It is my hope that IFI subscribers will even read articles about schools other than their own. When I write about a problem in a particular school, I always address the problematic assumptions that underlie whatever particular issue I am addressing. Those assumptions need to be analyzed and understood because they are pervasive and will manifest sooner or later in problems in all schools.
My goal is to address the weaknesses in the arguments used to defend, for example, anti-bullying curricula that specifically address homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder, so that people will not be deceived and so that they will be equipped to confront the problems in their own public schools.
Last Thursday, I wrote an article about Beye Elementary School in Oak Park, exposing the pro-homosexual activism that has arrived on its doorstep and which will be arriving on the doorsteps of every elementary school unless taxpayers become educated and develop some spine.
In response, I received several negative emails which are reprinted (unedited) below followed by my responses to them. The reason I'm reprinting these emails and my responses is that the specious ideas and ad hominem arguments embodied in these emails are common and often effective in silencing conservative voices:
It was only a matter of time before homosexual activism infected elementary education here in Illinois. This cancerous activism appeared during a recent Institute Day at William Beye Elementary School in Oak Park during which Oak Park resident and lesbian, Shannon Sullivan, who is the Executive Director of the Illinois Safe Schools Network, was invited to speak to the entire faculty.
During her biased presentation, Sullivan showed the film That's a Family, which I too have seen. It was shown at a professional development workshop at Deerfield High School when I worked there, and it angered more than a few staff members. Our workshop was organized by our homosexual director of technology, which should help put to rest the silly claim that the sexual orientation of our educators is irrelevant.
That's a Family implicitly espouses the offensive claim that families led by homosexuals are morally equivalent to those led by guardians, disabled parents, racial minorities, or heterosexuals. Some teachers at Beye are planning on showing this piece of political propaganda to their elementary students, citing the presence of families led by homosexuals in the Oak Park community as justification. But simply because a particular family structure exists does not require public educators either to discuss it or affirm it. Watch an excerpt from the film here.
Public education is rife with problems, but perhaps none quite as prevalent as pro-homosexual advocacy which infects schools from elementary through high schools, from small schools to large, and from poorly performing urban schools to affluent, prestigious suburban schools.
What may provide one of the links between all these seemingly diverse educational contexts are the departments of education through which all public school teachers must pass. An article published in December 2009 in the Music Educators Journal provides a glimpse into the troubling and presumptuous goals of just one of our nation's educator-ideologues: Professor Louis Bergonzi, Chair of the Music Education Division at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
His article is entitled "Sexual Orientation and Music Education: Continuing a Tradition," and his thesis is that music education can be improved by "acknowledging other sexual orientations, specifically, homosexuality." He believes that it's time to "Consider the beneficial presence of...musicians, colleagues, and students...whose emotional, romantic, and physical attractions are to...the same sex." He explains that his article focuses on "high school students and teachers" but is relevant to all educational levels.
He asks "Isn't it time...to examine how homophobia and heterocentrism bias our curricular content and the lives and work of LGBT teachers? Isn't it time we eliminate heterosexuality's privileged place in our profession?"
12/17/2009 10:11:00 PM By Robert Knight
-Townhall.com
What do you do if you're caught in something shocking, inexcusable and even criminal?
You divert attention by getting someone to attack the messenger: "Don't look at this stuff! Look over there!"
And so, amid the growing scandal surrounding President Obama's "safe schools czar," Kevin Jennings, his defenders have unleashed Media Matters to tar anyone who brings Jennings' shocking record to light. I think it will backfire on them royally when people see what it's all about.
Jennings is the Assistant Deputy Secretary for Safe and Drug-Free Schools at the U.S. Department of Education. He founded the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) in 1995 and ran it until 2008.
GLSEN promotes homosexuality in schools from grades K-12, organizes gay/straight alliance clubs and stages disruptive events such as "The Day of Silence" and "Ally Day."
The typical American mother would be a bit uncomfortable letting her six-year-old child browse the "alternative lifestyles" section in the local Barnes and Noble. Instead, she would direct his attention to the safe and welcoming shelves of the brightly colored children's book department. Amid the familiar stories of Peter Rabbit and Curious George, the little tyke should be safe from the propaganda of the cultural left.
But there he may meet a lonely and misunderstood little duck named Elmer, in a new retelling of Hans Christian Andersen's classic tale, "The Ugly Duckling," written for five-to-eight-year-old children. In this version, the duckling is "not like the other boy ducklings," not because he is a swan, but because he is "a great big sissy."
Now, there have been plenty of children's books designed to encourage the daydreaming bookworm or the shy computer enthusiast. The Sissy Duckling is not one of those books. Instead, this lushly illustrated and engagingly narrated volume packages the chants of the gay rights protestors [sic] in the gentle tones of a bedtime story. The author, after all, is Harvey Fierstein, who is introduced in his dust-jacket bio as "a three-time Tony Award-winning writer, actor, and gay rights activist."
Barack Obama's Safe Schools Czar Kevin Jennings founded the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) in 1990. In 2007 Kevin Jennings was paid $273,573.96 as the executive director of GLSEN. Recently he was appointed by the Obama administration to run the Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools in the US Department of Education.
On Friday, Scott Baker from Breitbart.TV and Co-Host of 'The B-Cast' submitted a shocking report on Obama's deviant Safe Schools Czar Kevin Jennings. This report was posted at Gateway Pundit blog. Scott explained:
I was recently approached by a team of independent researchers that I have known for some time and have come to trust. They prepared this report involving 'Safe Schools Czar' Kevin Jennings and the organization he founded, GLSEN, and asked that I find a way to help draw attention to what they uncovered. Knowing that Gateway Pundit has followed Kevin Jennings since his appointment, as we have on The B-Cast (here, here, and here), and on Breitbart.tv (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here), I felt this would be an appropriate place for this report.
As the Director of School Advocacy, I write primarily about current problems in public schools. The topics about which I write are generated primarily by concerns brought to my attention by parents of current public school children; staff or faculty currently employed in public schools; or news stories. The reason I write so much about the problem of pro-homosexual advocacy in public education is that that is the dominant problem parents and school employees are encountering in government schools.
I have two goals: First, to curtail the efforts of activist ideologues to use public education to transform the views of other people's children on the nature and morality of homosexuality and cross-dressing.
And second, to awaken the conservative community to their moral obligation to oppose these efforts with as much courage, conviction, forthrightness, vigor, and perseverance that activists demonstrate.
Activist ideologues routinely mouth their respect for diversity all the while censoring conservative views with hypocritical abandon. Those parents, community members, faculty, and administrators who hold traditional views about homosexuality and cross-dressing must express them with clarity and boldness even if the result is scorn and hostility from those who have arrogantly assumed that only their views are entitled to be represented in academia.
Focus on the Family's Citizenlink wrote about a Dec. 2009 court decision in CA that I hope serves as a warning to Illinoisans about where their silence will lead:
Adlai E. Stevenson H.S. One Stevenson Drive Lincolnshire, IL 60069
Take ACTION: Click HERE to send a message to Superintendent Twadell, Principal Gonzalez & the Dist. 125 School Board to let them know that you object to teachers using public money to impose their morality on other people's children.
IFI readers with memories like steel traps may remember the names of Stevenson High School English teachers Melissa Mack and Bill Fritz. For those, like me, who have memories like steel sieves, Bill Fritz is the sponsor of Stevenson's Gay Straight Alliance and one of the sponsors of last year's first dance for students who identify as homosexual. Melissa Mack is the Stevenson High School teacher who circulated an email to the entire faculty of Stevenson High School in which she denounced IFI for being "an extreme fringe group" and said that my article about the dance constituted a "hate-filled opinion from someone who supports book-banning" and "can only be characterized as ignorant prejudice." All this because I expressed the view that public schools have no business either implicitly or explicitly affirming particular views of the nature and morality of homosexuality. You can read about last year's brouhaha here and here.
Well, Mr. Fritz and Ms. Mack show no signs of ceasing their exploitation of public money to advance their personal views on controversial issues. They each co-taught dubious workshops at the November National Council for Teachers of English (NCTE) conference held in Philadelphia.
Take ACTION:Click HERE to send a message to Superintendent Eric Twadell, Principal Janet Gonzalez and the District 125 School Board to let them know that you object to the use of public money to impose their immorality on other people's children.
There is a concerted effort on the part of proponents of "critical race theory" to erode respect for America through public education. Critical race theory, also known as "teaching for social justice" pervades departments of education all around the country. Unapologetic former Weather Underground domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, who is a professor of Education at University of Illinois at Chicago, is a central figure in the effort to use our taxes to promote critical race theory in public schools.
Ayers has disciples who you can often recognize by their job titles. In Seattle, WA in 2007, Caprice Hollins, the district's "director of Equity, Race & Learning Support," generated a controversy when she sent an article entitled "Deconstructing the Myths of 'the First Thanksgiving'" to all staff and faculty in a Seattle school district. More recently, and much closer to home, District 113's (where else) Andrea Johnson used her spanking new highly paid position as Director of Diversity to send this very same polemical article to every staff and faculty member of Deerfield and Highland Park High Schools.
It was suggested to me that I file a Freedom of Information Act request with the school district for which I worked for a decade and which my four children attended. It was suggested that I request documents that mentioned my name. Neither I nor my husband was prepared for what we read in district emails, which are, of course, public documents.
The district is District 113 which is composed of Deerfield High School (DHS) in Deerfield, IL and Highland Park High School (HPHS) in Highland Park, IL, both affluent Chicago suburbs. I worked full-time in the writing center and was a member of the DHS English Department.
These emails resulted from my criticism of public education in general or District 113 in particular for promoting exclusively liberal views of the nature and morality of homosexuality; for promoting "critical race theory" or "critical social theory"; and for failing to provide balance on these two topics, both in terms of resources presented to students as well as to staff and faculty through professional development opportunities. The views I expressed are held by many across the country, including many prominent scholars; and I expressed them openly, either directly to the administration and school board or in public forums like the Chicago Tribune, Pioneer Press, or pro-family websites.
