Virginia’s Procrustean Solution to Racial Disparities in Math: Eliminate Advanced Math Courses

FOX News is reporting (and left leaning media are not) that the State of Virgina has just decided in the name of racial "equity" to eliminate all accelerated math courses prior to the 11th Grade.

The Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) is moving to eliminate all accelerated math options prior to 11th grade, effectively keeping higher-achieving students from advancing as they usually would in the school system.
Ian Serotkin, Loudoun Conty School Board Member comments:

My first reaction to this was that it seemed absolutely bananas, and that it sets a soft cap on the number of higher math courses students are going to be able to take. My second reaction was to wonder which outside math learning franchises (Kaplan, Mathnasium, etc.) are publicly traded, because I foresee their stock soaring.

Apparently, the deep-seated theme here is that the schools cannot have some kids doing advanced work in math because it makes other students feel bad. The Procrustean solution is to reverse-engineer the system starting from feelings, and advanced math be damned (along with the students willing to work extra hard at math). Other probable foundational principles feed the urge to "equity": Hard work and linear thinking are "white." And see here:

[T]he woke approach to mathematics is particularly poisonous to those it pretends to want to help. Let’s start with the reasonable assumption that mathematical talent is equally distributed at birth to children from all socio-economic backgrounds, independent of ethnicity, sex and race. Those born in poor, uneducated families have clear educational disadvantages relative to others. But mathematics can act as a powerful equalizer. Through its set of well-defined, culturally unbiased, unambiguous set of rules, mathematics gives smart kids the potential to be, at least in this respect, on equal footing with all others. They can stand out by simply finding the right answers to questions with objective results.

There is no such thing as “white” mathematics. There is no reason to assume, as the activists do, that minority kids are not capable of mathematics or of finding the “right answers.” And there can be no justification for, in the name of “equity” or anything else, depriving students of the rigorous education that they need to succeed. The real antiracists will stand up and oppose this nonsense.

Continue ReadingVirginia’s Procrustean Solution to Racial Disparities in Math: Eliminate Advanced Math Courses

No Real Teeth for “Anti-Discrimination” Efforts to Protect Asian-Americans

An amendment was offered to an "Asian hate crime" bill:

Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz introduced a change to a Democrat-authored “Asian hate crime” bill making its way through Congress, expanding on the bill’s prohibitions against anti-Asian racism by stripping federal funding from colleges and universities that discriminate against Asians in their admissions process . . .

The bill, Cruz said, “is not designed to do anything to prevent or punish actual crimes. It is instead a Democratic messaging vehicle designed to push the demonstrably false idea that it is somehow racist to acknowledge that Covid-19 originated in Wuhan, China and that the Chinese Communist Party actively lied and suppressed information about the outbreak, allowing it to become a global pandemic.”

Here is the vote on the Cruz Amendment:

Democrats apparently have no problem with the fact that Ivy League Colleges are viciously and openly discriminating against Asian-Americans.

Continue ReadingNo Real Teeth for “Anti-Discrimination” Efforts to Protect Asian-Americans

Enthusiastic Racism From the Academic Left

I agree with the message of this short video. I despair of the way that "anti-racism" is being implemented in many schools. What does it tell young people who identify as "black" that we need to lower standards for all "blacks" because they, as a group, cannot cut it?  Two things:

1. This claim is false. "Black" students can cut it.  If given high-quality education and parental involvement from the start, I believe that "blacks" are every bit as capable of educational achievement as any other "color" of student. Many "black" students are high performers.

2. This quick solution sends the same pernicious message that one would expect to hear from American slave-holders in the 1850s.  This is not what students need to hear.

Let's give all students (and their families) the tools they need to succeed.  And let's not shy away from inconvenient facts, including these the fact that 69% of "black" children were born outside of marriage (compared to 30% for "whites" and "15% for people categories as Asian.  I don't bring this up to be moralistic, but only to suggest that many more "black" children lack some of the resources available, on average, to children of other "races." A two-parent household (whether or not married) can, on average, offer more resources to the children of that household.  I also suspect that in some "black" communities (not all), education is approached differently than in some other communities (of all "races). John McWhorter has discussed this different approach on occasion (see, for example, the 30 min mark here). Both of these factors (and others) need to be addressed unflinchingly so that every child, including every single "black" child, gets the resources and encouragement he or she needs to excel as a student.

Nothing I have written here suggests that we should judge any child on any basis other than as an individual.  Every child is unique and there are high achievers and low achievers of every so-called "race."

