E Wayne Ross – Page 113 – Critical Theories in Education

Rouge Forum Update—Happy Bastille Day! (July 14, 2006)

Dear Friends,

The Rouge Forum No Blood For Oil web page is updated.

Of immediate interest are selected articles addressing the wars now involving Israel, Lebanon, and Palestine. Below we sought to select articles that are significant, yet not so widely spread that many people have already received them. There is a full complement of works on the page linked above.

Stratfor Red Alert on Hezbollah

Financial Times on the New Crisis in the Making

Sandy Tolan, author of Lemon Tree, on The Palestinian Crisis

Stephen Cohen on the New US Cold War on Russia

At the same time, it is important to remember the massive outpouring on May Day 2006, what was really a general strike in some areas and industries, and the underlying struggles, as well as community building, that made the huge demonstrations possible.

Here is one indicator of this ongoing piece of hope.

All over the US, border agents, ICE cops, and Homeland Security personnel are steadily attacking immigrant workers with raids on camps, work places, even homes and apartments. Here is a link on the recent LA police riot, attacking anti-racist demonstrators protesting the Minutemen.

At the same time, steady symphonies of deception coming from both parties of wealth seek to lure immigrants into the nationalism inherent in “get out the vote” projects, confusing elites’ “get out” enforcement projects with “get in with us,” shell games.

We are reworking our page on Immigration/Worker Rights, linked here.

On this page are several reports from colleagues in Oaxaca.

In addition, Glibert Gonzalez’s new book, Guest Workers or Colonized Labor?, Mexican Labor Migration in the U.S., offers important historical background. For those who come into this list from a literary view, see B. Traven‘s Jungle Novels.

Most of us, of course, face the question: What should school workers do? That’s taken up in this criticism of Jonathan Kozol’s recent “Education Manifesto.” It’s the most widely read piece on the Rouge Forum site so far this year.

Surely, the unions are dead-ends. At its July Representative Assembly, where NEA agreed to support, critically, the No Child Left Behind Act, delegates voted by a factor of at least three to one, NOT TO DISCUSS the wars on Iraq, Afghanistan, and around the world; this from an educators’ union charged with feeding children to the war machine. An agreement to silence discussion is beneath contempt.

Here is a link to a Rouge Forum Broadside on why NEA supports the NCLB

Justice demands organization. New kinds of organization.

CDC reports smashes pernicious stereotypes about black youth

Tim Wise’s latest ZNet commentary details findings from a new Centers for Disease Control report, which which examines the rates at which students between grades 9-12 drink, take drugs, carry weapons, and engage in all forms of potentially destructive behavior.

First, youth in general are far less engaged in destructive activity than commonly believed. Rates of drug and alcohol use and abuse, for example, as well as violence and other forms of pathology tend to be much higher among adults, even as the young are disproportionately tagged as the problem.

But beyond that, the CDC notes that contrary to popular belief, it is not black youth, but rather whites who tend to lead the pack in these categories of deviance, and that among all youth who are either black, white or Latino, blacks almost invariably are the least likely to do drugs, drink, or carry weapons either on school grounds, or generally.

And, as Wise notes, these findings have been consistent for over a decade and consistently ignored by the media.

“Yet in virtually no year has the media seen fit to make an issue of disproportionate white pathology, or the relative good behavior of black youth. If black youth kill someone, it’s a headline; if they do something right, you’ll be lucky to hear about it at all.”

So here are some of the facts, compiled by CDC in 2005, which should be making the news:

White youth are 2.3 times more likely than black youth to drive drunk;

White males are a third more likely than black males to have carried a weapon in the past month (31.4 percent vs. 23.7) and fifty percent more likely to have taken a weapon to school (10.1 vs. 6.8);

Although black and white youth are equally likely to have tried cigarettes, whites are twice as likely to smoke currently (26 vs. 13 percent), and 3.3 times more likely to smoke at least a half-pack a day (11.7 vs. 3.5 percent);