There are two reasons I am making public the content of some of these emails:
Last week, IFI was alerted to the fact that some School District 204 (Naperville, Aurora, Bolingbrook, & Plainfield) middle schools were participating in a diversity day last week. The person who contacted us thought that it would be a good idea for IFI to make this information known to District 204 parents.
On Thursday morning, I called six of the seven District 204 middle schools, leaving messages with six principals and two assistant principals. I explained that I worked for the Illinois Family Institute, that we had been contacted about this diversity day, and that I had some questions about it. Only one principal, Kathy Kosteck from Scullen Middle School, returned my call.
She expressed surprise that anyone would have concerns about a diversity day, so I explained that many parents understand that "diversity" is code language that conceals pro-homosexual ideologies.
Here is the form letter sent by the College of DuPage to those who expressed concern over Dr. Adelman's use of curriculum to advance her particular political biases. What is noticeably absent from this letter are any responses to the questions or concerns I raised in my initial article:
The famous -- and soon to be infamous -- Scholastic Books has decided to include the pro-homosexual book for 9-12 year-olds, Luv Ya Bunches, in its middle school book fairs. This troubling book is already in the Scholastic Book Club catalogue, which is distributed to elementary school children.
Because of the vociferous protests of homosexuals and a petition drive by the pro-homosexual organization Change.org, Scholastic Books has reversed its initial decision to exclude the book from their book fairs. It will now allow Luv Ya Bunches to be included at its middle school book fairs.
According to the Guardian, author Lauren Myracle "who regularly makes the list of the most banned and challenged authors in the US -- capitulated on the language, removing words such as 'geez', 'crap', 'sucks', and 'God', but refused to replace the lesbian parents of her character Milla with a heterosexual couple." Scholastic Books includes Luv Ya Bunches on its "Teacher's Picks" page as one of the "Best Books" for grades 3-5.
Change.org describes Scholastic Books as "one of the largest education publishers in the world with broad influence over the reading materials of children everywhere. . . .These are the same book fairs that have reach [sic] to millions of schoolchildren nationwide." Clearly, homosexual activists recognize the potential Scholastic Books has to transform the views of impressionable children.
IFI is urging parents to notify your children's schools that because Luv Ya Bunches is listed in the Scholastic Book Club catalogue, the catalogue is not to be distributed to your child and that you will not be ordering any books from Scholastic Books. (Click HERE for a sample message that you can edit, customize, print and send.)
What is the difference between an educator and an ideologue? Perhaps a look at Naperville North High School's teacher Kermit Eby will help answer that question.
Kermit Eby, the Naperville North social studies teacher who last year invited unapologetic Weather Underground domestic terrorist and "critical social theory" proponent Bill Ayers to speak at Naperville North, has now invited history revisionist and America-hater Howard Zinn to speak at Naperville North on Saturday, Nov. 7 at 2:00 p.m.
This same teacher signed the Support Bill Ayers petition (For those interested, Eby is signatory number 1947 on the petition, and he identifies himself as a Naperville North High School teacher). And this is the same Kermit Eby who signed the Historians Against the War petition in 2003, again identifying himself as a Naperville North High School teacher. These historians opposed "the expansion of United States empire and the doctrine of pre-emptive war that have led to the occupation of Iraq. We deplore the secrecy, deception, and distortion of history involved in the administration's conduct of a war that violates international law, intensifies attacks on civil liberties, and reaches toward domination of the Middle East and its resources."
Of course, Mr. Eby has every right to sign any petition he wants, but his obvious political leanings and interests appear to be influencing his pedagogical activities. A parent who had multiple meetings with Eby as a result of two of her children having him as a teacher wrote on a Daily Heraldblog that Eby makes his political views known through his classroom commentary as well as curricular resources:
Click HERE to send an email to the administrators and trustees at COD to express your disapproval of tax dollars being used to advance personal political agendas in an integrated biology and film class.
Last spring I was contacted by a remarkable student at the College of DuPage who could teach many adults a thing or two about courage and conviction.
She was enrolled in an integrated biology and film class entitled "Honors Seminar: Biology 1100 (Survey of Biology) and English 1154 (Film as Literature)-Defining Human Health on a Changing Planet" that was described in the course catalogue as follows:
This seminar combines an investigative and interactive approach to biology with the study of film as a literary genre to explore the concept of human health in its broadest sense. Using the medium of film as a commentary on past and current biological issues, we will explore ecological, evolutionary, and hereditary relationships among living organisms, examine lifestyle issues and analyze the relationships between population, agriculture, pollution, biodiversity, and disease. The principles and procedures underlying the modern approach to understanding living processes are emphasized. You will also explore contemporary health issues, and through these investigations come to appreciate the role of biology and film in society. Learning methods for this seminar include reading, film viewing, class lecture and discussion; labs issue deliberations, field trips, and cooperative research projects. All seminar participants will also be involved in service learning to enhance understanding of health issues at the local level.
Reading, film-viewing, lectures, discussions, labs, field trips, research projects, service projects, ecology, evolution, heredity, lifestyles, population, agriculture, pollution, biodiversity, disease, past biological issues, current biological issues, film appreciation--whew--I'm exhausted just reading this exhaustive list of topics and methods. And somehow in the midst of all this verbiage, the film/English professor, Dr. Deborah Adelman, forgot to mention her strident political biases and agenda. She failed to mention that she has a pro-abortion, pro-homosexual political agenda that she uses her Illinois taxpayer- funded salary to promote.
Contributes to offensive display of sexual perversion, child pornography, and anti-Catholic bigotry -- now being exhibited at Harvard University
WARNING: Photos at the linked site are offensive and pornographic.
If you want to know what Americans can expect in public schools, look no further.
Kevin Jennings is Barack Obama's "safe schools" czar in the US Department of Education. He's also the founder of the national homosexual group GLSEN, which sets up "gay straight alliance" clubs in high schools and middle schools across America. GLSEN is officially supported by the Massachusetts Legislature.
Jennings is also a former member of the radical homosexual group "Act Up", and he contributed to this depraved and offensive museum exhibit on "Act Up" now at Harvard University (see press release).
See the complete article, along with more photos of this shocking exhibit HERE...
Both higher and K-12 education are in desperate need of reform, though there are some extremely positive signs are on the horizon. Within a decade we might well see elementary, secondary, and universities become more about learning and less about cushy careers for the so-called "education professionals."
Last month I referenced the John W. Pope Center for Higher Education Policy, and today I wanted to bring to your attention an excellent article on their website by George Leef:
First, let's provide a quick definition of "Creative Destruction" from the Library of Economics and Liberty (emphasis added):
"Joseph Schumpeter (1883-1950) coined the seemingly paradoxical term "creative destruction," and generations of economists have adopted it as a shorthand description of the free market's messy way of delivering progress... Read more...
A longtime champion of homeschooling rights around the globe, Home School Legal Defense Association Senior Counsel and Director of State and International Relations Christopher J. Klicka was called home by his Lord on October 12, 2009, at age 48, following a 15-year battle with multiple sclerosis.
An attorney, spokesman, lobbyist, and homeschooling husband and father, Chris is survived by his wife, Tracy, their seven children (ages 11-21). An integral part of Home School Legal Defense Association's staff for 24 years, Chris was HSLDA's first full-time employee, first executive director, and first full-time attorney. He believed passionately that homeschooling was the best educational method for children and demonstrated that passion in every area of his life.
IFI had the privilege of working with him on occasion. He will be greatly missed.
Please keep his wife and children in your prayers.
In the video clip above, "Safe Schools Czar" and pederast-protector Kevin Jennings frets over the "aggressive" promotion of heterosexuality that takes place in public schools through the teaching of Romeo and Juliet.
Jennings makes the disingenuous claim that parents are fearful that homosexuals "are after their kids." He implies that the chief concern of parents is that teachers will try to recruit children into the homosexual lifestyle, when in reality that is not the chief concern of most parents.
Click HERE to send an email or a fax to President Obama, Secretary Duncan, U.S. Senators Durbin and Burris & your Congressman to urge them to withdraw the appointment of Jennings as Assistant Deputy Secretary for the Office of Safe & Drug Free Schools.
The indefensible decision of Arne Duncan to appoint radical homosexual activist and founder of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), Kevin Jennings to the position of Assistant Deputy Secretary of the Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools is finally generating the public opposition it deserves.
Criticism of Jennings is coming from multiple sources all over the country. From small and large pro-family organizations to the Washington Times to Sean Hannity -- all are calling for Jennings to resign or be terminated. Now is the time to act. Call or email your representatives and senators to politely demand the ousting of Kevin Jennings who is at least as unsuitable and controversial an appointment as the former "Green Czar" Van Jones was.
Jennings began his career in education as a teacher in a private Massachusetts boarding school. He has written and spoken about an incident that occurred when he was teaching there in which a troubled fifteen-year-old boy confessed to Jennings that he was having a sexual relationship with an older man he had met in a Boston bus station bathroom. Jennings' response to this troubled teen was to advise him to use condoms. Even more troubling, Jennings failed to fulfill his legal obligation to report sexual activity between an adult and a child under the age of 18. When Jennings' professional misconduct was reported to the National Education Association (NEA) by the chair of the NEA Republican Educator's Caucus, Jennings threatened a lawsuit against the teacher who reported it.
I was disappointed to read Julia Keller's article "Don't read that: The secret lives of book banners" in Sunday's Chicago Tribune. Julia Keller is the erudite literary critic for the Trib whose reviews of books are delightful, fresh, and insightful gems of writing in and of themselves. There were glimmers of her humor and story-telling skills in the anecdote, rich with evocative imagery, about her mother's peremptory seizure of Keller's stash of true-crime novels. Unfortunately, Keller's hearty, unequivocal endorsement of the American Library Association's (ALA) farcical Banned Books Week lacks the insight and complexity of thought I've come to expect from Keller.
