SECRETARY OF EDUCATION: too many untrained, unqualified bullshitters

The position of Secretary of Education is frequently filled with the secular equivalent of flim-flam artist televangelists. These individuals lack the training, experience, common sense or moral virtue to do the job. They do, however, possess a crucial skill. They are accomplished bullshitters. Tub thumping humbugs of the first magnitude.  

The Reagan administration provides a sterling example. Ronald Reagan promised he would eliminate the U.S. Department of Education, but dropped that when education unexpectedly gained national attention. He still slashed education spending in half. But Reagan staffers knew his administration had to look like they supported public education. They were in luck. Reagan had already appointed a know-nothing blowhard as Secretary of Education. William F. Bennett was a carnival barker in both style and substance. This gas-bag's unrestrained exaggerations and gross simplifications repeatedly made the news. And as they did, gullible Americans came to believe that: A. much was wrong with America's schools and B. the Reagan administration was working hard to fix them.

This is not the place to detail Bennett's demagoguery.  Let's just recount an incident that captures the noxious essence of his humbug. Reagan's Secretary of Education wrote an article that appeared in the November 1988 Readers Digest. In it he praised a school principal's extraordinarily simple method of "reforming a troubled inner-city Washington, D. C. school." "On the very first day," wrote Bennett, this remarkable "educational leader," this "no-nonsense principal, assembled the student body and ... with practiced eye, chose 20 potential troublemakers" to enforce order and put an end to chaos." And, according to Bennett, putting the school's most likely miscreants in charge of the rest of the student body worked magic! Order was restored and education proceeded!

Can you imagine? The school is chaoticl and the principal's solution is to put the potential trouble-makers in charge! Even a Secretary of Education should recognize such a policy is just plain nuts. Of course Bennett was not interested in the multifaceted and highly complex nature of actual reform. He was shoveling bullshit for political purposes.  Simple solutions for the simple minded. This is  how he politicized his position with carnival-barker effectiveness. For example, he repeatedly beat up on the National Education Association  — a relatively innocuous organization at the time. Charging that it was a major cause of what he alleged to be national school decline, he repeatedly pointed to it as the chief villain.  But why did Bennett really attack the NEA? It was a union that favored the Democrats and, rather ineffectually, opposed the Reagan administration's education policies.  Never mind facts! Bennett's job was to confirm the biases of Reagan voters and he did that well. What he failed to do was offer genuine leadership.

Enough about Bennett. Let's turn to Arnie Duncan, President Obama's Secretary of Education. Unlike Reagan, Obama increased Federal education funding by an extra $100 billion. But his selection of Mr. Duncan was similar to Reagan's choice of Bennett in that Arnie's chief skill was bullshitting. He actually lacked any knowledge of education policy, curriculum design, research on learning, human growth and development etc.. He had never even taught. Yet despite his utter lack of qualifications,, he had served as CEO of the Chicago public school system from 2001 - 2008. How come? Can you spell P O L I T I C S? 

Yes, Arnie was utterly unqualified to be secretary of anything. But he did have that one qualification as Secretary of Education. He really could dish out the shit. He was skilled at looking like he knew what he was talking about.  (He also provided the President with an excellent basketball buddy. An ex-professional hoopster, Arnie played a mean game of one on one.)  

During the Bush administration "No Child Left Behind" had been signed into law. It stipulated that in the future only "highly qualified" teachers would be permitted to teach." In fact it specifically ordained that "to teach math, science, social studies, the arts, reading or languages, candidates must have obtained a long-term teaching certificate, and demonstrate subject matter knowledge by either obtaining a college major in the subject, by passing a test in the subject taught." 

That's got real teeth, right?  Ah, but wait! The lawmakers also inserted the following at the very end: "...or by some other means established by the state." This was nothing less than a last second castration! It allowed states to dodge all of the supposed rigor. States could substitute whatever feeble faldarall suited their situation. And, of course, that's exactly what happened in state after state. Were legislators surprised that this happened? Hardly! They wanted to look tough, while simultaneously allowing the same laxity that has characterized teacher education since its inception. Tougher entry standards means paying more to entering teachers. Otherwise no one will want to meet these stringent standards. But that means you have to pay more to attract the best. And raising taxes to pay teachers more is politically unpalatable

California initially failed to take advantage of the No Child Left Behind escape clause. Consequently, the state faced an immediate shortage of highly qualified teachers. But President Obama came to the rescue. He waived his executive order wand and declared that wanna-be teachers still in training were, in fact, "highly qualified?" At that time many such people were filling in as full-time teachers in California. Now, thanks to Obama, these rank amateurs were instantly transformed into masters of the art. California's shortage of "highly qualified" teachers was over. 

