Back in the 1980s, the culture wars were at full pitch, with ethnic groups competing with one another for time and space in the social studies and history curriculum. In 1987, Jesse Jackson led a demonstration of 500 protesters at Stanford University chanting, “Hey, hey, ho, ho, Western civ has got to go!” In 1989, the introductory Western Culture program was replaced by “Culture, Ideas, and Values,” which taught an inclusive approach to race, class, and gender.
The battles over inclusion and diversity were numerous. Ultimately, it seemed over the past twenty years, we as a society reached a new equilibrium. We (that is, in movies, television, the media generally, in sports, in politics, in government, in industry, and in the school curriculum) recognize that many different groups and individuals played important roles in forging this nation and continue to do so today. Inclusion and diversity are more than words, they are an ideal for which we continually strive.
Trumpism revived an old and toxic element: White Supremacy. His praise of groups like the Proud Boys, his refusal to disavow them or even the Ku Klux Klan, allowed such groups to come out from under a big rock of infamy and crawl back into the edges of the mainstream.
The resurgence of hate groups and their open advocacy of violence against others is a direct rebuke to what seemed to be (at least for a time) the triumph of multiculturalism and inclusion.
Once you open this spigot, it is hard to turn it off, and the demands for group recognition and flow in many directions.
Consider the heated reaction to the Black Lives Matter movement. Critics called it racist, when in fact it was a demand for the recognition that systemic racism is deeply institutionalized and needs to be confronted and changed. The widespread and multiracial protests that followed the murder of George Floyd energized allies of racial justice and angered the newly awakened White Supremacists.
When loosely organized and disorganized groups began pulling down Confederate statues, that caused a backlash. Trump refused the Defense Appropriations Bill because it included a provision to rename military bases named for Confederate generals (who were, after all, traitors to the United States). Congress overrode his veto, not necessarily because they disagreed with him, but because they wanted the armed forces to get a deserved pay raise.
In San Francisco, the school board voted 6-1 to strip the names of prominent individuals from 44 school buildings, which led to an outcry because some of the names that will be removed are George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Robert Louis Stevenson, Paul Revere, and Dianne Feinstein. The school district, which has more than 57,000 students enrolled, is changing the schools named after historical figures linked to “the subjugation and enslavement of human beings; or who oppressed women, inhibiting societal progress; or whose actions led to genocide; or who otherwise significantly diminished the opportunities of those amongst us to the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” according to the text of the resolution.
For starters, it is always a bad idea to name a building for a living person. There should be a rule against it.
Schools that will be renamed include: Abraham Lincoln High School, George Washington High School, Dianne Feinstein Elementary, Roosevelt Middle School, Jefferson Elementary and Alamo Elementary. Lincoln was chosen based on “his treatment of First Nation peoples,” teacher Jeremiah Jeffries told the San Francisco Chronicle in December 2020. Washington and Jefferson were slaveowners. Feinstein, a former San Francisco mayor, was listed for reportedly ordering a Confederate flag to be replaced after it was torn down, according to the Sacramento Bee. The news also comes more than a year after the school board voted to cover a controversial mural depicting images of slavery and dead Native Americans at George Washington High School.
The board was partially motivated to draft the resolution after the deadly “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017. “This resolution came to the school board in the wake of the attacks in Charlottesville,” said San Francisco Board of Education President Gabriela López. “And we are working alongside the rest of the country to dismantle symbols of racism and White supremacy culture. “San Francisco is not the only city to take pass such a resolution.
In recent years, city councils and school districts nationwide have renamed buildings and removed monuments dedicated to Confederate leaders who fought to preserve slavery and White supremacy in America. In September of 2020, the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) identified more than 240 schools across the country that bear the name of a Confederate leader. More than 30 schools in the US have been renamed since 2014 in order to eliminate any link to Confederacy, according to the EJI.
San Francisco Mayor London Breed said she endorses the move to rename the schools but wonders why the board was not making plans to reopen the schools.
The board has invited suggestions for new names for the schools.