There's yet more troubling information about H.R. 2262, the proposed amendment to the Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act. According to the pro-homosexual website Change.org, "H.R. 2262 would require schools that receive Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act funding to implement comprehensive anti-bullying policies that enumerate categories often targeted by bullies, including. . .sexual orientation [and] gender identity/expression."
Change.or is sayig that if passed, H.R.2262 would mandate that schools that already receive funding for drug prevention education would either have to include homosexuality, cross-dressing, and "transsexuality" or lose federal funding for their drug prevention programs. And this would apply not just to high schools but to elementary schools as well.
H.R. 2262, "The Safe Schools Improvement Act," was introduced in May, and in June it was referred to the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education. This bill would "amend the Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act to include bullying and harassment prevention programs." Anyone who has been paying attention knows that anti-bullying/safe schools curricula are now the central means by which pro-homosexual propaganda is secreted into public schools.
According to the pro-homosexual website Change.org, "H.R. 2262 would require schools that receive Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act funding to implement comprehensive anti-bullying policies that enumerate categories often targeted by bullies, including . . . sexual orientation [and] gender identity/expression."
Joining bill sponsor Representative Linda Sánchez (D-CA) are 81 co-sponsors. Seventy-nine are Democrats, one is an independent, and two are Republicans. Co-sponsors from Illinois are Mark Kirk (R-10th District), Danny Davis (D-7th District), Luis Gutierrez (D-4th District), Mike Quigley (D-5th District) and Jan Schakowsky (D-9th District).
Take ACTION:Click HERE to send an email or fax to your U.S. Representative asking them to oppose H.R. 2262 and any other legislation that would use tax-payer funds to affirm homosexuality in our schools.
When a sexual orientation law in Maine was passed in 2005, it was the most radical of its kind ever. The law not only protected homosexuals from discrimination, it also prohibited discrimination on the basis of "gender identity" and "gender expression." "Gender identity" is the belief that one is either male or female, regardless of one's biological sex. "Gender expression" is the dress, hairstyle, and the like which expresses one's perceived gender.
One result of this law is what happened at the Asa C. Adams Elementary School when a twelve year old boy, a fifth grader, wanted to use the girls' room. The school offered a compromise -- the use of a unisex faculty bathroom. The boy's parents then claimed the school was discriminating against their child, who thinks he is a girl. When denied entry into the girls' bathroom, a case was filed and The Human Rights Commission concluded unanimously that the school discriminated against the boy.
I wrote an article last week about Challenge Day which took place from Aug. 31-Sept. 3 at O'Fallon Township High School in southern IL. The four-day event cost thousands of dollars with much of the funding evidently coming from the public coffers.
This workshop, based out of CA and patterned after large group awareness training sessions (LGATs), has been criticized from coast to coast. It employs emotionally invasive, encounter group-like exercises that break down the often fragile emotions of teens and culminate in collective weeping. Unfortunately for taxpayers and students, Naperville Central High School in Naperville, IL will be hosting three Challenge Days on Oct. 26, 27 and 28.
9/5/2009 7:00:00 AM By Michelle Malkin
-Townhall.com
"ABC" stands for All Barack's Children. On Sept. 8, young students across the country will be watching television. Yes, they'll be parked in front of boob tubes and computer screens watching President Obama's address on education.
Instead of practicing cursive, reviewing multiplication tables, diagramming sentences or learning something concrete, America's kids will be lectured about the importance of learning. And then the schoolchildren, from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade, will be exhorted to Do Something -- other than sit in their seats and receive academic instruction, that is.
Education Secretary Arne Duncan dispatched letters to principals nationwide, boasting, "This is the first time an American president has spoken directly to the nation's schoolchildren about persisting and succeeding in school." But the goal is not merely morale boosting. According to White House event-related guides developed by the U.S. Department of Education's Teaching Fellows, grade-school students will be told to "listen to the speech" and "think about the following": Read more...
How far the goals and activities of public education have moved since its inception can be seen in a look at Challenge Day--or more accurately Challenge Days--which are scheduled for Aug. 31-Sept. 3 at O'Fallon Township High School (OTHS) in O'Fallon, IL.
Challenge Day is the brainchild of Rich and Yvonne Dutra-St. John. The program's goals are as follows:
Challenge Day successfully addresses some common issues seen at most schools during our school programs including cliques, gossip, rumors, negative judgments, teasing, harassment, isolation, stereotypes, intolerance, racism, sexism, bullying, violence, homophobia, (emphasis added) hopelessness, apathy, and hidden pressures to create an image, achieve or live up to the expectations of others....Be challenged to celebrate the diversity of ALL people.
And how do they achieve those goals? They do so through invasive psychological exercises that culminate in a collective state of raw emotion and weeping. Here's an excerpt from a promotional video about Challenge Day narrated by Leeza Gibbons.
CNSNews.com reported yesterday that compared with other students, home school students score higher than the national average on the ACT college entry than other students taking the standardized test.
The national average for 2009 graduating high schoolers reported by ACT (American College Testing) officials is 21.1 on a scale from 1 to 36. Home school students scored a national average of 22.5.
Ian Slatter, director of media relations for the Home School Legal Defense Association, speculated that the one-on-one attention home-schooled students receive may explain the finding. "Parents can tailor-make an education program to suit the child. The child can then advance at their (sic) own pace. Typically, in the home-school environment, the teen is self-directed in their learning because parents set a topic or task, and the student will then do their own research," he said.
A Republican senator says President Barack Obama has consistently opposed Republican proposals that would make healthcare insurance less expensive and more accessible to the American public.
President Obama recently visited the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters to talk about healthcare. He told an audience at the DNC and thousands watching online and listening by telephone that "winning the election is just the start."
Obama says he is still looking for Republican support for a comprehensive healthcare bill, but Democrats privately are preparing a one-party push. Some Democrats say a strong-arm tactic on Senate healthcare legislation, one that would negate the need for any GOP votes, might be more effective than previously thought.
Senator Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) has been one of Obama's staunchest critics on this issue. He says the president opposed meaningful Republican legislation while he still a member of the Senate.
You wrote, "The Illinois Family Institute's Laurie Higgins is going after me (and my job) again."
I have never in any context suggested that you should be fired or that you should resign. In fact, I don't believe the school has any legal right to fire you. You should have fact-checked before you posted that inaccurate statement.
In addition, I have repeatedly stated that you have a First Amendment right to make whatever public statements you want on any topic. I have also made it abundantly clear that my goal is to provide information to District 204 parents--particularly IFI readers-about the nature of the ideas you express and endorse on your public blog so that they can make informed decisions as to whether they want their children to spend a school year under your tutelage.
District 204 parents really should spend some time perusing Neuqua Valley math teacher, Hemant Mehta's website to determine whether he is the kind of man with whom they want their children to spend a school year. He absolutely has a First Amendment right to promote any feckless, destructive, and offensive ideas he wants via his blog, but, as I mentioned in my earlier article, parents have the right not to have him as a teacher and a role model for their children. I want to be very clear about what I'm suggesting: I am suggesting that parents who have serious concerns about Mr. Mehta's potential influence on their children's beliefs politely insist that their children be placed in another teacher's class.
On his blog on August 18, he seems to suggest that Christians who publicly read passages from the Bible that he doesn't like should be charged with hate crimes. He wrote as follows:
"Does Free Speech Include Reciting Hate-Filled Bible Passages?"
Last week, I wrote an article forewarning IFI readers to avoid the "Bean" in Millennium Park on Saturday, August 15 at 1:00 p.m. because the "Great Nationwide Homosexual Kiss-In" was going to take place there. I never suggested banning the event; I simply warned those families who believe that homosexual activity is perverse to avoid this location.
But even that warning drew the ire of some homosexual bloggers and their supporters. On some blogs, commenters wrote that children should be exposed to homosexual kissing--not merely that if exposure were to happen, it would prove harmless--but rather that children should be exposed to homosexual kissing. We've come a long way, baby, from the days during which the homosexual community dishonestly claimed that all they wanted was tolerance. No longer is tolerance their goal. Coercive universal affirmation of homosexual acts is their subversive and pernicious goal. And compulsory exposure of children to subversive and pernicious ideas and images is one of their many means to achieve that end.
One of the bloggers who was peeved that I would have the audacity to warn IFI parents about the great homosexual kiss-in was Hemant Mehta, whose blog is called "The Friendly Atheist". He's also a math teacher in District 204's Neuqua Valley High School.
In the fall of 2008, I wrote two articles describing how absurdly imbalanced public high school book collections are on the topic of homosexuality. I mentioned in those two articles that Deerfield High School had approximately 65 books that espouse liberal views on homosexuality and not one that espouses conservative views. At New Trier High school in Winnetka, it's even worse: it's approximately 120 liberal books to 0 conservative.
Now the organization "Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays" (PFOX) has issued a press release taking a West Bend, Wisconsin library to task for its refusal to include in its book collection any books written by or about men and women who have decided no longer to engage in homosexual acts or identify as homosexuals, while at the same time carrying numerous books that espouse positive views of homosexuality:
Fox News reported that the National Endowment for the Arts had spent Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds to support "nude simulated sex dances...'pervert' revues and the airing of pornographic horror films at art houses in San Francisco."
"The NEA was given $80 million of the government's $787 billion economic stimulus bill to spread around to "needy artists" nationwide, and most of the money is being spent to help preserve jobs in museums, orchestras, theaters and dance troupes that have been hit hard by the recession.
"But some of the NEA's grants are spicing up more than the economy. A few of their more risque choices have some taxpayer advocates hot under the collar, including a $50,000 infusion for the Frameline film house, which recently screened Thundercrack, "the world's only underground kinky art porno horror film, complete with four men, three women and a gorilla."