[I no longer use the term "race" or the colors referring to "races" without scare quotes.  Use of these terms is horribly imprecise, unscientific and inherently divisive.  Claiming that there are "races" is the first step on the slippery slope toward racism.  We need a two-pronged attack: 1) We need to move away from claims that there are "races," as nothing good results from this divisive term. 2) At the same time, we need to ostracize and vigorously litigate against any person or organization that discriminates on the purported basis of "race." ]

Continue ReadingEnthusiastic Racism From the Academic Left

Grace Church School Experiences Anti-Racism Convulsions as Math Teacher and Parent Express their Concerns with Wokeness Ideology

I'd like to be the fly on the wall at the $54K/year Grace Church School in Manhattan. I want to know if there has been any meaningful discussion at the school now that, Paul Rossi, the math teacher who raised concerns last week, has been told to stay home because of "safety" concerns. And now, Andrew Gutmann, one of the parents at the school has spoken up in a big way.

The critical race theory indoctrination is thick at the school, where Gutmann has now pulled his daughter out of the school to protect her. Gutmann gave the school a huge gift on his way out: a 1700-word mass mailing to the other parents (reprinted in its entirety by Bari Weiss) describing in great detail his concerns with the school's intense obsession with the poisons of Wokeness.

As shown by this excerpt from the school's response, however, words and ideas are now allegedly the same thing as "violence" to the students--real conversation and the airing of differences are forbidden by the intense Wokeness training.  I can't think of a better way for the school to admit that Woke ideology withers when confronted with real facts and real discussion.

The extent of the damage being done to the students is on display in the mass mailing sent by Jane Foley Fried, the Head of the Brearley School (the letter is reproduced in the article). An excerpt:

Jane Fried, Brearley's head of school, sent a message to the school's families on Friday in which she slammed Gutmann's letter as 'deeply offensive and harmful.'

'This afternoon, I and others who work closely with Upper School students met with more than one hundred of them, many of whom told us that they felt frightened and intimidated by the letter and the fact that it was sent directly to our homes,' Fried wrote.

'Our students noted that as this letter, which denies the presence of systemic racism, crossed their doorways, the evidence of ongoing racism – systemic or otherwise – is daily present in our headlines.'

But Gutmann claims that Brearley students should not be 'frightened' by receiving a letter at their homes.

'The upper schoolers are afraid of getting a letter at their home?' Gutmann said Saturday.

'They're frightened and intimidated? The school has said it's number one priority is to teach the girls intellectual bravery and courageousness. Either they are lying or else they have done an atrocious job.'

Continue ReadingGrace Church School Experiences Anti-Racism Convulsions as Math Teacher and Parent Express their Concerns with Wokeness Ideology

A Brave Math Teacher Describes How his School Indoctrinates Young Children in Wokeness Ideology

We need more brave teachers like Paul Rossi, who guest-authored this article on Bari Weiss' Substack website: "I Refuse to Stand By While My Students Are Indoctrinated: Children are afraid to challenge the repressive ideology that rules our school. That’s why I am." Here is an excerpt:

I know that by attaching my name to this I’m risking not only my current job but my career as an educator, since most schools, both public and private, are now captive to this backward ideology. But witnessing the harmful impact it has on children, I can’t stay silent.

My school, like so many others, induces students via shame and sophistry to identify primarily with their race before their individual identities are fully formed. Students are pressured to conform their opinions to those broadly associated with their race and gender and to minimize or dismiss individual experiences that don’t match those assumptions. The morally compromised status of “oppressor” is assigned to one group of students based on their immutable characteristics. In the meantime, dependency, resentment and moral superiority are cultivated in students considered “oppressed.”

All of this is done in the name of “equity,” but it is the opposite of fair. In reality, all of this reinforces the worst impulses we have as human beings: our tendency toward tribalism and sectarianism that a truly liberal education is meant to transcend.

Rossi offers details and it is shocking to see what goes on in the name of education, especially the fact that his school excels at telling those with contrarian viewpoints to shut up and feel ashamed for thinking.

I notice from the school's "Message from the Head of School" page, that the school is not inclined to do real work, to look in the mirror or to consider the long-term consequences of its incredibly divisive approach to running Grace Church High School. That message ends:

So if the boorish “cancel culture” press wants to condemn us a newly dubbed “Woke Noho” school of politeness, dignity and respect, then I embrace it, and I hope you will too. George P. Davison Head of School

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Continue ReadingA Brave Math Teacher Describes How his School Indoctrinates Young Children in Wokeness Ideology