Although white and black youth are roughly equally likely to have tried alcohol, white youth are fifty percent more likely to drink currently (46 percent vs. 31 percent), and nearly three times as likely to engage in episodic binge drinking (defined as having five or more drinks at a time, more than once a month). Indeed thirty percent of white youth have engaged in such heavy drinking, while only eleven percent of black youth have, meaning that white youth are nearly as likely to have binged more than once in the past month, as black youth are to have taken a drink at all;

Although there is no statistically significant difference between white and black youth when it comes to marijuana use, whites between grades 9-12 are almost 3.5 times more likely to have tried cocaine, twice as likely to be current coke users, twice as likely to have used inhalants, twice as likely to have used illegal steroids, 3.3 times as likely to have used hallucinogenic drugs, nearly four times as likely to have used methamphetamine, and slightly more likely to have used heroin or ecstasy. While it should be noted that only very small percentages of youth of any color have tried these harder drugs–the fact remains that blacks are typically the least likely to have done so.

Ray Davies gives the people what they want

One of my favorite concert experiences ever was the Ray Davies “Storyteller” tour in the mid-1990s, which I took in with Dave B. and Kevin Q. at the Berkshire Performing Arts Center in Massachusetts. So it was with great anticipation that I checked out Ray and his new band at the Commodore Ballroom last night and he did not disappoint.

Davies is undoubtedly one of the best songwriters in rock history and “Other People’s Lives” (his first solo album released earlier this year) proves he’s not lost his touch since he churned out all those classic Kinks songs.

Davies is no rock ‘n’ roll relic. His songs often express a wistful affection for the past (usually without being maudlin) and this is certainly evident in his new work. But, Davies avoids being trapped in the past (as an oldies act) and his new tunes were the most most energized and exciting parts of the Commodore show last night.

Set List (from memory so missing tunes and certainly not in order after the first couple of tunes)
I’m Not Like Everybody Else
Where Have All The Good Times Gone?
After the Fall
All She Wrote
Over My Head
Sunny Afternoon
Next Door Neighbor
Creatures of Little Faith
Run Away From Time
Shangri-La [One verse and chorus on request from crowd]
The Tourist
Things Are Going to Change (The Morning After)
All Day and All of the Night
Set Me Free
A Long Way From Home [Dedicated to Dave]
The Getaway (Lonesome Train)
Till The End of the Day
Stand Up Comic
You Really Got Me

Rev. Jim Rigby: Christians Who Want Democracy Must Stop Bowing to a Dictator Christ

Here’s a ZNet commentary by Rev. Jim Rigby, pastor of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Austin, TX, and a longtime activist in movements concerned with gender, racial, and economic justice.

Rigby argues that Christianity is build upon a theology power, which contradicts the authority of Jesus’s teaching, which is found in truth. “To picture God in terms of power,” says Rigby, is “one of the great bait and switch gimmicks of all time. People within the power hierarchy proclaim that God is the ultimate authority, and then appoint themselves as God’s interpreters and enforcers. They are God’s humble bullies. It has been one of the most successful con games of all time.”

“Whereas American theology was born out of a hope for democracy, much of it is wedded to a picture of Christ as a benevolent dictator. Should we be surprised that a hierarchical cosmology would produce hierarchical churches and nations? Should we be surprised that religious nations that picture Christ as a loving dictator have produced conquistadors, inquisitors and crusaders?”

Keep reading for the full commentary…http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2006-06/21rigby.cfm

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ZNet Commentary
Christians Who Want Democracy Must Stop Bowing to a Dictator Christ July 10, 2006
By Rev. Jim Rigby

Whereas American theology was born out of a hope for democracy, much of it is wedded to a picture of Christ as a benevolent dictator. Should we be surprised that a hierarchical cosmology would produce hierarchical churches and nations? Should we be surprised that religious nations that picture Christ as a loving dictator have produced conquistadors, inquisitors and crusaders?

What else could they produce? As the tree is, so shall be the fruit. The word “Lord” was not in the original Bible. It is an English word from feudal times. Whereas the Greek word “kurios” had a range of meanings, from a title of respect, to a title of leadership, to a name for the sacred, the English translation “Lord” refers specifically to a male European land baron. Many people have softened that interpretation in their own minds, but in times of great stress, such nuance falls away and many Christians seek a white male king. He may be called “Pope”, he may be called “the decider President,” he may be called “televangelist,” but the title only masks what he is, a benevolent (or not so benevolent) dictator.