Those of us who are troubled by both premarital sexual activity and by comprehensive sex education should not abide in a state of willful ignorance or complacency about the problem of how to educate our children about sexuality issues.
Far too many teens and young adults raised in Christian homes are adopting worldly views of sexuality. We and our children are immersed in a sex-drenched culture that giddily promotes profligate sexuality. No sex ed curricula will be able to eliminate the pernicious effects of daily exposure to ubiquitous, tantalizing images of and ideas about pre-marital, extra-marital, and non-marital sexual activity in magazines, music, films, television, advertising, and even our public schools. But the difficulty of the challenge is no excuse for acquiescence to the unacceptable curricula offered in many schools. Read more...
On Thursday morning, June 25, three days before the Chicago "pride" parade, I called Nettelhorst Elementary School Principal Cindy Wulbert to ask whether the school was participating in the parade as was reported in the Chicago Tribune. I was told that Principal Wulbert was unavailable and that the school would be participating in the parade.
I asked the woman I was speaking to whether school time was used to make and/or tie the "thousands" of rainbow-colored fabric strips that the Trib reported were adorning the school fence. She claimed that she didn't know and that when she "arrived at school one day, they were just up."
I left a message asking that the principal return my call.
I called again in the afternoon and was told that Principal Wulbert was still not available and that Nettelhorst was not participating in the parade. The new person told me that there are Nettelhorst parents who are members of the gay and lesbian community and that they would be taking their children to march in the parade. She also informed me that Nettelhorst "does not have any school policy that prevents these parents from identifying the school their children attend." This raises the question, what is the difference between officially participating in the "pride" parade and unofficially participating if anyone can carry signs that say "Nettelhorst Elementary School"?
There is much to ruminate about following the publication of a study that compared the sexual behavior of teens who took virginity pledges with that of teens who did not. The study by Janet Rosenbaum appeared in the Jan. 2009 issue of Pediatrics and received widespread coverage by the mainstream media. The study showed that teens who make "virginity pledges" are no more likely to remain virgins until marriage than teens with similar religious views who do not make pledges. Moreover, those who make pledges are less likely to use condoms when they finally choose to have premarital sex.
The gleeful, smug announcement of these findings by all too many comprehensive sex ed proponents is troubling. Their responses suggest that they are more concerned about winning the battle to get ever more provocative and graphic sexual information into the heads and hearts of teens than they are with the disturbing information that fully 50% of our youth are sexually active by the time they are 21 years old.
According to the Chicago Free Press, on Monday, June 22 openly homosexual CEO of Chicago Public Schools (CPS), Ron Huberman, met with homosexual teens and community activists from a group called Gender Just who are "demanding" that Huberman "immediately commit to implementing several changes in order to make the city's schools safe for all students, particularly GLBT youth."
Here is their list of demands:
- They want the CPS to move forward with the homosexual high school, Social Justice Solidarity High School (formerly Pride Campus). - They are asking that the term "gender expression" be added to CPS anti-discrimination policy (which would be an indefensible and disastrous request to accommodate). - They want the CPS to create a district-wide accountability officer. - They want to require additional teacher-training on GLBT issues. - They want schools to distribute a resource guide and handbook written by Gender JUST to all CPS students. - They want to revisit Renaissance 2010 (Mayor Daley's school initiative through which the high school for homosexual and transgender students was created) and how it possibly impacts at-risk students. - They want a signed directive that promises to make all CPS schools safe and affirming for all students.
I am so angry I could scream -- but instead I'll write.
Nettelhorst Elementary School, a public school located in the Lakeview neighborhood of Chicago, has the dubious honor of being the first Chicago public school to march in Chicago's "gay pride" parade on Sunday.
According to an article in the Windy City Times, and not surprisingly, "Brad Rossi, a gay parent of a first-grade girl, and Marcia Festen, a lesbian parent of two daughters, one of whom is in kindergarten, were both crucial in bringing the idea to the school. The two worked together in the 1980s, and Rossi says that the idea came from California."
I have asked before and I will ask again, how depraved does the behavior have to become to which our public schools expose children and how young do the children have to be before conservatives and faith communities rise up in righteous indignation?
According to the Chicago Tribune, "The black metal fence in front of Nettelhorst Elementary School is obscured by thousands of strips of dyed fabric-yellows giving way to greens, then blues, purples and reds-each one tied on by the small hands of a student." How special.
[Content Warning: This article contains disturbing and graphic details.]
Yet another teacher-recommended novel has been challenged, this time in Antioch, IL. And yet another loss for wisdom, discernment, good taste, and morality has occurred as yet another feckless school board has arrived at the conclusion that 14-year-old students are well served by the book The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian by Sherman Alexie.
The novel is not utterly devoid of good qualities. It addresses some important issues regarding racial discrimination, conformity, inclusion, friendship, independence, and resilience, and it does so with heart and humor. But it also contains much to render it unsuitable for inclusion in public school curricula.
Before I proceed, I want to make it abundantly clear that not selecting a book to include in a school curriculum is not equivalent to book banning. If not selecting books did constitute book banning, then liberal English teachers and librarians are the ethical equivalent of Fahrenheit 451 firemen because they routinely engage in the "non-selection" of books.
Deerfield and Highland Park High Schools, which comprise District 113, have offered SEED, SEED II, and SEED for Administrators for many years. In addition, District 113 has employed the services of the pricey Glenn Singleton and his Pacific Educational Group which promote the same dubious "social justice" theories as SEED. The District has spent well over $100,000 for these programs that are supposed to help close the racial learning gap.
In 2007-2008, Glenn Singleton visited District 113 approximately seven times. Each time he came, the district pulled all administrators, including all department chairs; two teachers from every department; and some secretaries and custodians from both high schools away from work for the entire day to meet with Singleton at the Highland Park Country Club to discuss district "whiteness" and "institutional racism." Cumulatively, Singleton cost taxpayers $53,000; substitute teachers cost taxpayers $10,000; and lunch for everyone at the Highland Park Country Club for these seven visits cost taxpayers $20,000.
An educational expert is questioning the need for universal pre-kindergarten.
Chester E. Finn is senior fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution and chair of the task force on K-12 education. He is also author of the new book Reroute the Preschool Juggernaut. According to Finn, universal pre-K takes a one-size-fits-all approach and really fails to meet the needs of children from poor families.
"I think the universal approach strikes out on two grounds. One is that it provides a large, unnecessary windfall to millions of families that have already got their own preschool needs being reasonably well-met," he explains. "And secondly, it does not provide the kind of intensive preschool help that a much smaller population of very needy kids should get in order to be ready to succeed in school when they get there."
Click HERE to send an email or a fax to President Obama, Secretary Duncan, U.S. Senators Durbin and Burris & your Congressman to urge them to withdraw the appointment of Jennings as Assistant Deputy Secretary for the Office of Safe & Drug Free Schools.
If anyone has any doubts about the direction Secretary Education Arne Duncan wants to take public education regarding the issue of homosexuality, look no further than his selection of Kevin Jennings as the Assistant Deputy Secretary of the Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools. (Read the DOE Press Release HERE.) Remember, it was Arne Duncan who last October approved the nation's third homosexuality-affirming high school while CEO of Chicago Public Schools.
Kevin Jennings is the founder of the radical homosexual activist group, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) that you may know as the sponsor of the Day of Silence. This organization is committed to using public education to normalize homosexuality and gender confusion and demonize orthodox Christian view on these topics. GLSEN exploits "safe schools" and anti-bullying programs to achieve their subversive and destructive goals.
Jennings has written or edited multiple books that serve his goal of undermining conservative beliefs, including Becoming Visible: A Reader in Gay and Lesbian History for High School and College Students in which he states emphatically that teachers "must teach gay history." He also looks "forward to the day when books such as this are commonplace."
Kevin Jennings had this to say about people of faith who affirm orthodox biblical views of homosexuality:
We have to quit being afraid of the religious right. . . I'm trying to find a way to say this. I'm trying not to say, '[F---] 'em!' which is what I want to say, because I don't care what they think!
He also calls theologically orthodox Christians "hard-core bigots" and suggests they "Drop dead!"
There is a new report out from the Educational Testing Service (ETS) that the mainstream media for some reason seems reluctant to cover. According to their website, the Educational Testing Service "is a non-profit institution with the mission to advance quality and equity in education by providing fair and valid assessments, research and related services for all people worldwide."
Those schools, like District 113's Deerfield and Highland Park High Schools, that spend public money hand over fist on programs like Peggy McIntosh's SEED and Glenn Singleton's "Courageous Conversations" in order to close the racial learning gap ought to read this report.
Highland Park High School has a minority Hispanic population that does not perform well on standardized tests, and as a result Highland Park High School repeatedly fails the "Adequate Yearly Progress" evaluation of the No Child Left Behind Act. To close the racial learning gap in District 113, Superintendent George Fornero hired Glenn Singleton, an expensive "diversity" consultant from San Francisco whom Fornero had used in Ann Arbor, Michigan when he worked there.
A Homewood-Flossmoor reporter for the Southtown Star, John Ryan, posted a criticism of my article about a Homewood elementary school that has spent public money on the National SEED Project on Inclusive Curriculum. In it, he explained that he "requested the Illinois Family Institute forward . . . the names of any parents from the Homewood area they've heard from who have a problem with the program."
First, IFI does not give out the names of parents who contact us about school issues. Second, my article was not written in response to a parental complaint. I wrote it to expose the content of SEED to the uninitiated and uninformed. Many schools spend public funds on SEED, and very few parents know with any degree of detail what SEED is all about. That certainly is the case in Deerfield where the school in which I worked until last August has offered SEED for many years. In all communication with the public, the administration provides brief, general descriptions with benign-sounding phrases that conceal the highly politicized, leftist nature of the foundational theories on which SEED is based. I would expect that few Homewood-area parents or community members are familiar with the specific content of SEED training for staff and faculty.
