Mar 30, 2018

Reading for Subtext, This Time with Consideration of Underlying Issues in Daniel Bordman’s “School Policy Balance Bill Threatens Good Citizenship --- It would neuter education in civic discourse just when it is needed most.” (Star Tribune, Opinion Exchange, 22 March 2018)

A Note to My Readers   >>>>>

 

Among those articles that you have been given an opportunity to analyze in the course of these last few days is a piece published on the opinion pages of the Star Tribune on 22 March 2018 by social studies teacher and graduate student Daniel Borman.  This article was engendered by a bill before the Minnesota Legislature that would proscribe requirements that students express personal viewpoints for class participation and credit.

 

As I have done with several other articles, I now give that opinion piece again below, interspersed with my own comments.  Remember that I have asserted that articles in the Star Tribune should always be evaluated for subtext;  coverage of K-12 education issues at that publication is serviceable at best, so that the reader needs to be conscious of underlying issues, many of which staff writers are not even aware.  And those whose opinion pieces are published in the Star Tribune rarely give much evidence of understanding matters at the core of the K-12 dilemma;  hence, in these cases, too, the reader needs to glean what truly important information can be attained while reflecting how if at all the authors’  own expressed concerns may relate to truly important issues pertinent to K-12 education.

 

Please now consider again Bordman’s article, this time interspersed with my own comments, as follows  >>>>>

 

Daniel Bordman, “School Policy Balance Bill Threatens Good Citizenship ---  It would neuter education in civic discourse just when is needed most.”  (Star Tribune, Opinion Exchange, 22 March 2018)

 

Last week, while observing a student teacher teach social studies to sixth graders, I overheard a student ask whether a friend was going to walk out in protest of gun violence.

 

Instead of talking about crushes, their Snapchat streaks or what was on the math tests, these 12 year-olds were engaging in civic discourse about a pressing topic concerning them and the broader community.

 

Often, stakeholders in education forget that our stunts are also citizens.  The proposed Academic Balance Policy Bill in the Legislature does this and therefore should not become law.

 

University of Minnesota School of Social Work Profs. Ross Velure Roholt and Michael Baizerman write that “young people are systematically marginalized, if not outright excluded, from everyday citizen work on issues meaningful and consequential to them, for others, and for a community.”

 

Citizenship is not an innate human characteristic;  it must be taught and practiced.  Schools are one place where students get to interact with their peers and other adults.  If the Academic Balance Policy were to become law, the ability of schools to be these sites of democracy would be neutered.

 

My Comment    >>>>>

 

Bordman’s characterization of the two grade 6 students as engaging in civic discourse is overwrought. 

 

I frequently find that students are not really equipped to have meaningful discourse.  Students who come to me from the Minneapolis Public Schools have learned or retained little knowledge of the United States Constitution;  how legislation is proposed and passed;  the specific roles assigned to Senators and members of the House of Representatives in the United States Congress in proposing, considering, or passing legislation;  or the comparable roles of members in the two houses of the Minnesota State Legislature.  They have little understanding of constitutional amendments, including the wording of, history behind, or specifics of positions taken by participants in the current debate regarding, the Second Amendment.  Remember that I follow my students when they transfer to other school districts, and that I have observed many school settings.  The poor quality of instruction in history and government is pervasive in the schools of Minnesota and throughout the United States.

 

Genuine civic discourse is difficult to conduct in the absence of information on the pertinent issues and arguments on both sides of a debate.  Should Bordman prove to have conveyed more genuine knowledge to his students than does the typical civics teacher, then he should also know that the more abiding mediocrity of civics instruction is nevertheless the real problem impeding civil discourse in the classroom setting.

 

Citizenship cannot in fact be taught;  students can only go forth to practice citizenship when they have obtained the requisite knowledge for informed civic discourse.

 

Bordman’s referenced quotation from University of Minnesota School of Social Work Profs. Ross Velure Roholt and Michael Baizerman that “young people are systematically marginalized, if not outright excluded, from everyday citizen work on issues meaningful and consequential to them, for others, and for a community” strikes me as having the same limited value as proclamations produced by education professors.  The statement is overgeneralized, platitudinous, and murky.  How are students confined to the margins of citizenship?  My reply to the question would be that marginalization occurs when young people and the adults that they become are not given the necessary knowledge for civic participation.  The gravest problem is weak curriculum and teachers of limited knowledge and pedagogical talent, not whether this particular piece of legislation will be passed by Minnesota lawmakers.

