Jewish World Review August 29, 2003 / 1 Elul, 5763

Joanne Jacobs

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Consumer Reports


The Decline and Fall of Social Studies


http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | Social Studies instruction is a boring, muddled, content-free mess, writes Chester Finn in a fine tirade.

For a long time, this field's decline resembled that of the Roman Empire protracted, inexorable and sad, but not something one could do much about, even as evidence mounted that youngsters were emerging from high school with scant knowledge of history, geography, civics or economics.

Evidence also mounted that the movers and shapers within social studies had little respect for Western civilization; a disposition to view America as a problem for mankind rather than its best hope; a tendency to pooh-pooh history's factual highlights as "privileging" elites; a tendency to view geography in terms of despoiling the rain forest rather than locating Baghdad on a map; a notion of civics that stresses political activism rather than understanding how laws are made and why they matter; and anxiety that studying economics might unfairly advantage the free-market version.

Since Sept. 11, writes Finn, it's clear that social studies can't just be written off. American students need to learn "what it means to be American, to understand the world they inhabit and the conflicts that rock it, and to grasp the differences between democracy and totalitarianism and between free and doctrinaire societies."

Finn is part of Fordham Foundation's Reclaiming Social Studies project, which includes chapters titled "The Training of Idiots: Civics Education in America's Schools," "Garbage In, Garbage Out: Expanding Environments, Constructivism, and Content Knowledge in Social Studies" and "Ignorant Activists: Social Studies, ‘Higher Order Thinking,’ and the Failure of Social Studies."

Uncomfy Conservatives

Conservative students at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill are demanding a commitment to political diversity.

Committee for a Better Carolina (members)...say conservative students are uncomfortable and intimidated on a campus that is overwhelmingly liberal, and they want the university to commit to big changes.

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First, they will ask (Chancellor James) Moeser to include political affiliation and ideology in the university's official nondiscrimination policy. They also want the university to devote more money to bring in speakers from a wider variety of ideological perspectives. And they want the university to conduct an investigation into the campus climate for conservatives -- similar to the study conducted last year on the atmosphere for gay students.

The group also wants UNC to hire more conservative professors. Don't hold your breath on that one, guys.

De-Saddamizing Iraqi Books

Iraqi teachers are eliminating Saddamite propaganda from textbooks. It's a big job.

"There were things like: 'The 28th of April is the birthday of Father Saddam. Happy birthday, Father Saddam. Here's a song about Father Saddam,' " said Hisham Abdulla, a Ministry of Education official who co-wrote the English texts used during Hussein's rule...

The editing panel had to review 556 books, sentence by sentence. Fuad Hussein, a returned Iraqi expatriate who chose the panelists, remembers seeing one teacher's hand hesitate the first time she had to cross out a picture of the dictator.

"I told her, 'Don't be afraid. Just bring the pen down here, then across here, and he's finished,'" he said.

The editors -- all Iraqi teachers -- also are removing "slurs against non-Arab ethnic groups."

Patriotism, Rising

Japanese schools will grade students on patriotism, reports Layman's Logic. The Japanese think the younger generation is poorly behaved. (Is there any nation that doesn't think kids aren't what they used to be?) Japanese bureaucrats hope a little old-time patriotism will be the cure.

Lawsuit Hell

Blair Hornstine, who sued her school district for $2.7 million for trying to name a co-valedictorian, has settled for $60,000, reports the Philadelphia Inquirer. She'll get $15,000; the rest will go to her lawyers.

Blair Hornstine was reviled for filing a lawsuit to prevent a classmate from sharing valedictorian honors; she felt compelled to skip her graduation ceremonies. Due to the publicity, her plagiarized newspaper articles were revealed; Harvard withdrew its acceptance. Poetic justice can be harsh.

It appears Hornstine will not start college this fall. If she did get in somewhere at the last minute, her family has kept it quiet.