Maryvale High School, a public high school in Phoenix, Arizona, has a math teacher on a mission. Since, according to the Arizona Department of Education's School Report Card, only 53% of Maryvale's 10th graders passed the state standardized math test, it would be reasonable to assume that math teacher Juli Schexnayder's mission would be to improve the math test scores of Maryvale's 91.2 % Hispanic population. But that assumption would be oh so wrong.
Perhaps knowing that she is the sponsor of her school's gay-straight alliance provides a clue as to her mission. Open lesbian and gay-straight alliance sponsor Julie Schexnayder's mission is to transform society's beliefs about homosexuality one teenager at a time through her role as a paid public servant.
All over the country, taxpayers are unwittingly funding dubious professional development opportunities that schools provide to teachers through conferences, workshops, and seminars that teachers attend during the school year and summer vacation. I've written about these primarily in the context of high schools, but, unfortunately, these ideologically driven professional development activities have been making their way into middle and even elementary schools.
According to the Homewood, IL, District 153 Winter 2008 Newsletter, taxpayers have been subsidizing the deeply troubling National SEED Project on Inclusive Curricula for several years: "Over the past three years, about 90 staff members have participated in the training, meeting for three hours every month."
The National SEED Project on Inclusive Curricula explores "white privilege," race, gender, class, disability, and sexual orientation. Curiously, in the description of the SEED training for teachers in the District 153 newsletter, there was no mention of "white privilege," feminism, and sexual orientation-topics that might have led some community members to ask some hard questions.
At the April 21, 2009 meeting of the Local School Council, Principal Deborah Clark made the stunning announcement, that a representative from the homosexual activist organization, Lambda Legal, would be making a presentation to 7th and 8th graders on MAY 13, 2009 on the topics of gender identity and sexual orientation sensitivity training. This is manipulative rhetoric meaning that Lambda Legal will be coming to Skinner to indoctrinate middle school students with the utterly fallacious and calamitous ideas that gender identity disorder is not a disorder; that cross-dressing and homosexual behaviors are moral behaviors; and that homosexuality and gender identity disorder are analogous to race.
Lambda Legal is committed to using the legislative and judicial systems to impose their unproven, radical, and subversive moral views of homosexuality and cross-dressing on American society. According to their website:
Lambda Legal is the oldest national organization pursuing high-impact litigation, public education and advocacy on behalf of equality and civil rights for lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgender people and people with HIV. The work we do has impact on the way we live -- we change laws, policies and ideas.
And now activists within the public education system are aiding and abetting Lambda Legal's pernicious agenda.
King and King is a picture book recommended for children ages 4-8 years old.
It's the story of a young prince who does not want to marry a princess. The prince falls in love with another prince, and they begin marriage preparations at once. The story ends with a kiss between the two kings."
This was read to a second-grader in MA with no prior parental notification or opportunity for the parents to opt them out of hearing it.
What will legalized "civil unions" mean for public education?
The manipulation of language is the homosexual movement's stock in trade. The creation of the term "civil union" is intended to conceal the reality that civil unions are, in fact, marriages. Legalizing civil unions would be tantamount to legalizing "homosexual marriage." Of course, anyone who's paying attention knows that homosexual activist organizations have no intention of settling for civil unions. It's merely a stepping stone on their relentless, illegitimate quest to have their profoundly disordered relationships accorded the moral legitimacy that comes with the term "marriage." But in the meantime, while homosexual activists await the further clouding of the minds and hearts of Americans and the weakening of their collective will, activists will make do with "civil unions."
So, what will legalized civil unions mean for public education? Legalized civil unions will provide homosexual couples and their supporters the legal support necessary to compel schools to include families led by homosexuals whenever teachers address issues touching on family life.
We are all aware that our relativistic or nihilistic contemporary American life includes the tragic phenomena of children being raised in deliberately fatherless or motherless homes. A foolish society is allowing homosexual couples to procure children through illegitimate means. But that truly sad fact does not and should not compel publicly funded schools to expose all children to the notion of homosexual unions. Unfortunately, there currently exist families headed by homosexual couples, just as there are families headed by polyamorous partnerships, but public school teachers need not include them in discussions of family life.
Although the experience of being slandered over the past couple of weeks has been painful, the reason I'm writing about it has nothing to do with my feelings. My experience is, unfortunately, not unique. All over the country, those who publicly affirm conservative beliefs about homosexuality with the same conviction that supporters of subversive views of homosexuality affirm theirs will experience "the wrath of the tolerant" in the form of lies, obscenities, name-calling, or worse.
It's important that people be prepared for the hostility and deceit they will encounter if they speak publicly and resolutely about homosexuality. My hope is that conservatives will neither allow this kind of hostility to silence them, nor allow it to embitter them. We desperately need more courageous conservatives who will speak the truth graciously as Miss California, Carrie Prejean, recently did, even if it results in being publicly called scurrilous names.
Another cacophonous, divisive Day of Silence has come and thankfully gone, but it's important to take a moment to reflect on the vitriol and deception promulgated by some of its supporters. It's important because their deceitful words expose the dark underbelly of the movement well underway to use publicly funded schools to undermine conservative beliefs about homosexuality.
The homosexual blog Box Turtle Bulletin carried an article last week in which Timothy Kincaid spread pernicious lies about me. I don't know Mr. Kincaid, so I don't know if he has a limited capacity for following the logic of an argument or if he has a limited commitment to truth and an unwillingness to provide evidence for his defamatory claims.
What Mr. Kincaid's article did provide of value, however, is evidence for my claim that for homosexualists like him and those who support the philosophical positions of GLSEN, there is no distinction between orthodox Christian moral claims about homosexual behavior and bullying.
In a stunning display of malicious, deceitful non-reasoning, Mr. Kincaid wrote the following about me:
The "Day of Silence", sponsored by the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network (GLSEN) will take place Friday, April 17th in schools across the nation. Participating teachers and students are told to remain silent during class time to protest discrimination and bullying felt by students who believe they are gay and/or transgender.
The 6 minute video, made by a Bible believing church here in Illinois, exposes how our children are being indoctrinated, held captive and forced to accept an unproven and dangerous ideology while Biblical Truth is undermined.
A national coalition of pro-family organizations is urging parents to call their children out of school on the Day of Silence (DOS), an annual event sponsored by the partisan political action group, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN). On the DOS, students and sometimes teachers are permitted to remain silent during instructional time to protest the bullying of students who identify as homosexual or transgender.
The coalition that opposes the DOS believes that it's inappropriate to allow political protests to intrude into instructional time. Grove City College professor, Dr. Warren Throckmorton, on the other hand, is recommending that students join his "Golden Rule Pledge" effort which urges them to remain in school and pass out cards on which the Golden rule is printed. Apparently, he finds greater moral offense in parents removing their children from class on the DOS than he does in school-sanctioned political protest in the service of GLSEN's goals, which extend far beyond reducing bullying. Unlike Dr. Throckmorton, we believe that the worthy ends of ending bullying do not justify the means of exploiting instructional time.
The Day of Silence fast approaches, so Illinois Family Institute wants to encourage parents to spread the word about the Walkout. As you call your local high schools, be prepared for evasive, lawyerly responses from administrators.
I just spoke with Mr. Pryma, the principal of Glenbrook North High School in Northbrook IL. When asked whether students would yet again be permitted to remain silent during instructional time in order to participate in the GLSEN-created political action, Day of Silence, Mr. Pryma responded that students have a constitutionally protected right to remain silent all 180 days of the school year. Apparently, with a straight face he is trying to suggest that the expectations for student participation are precisely the same on the Day of Silence as they are on any other day of the school year.
I then told him that generally if students refuse to answer a teacher's questions or give a presentation, they are disciplined and/or lose points. In other words, a refusal to participate usually results in some negative consequences. I further explained that the ACLU and Lambda legal have written that a "school can regulate what students say. . . and it can also insist that students respond to questions, make presentations, etc." Mr. Pryma then said that if silence or refusal to speak ever becomes disruptive, the administration will address it.
The ghosts of elections' past are haunting Pennsylvania Avenue. If you'll remember, it was Illinois' own fallen Governor Blagojevich who promised Universal Preschool. Likewise, the massive tentacles of the new administration are prying their way into the nation's playpens, targeting children so young they still hug their mother's knee at the sight of a stranger.
Nationalizing preschool, like medical care, will not just be for those who can't afford it, it will be for everyone. I won't glaze your eyes or numb your mind with the staggering numbers it would take to pull this one off. Leave it to say that when it was proposed here in Illinois, it was projected that at three years the expansion would hit the $400 million a year mark. (Should I mention that, currently, 21 percent of all school districts in Illinois are on the state's financial warning or watch list?)
Again, Illinois Family Institute wants to commend all those Naperville taxpayers who acted on their convictions, expressing their vigorous opposition to the Bill Ayers invitation. If only more communities would follow your example, we could effect positive change in our public schools by ridding them of the influence of political activists who seek to use public education to bring about cultural transformation in the direction of their values and beliefs.
Illinois Family Institute and many others were very happy that the administration at Naperville North decided to cancel the Bill Ayers speaking engagement, but I was troubled by two of the comments Superintendent Alan Leis made in his formal announcement.
He wrote that "parents and others have written urging us to continue with the event because they want students exposed to diverse viewpoints." What troubles me about this claim is its transparent hypocrisy. Appeals to "exposing students to diverse viewpoints," or "teaching the controversy," or "fostering critical thinking," or "honoring all voices" are only made in the service of exposing students to left-of-center, including far left-of-center ideas. These appeals are never made in the service of exposing students to conservative viewpoints, particularly on the topic of homosexuality, which is one of the topics on which "social justice" theory advances a left-of-center position.