Neither Calvin nor Luther spoke English, but they helped the Popes lay the groundwork for the view of God as a cosmic dictator. From Popes, Luther and Calvin we have some of the ugliest slurs ever recorded against women, intellectuals, and those who refused the church’s message. How did Christians hold slaves, oppress women and slaughter nonbelievers? Perhaps they could not see Christ in non-male, non-European, and non-Christian people because they were limited by their theology. Their “Christ” was merely a glorification of the most powerful member of their own culture.

To picture God in terms of power is also one of the great bait and switch gimmicks of all time. People within the power hierarchy proclaim that God is the ultimate authority, and then appoint themselves as God’s interpreters and enforcers. They are God’s humble bullies. It has been one of the most successful con games of all time.

The real Jesus was born illegitimately. He called himself “the human one.” Just like Buddha, his authority came from truth, not power. He taught whoever has love has God. He said those who work for the common good are his church.

The real Jesus was an anarchist. He spent his life refusing to claim power over anyone. He said that God is understood in terms of love not power. We add nothing to the majesty of “the human one” by adding a throne or a crown. If he did not want to rule over others in life, why should he want it in death? That is why Jesus is called “lamb of God,” he spoke not as the king of the universe, but from its heart.

If you want to know why Americans are so frightened and why we are attacking anything that would challenge our dominance over others, read the Bible. Like Cain we have murdered members of our human family. Even when we silence our victims, the ground beneath our feet cries out against us.

Today’s church lifts its arms to praise Christ wearing liturgical garments woven in sweatshops. So called “Christian America” is still a nation built on the work of slaves. We do not see them because they toil invisibly in other countries. Today’s church doles out bits of charity from booty stolen from God’s powerless people the world over. Anyone who claims to believe in a just God, or even in justice itself, has to know at some level that the prayers for liberation coming from third world countries will be heard and answered. At some level, people of faith have to know that unless America repents of the sin of empire we are a doomed nation.

Whatever prophetic voices survive in the church must take a message to the mainstream denominations. “We are guilty of our leaders’ crimes. Just because we are silent and passive does not mean that we are innocent. If we have any status in the power hierarchy, we are partially responsible for its misdeeds.”

I realize that most of the church consists of wonderful and compassionate people, but that does not matter if we turn over our power to those less charitable. The moderate mainstream church is helpless against fundamentalism because it is built on a nuanced version of the same cracked foundation of a theology of power.

Whether or not we can change America in time to avoid a political and ecological apocalypse, it is never too late to do the right thing. All of us can begin to plant seeds of a better future for our children’s children. For Christians today, that means suffering the consequences of refusing to bow to the dictator Christ of this culture.

The Rev. Jim Rigby is pastor of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Austin, TX, and a longtime activist in movements concerned with gender, racial, and economic justice. This summer he is finishing a book on principles for a New Reformation. Rigby can be reached at jrigby0000@aol.com.

Natives to get more control over schools; Globe and Mail misses the (curricular) point

An editorial in today’s edition, the Globe and Mail raises concerns about the historic pact signed by B.C.’s aboriginal groups and the provinical and federal goverments, which will allow First Nations people direct control over their children’s education (covering everything from curriculum and exam to liscensing teachers).

The editorial states that “Natives need ways to be better integrated into Canadian society, not more ways to keep apart.”

The flaw in this logic is assuming that giving First Nations direct control over the education of their children will lead to social or cultural divisiveness.

It is obvious that the current arrangement—in which the federal government has control of reserve schools but apparently neglects them—is a failure that has contributed to the very lack of social and economic integration of First Nations people that the Globe and Mail laments.

The Globe and Mail‘s news coverage of the story today, by Petti Fong and Bill Curry, take the same line as the editorial, with an opening paragraph that seems aimed at inciting the idea that the new pact will lead to a denegration of the dominant culture in Canada.