Another star student is going to court. Mark Edmonson aced the SATs with a perfect 1600, but then fell victim to acute senioritis. His As slipped to Cs, Ds and Fs senior year; he lost his place at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He's suing to get back in to UNC’s class of 2007. But he's on shaky ground: Like most colleges, UNC warns seniors their acceptance is conditional on decent grades. If he’s really smart, he’ll learn from the Hornstine mess and drop the lawsuit.

Back to Skule

Those kids better larn their lessons, writes Dave Barry. Because their parents are suffering from brain leakage.

Why do our children perform so poorly on standardized tests? Does the fault lie with our teachers? With our school administrators? With our political leaders? Can we, as concerned parents, sue somebody about this and obtain millions of dollars?

Or maybe it's time that we parents stopped passing the buck on education. Maybe instead of pointing the finger at everybody else, we should take a hard look at ourselves in the mirror, and place the blame for our children's lousy test scores where it clearly belongs: on our children. They have a terrible attitude.

I have here a letter, which I am not making up, from a teacher named Robin Walden of Kilgore, Texas, who states:

"I teach math to eighth-grade students. This is an unnecessary task because they are all going to be professional basketball players, professional NASCAR race-car drivers, professional bass fisher people, or marine biologists who will never need to actually use math."

Like Barry, I went to school in the '50s and '60s, when we needed to learn math because some snot named Ivan knew math. A lot of kids were planning to beat up Ivan, if they ever met up with him.

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JWR contributor Joanne Jacobs, a former Knight-Ridder columnist and San Jose Mercury News editorial writer, blogs daily at ReadJacobs.com. She is currently finishing a book, Start-Up High, about a San Jose charter school. Comment by clicking here.

08/18/03: F is for valedictorian
08/14/03: Start-up success
08/11/03: Subliterate Superintendent
08/04/03: Alternative High School
07/28/03: Out of the System
07/21/03: Too Snobby for Shop
07/14/03: Be very afraid
07/09/03: Know-nothing nonsense
06/30/03: Affirmative action reactions
06/23/03: Overdressed Students, Underdressed Teachers, Dressed-down Exams
06/16/03: Paper 'Is-ness,' Excluding Awards, New Racial Consciousness and Politics
06/09/03: Racist math, red tape for charters, potty reading
06/02/03: Teacher Pay, Illiteracy , No Republicans Allowed
05/27/03: Research papers, athletics, reading
05/19/03: Soft America, plagiarism, Minutemen and Jets
05/12/03: Demographics, nerves, valedictorian, vouchers
05/05/03: Gender Bias, Banned Words, Helen of Troy
04/28/03: Tests, home-schooling, self-esteem
04/25/03: Lessons, American Pride, Iraqi Schools
04/14/03: Iraqi Textbooks and the English language
03/31/03:Teachers, hugging, text messaging
04/07/03: War talk at school
03/24/03: Watching the war
03/10/03: Classroom chaos
03/03/03: Teaching tales
02/24/03: Segregation stories
02/18/03: Writing Essays, America, Beyond Bert and Ernie
02/13/03: Size matters
02/10/03: Parental homework, cheaters and memoirs
02/03/03: Diplomas, academics, preschools and Ritalin
01/27/03: Head Start, Social Studies, Marx, Africa and Math
01/22/03: Teachers as targets
01/13/03: Big Bully's Feelings
01/06/03: School of 60's Whining and Communal Destruction
12/23/02: Teaching in
12/16/02: Chocolate city?
12/10/02: Mandatory Victimhood --- and when cleaning up a school is 'racist'
11/25/02: Multi-colored math, sensitive science
11/20/02: How to leave no child behind
11/18/02: The tummy track
11/11/02: Dysfunctional documents?
11/04/02: Why go to college? Why test schools?
10/28/02: Pride goeth before an F
10/21/02: Diversity adversity
10/14/02: Bad hat day
10/07/02: Inflated sense of worth
09/30/02: The Royal road to knowledge
09/24/02: Sierra's Club
09/20/02: Stupidity Watch
09/03/02: First, win the war
08/26/02: Out of their field, out of their minds?
08/20/02: Fun with failure

© 2002, Joanne Jacobs