubble Deep Field , 3-D animation
August 28, 2009Here’s something that will make the Texas State Board of Education cringe and cower under their desks; watch it in good health:
2 Comments | Accuracy, animation, Astronomy, Big Bang, Science, State school boards, Texas | Tagged: 3-D, animation, Astronomy, Hubble Deep Field, Science, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Scientist steps in to try to save the day
July 19, 2009On the one hand, you hope he’s got a good copy of the original cast recording of “Man of La Mancha,” with the late Richard Kiley singing the importance of dreaming the impossible dream. On the other hand, you hope it’s not an impossible situation at all.
Mathematics Professor Lorenzo Sadun declared his candidacy for the Texas State Board of Education seat representing District 10. He’ll be running against incumbent Cynthia Dunbar in a district that has a history of electing people with little or no education background and a commitment to scorched Earth conservative policies — if Dunbar chooses to run again. Dunbar has not announced her intentions.
Sadun is professor of mathematics at the University of Texas, in Austin.
Mathematics Prof. Lorenzo Sadun, University of Texas - Daily Texan photo by Mike Paschal
In the 2006 election, there was no Democratic nominee. Dunbar ran against a Libertarian and won approximately 70 percent of the vote. The 2010 primary election is scheduled for March, and Sadun declared last week that he will seek the Democratic nomination.
The Place 10 seat-holder may become very influential. With the board almost evenly split, a negative or positive vote can greatly affect educational policy and standards.
If Sadun is elected, he will be the only scientist on the board. He said that even though he may encounter opposition from members of the board, he will find a common ground with his colleagues and will pursue agreement without sacrificing the quality of education for Texas students.
“Despite my taking a fairly hard line, I am a conciliator,” Sadun said. “I have not met a person who knew so much I couldn’t teach them something, and I’ve never met someone who knew so little that they couldn’t teach me something.”
District 10 includes 14 counties surrounding Travis County to the east of the county, and the northern part of Travis County. Travis, home to the Texas state capital Austin and one of Texas’s five supercounties, was split in education board districts to limit the influence of its highly-educated, more liberal voter population.
District 10, Texas State Board of Education
Burnt Orange Report wrote that Dunbar will face opposition if she chooses to run again.
- Dr. Rebecca Osborne, a teacher in the Roundrock ISD, has also announced her intention to run for the District 10 seat, as a Republican.
- Austin education activist Julie Cowan will run for the Republican nomination
- Judy Jennings will run for the Democratic nomination. She is Director of Assessment at Resources for Learning.
- Democratic Party activist Susan Shelton will also seek the Democratic nomination.
Events in District 10 offer a sign of hope that the era ended when apathy from candidates and voters allowe anti-public education forces to dominate the Texas State Board of Education. And if Sadun were to win, it would be the first time a working scientist was elected to SBOE.
Who knows? Sadun could succeed — but if he wins a seat on the SBOE, it’s not likely he’d sing that other song Richard Kiley made famous, “Stranger in Paradise.” He’s no stranger to quality education, and SBOE isn’t paradise.
27 Comments | Campaigns, Education, Education reform, Elections, History, Politics, State school boards, Texas | Tagged: Campaign, Education, Elections, Politics, Texas, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 