Fong and Curry declare that “in new native school curriculums, John Cabot and Samuel Champlain will be minor footnotes in Canadian history, and Shakespeare a bit player in English classes.”

The content of any curriculum is not a zero-sum game. So, when Christa Williams, executive director of the First Nations Education Steering Committee, states that “The point [of new Native developed school curriculum] is to give kids material they can see themselves reflected in,” this does not automatically make the heros and events that dominate the curriculum social studies curriculum “minor footnotes.”

In fact, it illustrates a principle that should be at the core of the curriculum for all students in B.C., Canada, and everywhere else, that is, how do we create curriculum from which students can construct meaningful understandings of their world and learn how to have agency within it.

In B.C., 79 per cent of students graduate, but for students attending schools on reserves, that number drops to 43 per cent. What does this fact say about the experiences Native students are currently having in B.C. schools?

One way to think about the new accord is that things couldn’t possibly be worse, so why not?

A better approach would be think about how local control of schools and a focus on making the curriculum directly relevant to the social, cultural, historical experiences of the students might produce not only educational improvements, but actually strengthen our pluralistic society helping students to better under their place in the world and how they might take actions to transform it.

It’s that what democracy is suppose to be about?

Natives to get more control over schools—B.C. agreement could be extended to other provinces

PETTI FONG and BILL CURRY

VANCOUVER, OTTAWA — In new native school curriculums, John Cabot and Samuel Champlain will be minor footnotes in Canadian history, and Shakespeare a bit player in English classes.

After six years of negotiations, the federal and provincial governments signed a framework agreement in Vancouver yesterday to give schools on reserves more control over their curriculums.

Pupils in native schools will still have to meet provincial standards in such subjects as reading and math. But instead of learning Shakespeare, literature courses will teach the works of native playwrights such as Drew Hayden Taylor and authors like Eden Robinson.

“The point is to give kids material they can see themselves reflected in,” said Christa Williams, executive director of the First Nations Education Steering Committee.

“When we look at history books, we’re not going to see it from the perspective of the people who came to Canada as visitors, but we will blend it in with a longer, broader history.”

Ms. Williams said the whole point of revising the curriculum and other examination standards is to try a different approach to getting native students successfully through school.

The problem of high dropout rates among native youth has been an issue both federally and provincially. In B.C., 79 per cent of students graduate, but for students attending schools on reserves, that number drops to 43 per cent.

“Anything has got to be better that what we have now,” said Grand Chief Ed John of the B.C. Assembly of First Nations. “Our kids are dropping out like flies, we have to figure out a way to turn that around. What better message to have in the community than to take responsibility for your kids?”

The agreement will give parents, teachers and others in the native community the chance to provide input on what should be taught in schools on reserves and how, Mr. John said yesterday.

British Columbia is the first province to sign on to the framework agreement. About one in five of the province’s 200 native schools have already expressed their intent to negotiate individual agreements with the federal government. Once those individual agreements are done, Ottawa will transfer money directly to the native schools to run their education programs.

The federal government pays for education on reserves. Last year, it spent about $1-billion across the country and $175-million in B.C. for 16,000 students in native schools. About one-third of native students attend schools on reserves while the rest are in public schools.

Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice said he wants to take the B.C. model across the country so that eventually all native communities can opt out of education provisions of the Indian Act and create their own curriculums.

Mr. Prentice said native schools can pool their money to focus on specific needs, whether it be school supplies, teachers or psychologists.

He said the measures are consistent with what he has been promising since his days in opposition, which is to provide clear standards for native parents to judge their children’s schools.

Within six months, at least 60 native communities will take up the offer to assume authority to run their schools, the minister predicted.

Ottawa is already talking with governments in Alberta, Nova Scotia and Quebec to extend the agreement into those provinces.

Mr. Prentice played down any similarity between yesterday’s announcement and the promises to reform native education in the 2005 Kelowna agreement.

B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell, who had harshly criticized the Conservative government for not committing any money for the Kelowna accord for natives, said the agreement signed yesterday reflects the “spirit” of the agreement and is an important step toward closing the gap in education between natives and non-natives.

