I think that’s an oversimplification better used in political gamesmanship. I’m no expert on CRT, but I’ve sat in on lectures that were much more thought-provoking than what you just wrote. There’s a bit more to it than that I think.
This is a very slippery slope we’re on. What are you going to do when the liberals start a movement in some state legislature suggesting that we’re indoctrinating our kids on the virtues of capitalism and that it should be banned from higher ed. Or ban English because it’s ethnocentric?
What about the next nutty movement to eliminate any study of Karl Marx or Fredric Engels. I studied and read both at my tax payer funded undergraduate university, found some of what they had to say interesting and correct while question other positions. I’m a dyed-in-the-wool capitalist, but am a more informed and better read person for having read Das Kapital and The German Ideology.
State legislatures are hardly a bastion of our best and brightest … frankly the same is true of the House. The political pendulum swings left and right, and it swings harder in both directions these days it seems. What are you going to say when it swings hard left again?
My kids would dispute that assertion based on their own recent experiences in higher ed.
This is definitely going to veer into politics, but we don’t live in a democracy, we live in a constitutional republic. There are supposed to be checks and balances to keep us from going nuts with populist demands that are fickle and subject to demagoguery.
Besides, I think @cquin85 was trying to point out the logical consequences of trying to ban certain train of thoughts based on incomplete knowledge and fear.
I will also piggyback a bit more on this, because I think the state can set curriculum standards for it’s public universities, and I’m not sure if banning CRT would violate any consitutional rights. I suspect it will have to go under how they word it. I think if they say it can’t be taught that would violate constitutional rights to freedom of expression and so on, but if they don’t fund certain programs that would not be a violation. Someone with actual constitutional law experience would have to weigh in on that.
However, that doesn’t mean the debate should be closed to discussing if a state should ban certain topics. The point of a discussion is to talk about would this be good or not, and in the interest of keeping on topic and not politics. In this case, would these moves for Florida strengthen their schools or weaken them?
I mean we could just say - you don’t like it leave… but that seems both unproductive and against the purpose of a message board - which I think should be about discussing opinions in a respectful manner.
You and I do not get a vote on what the state of Florida does with its educational system, or whether California is correct that math is racially biased and shouldnt include calculus teaching. The voters who live there determine that. I understand you may neither like nor trust them, but that is the premise upon how we are governed, by representatives we elect. Majority rule generally, with protections for core rights of some types of recognised minorities ( which are not at issue here).
Neither liberals nor conservatives count as constitutionally protected groups. Within very broad parameters, states run their own education systems. The federal govt can set conditions on helping to fund those systems or students therein, again subject to both 1) national elections and 2) broad constitutional requirements.
Right, but the purpose of a message board is discuss what we think about things. And what’s going on in Florida is not necessarily going to stay there. I live in Virginia. Youngkin got elected largely because of his stance on education, notably using CRT as a political issue. I have a keen interest to see if what happens in Florida is helpful or hurtful, because I suspect it’s going to be an issue coming here soon, and my kids will most likely be attending Virginia schools.
And again, I think the purpose here is to discuss our opinions on the proposed changes and why we have them, and to hopefully learn more so we can make better decisions going forward. Isn’t that the purpose of a message board?
Oh, and you should be concerned about what California is doing as well, b/c it’s such a large state, it can influence the way things are done elsewhere.
I will point out they don’t say that calculus shouldn’t be taught or that math is racially biased, they are saying that the way math is taught is racially biased and want to slow people down and so on.
I would say they are right in their identification of a problem, but woefully wrong in their proposed solution. And that discussing that as a Virginian is useful.
Agreed, but you should of course consult with other Virginia voters on their views, since those are more relevant than ours. Given the demographic cliff, the Supreme Court rulings, the rise of AI- there are many changes coming to higher ed in ways hard to predict
So, I think we’re coming at this from different angles on the purpose of this thread. For me, I find it useful to discuss things like this to help me form my own opinion, and if it’s strong enough to influence others line of thinking in order to arrive at the best systems for college education.
I am not sure there is a best system for college education, given the different types of colleges and students we have. Nor do I think we could ever get consensus on that on a national scale. So people choose what is right for them or what they wish to fund.
What is not in dispute, IMO, is whether a governor has a right to change the direction of a public university. That’s not in question. What is in question is when that right is abused so that a college - its students, parents, faculty, and staff - become fodder or collateral damage in a governor’s decision to run for POTUS. Good faith change in college orientation requires hiring qualified people onto boards and presidencies and then dialogue with constituencies. This is not, by a long shot, what DeSantis did or is doing. He pushed right wing provocateurs onto the board to make trouble (news). This is not about education, it’s a stunt. And students and parents and faculty and staff are being flippantly used for DeSantis’ political gain.
That’s not democracy, it’s a horrendous abuse of democratic authority.
Oh it may very well be. And I would argue that publicly subsidizing a small group of mediocre students to the tune of $250k each for years constituted criminal level waste, fraud and abuse by the college administration.
We’ve had national consensus on it for years. That’s why heretofore I could study philosophy in the most elite universities in the liberal northeast or in the most broad access public in the most conservative corner of the south. In each place, I could find that department and get what I want out of it. It is the movement of politics into the space of higher ed that has lead to the problem you describe, one that didn’t really exist before. And this happening because whenever a politician needs to find a boogeyman for why anyone has incorrect beliefs, he or she blames the universities. They make for an easy and soft target. It’s fake news.
Who abolished their philosophy department? Seriously, the parade of horrors you fear has not yet occurred.
We have LACs, research universities, religious schools, STEM schools, more vocational colleges like nursing, military academies, public/private, flagship/ directional, sized from 1000-80,000, urban/rural, 2 year, 4 year-even some entirely online college. I dont see the consensus.