Speaking of idiocy in education...

The BBQ Pit
41

For those that don’t want to register with Washington Post, here’s a CNN link.

When I first heard of the AO programs being the only ones to get federal funding, and of course ol’ GW being the frontrunner behind it, I was mad as Hell. Now, I’m so mad there isn’t a nifty slogan to describe my anger.

Don’t you impose your own morality and religon on me, or the government and public schools, you fuckwits. If you believe that AO is the best, only, and God approved choice, then fine, you teach that to YOUR kids on your time, but don’t you do it to mine! (Not that I have any, but you see my point.)

I really don’t see the problem in teaching kids both I was taught both. All throughout middle and high school, anytime we had a unit or whatever on sex, the typical teacher rant was as follows:

“Abstinence is the only, 100%, surefire, guarenteed way to never get pregnant or get an STD. However, I’m not an idiot, and I know most of you will have sex, and probably pre-marital and not for purposes of procreation. So, here’s how to use a condom: Blah blah blah. Here’s what a birth control pill looks like, you take one set a month, etc, etc…”

See? Abstincense AND safe sex in one, easy to follow course. Yes, she even did the ol’ condom on a banana trick (although just the teacher, we didn’t get to ourselves.)

From CNN.com:

Excuse me? Ex-fuckin’-cuse me? Life does NOT begin when a sperm meetas an egg, at least not in the eyes of the federal government, or have we forgotten that (for the most part) abortions are legal? The supreme court has said that abortions can be legal, and that to get an abortion is NOT murder, so therefore it is NOT the ending of someone’s life. SInce I can get an abortion after conception (and indeed, that’s kinda the only time to get one) then I guess I must not be taking a life, since otherwise it would be murder.

I am only talking about the eyes of the law, here. If you personally think that’s when life begins, fine, go on thinking that, but don’t you fucking tell our kids that. :mad:

In addition, the CNN articvle talks about other complete and total lies taught to kids, like that men and woman each have 24 chromosones they contribitute to a new child…umm…it’s 23. Yes, this might have just been a typo in the book, but you’d think they would have caught it and fixed it by now.

Then there’s this little tidbit:

Oh yeah, way to emphasize gender sterotypes, guys. Yup, every woman on the face of the Earth measures her own worth and how successful she is by the man she is married to. Men can only be successfull and happy if they bang eleventy-billion chicks a day. But how can they nail these chicks if they are suppossed to NEVER HAVE SEX! Because, as we are all getting taught, SEX IS EVIL!!! :mad: :mad:

42

This is an interesting idea, but I think it should be incorporated into a broader strategy.

First, let’s admit once and for all that kids are going to make these moral choices for themselves, and all of our preaching and witnessing is not going to change the fact that some of them will make choices we don’t agree with. Second, let’s recognize that the purpose of education is to educate students, and prepare them for whatever choices they make.

So let’s prepare them. Let’s give them accurate information about contraception: how it’s used, what it’s failure rates are re: pregnancy, and what it’s failure rates are re: transmission of STD’s. So if they choose to engage in sex (something which we can’t stop) at least they’ll have the knowledge to effectively and safely pursue that course. And let’s give them information about strategies and body-awareness like Chotii suggests, so that if they choose abstinence they have the knowledge to effectively and safely pursue that course.

I know, I know: actually respecting teenagers enough to give them the facts they need to make informed decisions without our help is probably some kind of heresy.

43

How about if they just drink ***or ***have sex, but not both at the same time? :slight_smile:

OK, your position makes more sense to me now. I will admit that I’m not clear on what my position is, but I’m clear on one thing-- the federal gov’t should have ZERO input on education for all matters, not just sex. Education needs to be a local effort, and the last thing we need is either party in Wash DC telling us how to edumacate our kids.

44

  1. Isn’t it the federal government’s job to ensure that all children receive equal protection? If education is a fundamental right then doesn’t the government have to protect that right?

  2. Why would you trust a local government more than the federal government?

45

So the next local town that wants to teach God created the whole world in six days and that science is a lie should be allowed? Or a school wants to allow a Bible Club after school but not allow a Gay-Straight Alliance club, the Fedrel Couts should just look away? Should we just forget about the Consitution?

