Dr. Verenice Gutierrez, a principal with Oregon’s Portland Public Schools, has become convinced that America’s “white culture” negatively influences educators’ world view and the manner in which they teach their students.
For instance, last year a teacher in the district presented a lesson that included a reference to peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Gutierrez says that by using sandwiches as an illustration, the teacher was engaged in a very subtle form of racism.
“What about Somali or Hispanic students, who might not eat sandwiches?” asked Gutierrez, according to Portland Tribune. “Another way would be to say: ‘Americans eat peanut butter and jelly, do you have anything like that?’ Let them tell you. Maybe they eat torta. Or pita.”
Gutierrez is not the only Portland administrator who has become obsessed with identifying such forms of alleged racism. Almost all Portland school leaders have gone through “Coaching for Educational Equity,” a week-long seminar on race that’s conducted by the Pacific Educational Group...
In addition to teaching that peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are racist, PEG trains educators to view “rugged individualism,” “adherence to rigid time schedules,” and the belief that “hard work is the key to success” as traits of the dominant white culture.
PEG teaches that minority cultures value “color group collectivism,” “interdependence,” group success, shared property, learning through social relationships, and making life choices based on “what will be best for the family or group.”
Why are there so many crazies in my chosen profession?
The article closes in the same manner as I closed my own post about the school that wants students to turn in toy guns for books:
The Tribune reports that “Oregon’s Department of Education just last month identified Harvey Scott School (where Gutierrez is principal) as a ‘focus school,’ which means it’s among the state’s lowest performing 15 percent.”Notice a similarity?
Perhaps if the staff spent more time on academic fundamentals, instead of obsessing about non-existent racial issues, the students would learn more.
Hat tip to reader MikeAT.
"White privilege" doctrine is alive and well in our public school systems. Seattle schools bought into it back in 2006. When parents raised a fuss about it, the director of equity and race relations, Caprice Hollins, left. The agenda stayed behind, though, morphing just enough to camouflage itself.
ReplyDeleteExhibit B--I give you the topic of the Fall Faculty Retreat at a local community college:
ReplyDeleteBehind the Mask: Connecting with Diverse People
Looks like PEG is desperately hoping that if you're black you've got the makings of Marx's Socialist Man. Dream on, I say but then, other then Obamacare, what've lefties got to point to as real victories? Not a heck of a lot so dreaming of better days is taking up more of their time.
ReplyDeleteAnd to answer your question, how are the Verenice Gutierrez' of the world supposed to distinguish themselves? Not by being a world class teacher. Not even by being a world class principal. So her and her like have to distinguish themselves as mighty warriors in a war that's over when they're not feverishly embracing some edu-fad that apes the blistering pace of progress of technology or the relentlessly greater productivity of the private sector.
She's probably not actually crazy but the public education system rewards actions that look like the product of a disordered mind.
Like it or not ... the 'white culture' is the one you flocked to, if you happen to be unfamiliar with the concept of a sandwich. And if your lesson happens to mention a sandwich, and you don't know what that is? Ask your teacher! On the other hand...as a huge foodie, I'm not totally unsympathetic to the complaint. There would be absolutely nothing wrong with presenting the idea that virtually EVERY culture has its own type of sandwich, most of which are delicious -- and that would establish a common ground. Same as virtually every culture has its own type of dumpling. But I'm a food nerd.
ReplyDeleteIf you were to plot GDP/capita on one axis of a scatter plot and whether a society focuses on individualism versus group/tribal identity on the other, I wonder what the trendline would show? I'm pretty sure that tribal/group-based societies do significantly poorer than individualistic ones.
ReplyDeleteYet another example of supposedly well-meaning people trying to find excuses to keep the poor poor.
Maxutils: There's no problem with mentioning or discussing the concept of hand-held food and various examples - in the proper context. To outlaw mentioning sandwiches is something different; after all, newcomers should be open to our traditions too. BTW, I'm also a foodie and my DD did a report(second grade, I think) on similar food across countries, including China's egg foo yung, Spain's tortilla (very different from Mexico's) and Italy's frittata, among other comparisons.
ReplyDeleteIt seems that some people in this country are intent on wiping out all vestiges of middle class American lives. Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, cowboys and Indians, Cops and Robbers, Tag, competition, marriage......
ReplyDelete