"Ethnic studies" banned in AZ

[SwordoftheMorning]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/05/12/arizona.ethnic.studies/index.html?eref=rss_topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_topstories+(RSS%3A+Top+Stories)

Fresh on the heels of a new immigration law that has led to calls to boycott her state, Arizona's governor has signed a bill banning ethnic studies classes that "promote resentment" of other racial groups.

Gov. Jan Brewer approved the measure without public statement Tuesday, according to state legislative records. The new law forbids elementary or secondary schools to teach classes that are "designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group" and advocate "the overthrow of the United States government" or "resentment toward a race or class of people."

The bill was pushed by state school Superintendent Tom Horne, who has spent two years trying to get Tucson schools to drop a Mexican-American studies program he said teaches Latino students they are an oppressed minority. There was no immediate response from the Tucson Unified School District, the law's main target.

So the truth is once again the victim to the conservative right-wing campaign to re-whitewash America.

[TheKassi]

Oh by the freaking stars what the hell are these people on?

[TrueMetis]

Wonder how Oklahoma is going to respond?

[King Nobody]

Does this mean they're also going to stop teaching early American history in case it incites the Native Americans into a rebellion?

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

Does this mean they're also going to stop teaching early American history in case it incites the Native Americans into a rebellion?

Natives go to school on the reservation. They aren't welcome in polite society.

/sarcasm

[Datepalm]

Natives go to school on the reservation. They aren't welcome in polite society.

/sarcasm

Reservations are unaffected by state education policy?

[Annelise]

For purposes of discussion..

Mexican American Studies

Mexican American Studies Model

The objective of the Mexican American Studies Department is to create a truly equitable educational ecology. We offer our students:

* Academic rigor

* The opportunity to develop a critical consciousness

* Social and academic scaffolds to increase student success

We offer help so that students can enter the world independently, prepared to control their lives and provide leadership to their world.

Developed from research within the Social Justice Education Project, the model fosters Critically Compassionate Intellectualism. This model includes the following components:

* A counter-hegemonic curriculum.

* A pedagogy based on the theories of Paolo Friere.

* Student-teacher interactions centered on authentic caring.

For Latino students, each of these components creates both a Latino academic identity and an enhanced level of academic proficiency. The end result is an elevated state of Latino academic achievement.

Using the transformative curriculum model, the Chicano/Latino voice, experience, perspective, and history are moved from the margin to the center of the curriculum. This approach is supported by research by Banks (1995), Nieto (1999), Phinney & Rotheram (1987), and Yasso (2002). The Mexican American Studies Department has found that its curriculum, because of its inclusiveness and its critical nature, offers Latino students the opportunity to engage in a learning process which transcends the depth of any previous experience.

Influenced by the work of scholar Paolo Friere, our lessons follow the framework of critical pedagogy, popular education, and the related participatory action research. The key premise holds that students should be equal partners in the construction of knowledge, identification of social problems, and implementation of solutions to these problems. Friere's concept of "critical literacy" encourages students to adopt "an attitude of creation and re-creation, a self-transformation producing a stance of intervention in one's context" (Friere, 1998, p. 86).

To establish a learning partnership between students and educators, lessons are structured to engage students and educators in dialogue. This participatory approach empowers students to become equal partners in the learning process.

Dialogue is an "I-Thou" relationship, and thus, necessarily, a relationship between two subjects. Each time the "thou" is changed into an object, an "it", dialogue is subverted and education is subverted and education is changed to deformation. (Friere, 1998, p. 89)

Mexican American Studies offers this type of critical thinking and critical dialogue, which has typically been reserved to advanced placement or honors courses (Solorzano & Ornelas, 2002), into classes which are accessible to all students.

Student-Teacher Interaction

Our model promotes teachers to approach and experience their students from a state of "authentic caring". Authentic caring (Valenzuela, 1999) occurs when teachers connect with students' full humanity.

This approach fits with the "educational ecology" advocated by Ruiz and Moll (2002). Educational ecology understands and attributes social and educational capital to the cultural and socio-historical experiences that have nurtured the development of each and every student we encounter (Ruiz, 1997). The ideology and structure of the education experienced by Latinos and children of color must be reflective of the educational ecology of each of these students. This approach provides Latino students and students of color with the same quality of educational sovereignty afforded Anglo students.

http://www.tusd1.org/contents/depart/mexicanam/model.asp

Critical pedagogy & Friere:

"Habits of thought, reading, writing, and speaking which go beneath surface meaning, first impressions, dominant myths, official pronouncements, traditional clichés, received wisdom, and mere opinions, to understand the deep meaning, root causes, social context, ideology, and personal consequences of any action, event, object, process, organization, experience, text, subject matter, policy, mass media, or discourse." (Empowering Education, 129)

Critical pedagogy includes relationships between teaching and learning. This proponents claim that it is a continuous process of what they call "unlearning", "learning" and "relearning", "reflection", "evaluation" and the impact that these actions have on the students, in particular students who have been historically and they believe continue to be disenfranchised by what they call "traditional schooling".

[..]

According to his writings, Freire heavily endorses students’ ability to think critically about their education situation; this way of thinking allows them to "recognize connections between their individual problems and experiences and the social contexts in which they are embedded.