I posed the following questions to Naperville North Superintendent Alan Leis and the members of the District 203 Board of Education:
Of all the people Naperville North or teacher Kermit Eby could have invited to speak to students, Bill Ayers is the best you could come up with and the person Leis believes students from other schools would "die" to hear? While it seems unlikely that students would die to hear him, I have no doubt that many adolescents, trapped as they are in a period of immaturity and rebellion, would love to hear an adult who remains, like a much darker Peter Pan, trapped in immaturity and rebellion. But with all the remarkable professors available in the Chicagoland area, this is best you could offer students?
In the short video below, you will see Ayers and his equally radical wife defending Ward Churchill, the disgraced, discredited, goofball professor who was fired from the University of Colorado:
3/27/2009 10:26:00 AM By Charlie Butts and Marty Cooper
-OneNewsNow
A self-proclaimed bisexual male teacher in New York has invited his seventh-grade students and their parents to witness his commitment ceremony to another man.
The New York Times reports 32-year-old Chance Nalley gave slips of paper to his entire seventh-grade class at Columbia Secondary School, inviting them to the upcoming ceremony to be held at St. Paul's Chapel on the campus of Columbia University on April 4. Nalley teaches math, science, and engineering at the school -- "whose mission statement includes a commitment to diversity," notes the Times. Nalley reportedly obtained his principal's support before coming out to his students in the fall of 2007, when the school opened.
It's almost amusing to hear yet another public school administrator defend student exposure to radical ideas by appealing to the importance of "critical thinking." Naperville Unit District 203 Superintendent Alan Leiswaxes noble and enthusiastic about the pedagogical importance of students hearing a former terrorist speak, declaiming, "We're causing kids to think and face controversial issues and take their own position on it (sic), and provide students with an opportunity most school districts around the country would die for." It sounds as if Leis, like Chris Matthews, just may have been feeling a "thrill going up" his leg at the prospect of former Weather Underground member and "social justice" theorist extraordinaire speaking at Naperville North.
Administrators and teachers pull the old "critical thinking" argument out of their bag of rhetorical tricks exclusively in the service of exposing students to the ideas of liberals and radicals. Rarely, if ever, do you see public schools exposing students to essays or cultural commentaries or books or speakers that espouse conservative views "in order that students can think and face controversial issues and take their own positions" on them. Funny how that almost never happens.
Yesterday, I shared that I was going to discuss a letter sent by an English teacher at Deerfield High School to his students last spring regarding a vulgar, polemical play about homosexuality that he was going to teach. Because of a community imbroglio over this play, he was compelled to send a parental notification/permission letter. But what he ingeniously decided to do was send his students a manipulative letter prior to sending their parents a letter. Below is the text of the student letter, which was brought to me by a concerned community member, together with my commentary. The teacher's words are in black and my comments in blue:
3/17/2009 3:00:00 PM By Laurie Higgins, Director of IFI's Division of School Advocacy
-Illinois Family Institute
Parents and other taxpayers shouldn't have to worry about the content of resources, activities, classroom comments, or all-school emails. Unfortunately, because of the disproportionate number of teachers who hold liberal or radical socio-political views and who believe it is their right and duty to reform the views of other people's children using public money, parents and other taxpayers do need to worry and be vigilant about the ideas that teachers are expressing in myriad ways to students.
Last week, I wrote about a Stevenson High School teacher who inappropriately used all-school email to express her unproven, inflammatory opinions of both conservative views on homosexuality and on Illinois Family Institute (see Part 1 and Part 2). Even more troubling, however, is that teachers are seeking to use public time and resources not just to influence colleagues but to manipulate impressionable students.
3/11/2009 10:54:00 AM By Laurie Higgins, Director of IFI's Division of School Advocacy
-Illinois Family Institute
Yesterday, I posted Part I of my response to a troubling email that was sent to the entire faculty of Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, IL by an English teacher. There were two central reasons that I decided to write in some depth about this incident.
First, the fact that a teacher would presume to use all-school email to express her personal beliefs on the controversial issue of homosexuality reveals an attitude of entitlement shared by all too many public school educators. They erroneously believe it is their right and duty to use their publicly subsidized jobs to transform the moral convictions of society, including other people's children, and they count on the public remaining largely unaware of their moral reformation efforts.
As a result of my article about Stevenson High School's dance for students who identify as homosexual, an English teacher sent an email to the entire Stevenson faculty denouncing Illinois Family Institute.
Her email exposes the presumptuous attitude many public educators have toward using public money to advance their particular social, political, and ethical views. They believe they are entitled to use public resources to promote their views and to attempt to transform the views of other people's children. And they rely on public ignorance and cowardice to continue promulgating their unproven beliefs to impressionable students.
Her email also reveals beliefs commonly held by liberal educators that need to be understood, exposed, and rigorously, relentlessly, and boldly challenged.
ADF attorneys inform public official that new policy prohibiting prayer over PA systems at private schools is on shaky ground.
Alliance Defense Fund attorneys urged the Illinois High School Association in a letter sent Wednesday to terminate its policy banning private schools from praying or delivering religious messages over public address systems before IHSA tournament games hosted at private schools. ADF attorneys also offered the IHSA free legal representation in the event it is sued for rescinding its new rule if it decides to do so.
On January 22, 2009, U.S. District Judge Robert W. Gettleman ruled that the following Illinois law is unconstitutional:
(105 ILCS 20/1) Sec. 1. In each public school classroom the teacher in charge shall observe a brief period of silence with the participation of all the pupils therein assembled at the opening of every school day. This period shall not be conducted as a religious exercise but shall be an opportunity for silent prayer or for silent reflection on the anticipated activities of the day.
(105 ILCS 20/5) Sec. 5. Student prayer. In order that the right of every student to the free exercise of religion is guaranteed within the public schools and that each student has the freedom to not be subject to pressure from the State either to engage in or to refrain from religious observation on public school grounds, students in the public schools may voluntarily engage in individually initiated, non disruptive prayer that, consistent with the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses of the United States and Illinois Constitutions, is not sponsored, promoted, or endorsed in any manner by the school or any school employee.
ACLU Senior Staff Counsel Adam Schwartz made the untenable, irresponsible, and paranoid statement that this law "coerced children to pray as part of an organized activity in our public schools."
The Illinois Family Institute is part of a national coalition of pro-family organizations urging parents to call their children out of school on April 17. This is the day designated for this year's Day of Silence when students and/or teachers will purposely remain silent during instructional time to protest so-called discrimination and gain sympathy for students who identify as homosexual or transgender.
The Day of Silence is a yearly event sponsored by the partisan political action group, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN). The implicit purpose is to undermine the belief that homosexuality is immoral. It is the belief of the sponsors of the Walkout that parents should no longer passively accept the political usurpation of taxpayer funded public school classrooms through student silence.
Yet another bone-headed decision at Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, IL. A few weeks ago, it was the student newspaper article on debauchery -- I mean, "hooking up,"-- which was approved by the newspaper sponsor Barbara Thill. And now we have the first dance for students who self-identify as homosexual, which was approved by English teacher, Bill Fritz.
It shouldn't surprise anyone that this kind of corrupt event would be supported by an English teacher. Although nowadays moral mischief emerges from all quarters in public schools, taxpayers should be especially vigilant about the activities of English and theater teachers, many of whom arrogantly believe that the community members who pay teacher salaries have no right to oversee how their taxes are spent and believe that a central task of theirs is the moral reformation of other people's children.
J. Gresham Machen saw in 1933 what many are trying to say today about the need for private education.
The only way in which a state-controlled school can be kept even relatively healthy is through the absolutely free possibility of competition by private schools and church schools; if it once becomes monopolistic, it is the most effective engine of tyranny and intellectual stagnation that has yet been devised. (J. Gresham Machen: Selected Shorter Writings, 167)
Why is religion taboo in American schools? Christian attorney John Whitehead addresses that question.
"God has become THE four-letter word in most public schools in the United States," says Whitehead, founder of The Rutherford Institute. And he explains in a commentary why that has come to pass: "An elite segment of society that views God as irrelevant has come to predominate." (View video commentary)
Whitehead gained his legal insights into the phenomenon through the many cases of religious discrimination that have crossed his desk. Read more...
The Chicago Archdiocesan Office of Catholic Schools (OCS) has distributed its "Year in Review" Report 2009 detailing its accomplishments, data and progress in three focus areas: Catholic Identity, Academic Excellence and School Vitality.
93,286 elementary and secondary students attend Catholic Schools in Cook, Suburban Cook, and Lake counties, consisting of 78,471 Catholic and 14,815 Non-Catholic children, with racial backgrounds including White, African-American, Asian, Hispanic, Multi-Racial and Native American.
In the area of Academic Excellence, for the second consecutive year, the OCS has earned the distinction of being the school system with the largest number of "No Child Left Behind - Blue Ribbon Schools," with six in 2008 and 21 receiving this award since 2003. OCS has received national honors from the National Catholic Educational Association for Distinguished Teacher, as well as local honors for the Golden Apple Awards of Excellence in Teaching. Maintaining a high school graduation rate of 98%, and 95% of that number college-bound for the class of 2008, with $150 million in college scholarships offered . Yearly student attendance is 98% with a 17 to 1 student/teacher ratio.
Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, IL has found itself in the midst of a mini-tempest as a result of a recent article in the student newspaper, the Statesman, on the topic of hooking-up. For the uninitiated, hooking up refers to casual sexual encounters between individuals who are not in committed relationships. Hooking up is a relatively new euphemism for an old phenomenon. It's a euphemism for what in the days when people discriminated between moral and immoral behaviors would have been called profligate or promiscuous behavior.
I have not yet had the opportunity to read the article, but for the purposes of my comments, reading it is irrelevant. I'm not taking a position on the particular perspective of the writer or writers. Rather, I want to suggest that the entire topic is inappropriate for a student newspaper that is written by students enrolled in a curricular class.
An elementary school in -- where else -- Massachusetts, sent a letter to parents in August 2008 informing them that "Our night custodian has informed us of his decision to change his gender and, as we begin the school year, he will begin living and working as a woman."
