If We Just Stop Noticing, Everything Will Be Fine
Board members say the changes are part of a larger effort to combat racism.
From the schools of San Diego, some “equity” news:
Students will no longer be graded based on a yearly average, or on how late they turn in assignments. Those are just some of the major grading changes approved this week by California’s second-largest school district… “If we’re actually going to be an anti-racist school district, we have to confront practices like this that have gone on for years and years,” says San Diego Unified School District Vice President Richard Barrera.
The practices being confronted – i.e., excluded from consideration in academic grading – include expectations of “turning work in on time” and norms of “classroom behaviour.” Abandoning such standards is, we learn, an “accountability measure.” On grounds that acknowledging tardiness, misbehaviour and a lack of diligence results in “racial imbalance,” which, in the land of the bedlamites, simply won’t do.
Student School Board Member Zachary Patterson, who is also a junior at University City High School, says while some classmates expressed concerns about grade inflation, overall the feedback from his peers is positive.
A license to disregard normal deadlines and to be selfishly disruptive, all with academic impunity. Why, it’s convenient and morally improving. Mr Patterson, an eleventh-grader who deploys the word inequities with dutiful enthusiasm, informs us, “Students all across the district are excited about this.”
After Patterson expressed concerns at this week’s meeting, the board will also review potential student disparities stemming from its zero-tolerance disciplinary policy on cheating in the coming weeks.
You see, expecting students to meet basic standards of behaviour, punctuality – and, it seems, probity – is “not fair,” according to SDUSD Vice President Richard Barrera, who adds that the new policy is – and I quote – “an honest reckoning.” An intriguing choice of words.
Update, via Rafi in the comments:
Just the boost private schooling, or even home schooling, needs.
Abandoning such standards is, we learn, an “accountability measure.”
Are we in Wonderland yet?
The underlying message is that POC students are tardy, disruptive, and dishonest, and it’s unfair to insist they change their ways because they’re inherently unable to meet “white” standards of conduct.
The Klan never really died away. They just became Critical Race Theorists.
Is this why there is an outrage against the cartoon character Speedy Gonzalez as being a racist stereotype of Mexicans? Because it unfairly portrays them as being clever and quick? It’s about time the school board embrace the reality!
The Klan never really died away. They just became Critical Race Theorists.
That.
“an honest reckoning.”
There’s nothing honest about it.
There’s nothing honest about it.
One more time:
For those who missed it.
When you stop caring about preparing students for life as an adult in modern society, it all makes perfect sense.
Very much related:
On racial discipline quotas in public schools – and their consequences.
The Klan never really died away. They just became Critical Race Theorists.
I’m not entirely sure I agree. They share some similarities certainly – both seem to believe in an idea of “whiteness as superiority”, but then they diverge as to whether or not that’s a good thing, and it seems to me that they have different views as to how “whiteness” is actually defined. I also find it hard to imagine the Klan pulling down and calling for the removal of American monuments, with perhaps the possible exception of anything dedicated to President Lincoln. But not memorials to rank-and-file Confederate soldiers or statues of Christopher Columbus and the Founding Fathers. All that’s being done by the Cretinous Race Theorists and their foot-soldiers. I’m not convinced that they’re the same. Not convinced at all.
Jordan Peterson’s take on Pinocchio seems apropos. They are turning high school into Pleasure Island in order to make students suited for nothing but servitude. They are depriving students of the skills necessary to become more than they are now.
The Klan was also strongly anti-Catholic, for what that’s worth.
Doubtless some will choose to believe that the proponents and enforcers of “equity” policies mean well, that their hearts are in the right places. Though this conceit doesn’t often withstand scrutiny. Especially when the practical consequences of such policies become hard to miss and the proponents refuse to concede any error on their part. As I said following the post on racial discipline quotas, linked upthread:
Well-meaning, my arse.
When you stop caring about preparing students for life as an adult in modern society, it all makes perfect sense.
I would say that the endless “preparing” is at the root of much of the problem. Young people need to get jobs. Real jobs with objectives and increasing levels of responsibility. And on the flip side of this, employers and those others of us in leadership positions have a responsibility to be (somewhat) patient with their failures. The expectation that our schools are supposed to turn out perfect little worker bees is another thing that has led us here.
“If we’re actually going to be an anti-racist school district,”
I respectfully suggest that while they might be “anti-racist” (with all the requisite caveats necessary for the use of that thoroughly misleading term), they will cease to be, in any meaningful sense at all, a school district.
In the new order of things racism isn’t something to be decried but rather established.
they will cease to be, in any meaningful sense at all, a school district.
As seen, for instance, here.
Well-meaning, my arse.
Speaking of which, this rather telling transitive misuse of fail (my emphasis):
According to data presented by the district, under the old grading system, teachers fail minority students more than White students – a lot more.