I suggest that they be called by numbers, not by names. Why not High School #1, Public School #2? That way they will never offend anyone and their names will live forever.
I went to a junior high school in Houston named for a Confederate general, Albert Sidney Johnson Junior High. The name and the school are long gone. Good riddance! (I still remember the marching song, however, which was catchy.)
But it gets wilder still in North Carolina. There, the newly elected Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson, who is African American, accuses the schools of indoctrinating students and calls for changing the state social studies curriculum so that it does not acknowledge systemic racism. Lt. Governor Robinson has collected nearly 20,000 signatures to endorse his views. His petition says:
THE NORTH CAROLINA STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION will vote Thursday, Feb. 4, to adopt new state social studies standards, kindergarten through high school.
The (CL.B.1) standard states: “Explain how individual values and societal norms contribute to institutional discrimination and the marginalization of minority groups living under the American system of government.”
The proposed standards are political in nature and paint America as being systematically racist. These divisive standards consistently separate Americans into groups in an effort to undermine our unity. The proposed standards indoctrinate our students against our great country and our founders. The standards are not age-appropriate in the elementary grades. Will you stand with Lt. Governor Robinson in rejecting the current standards the State Board of Education is planning to vote on?
There may be a moral to this story, but I am not sure what it is.
My takeaway: Tell the truth as best you know it. Respect other people. Listen to them. Don’t try to push your views on others who disagree. Pay attention to historians. Rely on reputable sources. Teach the conflicts and debates. Don’t die on the wrong hill.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Thanks for this post, Diane!!!
Celebrating Black History Month
This is rare footage of the Greenwood district of Tulsa, OK, in the 1920s. It was this prosperous enclave of black homes and businesses that a murderous white mob burned down in the Tulsa Race Massacre, May 31-June 1, 1921. And, of course, this is where our racist-in-chief president, Dog-Whistle Don, chose to go when he returned to the campaign trail during the pandemic.
America had an opportunity and blew it.
What a great closing line to an altogether beautifully written piece, Diane!!!
Complex for sure. However we need, I think, to own up the fact that struggles over naming are proxy wars over the extent to which we want to undo the inequities that plague our communities and nation today. Defenders of Confederate monuments are saying, “FU. I don’t care about inequity and racism.” Those who are demanding the removal of slaveholder and traitor statues are saying, “It long past time to undo racism, damnit.” Unlike General Lee, Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln are more nuanced figures. Maybe if we agreed to do something substantive about racism and inequity people might be able to live with the ambiguity. Remains to be seen.
you just saved me a lot of verbiage with a few good sentences.
struggles over naming are proxy wars over the extent to which we want to undo the inequities that plague our communities and nation today
Nailed it, Arthur
Why don’t we sell the name of the school to the highest bidder for a number of years …like sports arenas …
That’s should be a good fundraiser. No one would have an Alma mater because the names would change so often.
I have long been an advocate of requiring Congresspeople to wear suits like those of NASCAR drivers, with the names of their corporate sponsors plastered all over them, in a size proportional to the size of the donations
What a creative idea!
Don’t think this has not been tried. Here is a report from the only center I know that has taken on commercialism in schools.
Click to access RB%20Trends%202017_2.pdf
Lt. Governor Robinson says, in his Trump Toddler English way, that the proposed standards “paint America as being systematically racist.” The phrase in current use is, of course, is “systemically racist.”
But one can’t falsely “paint” this country as being racist anymore than one can falsely “paint” new grass as green. This country gave people of color genocide and slavery, followed by Indian Schools and Jim crow and lynchings and systemic racist local, state, and federal laws and regulations and policies, including federal housing policies that ensured that blacks would not build generational wealth.
And in exchange, people of color turned out in enormous numbers in the recent election and saved democracy.
Grace abounding to the chief of sinners.
“If you, O LORD, kept a record of sins, O Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness; therefore you are feared.”
-Psalm 130
Forgiveness requires confronting truth.
yup
I am so freaking sick of listening to people talk about others’ sins. Enough with the talk already. Go out and do some.