Superintendent Ernest Boss and Principal Norman Yvon further stated that "if [students] ask at school, they will be given a simple and straightforward answer. The best thing to tell them is that our custodian used to be a man. She has changed her gender role and is now a woman."
Four days after the Chicago Board of Education confirmed Mayor Richard Daley's choice of Ron Huberman as the next Chicago Public Schools CEO last month, it was revealed in a Sun-Times story that the new schools chief was gay and has had a live-in partner for the past four years.
The news set off a firestorm in some circles. Illinois Family Institute's Division of School Advocacy Director Laurie Higgins blasted the school board for confirming Huberman's appointment:
"Whereas in many professions one's views on sexuality and one's sexual conduct would be irrelevant, in the field of education it is highly relevant," Higgins, a former teacher herself, wrote in the group's weekly newsletter.
This week Illinoisans were greeted with the news that the new CEO of Chicago Public Schools, Ron Huberman, self-identifies as homosexual. Mayor Richard Daley's choice as head of the third largest school district in the nation, one that serves more than 400,000 students, has revealed both his ignorance about and involvement with sexual perversion.
This is exactly what students who already suffer from significant disadvantages don't need: a leader, and therefore role model, who affirms sexual deviance and who in his personal life volitionally engages in immoral conduct.
What a terrible example he sets, particularly for young men. I'm sure that Huberman possesses many admirable traits, but his sexual conduct is not one of them. There are no perfect people, and therefore there can be no perfect leaders, but possessing flaws and affirming immorality are two entirely different things.
"To sin by silence, when we should protest, Makes cowards out of men." ~Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919)
In a piece I wrote early last October, entitled "Pro-Homosexual Advocates Seek the Hearts and Minds of Our Little Ones," I wrote that "It's a good idea to check in every once and again with the mischievous goings on in the U.K. to see what our future holds if we don't awaken from our moral slumber." I wrote about the No Outsider's Project that was being marketed to elementary schools in the U.K.
Their website explained that "The project is exploring ways of challenging homophobic discrimination through the positive use of stories, drama and the visual arts, as well as through revisions to school policies and practices and the development of guidance on challenging homophobia at primary level," and that the project developers were "recruiting teachers to the project NOW!"
It was recently announced that the University of Idaho has reversed its decision to allow co-ed dorm rooms. As reported on WorldNetDaily, Bryan Fischer of Idaho Values Alliance has commended University of Idaho President Steven Daley Laursen for the administration's decision to abandon the "wrongheaded and poorly thought-through plan."
Apparently, Laursen's epiphany regarding the wrongheadedness of this plan occurred after the Idaho Values Alliance posted an article about the co-ed dorm proposal that ultimately "reached state lawmakers." What this reveals is that political engagement works.
The Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network (GLSEN) has announced that in addition to the Day of Silence, it is sponsoring another day during which it encourages young impressionable and confused students to celebrate disordered thinking and immoral behavior. TransAction! Day will be held on Friday, Feb. 27, 2009. Clearly, GLSEN sees public education as their personal playground for propagandizing the nation's children.
GLSEN jubilantly declares that:
"This is a day for education and celebration of transgender and gender non-conforming people and experiences. A day to begin having dialogues about gender and to advocate for inclusive schools for all regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity/expression. TransAction! encourages students to organize a workshop, panel discussion, or similar forum about gender, gender identity gender roles, and the broader transgender umbrella."
Want to know how to win the culture war? Watch The Laramie Project, a textbook, in dramatic form, of how homosexuals use emotionalism and the media to sway public opinion.
Christians have a lot to learn from homosexuals about how to wage a culture war.
Religious and cultural conservatives have concentrated on political activism - electing conservatives to positions of power, passing laws and exerting pressure on politicians - with some success. In the meantime, the gay-rights lobby has, in only a few years, turned around the culture's attitude toward homosexuality in a way that is nothing short of revolutionary. Homosexuality has gone from being considered a vice and a psychological disorder to being considered just as legitimate as heterosexuality, with special rights and status. Attitudes have changed from disapproval to tolerance to acceptance.
I'm speechless. Now, however, I'm beginning to understand how a homosexuality-affirming middle school was by default approved by the Milwaukee Board of Education. Wisconsin public schools are permitting radical ideologues to use public money to promote their subversive, unproven moral conclusions and political goals about homosexuality. These propagandists, who should be teaching history or literature or writing, are instead pursuing their illegitimate goals of transforming the views of other people's children on the contentious issue of homosexuality.
Here is the most recent manifestation of educational malpractice:
Sarah Arnold who teaches 11th grade English in the Elkhorn, Wisconsin area, generously shares with readers of Teaching Tolerance, a publication of the social justice organization Southern Poverty Law Center, her grand sexual re-education scheme. Disturbed that her students "cracked jokes about anything that defied gender stereotypes," she embarked on a 37-day indoctrination program to transform her students' view on homosexuality -- a 37-day unit. The average school year is 180 days, and she spent 37 of them on homosexuality.
A few of the headlines on the Drudge Report this morning involve an international discussion over the relative strength of the U.S. and Russia after the events of the past year, Israeli airstrikes on Gaza, and this one:
"Iran orders Muslims to defend Palestinians."
While Champion News encourages clear thinking people to stay informed and remain concerned about world events, we'd also like to see more Americans give a damn about things closer to home as well - like our local public/government-run schools.
1/8/2009 11:34:00 AM By Phyllis Schlafly
-Eagle Forum
Why did 18-to-29-year-old evangelicals vote for Barack Obama despite his apostasy on the fundamental moral issues of abortion and same-sex unions? They voted 32 percent for Obama, twice the percentage of that demographic group who voted for John Kerry in 2004.
Many of these young people identify "social justice" as the reason that led them to relegate the prime moral issues of life and marriage to the back burner. But the term "social justice" does not define a moral cause; it is leftwing jargon to overturn those who have economic and political power.
What caused young evangelicals, the children of the so-called "religious right," to change their moral imperatives so dramatically?
Critics of America's public school system have launched a new effort highlighting the need for Christians to exit the system.
The initiative -- dubbed The Call to Dunkirk (video link) -- was launched by Dr. Bruce Shortt, author of The Harsh Truth About Public Schools; Rev. Voddie Baucham, author of Family Driven Faith: Doing What It Takes to Raise Sons and Daughters Who Walk with God; and the founder and director of the Exodus Mandate Project, retired U.S. Army Chaplain Lt. Col. E. Ray Moore.
Below is an email sent to Illinois Family Institute on Dec. 22, 2008. I am posting it here, followed by my response because the writer expresses increasingly common sentiments and deeply troubling, fallacious ideas that any of us who hope to influence the culture in positive ways must be prepared to address:
If you really cared about family, you would help the gay and lesbian people have families. Gay children are disowned by their families, run away, or commit suicide because of the intolerance fostered by groups like yours. You think you do good, but you hurt people for a living. Shame on you. You will be judged by a God who will wonder why you felt the need to attack people you hardly know and do not even care to understand. I am praying for your whole sick group.
My response:
Dear Mr. H.,
I fully expect to be judged by God, and that's why I try to live according to His revealed will, which is unequivocally clear on His view of volitional homosexual acts.
Below is an email I received regarding my criticism of the production of Macbeth that I attended last Friday night, followed by my response which I hope is helpful to others who may be confused by the same issues the writer addressed:
Your evaluation of Macbeth made me chuckle. I am going to see the production tonight. My daughter, who works at the theatre, has seen it and was quite impressed with the production. I will reserve my comments to you until after I have seen it. However, I must be upfront and tell you I have little, if any, respect for your organization, so, naturally, your opinion is of no importance. However, I did want to share with you this funny (sad?) anecdote. One parent that came into the theatre worried about the sexual overtones of the show was quite accepting of the violence. No problem there! We can maim people, carry guns, annihilate anyone with whom we disagree, but show people having sex???? Blasphemy!! What a mixed-up set of values . . .
My response:
Dear Ms. F.,
I'm curious why you would bother to write, since you have little, if any, respect for Illinois Family Institute and find our opinions of no importance. Despite your evident disdain for my opinions, I will try to respond thoughtfully to your concerns.
The National Center for Education Statistics, which is part of the Department of Education estimates that homeschooling grew 36 percent between 2003 and 2007. "Homeschoolers can now be found in all walks of life," said Michael Smith, HSLDA President.
The NCES estimates 1.5 million homeschooled children, or 2.9 percent of the school age population in 2007. This is a significant increase from 1.1 million in 2003, or 2.2 percent of the school aged population.
The NCES survey also considered the reasons parents are turning to homeschooling. Parents continued to cite the negative peer influences of public school, the desire to provide religious or moral instruction as well as concern about the academic quality of public school as their reasons for homeschooling.
The nation's first "gay"-affirming middle school has just been approved right here in the Midwest. On Dec. 16, 2008, the Milwaukee Board of Education approved a "gay-friendly" school for 11, 12, 13 and 14-year-olds.
According to U.S. News and World Report, "At a meeting two weeks ago, a subcommittee of Milwaukee's Board of Education unanimously approved the Alliance School's proposal to serve sixth, seventh, and eighth graders. The proposal gained unanimous approval from the full board by default when the item was not pulled for further discussion or a vote at last night's meeting. . . . Marty Lexmond, the director of school innovation for Milwaukee Public Schools, said the need for a gay-friendly middle school is even greater today because adolescents are publicly identifying their sexuality as early as middle school."
Yet more public money will now be used to affirm theories about the nature and morality of homosexuality that are controversial, unproven, flawed, and harmful, first, to very young, sexually confused adolescents and, second, to society.
Homosexual desire and conduct are not immutable, intrinsic human attributes. And volitional homosexual conduct is not moral conduct. The beliefs that homosexuality is intrinsic, immutable, and moral are unproven, hypothetical, and dangerous philosophical theories that public school administrators have no business affirming and no business using public money to affirm.
