The Old Eighteen

Ohio teacher fired for branding crosses on his students' arms

Seriously, what the hell is wrong with these people?

The school board of a small central Ohio community voted unanimously Friday to fire a teacher accused of preaching his Christian beliefs despite staff complaints and using a device to burn the image of a cross on students' arms.

School board members voted 5-0 to fire Mount Vernon Middle School science teacher John Freshwater. Board attorney David Millstone said Freshwater is entitled to a hearing to challenge the dismissal.

Freshwater denies wrongdoing and will request such a hearing, the teacher's attorney, Kelly Hamilton, told the Mount Vernon News.

[...] Freshwater used a science tool known as a high-frequency generator to burn images of a cross on students' arms in December, the report said. Freshwater told investigators he simply was trying to demonstrate the device on several students and described the images as an "X," not a cross. But pictures show a cross, the report said.

You know, I'm not a scientist or anything, but I'm guessing that there are a multitude of better ways for a teacher to demonstrate a science tool to his students than using it to burn their arms with a religious symbol.  And yet, amazingly, there are actually people out there speaking up for this idiot:

Freshwater's friend Dave Daubenmire defended him.

"With the exception of the cross-burning episode. ... I believe John Freshwater is teaching the values of the parents in the Mount Vernon school district," he told The Columbus Dispatch for a story published Friday.

Okay, hold on for just a second.  Maybe it's just me, but generally, when you're speaking up for someone and you have to begin your defense with the disclaimer "with the exception of the cross-burning episode," you're probably treading on thin ice intellectually.  And that's borne out by the fact that this guy has been an ongoing problem for the school district for years now:

But Lynda Weston, the district's director of teaching and learning, told investigators that she has dealt with complaints about Freshwater for much of her 11-year term at the district, the report said.

A former superintendent, Jeff Maley, said he tried to find another position for Freshwater but couldn't because he was certified only in science, the report said.

[...] Other findings show that Freshwater taught that carbon dating was unreliable to argue against evolution.

This is the rotten fruit being harvested from several decades of allowing dominionists to continue pushing the envelope in their efforts to undermine the constitutional separation of church and state.  These people already have a disproportionate amount of influence in our government at all levels, and if allowed to, they'll continue pushing until they've taken over everything, not just our schools.  We need to start pushing back.

Texas Education Commissioner tries to sneak private school vouchers through the back door

Having failed in his attempts to get private school vouchers past the Texas Legislature, Governor Rick Perry is taking a different approach, having one of his political appointees sneak money to private schools under the cover of a dropout recovery program:

Teacher and other education groups Tuesday criticized Texas Education Commissioner Robert Scott for opening the door to some private schools to get state funding for programs aimed at dropouts.

The commissioner, citing the need to alleviate the state's dropout problem, issued a request for applications from entities interested in a pilot program that would allow dropouts to return to school and work toward a diploma.

The state has allocated about $6 million for dropout recovery grants that will be distributed to school districts, charter schools, universities, education service centers, and private schools operated by nonprofit organizations.

[...] "We are appalled but not surprised that the governor's pet agency has found a way to try and repay his debt to a voucher lobby that has spent millions on his campaigns and have nothing to show for it," said Donna New Haschke, president of the Texas State Teachers Association.

Her reference was to campaign contributions to Gov. Rick Perry by voucher supporters, notably San Antonio millionaire James Leininger. Mr. Leininger has repeatedly tried to get the Legislature to approve a pilot voucher program for private schools – but has been rebuffed each time.

Linda Bridges, president of Texas AFT, an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers, contended that the proposal "has nothing to do with effective programs for dropout recovery but has everything to do with the commissioner trying to fly under the radar and gain a foothold for private school vouchers."

The Texas Freedom Network, a nonprofit public interest group, said the program's "loose rules" would make it easy for parents to withdraw their children from public school and have them classified as dropouts so the state could pay tuition for them to attend private school.

Florida teacher has special needs student voted out of classroom

Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with people in Florida?

A Port St. Lucie mother says her five-year-old son with special needs was voted out of his classroom by his peers at the behest of the teacher, who has since been reassigned.

Five-year-old Alex Barton will be starting his summer vacation early.  His mother doesn't want him to to return to school after what allegedly happened in class at Morningside Elementary Wednesday afternoon.

"I'll never be able to send him to school again without worrying if something is going to happen," says Melissa Barton, Alex's mother.