The culture wars exist because it benefits political leaders to do thing that highlight differences rather than searching for common ground. This cannot endure as a modus vivendi to create representative government. We must come together over the common goal of creating better society, or we shall all perish.
A great start would be to unite behind convicting the treasonous Trump
What do we do if, as expected, the republican majority does not convict? The risk of impeachment is the same as the impeachment
that tried to convict him of blackmailing/bribing Ukraine into trashing Biden during the campaign. After that failed attempt, Trump felt emboldened and acted vindicated.
Congressional investigation used to be the way for political leaders to be chastened, but republican attempts to kick out Clinton for sexual impropriety ruined the chance for a long time for the public to take congressional investigation seriously, and democrats were forced to accept Clinton or set the precedent of removing a president for lying about personal matters.
Republicans will try to stand on the idea that impeachment is only for removal from office. If that is a valid argument, there must be a constitutional amendment allowing for figures removed from office to be prosecuted and held accountable after they are gone from office.
If the Republicans do not convict, they are saying that the president may engage in any criminal or treasonous behavior in the month before Inauguration because he will be a private citizen soon.
Great argument, Diane!
Diane, I liked your comment about how “the president may engage in any criminal or treasonous behavior in the month before inauguration because he will be a private citizen soon.”
Trump’s quickly put together legal team are arguing you “CAN IMPEACH A PRESIDENT WHO IS NO LONGER IN OFFICE”. Would that this was not a typo.
“Fight like hell” is definitely not free speech when spoken to a mob ready to storm the Capitol and kill Pelosi, Pence and AOC.
………………………………………..
Senate Can’t Impeach an Ex-President, Trumps’ Legal Team Argue in Pre-Trial Brie
Ana Lucia Murillo
Breaking News/Cheat Sheet Intern
Updated Feb. 02, 2021 1:51PM ET /
Published Feb. 02, 2021 1:48PM ET
Pete Marovich/Pool/Getty
Former President Trump’s slap-dash impeachment legal team filed their first official response to impeachment charges on Tuesday, arguing that whether or not Trump instigated a riot is a “moot” point since the Senate can impeach a president who is no longer in office. The lawyers argued that, either way, Trump’s remarks at the Jan 6. rally, where he told his supporters to “fight like hell,” were protected as free speech. Trump’s legal team has been hastily assembled after the initial team fell apart last week—which may explain the typo in Tuesday’s brief.
The brief was filed in response to one filed by House impeachment managers Tuesday morning in which lawmakers claimed Trump’s incitement of supporters who stormed the Capitol was a “betrayal” that can’t go unpunished. “It is one thing for an official to pursue legal processes for contesting election results,” the managers wrote in the brief. “It is something else entirely for that official to incite violence against the government, and to obstruct the finalization of election results, after judges and election officials conclude that his challenges lack proof and legal merit.”
Read it at CNN
Of possible interest is this report on how corporations are facing their own histories of exploitation and exclusion within their organizations.
https://verdict.justia.com/2021/02/02/corporate-transitional-justice?utm_source=verdict-newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2021-02-02&utm_content=text-view-in-browser-1
Also, the San Francisco Unified School District’s art department (previously “VAPA”) renamed itself because acronyms are tied to “white supremacy culture.”
https://reason.com/2021/02/02/san-francisco-schools-acronyms-white-supremacy/
The culture wars have not only never stopped, but they’ve become increasingly intense and insane.
”The (CL.B.1) standard states: ‘Explain how individual values and societal norms contribute to institutional discrimination and the marginalization of minority groups living under the American system of government.’”
That question really raised my eyebrows, not because I disagree with the premise, but because there is a premise. INAT (I’m Not A Teacher), but based on my experience as a student, it seems a more appropriate phrasing would be, “Did individual values and societal norms contribute to institutional discrimination and the marginalization of minority groups living under the American system of government? Support your answer with historical examples.”
Even though my answer would start with, “Yes,” I don’t believe building the assumption into the question is conducive to development of critical thinking. The original phrasing sounds a little too much like, “Senator, are you still beating your wife?”