Realizing one’s consciousness ("conscientization") is a needed first step of "praxis," which is defined as the power and know-how to take action against oppression while stressing the importance of liberating education. "Praxis involves engaging in a cycle of theory, application, evaluation, reflection, and then back to theory. Social transformation is the product of praxis at the collective level."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_pedagogy

[Swordfish]

The measure doesn't prohibit classes that teach about the history of a particular ethnic group, as long as the course is open to all students and doesn't promote ethnic solidarity or resentment.

[TheKassi]

The measure doesn't prohibit classes that teach about the history of a particular ethnic group, as long as the course is open to all students and doesn't promote ethnic solidarity or resentment.

Holy crap, so they are cutting the founding fathers out, and our several decade long struggle against the British?

Or does this only apply to ethnicities that are brown skinned?

[Annelise]

The measure doesn't prohibit classes that teach about the history of a particular ethnic group, as long as the course is open to all students and doesn't promote ethnic solidarity or resentment.

I confess to being confused, because it also reports this:

The measure signed Tuesday prohibits classes [...] that are designed primarily for students of a particular race.

I'm not sure how you have Mexican or African or Native American Studies, in that case. :unsure:

[Swordfish]

I confess to being confused, because it also reports this: I'm not sure how you have Mexican or African or Native American Studies, in that case. :unsure:

Yeah, it seems like a total mess to me......

But it's also probably a tempest in a teapot in terms of any actual effects on any curriculum.

Holy crap, so they are cutting the founding fathers out, and our several decade long struggle against the British?

Or does this only apply to ethnicities that are brown skinned?

Just the brown ones.

[The_BlauerDragon]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/05/12/arizona.ethnic.studies/index.html?eref=rss_topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_topstories+(RSS%3A+Top+Stories)

So the truth is once again the victim to the conservative right-wing campaign to re-whitewash America.

I lived in Tucson for about 8 months in the 5th grade... I really don't know if that was what they were teaching there or not, as I was the only student in the entire school who spoke or understood English. I kept having to ask my teachers (the ones that spoke both languages, anyway… a few didn’t speak English) to stop and repeat themselves in English for me. After a few months of that, I just started doing my own thing and ignoring everything else. It made me truly understanding of the plight of ESL students in English speaking classrooms, but it made me entirely unsympathetic to the Arizona public school system.

8 months with no-one your own age to talk to can make you learn a lot about being your own best friend.

As for the classes, if they are truly promoting racist beliefs and teaching a hatred for this country, then I am not the least bit unhappy about their being banned. My question would be why they were allowed to exist in the first place. Somehow, I don't think that is really what was at issue here though. I'd find it hard to believe that people would be objecting to a law that banned racist and Anti-American propaganda from being taught in the schools… So I am left to ask what the real issue is here? Who is it that is actually in the right? Am I going to put my money on the State? Not on your Life! Not THIS state anyway…

[Annelise]

This

"Habits of thought, reading, writing, and speaking which go beneath surface meaning, first impressions, dominant myths, official pronouncements, traditional clichés, received wisdom, and mere opinions, to understand the deep meaning, root causes, social context, ideology, and personal consequences of any action, event, object, process, organization, experience, text, subject matter, policy, mass media, or discourse."

should be expanded to all students IMHO, but it looks like it may be a victim of the unpatriotic brush:

The new law forbids elementary or secondary schools to teach classes that [...] advocate "the overthrow of the United States government".

[Annelise]

Wonder how Oklahoma is going to respond?

Heh. I was talking to a co-worker the other day and made a cheerful comment about our recent expansions into a couple new states (including OK). She asked if I wanted to move there. "Ah, no. Thanks though."

[Annelise]

Yeah, it seems like a total mess to me......

But it's also probably a tempest in a teapot in terms of any actual effects on any curriculum.

The district didn't seem to think its programs would be affected judging by its response, so I imagine it will go to court. Horne has been after it for 2 years, I don't imagine he's done. Reportedlyan activist?* telling students the Republican party hates Latinos is what set him against the program.

*your link isn't working at the moment so I can't look up the name/capacity - my kid is taking over... wrenching the keyboard from my hands.. lol

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

Reservations are unaffected by state education policy?

Native American reservations are quasi-sovereign nations with ties to the federal government. AFAIK they don't answer to the state board of education. I believe their schools are administered by the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

[TheKassi]

Just the brown ones.

Damn it.

[Ser_not_appearing_yet]

So in Arizona, slavery never existed? Does this include history classes, or just 'ethnic studies' (whatever that is).

[SwordoftheMorning]

The real "legal" issue with this law is the fact that parents with an agenda, "community leaders", and of course Tea Party wingnuts can effectively cripple the curriculum of the AZ school districts by suing to have classes they decide are "banned" by this piece of garbage legislation removed from the schools. This isn't even a slippery slope in my opinion, it's the intent of this law. So effectively, only the lily-white bread version of history and social studies will be allowed. That of course, is the neo-con, Tea Party dream. The return of the pre-1960's version of All Hail the great(white) America of the past.

[Ken Stone]

Clearly AZ could learn something from Sun Tzu. If you wish to destroy your enemy you must learn about them.