It seems a shame to have to point this out to people entrusted with the education of the “[n]early 106,000 students” in the “San Diego Unified School District” school system … but that’s not how tests work.
Ultimately, it is students, not teachers, that fail assessments.
Asking questions as to why some, or indeed any, students fail is a crucial part of the educational process.
The fact that “30% of all D or F grades were given to English learners” suggests a range of issues not the least of which is that it is inevitably harder to pass assessments written by and designed for proficient speakers of English if you are a student for whom proficiency in that language is limited to a greater or even a lesser degree. Similarly, all manner of other social and economic factors may impact on a student’s performance in assessments (e.g. having parents who are addicts, or illiterate, or suffering with behavioural and cognitive problems; having parents who despise all forms of authority and state institutions and who loudly and energetically encourage that same hatred and contempt in their children at any and all opportunity; experiencing the turmoil of an acrimonious divorce; living in poor quality overcrowded housing, etc.)
But to hear someone in the management of public education assert that it is the “teachers” who “fail students” while – mirabile dictu – not even mentioning, even if only to refute the charge, what this may imply about the quality of teacher training is to beggar belief.
To then hear that same person decide to abandon standards altogether while declaring it progress is nothing short of a total and absolute fucking disgrace and every fuck-knuckle that approves it well and truly deserves to be hauled in front of an inquiry and investigated for their obvious incompetence.
Public education across the West has been in trouble for decades.
The death of this particular canary doesn’t bode well for what’s around the corner.
The death of this particular canary doesn’t bode well for what’s around the corner.
Indeed. And when parents hear the word “equity,” they should regard it as an alarm bell.
Not a gentle ringing, mind, but a full-on Ripley-escaping-the-Nostromo klaxon.
From the schools of San Diego, some “equity” news:
In 1996 55% of California voters found a shred of sanity and passed Proposition 209 –
The sky didn’t fall, the KKK didn’t run amok in the streets. But in this woke season, the current California ballot contains Prop 16 – which will overturn 209 and legalize racial discrimination in public institutions.
Captain Nemo:
I was being a bit tongue in cheek. But taking my comment seriously (allowing me to have it both ways), I didn’t say the two movements were identical. They do, however, have similarities.
The most obvious is their fanatical focus on race as THE defining aspect of individuals. Neither movement knows how to deal with someone without knowing their race. The idea of treating people equally regardless of race is foreign to both. Another is their belief in race essentialism, meaning that all members of a race share certain essential qualities beyond merely the color of their skin. They also believe that some races are superior to others. The CRTers flipped the hierarchy when it comes to whites and blacks, although both movements agree that Jews and East Asians should be near the bottom.
But in some respects they maintained the hierarchy. Both posit that blacks are incapable on the whole of certain civilizing behaviour. The Klan thinks that this makes blacks inferior. The CRTers think that whites exploit such innate characteristics to keep blacks oppressed, making whites inferior.
As the saying goes, because there are inequalities there must be structural racism, and we know structural racism exists because there are inequalities.
Just ignore the NBA, the NFL, the 100M sprint finals etc etc etc
The elites are determined to dumb down the entire population of the world in tandem with disarming those who still have guns.
The problem is that if there are no smart people to maintain and continue the complex systems that we all depend upon, how will the elites manage when their internet goes down or have a power out.
Just look at some of the many countries whose populations are totally ignorant … those are folks who live miserable short lives over-seen by despotic ‘elites’.
Smart people are needed in running a complex modern world, but smart people will not enjoy being slaves. They will rebel eventually …
Being the only one’s who know how the infrastructure works, they may be successful, but that will be in the distant future. Way too late to save our asses.
Smart people are needed in running a complex modern world, but smart people will not enjoy being slaves. They will rebel eventually …
Oh, I’ve seen smart people do all kinds of stupid things. The ‘smart’ people are the problem. Tunnel vision and a blind faith in their own (and fellow travelers’) abilities. Look what smart people have done to their very own citadels of smartness, the universities.
Smart people are needed in running a complex modern world
Fewer and fewer are needed every day, due to automation.
In all “fairness” we’ve overlooked “Slow Poke Rodriquez” in our comments. Perhaps if we licensed Warner Brothers to illustrate the results of “equalization” in cartoon Mexican mice this would all be more palatable.
Episode 1. “Slowpoke Goes To Harvard And Demonstrates Difficulties With Subject / Verb Agreement”
Episode 2. “Slowpoke Goes To The Whitehouse And Is A Crap President”
Oh, I’ve seen smart people do all kinds of stupid things.
I have encountered plenty of smart people in the STEM fields who are more or less clueless about many other things.
I have encountered plenty of smart people in the STEM fields who are more or less clueless about many other things.
I believe the problem is in how we define “smart”. And “smart” doesn’t translate into “good character”. Smart is an innate, goodness is not, honesty is not, a work ethic is not.