She admits he's had behavior problems, and can be difficult at times.

She says he's undergoing tests to determine if he suffers from Autism and other disorders.

But, she claims a Wednesday incident pushed the lines of discipline into the realm of abuse.

"(She) took him and stood him in front of his classmates this week, asked every single child to tell Alex why we don't like him... in his words, tell Alex why we hate him," she explains.

After having each child ridicule the boy, she says the teacher continued belittling him.

"Then they had a vote on if he deserved to stay in the class or not," says Barton.

Like a twisted reality show, Barton says in a 14-2 vote, his classmates voted the five-year-old out of the classroom.

My guess is that the kids actually meant to vote the teacher out of the classroom, but they got confused by the butterfly ballot or something.  I think we should ask for a recount.

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(via North Texas Liberal)

Support Edra Bogle for SBOE District 14

I don't live in District 14, but if you do (check this map to find out), I encourage you to support Edra Bogle  - we need more good Democrats like her on the State Board of Education.  Bradley Bowen at North Texas Liberal has more here, or you can go to Edra's web site for more information about her and where she stands on the issues.

SBOE ignores teacher-backed curriculum proposal

Because why should the right-wing majority on the Board of Education give any regard to the recommendations of Texas teachers when they have their DC consultant to listen to?

State Board of Education members, casting aside months of work by English teachers across the state, tentatively approved new curriculum standards Thursday for English and reading classes that will be used in Texas schools for the next decade.

Led by its social conservative bloc, the board rejected a curriculum proposal written and backed by several teacher associations – including those representing English teachers – and instead adopted a Washington, D.C.-based consultant's plan that changes the way grammar is taught..

The teacher-backed proposal was rejected on a 9-6 vote, before board members approved their consultant's plan by the same 9-6 split. Voting with the seven social conservatives on the board – all Republicans – were Geraldine Miller, R-Dallas, and Rick Agosto, D-San Antonio.

Key differences in the two plans centered on how grammar should be covered and the best methods for teaching reading comprehension.

A majority of the board wanted grammar taught by itself, while teachers wanted it taught in writing classes as is currently done in most schools. The board majority also discarded widely used teaching strategies for reading that were favored by teacher groups.

"It is disheartening that the board has completely discounted the recommendations of teachers who are in the classroom teaching these subjects," said Cynthia Tyroff of Texas Council of Teachers of English and Language Arts, one of 17 teacher associations that worked on the teacher-backed plan.

But board member Cynthia Dunbar, R-Richmond, said some teachers and their supporters "subverted" the process of writing the curriculum standards by working behind the scenes to influence the final version of the plan.

"We don't want to say we're not listening to teachers, but I am very frustrated," she said. "This process has become a joke and mockery."

Yeah, how dare those teachers try to influence the development of the curriculum standards that they're expected to adhere to!

Top 10 signs your teacher is drunk

From the home office in Dallas:

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(via Unfair Park)

Texas Republicans drop the ball on education funding

You're doing a heckuva job, Rick Perry: the school funding system that he and the Republican-controlled Texas Legislature passed two years ago doesn't include adjustments for inflation, a colossal screw-up that could force many school districts to make deep spending cuts and even force some districts into bankruptcy:

The school funding system approved by Texas lawmakers two years ago provides no new money to cover rising costs — especially for fuel, utilities and health insurance — and officials warn the plan's tax revenue straightjacket will allow inflation to push some school districts into bankruptcy.

At-risk districts, generally, will find a way to make it for the next school year, but many face horror situations in a few years unless legislators dramatically change the school funding system again, and soon.

Take the Houston-area Spring Branch Independent School District. Its budget projections show the district's current $58 million reserve fund will slide $68 million into the red within four years.

Unless a fix is enacted during next year's legislative session, school districts will be faced with difficult choices, including closing campuses and firing teachers, said Mike Falick, president of the Spring Branch school board.

"It's an untenable system. No business in the world would be able to survive with fuel, health insurance and salary increases and a flat revenue source," Falick said. "It's not sustainable.

Some school districts eventually will face "insolvency, some in a shorter time than others," he said.

Humble Independent School District is about two years away from insolvency, Superintendent Guy Sconzo said. It will cover a $7 million budget deficit this year and a projected $23 million deficit next year by dipping into its $53 million reserve fund.

