Georgia’s House of Representatives is scheduled to vote today (Friday) on HB 1084, a bill to prohibit the teaching of Critical Race Theory, or any kind of teaching that promotes a worldview of “race scapegoating or race stereotyping.” Though the sentiment isn’t bad, the curative is terrible.
A better idea might be to specify subjects that must be taught and the number of hours that must be devoted to those subjects in public elementary and high schools. Parental input and review of the subject materials and lessons should be a requirement. An orderly process for doing that should be established.
I'm familiar only with the school systems in Georgia. The State Department of Education provides some requirements, some guidance and the bulk of the funding. The legislature passed some measures to partially equalize total funding after some local school districts became very wealthy when capital intensive industries (nuclear power plants for example) located inside their boundaries and paid millions in property taxes.
Cities can and do establish their own school systems as do counties. One small county in NE Georgia has two city school systems and a county system with no overlap. Gwinnett County has a population of nearly a million and has a county school system. At least one city within the county has a city system which was established as an elite academy to serve the city but will take students from elsewhere if they can afford the price.
That's probably more than you needed to know. I could have just said school systems in Georgia are a hodgepodge. I believe the state should establish the curriculum for the subjects that are most objective such as math, science, English, health, reading, factual history, etc. Local school boards and parents should have the right add language, music, government, civics, discussion courses and the like.
Given the variety found in Georgia school systems, I think it would turn out OK. If some group of parents were unhappy with the outcome, they could probably create their own city and run it their way. Georgia is flexible except new counties can be created only by consolidating existing counties.
This is very helpful. The trick will be to pull the "problematic" subjects where curriculum is being developed at the state level down to the local level WITHOUT compromising the educational opportunities of local students. I don't quite know how you'd do that without creating negative second-order effects. For example, the same approach to limit CRT-inclined education in one district might be used to attack evolutionary biology at another district. Personally, I'd keep civics at the mandated state level (everyone who graduates should have some training in being a citizen), so that probably keeps the controversy where it currently is.
I agree on civics, but I am concerned about indoctrination of younger students if teachers teach their opinions rather than facts. We agree also on subjects that might be influenced by folklore or literal religious beliefs. Science should be the rule. Not all students go to college so some values discussion should be a part of the last two years of high school.
I do not know how the evolution vs. creation argument got into the education discussion. I graduated from high school in NE Georgia about 65 years ago and never once heard a creation lesson. My parents were taught the same way and they were both born before 1920.
Maybe it was an issue in some school systems or in private church schools. They would have been better off teaching evolution with a caveat that the Lord works in mysterious ways.
The problem even with good civics education is that SOME level of non-neutral indoctrination is desirable. In theory we're educating young folks not only HOW the system works, but WHY they should also want to be a part of it. Students should graduate not only with a working knowledge of the rules of the system, but a sense of the inherent(?) value of those rules.
And unfortunately, you can't have the "here's WHY you should think America is great conversation" without opening up the factual can of worms about how America struggled and continues to struggle to meet that Platonic ideal of responsible self-government you'd be teaching in a civics course. And a good part of civics education is how our system mediates those differences in opinions in a way that doesn't grind everything else down to a halt.
I wish the folks in GA trying to find a way to navigate these straits all the luck they can muster.
A better idea might be to specify subjects that must be taught and the number of hours that must be devoted to those subjects in public elementary and high schools. Parental input and review of the subject materials and lessons should be a requirement. An orderly process for doing that should be established.
Interesting idea. Do you suggest doing this at the state level or at the local school district level?
I'm familiar only with the school systems in Georgia. The State Department of Education provides some requirements, some guidance and the bulk of the funding. The legislature passed some measures to partially equalize total funding after some local school districts became very wealthy when capital intensive industries (nuclear power plants for example) located inside their boundaries and paid millions in property taxes.
Cities can and do establish their own school systems as do counties. One small county in NE Georgia has two city school systems and a county system with no overlap. Gwinnett County has a population of nearly a million and has a county school system. At least one city within the county has a city system which was established as an elite academy to serve the city but will take students from elsewhere if they can afford the price.
That's probably more than you needed to know. I could have just said school systems in Georgia are a hodgepodge. I believe the state should establish the curriculum for the subjects that are most objective such as math, science, English, health, reading, factual history, etc. Local school boards and parents should have the right add language, music, government, civics, discussion courses and the like.
Given the variety found in Georgia school systems, I think it would turn out OK. If some group of parents were unhappy with the outcome, they could probably create their own city and run it their way. Georgia is flexible except new counties can be created only by consolidating existing counties.
This is very helpful. The trick will be to pull the "problematic" subjects where curriculum is being developed at the state level down to the local level WITHOUT compromising the educational opportunities of local students. I don't quite know how you'd do that without creating negative second-order effects. For example, the same approach to limit CRT-inclined education in one district might be used to attack evolutionary biology at another district. Personally, I'd keep civics at the mandated state level (everyone who graduates should have some training in being a citizen), so that probably keeps the controversy where it currently is.
I agree on civics, but I am concerned about indoctrination of younger students if teachers teach their opinions rather than facts. We agree also on subjects that might be influenced by folklore or literal religious beliefs. Science should be the rule. Not all students go to college so some values discussion should be a part of the last two years of high school.
I do not know how the evolution vs. creation argument got into the education discussion. I graduated from high school in NE Georgia about 65 years ago and never once heard a creation lesson. My parents were taught the same way and they were both born before 1920.
Maybe it was an issue in some school systems or in private church schools. They would have been better off teaching evolution with a caveat that the Lord works in mysterious ways.
The problem even with good civics education is that SOME level of non-neutral indoctrination is desirable. In theory we're educating young folks not only HOW the system works, but WHY they should also want to be a part of it. Students should graduate not only with a working knowledge of the rules of the system, but a sense of the inherent(?) value of those rules.
And unfortunately, you can't have the "here's WHY you should think America is great conversation" without opening up the factual can of worms about how America struggled and continues to struggle to meet that Platonic ideal of responsible self-government you'd be teaching in a civics course. And a good part of civics education is how our system mediates those differences in opinions in a way that doesn't grind everything else down to a halt.
I wish the folks in GA trying to find a way to navigate these straits all the luck they can muster.
Just so there is no proselytizing allowed in public schools.