Did Secretary Duncan complain when Obama transformed apprentices to master craftsmen with the stroke of a pen! Not a whimper came from Arnie. Apparently he had changed his mind. 

Eventually a federal judge ruled that Obama's evasion violated the No Child Left Behind "highly qualified" requirement, Congress corrected that. They piously legislated that the classification "highly qualified" included those who weren't. Arnie went along with that too. By then his expressed concern about inadequate teacher preparation had evaporated.

Last, there is Betsy DeVoss, Secretary of Education under Donald Trump. How much training in education did she have? Zero. How much teaching experience? Zero. How much personal experience in public school where 90% of American send their children? Zero. How much has she and the rest of her family donated to Republican causes? Forbes reports about $200 million dollars in 2017.  

That's 200 million reasons why, having always attended private conservative Christian schools, having long demanded deep cuts in federal education spending, having enthusiastically championed privatizing public schools through vouchers, and after boldly boosting the for-profit college industry despite their student loan default rate being 6 times higher, she still ended up U.S. Secretary of Education. 

Was Ms. DeVoss a bullshitter similar to the two cited above? To be fair, that's not clear. Perhaps she was just a true believer trained in the fundamentalist tradition that renders one incapable of reasoning. A sort of free market fanatic who falsely linked materialistic capitalism with the decidedly anti-materialist teaching of Jesus Christ. In any case, she was clearly in over her head as Secretary of Education. In fact, to even get the job Vice President Pence had to cast the deciding vote, given the 50-50 tie in the Senate vote on DeWees.

There are competent, qualified people who have served, and now serve, as secretaries of education at the state and national level. But there are too many counter-examples. Should our political "leaders" want to get serious, not just solemn, about improving America's schooling it is way past time for them to appoint highly qualified experts. In the meantime, though there still will be lots of openings for untrained, unqualified, conscience-free bull shitters.

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION: Neglected Considerations

Anyone planning to take affirmative action in order to ameliorate injustice should first consider that numerous handicaps, many equaling or exceeding the impact of those presently qualifying, are being ignored.

Consider the following examples, then ask: A. Should affirmative action be extended to these and similar classes of people? B. If not. why not? C. Does the abundance of overlooked and/or hidden handicaps make fair administration of affirmative action impossible to effectuate?

Physical Attractiveness

In a study entitled "What Is Beautiful Is Good," researchers from the American Psychological Association experimentally documented a phenomenon they referred to as the "physical-attractiveness stereotype." Investigators showed photographs of attractive, average, and unattractive people to university undergraduates. The students were asked to rate the people in the photos on various personality traits and behavioral tendencies, based solely on their appearance in the pictures.

The finding were that compared to unattractive people, attractive people were assumed to possess a higher number of positive traits. The students rated them confident, strong, assertive, candid, warm, honest, kind, outgoing, sensitive, poised, sociable, exciting, and nurturing (Dion, Berscheid, and Walster 1972). Startling as these results may be, the physical-attractiveness stereotype is robust. It has been replicated in several different experimental paradigms (Feingold 1992). Aristotle was right when he observed, "Personal beauty is a greater recommendation than any letter of introduction."

Obesity

Weight is another, often overlooked, physical characteristic associated with discrimination and unfair treatment. Research on attitudes toward overweight people has shown they are often perceived as lazy, unintelligent, slovenly, and unattractive (Grover, Keel, and Mitchell 2003). Several studies have demonstrated that such negative attitudes toward obese individuals may contribute to discrimination in the work place. Specifically, obese people are not hired as often as people of normal weight (Roe and Eickwort 1976); are less likely to be promoted (Larkin and Pines 1979); and often report being discriminated against by managers and peers (Rothblum, Brand, Miller, and Oetjen 1990).

Short Stature

Height, particularly in men, is another physical attribute associated with negative stereotypes and discrimination. A 1992 study by researchers from Michigan State University demonstrated that short men are often judged inferior to tall men in several personal attributes. People tend to judge taller men as more socially attractive, higher in professional status, more masculine, more athletically inclined, and more physically attractive than short men (Jackson and Ervin 1992). Similar studies have found that short men often experience discrimination in professional settings. For example, short job applicants are not hired as often as taller applicants (Bonuso 1983); short employees earn less, on average, than taller employees (Loh 1993); and short political candidates lose elections more often than taller candidates (Gillis 1982).