Teachers, am I on the right track, or off base?
Lenny,
I agree with you.
Thank you! Good to have expert perspective. It seems to me approaches like this fuel the right’s claims that liberals’ education policies are “indoctrination,” because frankly, this one is, & justify demands for school choice, undermining public schools. School choice advocates will take even a single example like this & run with it.
Apparently the right aren’t the only ones who act against their own interests.
Me too.
The Lefty education orthodoxy derides teaching facts (so inferior to critical thinking skills!), EXCEPT when it comes to liberal darlings like MLK and Harvey Milk, in which case the facts must be taught. This gives credence to conservatives’ fear that our schools are indoctrination factories.
Ponderosa, it is beneath you to suggest that public schools are “indoctrination factories.” Is yours?
Can you cite specific examples of cases where established educational institutions have knowingly misrepresented facts?
I did not say there was misrepresentation of facts. I said that CA elementary schools, in keeping with fashionable constructivist pedagogy, teach skills and almost no facts –with the conspicuous exception of MLK, Harvey Milk and a couple other icons of the Left. The students who come into my history classes seem to have learned almost nothing in elementary school EXCEPT MLK. They no nothing of Washington the man, or Washington the city. Some don’t even know they live in a country called the US. They say their country is California. The same education experts who lambaste fact learning lobby the legislature to mandate learning facts about these icons. Let me be clear –I am a gay liberal and am very happy that these things are taught. However, putting myself in the shoes of a conservative parent, I’d look at this and think “bias”. Wouldn’t you? If schools taught a flood of diverse facts, as I think they should, the teaching of liberal darlings would not look like indoctrination. But when those are the only facts that are systematically taught?
I am no white nationalist, but I think it’s wrong that white males like Washington, Lincoln, Twain and others seem to have been banished from the curriculum. To be sure a big part of the problem is constructivist pedagogy that denigrates fact learning. But it seems to me that there’s a campaign to ignore, discredit and sometimes demonize anything associated with white people, coupled with a worthwhile campaign to laud people of color (POC). The underlying doctrine seems to be “POC pride; White shame”. This is wrong, and it fuels Trumpism. Liberal radicals are just as destructive as the Marjorie Taylor Greenes. They help create the Marjorie Taylor Greens. We need a strong, sensible center.
Ponderosa:
Thank you for your detailed answer.
I come to this blog not as an education professional, but as the spouse of one, as well as the parent of a special needs student, now in college, who received school placement & services through the public education system. Therefore, I can’t comment on specifics of current curricula, in CA or elsewhere.
If, as you say, public school students above, say, 3rd grade lack knowledge of what I agree are basic facts on US history & structure, I certainly consider that a deficiency. Assuming that’s true, however, it doesn’t indicate necessarily that the reason for that inadequacy is bias. Other possible causes might include, for instance, incompetence or negligence in curricula planning, or ineffective teaching methods that don’t result in retention of essential basics.
Before meeting with my child’s teacher(s) or administrator(s), I’d have to be very honest with myself about my actual motivation & the results I hoped for. Is my concern over the educators’ political bias, or what my child is being taught. If my child is learning what I consider appropriate & complete content, I don’t care what teachers’/administrators’ personal views are. If I was a conservative parent motivated by wanting an education for my kids that would best prepare them to function as adults, in our society in general, I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion that bias was the reason for the absence of these elements. Even if I suspected it might be, it would be counterproductive to my interests to open with that accusation in any discussion with the education system. I’d open the discussion with a question rather than an accusation, asking why my child didn’t know these facts I’d come to regard as essential basics: have they been intentionally excluded or relegated to minor priority, were they taught but my child didn’t learn or retain them, etc.?
I’d need answers to those questions before formulating the most effective approach for addressing my concerns. If I open with accusations, setting myself up as an adversary from the start, I’ve already diverted the topic from my desire for my child to have this knowledge to whether or not the educators are biased. Thinking strictly in terms of my goal, if I make the educators start by defending their motives or sincerity, the discussion is unlikely to return to curriculum content, & I’ve defeated my own purpose.
