Mark Morford, columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, writes that “hordes of easily terrified, mindless fundamentalist evangelical Christian lemmings have been bad for the soul of this country…” Wow, so how do you really feel, Mark? In an otherwise on-target assessment of youth culture, he connects problems in our nation’s education system with Christian lemmings. In my response, I note that those “lemmings” could help lead us out of the morass.
Category: Cultural news
University of Delaware says, “there have been some missteps”
The University of Delaware appears to be taking seriously some of the concerns from the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) regarding the student life ideological education program. In a letter from the school, Vice President for Student Life, Michael Gilbert, says
I do acknowledge that there have been some missteps with the implementation of our program. This is a new effort involving over two hundred staff. As with any University educational endeavor assessment and feedback measures have been established to identify issues or concerns. Each of the issues FIRE presents are currently under review. In fact, we recently became aware that students in several residence halls were told their participation is mandatory at these activities and we have taken steps to clarify this misconception and to notify students of their rights in this area.
Time will tell what their review brings but the group bringing the concerns public, FIRE, believes the letter to be insufficient.
FIRE’s Response: FIRE unequivocally stands by its description of the University of Delaware’s “curriculum” for student housing residents. We invite the public to view the full curriculum of the residence life program—available in PDF format on our website—in its entirety, and to judge for themselves whether we have misrepresented any aspect of the nature of that program through selective quotation. In fact, as readers will see upon examination, the concerns that we have raised pervade every one of the hundreds of pages that constitute the University of Delaware’s residence life curriculum.
From my initial glance, I do think FIRE has a point. There are some issues of definition and emphasis that go beyond raising issues but rather prescribe an acceptable point of view. This seems what one would expect at a sectarian school, but not at a taxpayer funded public school.
Developing…
Delaware school requires “treatment” for bad thinking
I have been following the development of a story out of Delaware regarding the University of Delaware and residence life trainings to address student worldview. The link is to the website of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Eduation (FIRE). According to the website and documents I have seen, the university keeps a portfolio on students to ascertain progress toward institutional goals. The goals include forced views of white privilege and “heterosexism.” There are links on this site to the university’s ideological program.
It occurred to me that even my sectarian college does not micromanage the views of our students. I do not know how this will all shake out but I am following it. While I am sure there are some reasonable behaviors that the school would like to encourage, taking a “re-education” methodology (if this is implemented as described) seems counterproductive.
UPDATE: University of Delaware has stopped the program – see here.
From meddling to preaching; two important articles on shifts in Evangelicalism
David Kirkpatrick has a lengthy analysis of shifts in evangelicalism in yesterday’s New York Times. Called “The Evangelical Crackup,” the article describes what appears to be a shift in evangelicalism away from political activism.
And then the Rocky Mountain News describes a similar shift underway at Focus on the Family with the advent of Jim Daly as head of the organization.
Maine school board votes to allow birth control in middle school
This story has been all over the media but I wanted to post it as a starter for discussion. The link leads to a NPR discussion a bit more in depth than the AP reports.
I can think of several reasons why this could backfire. I do not believe middle school kids are likely to be consistent in taking the pills but may have a false sense of safety. We know kids aren’t very consistent in implementation of most birth control methods so I suspect this will not have much effect on births and inasmuch as sexual activity increases, so might the incidence of STDs. Seems to me the best birth control method at this age is the presence of an adult. Maybe the school board could spend some money on adult supervision. I do not know what the fact on the ground are there but I sure hope this doesn’t catch on elsewhere.