Humble ISD has cut spending by $17.5 million since 2002, Sconzo said, but is struggling with inflation and enrollment growth. Each new student costs the district about $6,800, but it gets only $4,937 from all sources to educate that student, he said.

"As we reduce more, we get on the road of becoming Minimum ISD. We will be able to comply and meet state laws and regulations, but we can't do anything more than that because we can't afford to," Sconzo said.

Predictably, Governor Goodhair's response to the problem has been, shall we say, low-key:

State leaders defend the current system but will consider the school districts' complaints. The 2-year-old reforms achieved unprecedented funding equity for Texas public schools while shifting about a third of the tax burden away from local property taxpayers, said Allison Castle, spokeswoman for Gov. Rick Perry.

"It is important to remember that school districts and school boards have local control over setting their own budgets," she said. "It is up to the local school boards and districts to determine how best to spend the funds."

Republican legislators are promising to address the funding crisis during next year's legislative session, but who's to say they won't just make things even worse?

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(via lightseeker at Texas Kaos)

NSBA study: newspapers create negative view of public schools, often based on false or misleading info

A soon-to-be-released study by the National School Board Association’s Council of Urban Boards of Education (CUBE) says that parents who rely on newspapers for their information are more likely than other parents to harbor negative opinions about school safety, teacher quality, and academic achievement at their local public schools:

More than 76 percent of parents with personal experience in their local schools agreed that their children’s schools were safe, the study found. But that figure dropped to 61.5 percent among parents who rely heavily on newspapers for information.

Nearly one in three parents believe some children carry guns or knives to school -- if they rely on newspapers to form their opinions, Perkins added. Only 11.1 percent agree with that assessment if they get their information on schools from their children.

A similar disconnect was found when parents were asked about the likelihood that their child would do well on standardized tests. Among those who rely on newspapers, twice as many are skeptical about the chances of high academic performance (10.8 percent) as are those parents with a personal experience with the schools (5 percent).

Asked if teachers care about their child’s success, 85.5 percent of parents agree -- if they rely on their children as a primary source of information on the schools. Only 57 percent of parents agree if they rely on newspapers for information.

According to Brian Perkins, the principal investigator of the CUBE study, newspapers and other media may bear at least part of the blame for this phenomenon because they often draw false or misleading associations between local schools and the crime stories that they cover:

In New Haven, he said, his school board responded to these findings by meeting with local newspaper editors. One complaint was that crime stories often linked a victim or criminal to a nearby school, even if the crime did not occur on school grounds or those involved were no longer students.

"What are you guys doing?" he said school officials asked the editors. "When you report a story about someone who was shot, it could be two blocks away from a school, but you say it's over there near so-and-so school. What about the church nearby? Or the liquor store? You didn't mention that."

Tim Rogers at FrontBurner was able to find a local example of this problem in the pages of the Dallas Morning News:

Surely a decent newspaper would never make such a mistake, right? On April 16, the DMN ran a story about a kid who died most likely from a cheese overdose. The online version came with the headline "'Cheese' Heroin Likely Killed 18-year-old Dallas Man." But the print version ran with this headline: "'Cheese' Likely Killed W.T. White Student."

Thing is, the deceased hadn't been an active student at White for about 18 months. The paper ran a correction, but I'm sure it did nothing to change the perceptions reinforced by the erroneous headline.

It would be easy to explain mistakes like this on sloppy journalism, and that may be a part of the problem.  But I think it also stems from the tendency of newspapers and other corporate media outlets to up the fear factor in their coverage, in order to make it more attention-grabbing.  A story about an 18-year-old guy overdosing on heroin might not generally grab your attention, but if the man in question is identified as a student at the school your son or daughter attends, you might be more likely to take notice and read the story.  It's a symptom of a wider problem: the corporate media see their news departments as nothing more than another avenue of profit, so they do whatever it takes to up their ratings or sell more copies.  If that means sensationalizing the news, or emphasizing trivial information like celebrity gossip because of its entertainment value over more important news that isn't as sexy, so be it.  And if it means overselling a particular angle in a news story, or even inventing an angle that isn't fully supported by the facts, that's what they'll do.  It's why more and more people are abandoning the mainstream media as a reliable source of unbiased information, but unfortunately there are still far too many people out there who rely on corporations like Belo to give them reliable and accurate information.

Judge dismisses Burleson HS Rebel flag lawsuit

This is good news:

A federal judge has dismissed a case by current and former Burleson High School students who were forbidden from carrying purses bearing the Confederate battle flag on campus.