The responses to this opening inquiry would then guide me. I’d continue with questions, keeping them as non-confrontational as possible, presenting sincere requests for information — it’s hard to accuse them of bias if I display it myself, letting the educators choose how to present their motivations rather than defend themselves against my accusations. Ideally, they wouldn’t be able to characterize my political orientation from my questions. Only if their answers state explicitly that they’re deliberately excluding or downplaying certain facts would I address the issue of bias, & even then I’d try to avoid using terms like “bias” or other descriptions of motive, keeping the discussion to content, e.g., “Do you think it’s important that students have this knowledge in order to function intelligently in society?”; “Why (not)?” I think this approach would be most productive for any parent concerned about curricula.
If, on the other hand, my objective — regardless of my own politics — was to address the educators’ political positions, I could go in with an accusation, but then shouldn’t expect it would lead to any useful discussion of curricula.
This sounds like indoctrination to me:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-worst-governed-state-now-turns-to-indoctrination/2021/02/04/da6e5c4a-6725-11eb-886d-5264d4ceb46d_story.html
NC is undergoing a similar change. I like this compromise position:
A preamble attached to the standards by State Superintendent Catherine Truitt (R) stakes out a middle ground. The state school board believes that social studies lessons should reflect the nation’s diversity, she wrote.
“This means teaching the hard truths of Native American oppression, anti-Catholicism, exploitation of child labor, and Jim Crow to name a few,” the preamble says, “while simultaneously teaching that the US Constitution created the world’s first organized democracy since ancient Rome and that than 90 years into our country’s history, President Lincoln ended the United States’ participation in what had been more than 9,000 years of legalized slavery and human bondage in most parts of the world.”
Ponderosa Thanks for the George Will link. I’m not sure what you mean by your reference to it . . . that it sounds like propaganda to me, (the Illinois curriculum or Will’s take on it); but in reading it, I had to wonder why teachers reflecting on their own potential biases is a particularly “progressive-only” idea? . . . rather than, say, teachers practicing good mental health? I used to like reading Will’s work.
“CRTL would require teachers to (the following jargon salad is standard progressive patois) ‘assess how their biases . . . affect . . . how they access tools to mitigate their own behavior (racism, sexism, homophobia, unearned privilege, Eurocentrism, etc.)’ Stanley Kurtz of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center notes that CRTL promises that its ideology will infuse the licensing and certification processes for aspiring teachers. This will be a coercive incentive to adhere to the progressive catechism, including the principle that systemic oppression and racism can always be detected in nonprogressive policies.”
On that last sentence, didn’t we read earlier here that North Carolina took “systemic” out of their history curriculum . . . no laws or customs securing racism or sexism either? Wow. Aren’t we lucky.
But I think systemic oppression (as with women) and racism should be looked for and can be found, but not ALWAYS, in non-progressive as well as progressive policies. In this case, I have to wonder if ALWAYS is really what the actual documents say or even infer? What teachers and we ALWAYS need to do is to keep diligent about our own biases. But if ALWAYS is in the literature, then they need to change it. However, but, judging from other inanities in this George Will opinion piece, I certainly won’t take Will’s word for it. CBK
There’s a Straight Line from a Child-Murderer to Donald Trump’s Treason
Thom Hartmann’s blog
The roots and brutality of the January 6th coup attempt grew in the soil of libertarianism and Ayn Rand’s writings
Many Americans are baffled by the Republican Party’s embrace of a billionaire sociopath and elected Republicans’ willingness to overlook the death of five Americans, including a police officer, in an attempted coup. (Particularly after they spent over 2 years and tens of millions of dollars obsessing on 4 dead Americans in Benghazi.)
But it’s not just power politics; the roots of this movement in today’s GOP run from a 1927 child murderer, to a real estate lobbying group, to Ronald Reagan putting both of their philosophies into actual practice.