 

Bordman continues    >>>>>

 

The bill says school districts must create a policy that “prohibit(s) school employees, in their official capacity, from requiring students or other school employees to express specified social or political viewpoints for the purpose of academic credit, extracurricular , or as a condition of employment.”

 

I understand that people go into teaching to indoctrinate students.  There may be a few bad apples who do.  However, professionalism dictates that as teachers we treat our students not as pawns or widgets, but as humans capable of their own agency.

 

There are two main problems that would occur if the bill were to become law:

 

First, a chill factor would set in;  teachers would not know what was or was not considered controversial.  Is it controversial to debate the legalization of marijuana in a social studies classroom?  To some, absolutely.  To others, the debate is germane because it is a replica of what is happening in state legislatures, including Minnesota’s.

 

How one teacher evaluates controversy may differ from another, or from a student, parent, administrator, or overzealous lawmaker.  It is much easier to avoid controversy altogether and not have a discussion.

 

But lack of discussion would leads [sic] to the second problem---  students leaving school not knowing how to discuss current events and political issues.  Social-studies scholars Walter Parker and Diana Hess have argued that schools are a space to learn using discussion.  If schools are not sites where such skills are practiced, students will turn to other influences around them.  In an age when, over and over again, we’ve seen that people are exposed to fake news and cannot tell what is fake news or not, forbidding our students to practice media literacy and argumentation---  both of which are codified in state learning standards---  would be educational malpractice.

 

My Comment      >>>>>

 

Note the indicated inappropriate rendering of “leads” where “lead” should have been used with careful writing or editing.

 

Observe another reference to lightweight scholarship, this time indeed provided by education professors.  There is deep irony in the fact that both Walter Parker and Diana Hess are professors of social studies, she at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he at the University of Washington-Seattle.  This places them in the pseudo-professional position that has sent so many ill-prepared social studies teachers forth to K-12 classrooms.  Social studies is a field invented at mid-20th century in a shift from instruction in the genuine academic fields of history, government, and economics to lightweight fare trained on matters of family, neighborhood, and community familiar to the student’s own experience.

 

Social studies professors and teachers have done more to deny students proper preparation for citizenship than the legislative bill of Bordman’s concern will ever deny if passed.  Knowledgeable and creative teachers will find a way to convey knowledge and encourage discussion.  If teachers lack such knowledge or retreat to positions as “guides” or “facilitators,” as encouraged by education professors, then passage of the law to limit discussion will not matter.

 

Bordman continues    >>>>>

 

I was a high school student in the lead-up to the Iraq war.  I had just published a commentary in my high school newspaper saying I did not believe the war was justified when my chemistry teacher went on five-minute tirade about why Saddam Hussein needed to be bombed.   After all, he did 9/11, or so my teacher said.  I sat in that room with no recourse, feeling targeted.  I take this memory into my classroom on a daily basis.  I share it with my students who are learning how to be social studies teachers.

 

That incident does not mean to me that we should ignore controversy all together [sic].  Let’s remember that one of the reasons the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida have been so effective at creating a movement is that their school allowed them the practice to learn how to communicate a clear, articulate message.  We have seen them organize matches, organize support and challenge elected officials.

 

I understand why some in the Legislature would want to avoid empowering students.  However, as evident by the sixth-graders I saw last week and the thousands who marched in protest, they do so at their own peril. 

 

My Final Comment

 

Note another [sic] indication.  The proper word selection at that point is “altogether,” meaning “completely,” not “all together,” meaning ”in unison.”

 

I agree with Bordman that legislation limiting issues for class discussion is not wise.

 

But more perilous is the generally poor to mediocre quality of most social studies instruction, and curriculum or lack thereof that generally prevails in this course of questionable provenance;  such classes typically fail to impart strong knowledge sets from the truly important fields of history, government, and economics.

 

Journalistic reports indicate that students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida are given the benefit of instruction from a teacher who is a specialist in civics, meaning the fundamentals of United States government and applications for citizenship.

 

As unwise as the legislation referenced by Bordman is, the greater lack of wisdom resides in our own timid citizenship for not demanding more such teachers of excellence.

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