46

They also leave out the fact that sex is initially FREE and feels good. When you are a teen (as well as an adult) this is an attractive combination.

Yes, abstinence is the best way to prevent pregnancy and to keep from spreading disease. Is it realistic to tell teens “just don’t do it”? No. There has to be more taught than “no”.

47

Orbifold: Let’s give them accurate information about contraception […] So if they choose to engage in sex (something which we can’t stop) at least they’ll have the knowledge to effectively and safely pursue that course.

And let’s also bear in mind that we’re giving them this information not just for their teenage years, but for their whole future lives. We teach kids about interest rates and checkbook balancing and other topics of “Business Math” even if they don’t yet have bank accounts or credit cards, don’t we? Because we know that they’ll need this information sometime, and including it in mandatory primary and secondary education is the only way we can be sure that they’ll be exposed to it.

Similarly, even the most vehemently pro-abstinence kids are very likely going to grow up to have sex sometime, and when they do, they should have reliable information about things like contraception, STDs, and sexual orientation issues. (How many people have ended up in an unhappy straight/gay marriage—either as the unwitting straight spouse or the bewildered closeted gay spouse—due to not understanding anything about homosexuality and thinking that because male-female pairing is “normal”, it must automatically work for them?)

This is some of the most important practical knowledge that anybody could possibly have: we should not be leaving it up to chance by saying that the only thing schools need to tell teenagers about sex is that they should postpone having it until they’re adults and/or married. Sheesh, what stupidity.

48

What? It’s free?

Time to talk to my girlfriend. :mad:

49

Actually, it isn’t. No state is REQUIRED to provide students with an education. It is only required to provide all students with an “equal education” if education is provided to some. That’s the current situation in the US, and is actually consistent with my own personal view.

Local governments are more in tune with the desires of parents in the local communities. While the SC might rule about certain subjects (ie, religious advocacy) NOT being taught in schools, I can’t see that they would (or should) rule that certain other subjects MUST be taught in schools. If a local school board decided not to teach sex ed at all, do you think the SCotUS would force it to?

50

Welcome to SDMB, Boggette.

Reminds me of the “Eat less, exercise more” mantra regarding weight loss. Telling someone what to do is less useful than telling them how and why.

51

The desires of parents are the problem. The desires of morons cannot be allowed to override their childrens’ federal right to a legitimate education. Civil rights are not subject to popular referendums. The right of children to a basic education cannot be abrogated by a vote. There are time that children need to be protected from their buttwad parents, when abuse or neglect are in play, for example. Cockblocking a child from getting an education is a violation of that child’s rights and a form of neglect as much as failing to provide food or shelter.

52

Really? So you do you also think that parents have a right to prevent their kids from learning how to read or do arithmetic? Do the kids have any rights at all?

As to the SCOTUS question, I would hope they would at least rule that children can’t be taught false information.

53

Unfortunately, they are. See the 2004 election in several states with regard to gay marriage.

54

Thanks for the welcome.

And this always reminds me of prohibition. If you worked in a truly nasty job, like, say, coal mining during those days, you looked forward to your drinks at the end of the day to ease the tedium and temporarily forget the horrors of the job you have to return to the next day. But some thumper with a different life says you can’t have it because they don’t like it or are having a problem with it.

Similar with sex. It’s a completely natural, wonderful practice that some people seem to feel should be taboo. Screw them! I plan to teach my daughters that there is nothing wrong with their bodies. (I don’t have sons, but I’d teach them the same, too!)

55

If you think it is the responisbility of the state to raise children, I can see where could think that. But we give parents significant latitude in how to raise their children. Do you think parents should not be able to force their children to attend religioius services? What if those religious services teach that the bible is literally true? I certainly wouldn’t advocate that being taught in a public school, but what about Sunday school?

As for your question about whether or not parents should be able to prevent their children from learning arithmatic, I’d say “yes”, with the following qualifications. All states currently require children to attend some form of schooling. I’m not going to argue for or against that. Let’s just accept that as the status quo and go from there. I certainly DO think that parents, thru their local school boards, should be able to decide the school curriculum w/o any interference from Wash DC. In the instance that the local school board decided NOT to teach math, then so be it.