Thus, Republican policies over the past 40 years not only gutted America’s middle class, but led straight to the Trump presidency and the attack on the Capitol on January 6th that he led. Many Americans are now so confused about how government should work that they’ve embraced a bizarre conspiracy theory positing Trump as a sort of messiah…
https://shar.es/aoJPmO
Thanks. This is the best explanation on Rand I have read. The Fountainhead was one of several novels required of my sophomore college English class. I was revolted by the ideas in it, suggesting to the teacher that we should have read real literature. I think he was insulted.
I know a place where there is a statue to Ayn Rand. I guess the place never heard this story.
Death Valley covers 5,270 square miles.
Why not give 1,000 of those square miles, the most desolate area, to Trump and his hardcore followers. Built a wall around that 1,000 square miles and let them do whatever they want inside that wall, but never let them out.
Never thought I’d agree with McConnell on anything. Why in the world do we have 81% of Republicans who still like Trump? Nothing, not even encouraging the storming of the Capitol building to kill Democrats, gets through to them.
……………….
The Memo: It’s Trump vs. McConnell in battle for GOP’s soul
McConnell clearly has come to see Trump — and Trumpism — as a liability for his party in the future. Comparisons are drawn with the rise of the Tea Party roughly a decade ago — a development which on one hand gave the GOP a new infusion of energy and on the other produced eccentric nominees who lost winnable Senate races.
McConnell and the rest of the GOP establishment are desperate not to repeat that scenario. The fact that a number of corporate donors have said they will pause their giving to GOP candidates who refused to accept the result of the 2020 presidential election adds fuel to their fire.
But Trump loyalists see things entirely differently.
They argue that the establishment has a greatly inflated sense of its own popularity beyond the Beltway. They note that, among the party’s activist base, Trump remains the most popular Republican in the nation by far.
In an Economist/YouGov poll conducted last week, Trump was viewed favorably by 81 percent of Republican voters, even though only 41 percent of all registered voters saw him the same way.
McConnell’s favorability rating among GOP voters was just 27 percent…
https://thehill.com/homenews/the-memo/537060-the-memo-its-trump-vs-mcconnell-in-battle-for-gops-soul
I doubt that the Screen Actors Guild cares one Twit about the Orange Moron.
………………………..
Trump blasts Screen Actors Guild in resignation letter: ‘You have done nothing for me’
By
Staff Writers American Digest
on
February 4, 2021
Donald Trump may be out of the White House, but he’s not done infuriating and humiliating liberals.
Trump defiantly announced on Wednesday that he’s resigning from the Screen Actors Guild — Hollywood’s most powerful union — after the organization threatened to cancel his membership following January’s Capitol riots.
Hollywood is ever-focused on attacking Donald Trump, despite years of adoration of him prior to his presidency. The Guild thought they had one on Trump by threatening his membership with a vote convicting Trump of violating the terms of his membership for his alleged role in the capitol riots.
Trump responded with a resounding “who cares!”
“I write to you today regarding the so-called Disciplinary Committee hearing aimed at revoking my union membership. Who cares!” he wrote to SAG President Gabrielle Carteris.
“While I’m not familiar with your work,” Trump sniped, “I’m very proud of my work on movies such as Home Alone 2, Zoolander and Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps; and television shows including The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Saturday Night Live, and of course, one of the most successful shows in television history, The Apprentice—to name just a few!”
Trump blasted the organization’s failures to effectively represent its members, adding in his letter that “your organization has done little for its members, and nothing for me—besides collecting dues and promoting dangerous un-American policies and ideas—as evident by your massive unemployment rates and lawsuits from celebrated actors, who even recorded a video asking, ‘Why isn’t the union fighting for me?’”
The video referenced was recorded by prominent actors including Mark Hammill, Whoopi Goldberg, and Morgan Freeman, who attacked the SAG’s decision to cut health benefits for its members.
“I no longer wish to be associated with your union,” Trump concluded “As such, this letter is to inform you of my immediate resigning from SAG-AFTRA,” adding, “You have done nothing for me.”
