Tuesday education news

Check back every Tuesday for the latest in education news. Speaking of the latest, I just have to say how much I like Number 2 Pencil for her daily documentation of what is going on in the loony public school system.

This week FrontPageMagazine.com outs the NEA’s (Broken link, active June 28, 2005) anti-biblical and liberal agenda, while the Jewish World Review examines the interests of the adults in the public school system: they compete with the interests of the children who are supposed to be getting an education. In a related story, California voters will this fall have an opportunity to diminish the effects of tenure, which serves to protect teacher jobs rather than quality education.

Delegates to the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting have approved a resolution (Broken link, active June 28, 2005) encouraging churches to investigate what impact the homo[s-x]ual agenda is having on public schools. It is not small: “alternative” orientation is presented as normal or healthy in [s-x] ed curriculum across the country, while gay activists continue to make inroads (Broken link, active June 28, 2005) in para-educational organizations such as the NEA and the PTA.

On the school standards battlefront, one California school has recognized all of its students at a recent graduation – even those who flunked. Another California school board solved the problem of not enough students testing as gifted by tinkering with the identification process until one quarter of the students test in (5% is the national average).

And then there is always the ridiculous: from schools deciding it is too shameful to be named after a U.S. president, to students being forced to have their lunch period at 9:30 in the morning, to Mother’s Day being renamed “Parent’s Day” so as not the offend the vast number of “two father” families out there (hat tip: Glenn Beck).

Now for the good news! Here in the US, the Concerned Women for America applaud recent Congressional efforts to restore a parent’s right to know when their children are given contraceptives or prescriptions. And the monolithic teaching of evolution in schools continues to be challenged – not in Kansas this time, but the Netherlands (Broken link, active June 28, 2005).