I was being a bit tongue in cheek.
Ah, I see. Sorry – tone doesn’t tend to carry that well in written form.
Prop 209 has been functionally dead in CA for a while now. Progressives have used the courts to attack it from the moment it passed, Prop 16 is just the final burial.
I believe the problem is in how we define “smart”. And “smart” doesn’t translate into “good character”. Smart is an innate, goodness is not, honesty is not, a work ethic is not.
Yes indeed.
Also, many in the STEM fields are ignorant because they focus on their chosen fields and never really take much time to learn other things: thus what they do learn is often, by default, the official truth peddled by the left which they absorb without thought or question.
Another aspect of STEM is that for the most part, in STEM you can trust what you are being told in the classroom. STEM by its nature weeds out the impurities. Thus many who are good at STEM subjects think other sources of information have been likewise vetted and are equally trustworthy when pretty much the opposite is true. Recently at least.
Also, many in the STEM fields are ignorant because they focus on their chosen fields and never really take much time to learn other things…
My neighbour is an engineer. Nice guy. His wife is a social worker working in a hospital. So I expect her, at least, to lean a little left. We had them over for drinks one day and I made the mistake of bringing up what a fiasco global warming policies were. He was a big believer in the orthodoxy of today–the science is settled etc. He accepted everything without question. It was the last time I brought it up.
Also, many in the STEM fields are ignorant because they focus on their chosen fields
I once worked for an environmental engineering consultancy that employed hundreds of chemical engineers. Every single one of them was absolutely convinced that global warming was real and catastrophic. I used to enjoy pointing out that they didn’t really believe that; if they did, they’d be moving north and inland and digging the foundations for the survival bunker. The cognitive dissonance was epic; Very Smart People aren’t used to being wrong and they don’t handle it well.
I think VSPs (or just plain old experts) in any field also tend to get intellectually lazy. They’re accustomed to understanding new ideas and information in their areas of expertise with little effort, so when something new outside their fields comes along, they take only a superficial look and assume they’ve mastered it. We’re overrun with pro sportsball players pontificating on sociopolitics, actresses lecturing on foreign policy, etc.
It feels as if this is some kind of outcome from an extended period of psychological priming.
they will cease to be, in any meaningful sense at all, a school district.
Watching the video, I can’t help wondering whether Mr Zachary Patterson – who seemingly believes that cheating should be permitted, or at least not punished, when brown-skinned students do it – imagines himself as some kind of righteous and enlightened being. Rather than, say, a dupe. Which is to say, the kind of student most susceptible to, and most eager to regurgitate, fashionable hokum.
Perhaps his future includes a career in leftist politics. Maybe one day he’ll be steering the educational policy of a school near you.
It feels as if this is some kind of outcome from an extended period of psychological priming.
Emotional dysregulation is the defining trait of humanity in the 21st century.
Emotional dysregulation is the defining trait of humanity in the 21st century.
The video posted this morning is not entirely unrelated.
Setting up black kids to be virtually unemployable in the real world – the world where deadlines exist and unpunctuality can see you sacked. And no doubt the results of making black kids unemployable will also be attributed to the racism of the jobs market and America generally. And that will lead to the call for MORE critical race theory and white re-education. And so the scam perpetuates itself.
Black kids are not unemployable though.
Assuming as a minimum, they avoid lengthy penal incarceration, there are “colleges” just itching to take them irrespective of being as dumb as a box of rocks. Said colleges, taxpayer funded naturally, will issue degrees for just occasionally showing up. Said degrees will be accepted, via the joys of positive discrimination, in both public and private bodies filing their quotas by creating new positions, departments and entire industries centred on blackness. As I have said several times on here the Golgafrinchans are going to need a much bigger Ark B, presumably built by Indians with H1B visas.
…new positions, departments and entire industries centred on blackness.
The parasite which kills its host is not a successful parasite. Neither is the parasite which annoys its host enough to get treatment against parasites. I’m not sure which one of these outcomes will come to pass or when, but I’m confident that one or the other is inevitable.
But hey, let’s just keep shrinking the engine and adding weight to the cargo. What better way to prove our commitment to “sustainability”?
Thanks to the San Diego School Board and young Zachary Patterson, we now know African-Americans just aren’t capable of making it through life on the content of their character.
Oh yeah, we know who the racists are all right. The Reverend Doctor must be spinning in his grave.
Job application question number 1: Spell the three letter word for a feline animal. “Don’t hit me with that white supremacist s***. Gimme the f****** job.”
…followed 45 minutes later by a flash mob in front of your shop loudly demanding that you get rid of the racist job application and fire the manager who so unfairly tried to humiliate the Job Applicant Of Colo(u)r.
‘Related’
https://www.sfchronicle.com/education/article/Lowell-High-School-will-use-lottery-admission-15662977.php
‘Related’
Thanks, Rafi. See today’s post.