Trump is indeed the ‘only one to support Christian religion’. Here is another FREE gift. Why wouldn’t you want the most popular Christian memorabilia of the great leader Trump? [In the original add you can even see a photo Trump holding the bible. I’m sure that is the only time he ever held it….photo op! ]
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Diane This is FYI/for comparison . . . a cross-post from the National Literacy Association with a link for a paper about U.S. Strategy for International Basic Education for Fiscal years 2019-2023. Things are changing at NLA also. CBK
ALL COPIED BELOW
Hello, AAACE-NLA,
Adult educators who are interested in creating more relevant adult basic skills development systems that integrate basic skills with other learner and community needs might find the following report informative and inspiring. (See the “Conclusion” at the end for how we might use such ideas here in the US.)
“US Government Strategy for International Basic Education for Fiscal Years 2019-2023” ( https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1865/USG-Education-Strategy_FY2019-2023_Final_Web.pdf ) describes how U.S. government agencies involved in international develop should work together with each other and in partnership with host countries to ensure “equal access to relevant, quality education (that) creates pathways for greater economic growth, improved health outcomes, sustained democratic governance, and more peaceful and resilient societies.”
The document is an outgrowth of the federal “Reinforcing Education Accountability in Development (READ) Act” of 2017 which calls for “a comprehensive, integrated U.S. Government strategy” to “strengthen (partner countries’) education systems and create a foundation for sustained economic growth that places partner countries on a trajectory toward graduation from assistance.”
As stated in the Executive Summary, the strategy calls for leveraging and coordinating the resources of U.S. foreign assistance agencies, “to achieve a world where education systems in partner countries enable all individuals to acquire the education and skills needed to be productive members of society. To accomplish this goal, the U.S. Government has two principal objectives:
Improve learning outcomes; and
Expand access to quality basic education for all, particularly marginalized and vulnerable populations.
Interventions will address international educational needs across the spectrum, from early childhood to primary and secondary education to workforce development and vocational training, in both formal and non-formal settings . . . U.S. Government departments and agencies will work with partner countries, other donors, multilateral organizations, the private sector, non-government organizations (NGOs), and faith-based institutions around the world.
The U.S. Government will build on past progress, learn from our experiences, and take into consideration emerging trends to achieve three principal coordination goals:
Strengthen transparency and accountability and streamline reporting;
Work to ensure a consistent level of quality across programs; and
Improve coordination and reinforce a “One U.S. Government” approach while optimizing each agency’s strengths to achieve maximum impact of taxpayer dollars.
Each year, a mandated annual public report will be submitted to Congress and will include a description of the efforts of each department and agency to implement the Strategy and a description of progress made toward meeting the goals and objectives of the Strategy—with particular emphasis on whether there are demonstrable and quantifiable improvements, such as in literacy, numeracy, or other basic skills.
The document goes on to state that current education efforts in many countries can be constrained by “a lack of nurturing care (for children), including malnutrition, poor health, or a lack of parental or caregiver involvement and safe environments, among other issues. There are chronic shortages of trained and qualified teachers and instructors; often they are simply absent. Many students either lack books and other materials entirely, or are required to share them extensively with others. Where students do have books, most are poor quality, and often they are written in languages they do not understand. Moreover, millions of youth and adults are left unemployed or under-employed, lacking skills to meet the demands of a modern economy because they do not have basic literacy, numeracy, soft, and technical skills.
Other challenges include war and civil unrest, which results in closed schools, children forced to focus on basic survival or to engage in violence; growth in youth populations (currently the largest in history for many countries); gender roles that discourage education for girls; lack of resources and poor coordination of those resources that do exist. These problems exist despite evidence that education can reduce violent extremism, improve public health and social stability, and strengthen workforce and economic development.
The document calls for “a holistic approach” to improving basic education around the world. Such an approach will benefit both the host countries and the US. Components of this approach include:
· Supporting school nutrition and health programs;
· Building new schools and renovating old facilities;
· Protecting children from exploitation;
· Improving curricula, training of teachers, and providing quality learning materials;
· Removing barriers to education;
· Preparing individuals for employment.
The report emphasizes, thought, that “Achieving these goals will take thoughtful analysis, planning, resources, and commitment.”