I don’t think we want to enact a law to prevent every possible worst case scenario from hapenning. That’s a sure way to a totalitarian dictatorship. At some point you realise that your scenario is so unlikely to happen that it’s better to keep the law such that it is still possible to happen, rather than make the law so rigid that we lose our freedom to raise our kids the way we want.

Additionally, I don’t think it’s wise to have the SCotUS deciding what is “true” and what is “not true”. They wouldn’t have time to do anything else. Again, at some point you just have to let people be free and trust them to do what is best for their kids.

56

Here’s a quasi-hypothetical I posted elsewhere recently:

The state of North Brickerkota funds its public school systems in the following manner: 50% of the public school funding comes from the state government, and is delivered to all schools on a pro-rata basis: a school with 200 kids gets half as much state funding as a school with 400 kids.

The remaining school funding is accomplished locally, by county, through property taxes.

Parents from Pottersville County complain that their schools are poorly funded compared to schools in Bedford Falls County. Most residents of Pottersville Country are poor, and land values are low; the local property taxes do not raise nearly as much money as their wealthy neighbors in Bedford Falls County.

The Pottersville parents sue, claiming a violation of the Equal Protection clause: they are not being treated the same under the law as residents of a wealthy county, and their children are, by virtue of being being poor, not receiving the same level of education in public schools as wealthy children are. They point out that there is no good reason for the state to fund 50% of education based on local property taxes.

Should the Court find that North Brickerkota must change its scheme of financing schools?

(It’s “quasi-hypothetical” in that the facts track with a real case, but with the identities of the states changed to avoid regional stereotying).

57

I believe that, yes, all the schools should be equally funded at a state (if not federal) level. Children should not be penalized for the poverty of their parents.

But I was really talking about rights as it pertained to curriculum, not funding. No matter who the kid is, he has a right to be taught that 2+2=4, not 5.

58

Bricker-

If we are talking about Ohio then absolutely the court needs to rule that Ohio needs to change its method of funding. I watched a documentary about just about this topic in class. Frankly I was shocked and appalled at the differences in schools. Schools with huge gyms, olympic sized pools versus a school that has beams so low they are hit when playing basketball. Schools that had their students working with advanced computer controlled robots versus schools that have to eliminate their library for lack of funds. Their library for fuck sakes its a school and we can’t even get the kids some damn books? Rich kids get to learn in these modern, nice looking schools with all the material’s and books they want. Poor kids get to learn in buildings that have been condemed, roofs that leak puddles into classrooms, stuck into janitors closets, buildings heated by coal with no filters and with barely enough textbooks from 1950 for the class.

Anyone who thinks America is the land of oppurtunity, where sucess depends on how hard you work is fucking delusional and should seek immediate psyciatric care.

59

I think they should.

And I think I live in “Pottersville.” :smiley:

60

I never said that. I said that the state has a responsibility to protect the rights of children.

Of course not. I have made no statement about what parents can’t tell their kids, I’m saying that they don’t have a right to prevent a basic education. As long as the kid can pass a test on the three ‘r’s and give a coherent description of evolutionary theory then I don’t care whatever other garbage the parents want to fill their kids’ heads with.

So the children have no rights? Parents have the right to force their kids to remain illiterate until adulthood?

I don’t thinks so. Children are not property. There is no right of a parent to prevent education. As a matter of fact, it’s illegal. Parents do NOT have a right to set the curriculum because they’re not qualified to set the curriculum and they have no right to deprive their kids of their own civil rights. Children have rights independent of their parents. They are not pets, or slaves or wind up dolls. They are citizens.

I haven’t advocated any new laws, so I don’t know what you’re talking about. You and Lib seem to be the ones who want to eliminate civil rights for children.

Who said anything about SCOTUS? School curriculums need to be established by people who are qualified to do so. It mostly isn’t that hard to figure out what’s “true,” but if someone has an objection then they should be given a chance to challenge a certain piece of ciurriculum on a factual basis. If they prove something being asserted as fact is not true, or at least is not proven, then it can be removed.