“Our goal is to make sure young first nations kids across the province get the education they need to deal with the world they live in in a comprehensive and topical way,” he said, “and in a way that grounds them in their own culture and their own traditions so they have the sense of confidence to deal with the world they live in today.”

The agreement applies from kindergarten to Grade 12 and could be extended to include early childhood development and postsecondary education.

U of California starts cyber charter school

The University of California, which has offered individual online courses for high school students for the past seven years, is creating a full online high school in which selected students could take all of their courses online, The San Diego Union-Tribune. reported.

The UC Online Academy will open in August, with as many as 125 students starting the program in 9th grade. Like brick-and-mortar charter schools, cyber charters operate free of many public school regulations on staffing, curriculum and spending. In exchange, they pledge to meet specific academic goals. If a school doesn’t achieve the goals, its charter – the permission to operate – can be revoked.

B.C. First Nations sign agreement to control own education

An historic agreement among B.C. First Nations, the provinical and federal governments will allow First Nations to control their own education. First Nations will be allowed to set up their own school boards, certify teachers, and determine the curriculum to be taught from kindergarten through Grade 12 for tens of thousands of B.C. aboriginal children.

The deal is an important milestone that everyone hopes will be an important, positive development in improving educational outcomes for native children. First Nations leaders have been seeking jurisdiction over education since 1972. About 70 percent of aboriginal children living on reserves fail to graduate from high school and only 27 percent of the first nations population between 15 and 44 years old hold a post-secondary certificate, diploma, or degree (compared to 46 of the Canadian population).

Gaining control over schools is just a small step, however, alleviating the poverty and other deleterious social conditions that disproportionately affect First Nations people remain huge problems that must be addressed. And, as in any context, to expect that educational improvements can be had without improving the economical and social conditions is fool-hearty.

As Jean Anyon has said, trying to reform schools without reforming the social and economic situations the schools sit in is like cleaning the air on one side of a screen door.

B.C. First Nations sign agreement to Control Own Education
NORTH VANCOUVER, B.C. (CP) – After decades of abuse in native residential schools, B.C. First Nations are moving in the opposite direction to educate their children with a new agreement on aboriginal education.

“The purpose of (residential) schools was to take the Indian out of the kids,” said First Nations Summit Chief Ed John, who himself went to a residential school for seven years.

The framework agreement between the B.C. and federal governments and natives gives First Nations control over their children’s education.

After legislation has been changed by both governments natives would be able to certify teachers and schools and establish their own curriculum and exam standards.

John believes the changes will allow them to close the huge graduation gap between natives and non-natives.

“Anything has got to be better than what we have now,” he said.

“Our kids are dropping out like flies. What better message (is there) than having your communities taking the responsibility for (their) kids.”

Nathan Matthew, the negotiator with the First Nations education steering committee, told a news conference Wednesday the system is created on the ashes of the residential school system.
“The signing of this education agreement today will empower B.C. First Nations to deliver quality education on their own terms,” he said.

“Education that reflects First Nations culture, tradition and provides contemporary knowledge and skills.”

B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell believes the changes will increase graduation rates for native children, which hovers below 50 per cent.

“It’s very important to recognize people’s history and to show respect for their culture,” he said.

Campbell pointed out the Nisga’a nation in northwest B.C. improved its graduation rate to more than 60 per cent when it took over its education program.

He said the goal is to not only give young First Nations the education they need, but to ground them in their own culture and traditions, “so they have a sense of confidence they need to deal with the world.”

“In the past we have failed young First Nations students,” the premier said.

Federal Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice called the program a model for other provinces to follow.

“There are other provinces such as Nova Scotia and Alberta, Quebec, that are similarly interested in the concept,” he said.

Prentice said the education idea has been tested in the past.

“Everywhere where we’ve tried pilot projects. . .where the First Nations community has been heavily involved in the education system, we’ve had great success.”

Neither Prentice nor Premier Campbell would say what the program may cost, but said it would be funded with startup costs and on a per-student basis.

Squamish First Nations Chief Gibby Jacob, who hosted the news conference, said the importance of the announcement is underscored by the generations of system failures natives have tried to learn under.