These efforts will be facilitated through coordination of efforts at global and country levels and across sectors, emphasis on partner country ownership, strengthening of the capacities and performance of holistic education systems, use of innovative financing, monitoring of progress and gaps, leveraging of resources of participating countries, agencies, and donors; and appropriate involvement of private sector, academic, and implementing organizations, harnessing technology and innovation, and focus on country needs and opportunities, and focus on relevant (and not necessarily “academic”) outcomes, especially for vulnerable populations (e.g., in conflict zones, refugees, girls).
The document profiles programs in Africa, Middle East, and Latin America and concludes with strategies that will be carried out by various U.S. international development agencies.
Conclusion: How the above document might inform adult basic education planning in the US
Adult basic skills education advocates in the U.S. should consider creating a similar collaborative, integrated strategy for our own country. (Such a holistic approach was more common in the olden days of the 1980s and 1990s.)
Right now there are several federal policy proposals floating around – each of which might have merits — but there seems to be no coordinated vision to guide them. We are also at risk of overlooking (a) the many ways adult education can support adult learners and (b) the supports that adult educators need to do quality work.
The above-described multi-year international basic education strategy and legislation provide a ‘think different” model that we might adapt to adult education planning here in the USA. Best wishes, Paul Jurmo
What bothers me is that the far R media are still pumping out all sorts of CR*P supporting Trump. What will it take to shut these media down because once started people are making money from it.
There were several ridiculous polls to take:
Which president did more to protect our freedom of religion?
Obama Trump
Will Democrats undo Trump’s economic gains?
Yes No I’m not sure
Do you support Vice President Kamala Harris?
Yes No Not sure
Which president did more to protect our freedom of religion?
Obama Trump
Was President Trump one of the best presidents in U.S. history?
Yes No Not sure
I have no idea of where American Digest gets its numbers [pathological liar Trump has lying media] but I’m in favor of breaking up the GOP. Then Democrats would win. Hope Trump spends his remaining years in prison. It would save taxpayers a heap of money.
What bothers me is that these blankin small-time media won’t shut up.
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64 percent of GOP voters say they’d join hypothetical Trump-led 3rd party
By
Ryan Ledendecker
on
In the wake of the 2020 presidential election, ticked-off supporters of former President Donald Trump took to social media and expressed their desire for a Trump-specific third party in order to get away from the establishment Republicans who seemed to only support Trump when it was politically convenient.
According to The Hill, while the idea of a third party has mostly been shot down by some of Trump’s closest advisors, a new poll revealed that the appetite for such a party is ferocious, with a Hill-HarrisX poll finding that a staggering 64 percent of Republican voters would join a hypothetical Trump political party.
The survey, which was conducted in late January, which was well after President Joe Biden’s inauguration, found that only 32 percent of registered Republicans wouldn’t support a Trump-led political third party.
Making things extremely interesting is the fact that the survey also found that not only would 28 percent — nearly a third — of independents would join the ranks of such a party, but also that 15 percent of Democrats would consider joining as well, which both of those added together equals millions of unexpected fans of the idea.
Overall, 37 percent of all voters would join a third party should Trump eventually decide to launch one. If those numbers held true and if it were to hypothetically happen, that means over a third of U.S. voters would potentially back a Trump-led third party, which would completely change American politics overnight.
Dritan Nesho, CEO and chief pollster at HarrisX, revealed that he believes if Trump started a third party, it would be nothing less than a dominant force in American politics and could possibly become the second-largest political party in the nation.
“If Trump were to split from the GOP and create his own party, polling suggests he might well create the second largest political party in the country, knocking the GOP down to third place,” Nesho said.
According to Newsmax, an offshoot of the idea, founded by Jim Davis called the “MAGA Patriot Party,” aims to primary all of the House Republicans who voted in favor of a second impeachment against the former president.
“Number one, that’s to try to primary certain Republicans out of office, if we can win a primary against them. And if not, to split the vote and put one of our party candidates against them,” Davis said of the new party’s two primary goals.
…and do let the door hit ’em in the a– on the way out!