The ruling released Tuesday by Judge David C. Godbey ends the more than year-long lawsuit about the place of Confederate symbols in public life. School district officials said the symbols could be disruptive because of the racial overtones. The defendants and the Southern Legal Resource Center, which represented them, said the school’s decision violated their rights of free express, due process, equal protection and right to express their heritage.

This ruling will upset some people, but I think that the judge was right to dismiss this lawsuit.  Like everyone else, high school students have a right to express themselves.  However, as minors in a public school setting, there are reasonable limits to that right, and educators have to balance the free speech rights of individual students against their duty to maintain an orderly environment where parents can send their children to learn.  In this case, the school district had good reason to suspect that allowing students to carry around a symbol loaded with obvious racial overtones would lead to trouble, and their suspicions were later shown to be justified:

The school district noted in court filings that soon after the publicized dispute in 2006, profane and racist graffiti – featuring the “N” word and a swastika – was scrawled on the wall of a Burleson High restroom, and someone raised a homemade Confederate battle flag at the school flagpole.

Predictably, supporters of the two girls who brought the rebel flag purses to school with them are trying to play the "heritage" card:

Apparent supporters of Ms. Thomas and Ms. McAllum distributed a pro-Confederate flag flier at school saying: “Your ignorance isn’t a reason for our heritage to be hidden.” The flier also said that the “Civil War” wasn’t fought over slavery, the flag represents a pro-American and pro-Constitution position, and that slavery was legal under the U.S. flag.

FIrst of all, yes, slavery was at one time legal under the American flag.  But the United States, unlike the Confederacy, was not created with the specific goal of preserving the institution of slavery.  And let's be clear: the Civil War was about slavery.  The argument that it was about states' rights ignores the fact that most of the people citing states' rights were doing so to preserve slavery, and that these same people forced the passage of legislation such as the Fugitive Slave Act, which forced anti-slavery states to participate in the enforcement of Southern slavery.

And about that flag.  The flag being referred to here, which is often referred to simply as the "Confederate Flag," was never actually used to represent the Confederacy at any point during its existence.  The flag in question is an amalgamation of the colors from the battle flag of the Army of Northern Virginia and the design of the Confederate Navy Jack.  The flag didn't become popular until the 20th century, and it is more a symbol of the Jim Crow era than of the Civil War.  It never flew over any of the Confederate capitol buildings, but it saw plently of action during the Civil Rights era, when it was used to intimidate African-Americans who were marching for freedom and their supporters.  To the extent that the flag can be thought of at all as representing the Confederacy, it is a symbol of sedition; beyond that, it's nothing more than a symbol of racism and ignorance.

The heritage that this flag represents is a disgraceful heritage that all Southerners should be deeply ashamed of, and certainly not proud of.  It has no place being flown anywhere, and should be relegated to museums and history books.  It certainly has no business being allowed in a public school, which is supposed to be a friendly learning environment for students of all races.

TSTA survey: Morale shockingly low among Texas teachers

Being a teacher anywhere in this country has got to be one of the most thankless jobs that a person can have, and perhaps nowhere is that more true than here in Texas, which has a history of underfunding its public schools.  A recently released survey conducted by Sam Houston State University for the Texas State Teachers Association seems to confirm this: according to the survey, a staggering 44% of Texas teachers are seriously considering leaving the teaching profession.  Asked why, 42% of them cited poor working conditions, and another 21% cited low salaries.

Delving further into the numbers, you get a sense of why so many teachers want to leave.  More than a quarter of teachers are forced to work a second job in order to make ends meet, putting in an average of 12 extra hours per week, and over a third have summer jobs.  On top of that, the average teacher puts in an extra 13.4 hours a week of schoolwork outside the classroom, and spends $719 a year of their own money purchasing school supplies for their students without reimbursement.  Taking all that into consideration, and factoring in the other sources of misery that teachers are faced with including belligerent students, difficult parents, the constant pressure of making sure that students are prepared for achievement tests, and the misplaced blame of legislators and the general public for the sorry state of public education, we should probably be surprised that only 44% of teachers in this state are thinking about quitting.

We need more, better-paid teachers who are given the tools and the support they need.  I've got an idea: how about we bring our troops home from Iraq, and redirect some of that money that we're spending over there to improve our educational system right here in America?