Vancouver Sun: Natives to control own education

Natives to control own education
Historic pact between B.C. and Ottawa seeks to end high dropout rate for aboriginal kids

Miro Cernetig
Vancouver Sun

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

VICTORIA — British Columbia’s first nations will be given direct control over the education of their children in a historic agreement — more than three decades in the making — to be unveiled today by the federal and provincial governments.

Seeking to end the high drop-out rate among native children on reserves, a failure often linked to the poverty in which many Canadian aboriginals live, the federal and provincial governments will allow first nations to set up their own school boards, certify teachers and set curriculum from kindergarten to Grade 12 for tens of thousands of aboriginal children in the province.

“It means that first nations parents and communities would have the right and the responsibility to determine how their children are educated and to determine the content of that education,” states one of the federal government’s background documents obtained by The Vancouver Sun.

The deal, to be announced in North Vancouver by federal Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice and Premier Gordon Campbell, is being hailed as a first in Canada and an “an important milestone” that could be emulated in other provinces, according to the draft agreement.

At least 40 of the almost 200 first nations in B.C., representing about 160,000 people, have already indicated they want to form school boards. They would be sanctioned to hand out provincial high-school graduation diplomas, known as the Dogwood.

The ground-breaking deal also stipulates that first nations school boards must agree to an oversight system, the details of which have yet to be spelled out, to ensure they meet provincial educational standards. In another surprise move, native parents will get the right to take the federal money allotted to each native child’s education and move it into the provincial school system if they choose.

For federal Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice the deal represents his first major policy move since the death of the Kelowna accord, the $5.2-billion deal that Premier Gordon Campbell and other premiers and native leaders signed with former Prime Minister Paul Martin in 2004. Prime Minister Stephen Harper distanced himself from that plan, promising he would still meet its goal of improving the lives of natives.

“I take my hat off to Minister Prentice,” said Campbell, who had warned Ottawa it risked tarnishing the Crown’s image if it bailed on the Kelowna accord’s poverty alleviation goals. “This has never been done before in Canada. It’s a historic step. It’s a first step.

“There may be times things don’t work as smoothly as we want … but the real spirit of the Kelowna accord, if you want to call it the Kelowna accord, is an open partnership with first nations to close the gap that has separated them from the rest of society for so long. It’s erasing the boundaries of the third solitude that first nations live in. And this is what this will do.”

The deal being offered today is voluntary and there is no unanimity on the part of B.C. first nations as to whether they will sign on. While most native leaders have been calling for greater autonomy and control of schools, others feel they aren’t ready or fear giving up their one-on-one relationship with the federal government.

Under today’s agreement, a first nation choosing to set up its own school board must opt out of parts of the Indian Act that allow the federal government to appoint third parties to run reserve schools. The federal government will be introducing legislation to make that possible in the next few months.

Education has been long seen by native leaders across Canada as one of the reasons for the chronic poverty and unemployment amongst the country’s approximately one million natives, who are twice as likely to be unemployed than other Canadians.

Since 1972, in a paper entitled Indian Control of Indian Education, native leaders have been “seeking recognition by the federal and provincial government of first nations’ jurisdiction over education,” Ottawa notes in its position paper.

But there has also long been a divisive debate about what is the best way for first nations to take control of schools.

There is no doubt that native children in reserve schools are faring poorly. According to the Assembly of First Nations, “there has been literally no progress over the last four years in closing the gap in high school graduation rates between first nations and other Canadians. At the current rate, it will take 28 years for first nations to catch up to the non-aboriginal population”

The statistics reveal a major disadvantage for young aboriginals. Abut 70 per cent of children living on reserve fail to graduate from high school. As well, the Assembly of First Nations estimates that 10,000 aboriginal students who are eligible and looking to attend post-secondary education are on waiting lists because of underfunding.

Only about “27 per cent of the first nations population between 15 and 44 years of age hold a post-secondary certificate, diploma, or degree, compared with 46 per cent of the Canadian population within the same age group,” the assembly says.

mcernetig@png.canwest.com