Perhaps Arne Duncan's appointment as Secretary of Education is a good time to revisit the wisdom, ethics, pedagogical soundness, and efficacy of comprehensive sex education-yet another misnomer in the field of education.
In 2006, under Arne Duncan's leadership, Chicago Public Schools, adopted comprehensive sex education curricula. According to the Windy City Times, "On April 26, the Chicago Board of Education unanimously passed the Family Life and Comprehensive Sexual Health Education policy submitted by Chicago Public School ( CPS ) administrators, according to a press release from the Illinois Caucus for Adolescent Health ( ICAH ). . . . A CPS task force worked with youth leaders from around the city who were affiliated with ICAH to shape the policy."
The Illinois Caucus for Adolescent Health held its Spring 2006 fundraiser at the Playboy mansion, which is understandable because who cares more deeply about sexual ethics than Hugh Hefner and his daughter Honorary Event Chair Christie Hefner.
Obama searched the nation for the best candidate to serve as Secretary of Education, and, lo and behold, he found just the person right here in Illinois: Arne Duncan, current CEO of the Chicago Public School system.
To be fair, Duncan has earned praises from some quarters for his support of charter schools, his willingness to close failing schools, his support for greater student accountability, and his promotion of merit pay for teachers. Even conservative educational policy expert, Chester Finn, president of the non-profit Thomas B. Fordham Foundation and Senior Fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution, is pleased with Duncan's appointment.
That said, however, Duncan also recommended approval of the proposed Chicago Social Justice High School-Pride Campus that was committed to affirming, and therefore normalizing, homosexuality. This publicly subsidized high school, which the proposal designers have promised to reintroduce next year, would have had homosexuality-affirming curricula.
Can Illinois "set the tone for sex ed nationwide" per the article by Laura Berman on 12/9/08? If reducing teen pregnancy is the measure of success, then apparently we already have by using abstinence education provided by organizations such as Project Reality, now defunded by the Blagojevich administration.
Statistics on teen pregnancy in Illinois provided by the Council of Chief State School Officers reveal that for teens 15-19 years of age, pregnancy rates dropped from 64.8 to 42.2 per 1000 teens from 1991 to 2002. This 42.2 rate was under the national average of 43.0 per 1000.
Parents who have chosen to pull their kids out of the mess that is the public schools already understand that the education of their children is no one else's responsibility but their own.
For the rest of the parents who for whatever reason continue to avail themselves of publicly funded K-12 childcare, we hope the majority of them realize the limitations of the public school system.
Two opinion columns highlighted nicely some of what goes on and doesn't go on inside the schools. Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby quoted from an endorsed statement from the Democratic Party Convention in 1892:
I received an email from a gentleman in response to my commentary on the suicide of Jesse Kilgore, whose friends and father believe may have become depressed after his faith had been challenged by classmates and biology professor who also suggested Jesse read The God Delusion by atheist Richard Dawkins.
I believe the comments expressed in this email deserve a response, and I also believe that this email expressed ideas or questions that others may have, so both his comments and my response follows:
He wrote:
. . . if [Jesse's] "conservative Christian views" and faith were well reasoned and deeply held, the reading of one book would not have undermined those beliefs. It's akin to saying that the reading of Das Kapital or The Communist Manifesto will undermine your beliefs in the free market. Would, by the same reasoning, the reading of Helter Skelter turned him into a murderer?
This kid was obviously one troubled individual long before his college prof told him to read a book.
In a November 14 article in -- where else -- the San Francisco Chronicle, Cleve Jones, a gay activist and creator of the AIDS quilt, and Dustin Lance Black, screenwriter for the new pro-homosexual film Milk and writer for the pro-polygamy HBO series Big Love, have thrown down the gauntlet, challenging both our country's leaders and America to incorporate radical, subversive, perverse views of sexuality into all laws, policies, and governmental institutions. They want no public, cultural corner left undefiled by sexual libertinism -- and they want unfettered access to public money and public education to subsidize this latest manifestation of the sexual revolution.
Jones and Black refer to traditional views of sexuality, marriage and family as reflecting "the worst, most divisive appeals to bigotry, ignorance and fear," declaiming that they "demand that the federal government act immediately, decisively and unequivocally to ensure equal protection under law throughout the United States of America."
Jesse Kilgore's identity or what might reasonably be described as his orientation was, until the end of his short life, decidedly counter-cultural. That which he had considered central to his identity for many years, is something that is vilified and mocked by strident and increasingly hostile cultural voices. One would think that in 21st Century America , a supposedly enlightened time during which many claim to honor diversity, such ignorance, intolerance, provincialism, prejudice, bigotry, and yes, even hatred, would have slithered back into the hidden recesses of American life where they belong.
But no, this cultural infection remains, festering within the academy, where it just may have contributed to tragedy.
On October 7, Jesse, a 22-year-old conservative Christian, walked into the woods near his New York home and shot himself.
Just one day prior to the vote on the proposed "gay"-affirming Chicago public high school, the proponents of the plan requested that the vote be postponed for a year while they finalize their plans. Chicago Public Schools CEO Arne Duncan has already recommended approval of the recently renamed "Social Justice Solidarity High School," which has been criticized by both homosexual and conservative groups, including the Illinois Family Institute.
In the face of mounting public opposition, the organizers of this proposal dropped "Pride" from the school's name in order to appease those who opposed the original separatist nature of the school. The more significant problem with the school than its violation of the principle of separate but equal, however, is its goal to offer "gay"-affirming curricula.
Politicians and public school educators cannot affirm something that they have not previously concluded is affirmation-worthy. Therefore, it is clear that Duncan and perhaps the Board of Education have arrived at unproven, controversial conclusions regarding the nature and morality of homosexuality-areas that stand far outside their areas of expertise.
WLS Radio is reporting that Chicago Mayor Richard Daley has changed his position on the proposed "gay"-affirming high school, and that tomorrow the Chicago Board of Education will vote in favor of it.
I'm sure Mayor Daley spent countless hours reading and thinking deeply about ontology, teleology, ethics, pedagogy, political theory, and civics as he cogitated about this momentous -- and potentially calamitous-decision.
Or maybe not. Judging from the chuckleheaded nature of his reversal of opinion, I'm guessing he consulted none of the philosophical sources that one ought to consult before arriving at conclusions on the nature and morality of homosexuality that are necessary when making a decision like this.
Chicago Tribune reporter Carlos Sadovi reports that organizers of "Chicago's first public high school catering to gay and lesbian students have changed the name and broadened the focus of the school to include all disenfranchised groups of students." According to Sadovi, "Mayor Daley expressed concerns that developing the proposed School for Social Justice's Pride Campus would segregate gay youths."
"Education is simply the soul of a society as it passes from one generation to another." ~G.K. Chesterton
In her article "Trans-Friendly Preschool" that appeared in the Journal of Gay & Lesbian Issues in Education, Laurel Dykstra advocates ideas and recommends activities that can only be described as ignorant, radical, subversive, cruel, and pernicious. No civil society, let alone those who claim to be followers of Christ, would countenance such evil being perpetrated on our most innocent. The ideas articulated by Dykstra constitute not education, but unconscionable educational malpractice.
Virtually every cultural institution-from our churches to our courts to our legislatures to our news media to our entertainment industry to our government schools-has been commandeered by homosexuals and those who support their destructive cultural agenda. Those who hold traditional Judeo-Christian values must boldly and tenaciously oppose through word and deed efforts to normalize homosexuality-especially in government schools that our taxes subsidize.
"If I profess with the loudest voice and clearest exposition every portion of the Word of God except precisely that little point which the world and the devil are at that moment attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may be professing Him. Where the battle rages there the loyalty of the soldier is proved; and to be steady on all the battle front besides, is mere flight and disgrace if he flinches at that point." ~Martin Luther
Illinois Family Institute's new Division of School Advocacy (DSA) is in the process of creating workshops that we will lead for church small groups, adult Sunday school classes, senior high youth groups, college ministries, parent groups, church leader groups, and public and private school educator groups. The relentless cultural assault on fundamental immutable truths about sexuality, marriage, and the natural family has made these workshops necessary.
We are convinced that there is no cultural institution other than the church that has the reach and power to stand as a countervailing force to the movement to normalize homosexual conduct. We desperately need the leadership of the church if we hope to turn hearts and minds away from the deceptions being propagated in the culture.
11/11/2008 8:37:00 PM By Phyllis Schlafly
-EagleForum.com
Many voters didn't think it important when it surfaced during the presidential campaign that Barack Obama's friend, the 1960s radical William Ayers, is now a professor of education at the University of Illinois in Chicago. Ayers's preoccupation with inserting his ideas of "social justice" into public school curriculum didn't seem an issue to make tracks in a national election.
Now we find that in election week, the most respected education journal, Education Week, featured a front-page article on "social-justice teaching." This confirms that accusations about "social-justice teaching" are not inventions of John McCain's partisan consultants, but are matters that vitally concern everyone who cares what the next generation is taught with taxpayers' money.
"During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act." ~George Orwell~
The radical and subversive ideology of homosexual activists and their supporters has to a great extent won the day in our colleges and universities and high schools. Now they're gunning for our middle schools.
The goal is to use public funds to indoctrinate our nation's children with their unproven, controversial theories on the nature and morality of homosexuality. Some may challenge the use of the word "indoctrinate," but when public schools expose children to resources and activities that present homosexuality as normal, positive, biologically determined, immutable, inherent, and morally equivalent to heterosexuality, while censoring all resources that challenge those arguable claims, they are engaging in indoctrination-not education.
WLS Radio is reporting that Chicago Mayor Richard Daley has changed his position on the proposed "gay"-affirming high school, and that tomorrow the Chicago Board of Education will vote in favor of it. 
The radical and subversive ideology of homosexual activists and their supporters has to a great extent won the day in our colleges and universities and high schools. Now they're gunning for our middle schools. 
