by Chuck Shepherd
© 2010 by Chuck Shepherd. All rights reserved.
Government in Action!
* In January, the Berkeley (Calif.) School Board began consideration of a near-unanimous recommendation of Berkeley High School's Governance Council to eliminate science labs from its curriculum, reasoning that the classes mostly serve white students, leaving less money for programs for underperforming
minorities. Berkeley High's white students do far better academically than the state average; black and Latino students do worse than average. Five science teachers would be dismissed.
[East Bay Express, 12-23-09]
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Yeah, I think it's obvious that there's some disparity in test results... but "remove science"?!? What's the rationale there? Make everyone equally uneducated? Or - oooh, here's a thought - OR, you work on bringing other people up closer to the top standard.
I hear of black kids being accused, by their peers, of "acting white" for doing well in school - that's appalling. But do you want that to become a universal? Do you want every child in the country dumbing down so as not to exceed expectations? That's ludicrous.
America: please don't get dumber.