Some Of The Other Factors

Social psychological research also indicates that people with red hair are often stereotyped as "clownish" and "weird" (Heckert and Best 1997). Negative stereotyping based on language and dialect (i.e., Southern accents, ebonics) also is a common occurrence (Anisfield 1972). Additionally, children who wear brand-name clothing and shoes are judged "popular," "wealthy," and able to "fit in with their peers" compared to children who do not wear name brands (Elliot and Leonard 2004).

What does such research have to do with equity in the classroom? The answer is "Everything." If unattractive, obese, or short people, for example, experience discrimination in a broad setting, it is very likely that they experience similar discrimination in an educational setting. So shouldn't fair share educators be prepared to apply compensatory measures for any student victimized by prejudice? Why should some students qualify for fair share treatment just because their particular group has more political muscle?

Conclusion

Instead of focusing on skin color or other group differences, perhaps educators should embrace the character-based vision of Martin Luther King, Jr. If they have the freedom to do so and if they can overcome the natural human tendency to stereotype, perhaps they should focus on each child's individual humanity, rather than his or her race,ethnicity, or what have you. After all, in the end, isn't character, not group membership, the most important quality of all?

--GKC

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See also, "Fair Share or Fair Play"

PREPARING STUDENTS TO MEET ACTUAL WORKPLACE EXPECTATIONS

School "leaders" make a show of concern over whether or not students are prepared to "meet the expectations of the workplace." Truth is, most aren't. But not for the reasons "leadership" typically fusses about.

 

In reality things like a graduate's math skills, or reading level, are of marginal concern. What really matters is making graduates ready to meet the REAL expectations of the workplace. That means educators must make sure the kids are prepared for things like this:

1. Working for ever-smaller portions of the profits while corporate chieftains make ever-more  preposterous amounts of money. (Elon Musk just 'made' $48 BILLION.)

2. Being discarded like 4-day-old leftovers when it serves 'corporate' interests.

3. Seeing the corporation's future compromised by senior staff focusing only on quarterly reports.

4. Having their jobs moved overseas whenever it benefits the bottom line.

5. Watching their health benefits shrink.

6. Discovering their pension funds have evaporated.

7. Being unable to take the time to pee.

8. Being over-supervised, but utterly uncared about.

9. Lacking the resources to do the job, while senior staff get far more than they need.

Preparing students for the likes of the above will, in fact, be far better preparation to "meet the expectations of the work place." Not every workplace. But far, far too many.

RAISING A TEEN: finding that elusive balance

 

Raising a teen is a challenging proposition. And a prime reason is the parental tendency to overestimate how much of their control remains. Parents tend to base their judgements about that on past experience.  A past in which they had a high degree of control. But that control slips away in ways which are not always obvious. And even when they are noticed, parent's tend to underestimate the degree of loss. That can have disastrous results. Here's a tale illustrating this point.

My wife and I watched neighboring parents try to deal with their daughter's adolescence. Both rather rigid, church going conservatives, they foolishly tried to maintain the same control or her that they had when she was younger. But as they did so the girl persisted in doing things they disapproved of. They then tried even harder to enforce the rules. But, impelled by social pressure and hormonal secretions,  the girl rebelled even more. When they urged her to study more, she studied less. When they forbid her to drink she got hammered — and smoked marijuana in the bargain. When they forbade her to ever see a boy friend again. she clandestinely did so anyway. When she repeatedly phoned the same forbidden boyfriend, they confiscated her cell phone. She secretly secured another.  That the young man was African-American, she white, intensified the rebellion.

The struggle climaxed when the girl became pregnant to the very boy her parents had forbidden. Worse, the boy turned out to be abusive, punching her in the stomach upon learning she was pregnant. The girl didn't tell her parents. But she did brake off the relationship, set the cops on her abuser and secretly secure an abortion. (Something her parents also would have forbidden — had they known.)   

This control struggle produced bitterness and estrangement between parents and child. The costs of their over-zealous parenting far exceeded the benefits. Yet the parents remained relatively oblivious of the fact that modern teens have a great deal of control over their own lives. They simply couldn't grasp that the degree of control they sought was inappropriate, counter productive and well-nigh impossible to enforce. Instead they blamed modernity.

Teens from functional homes with realistic teen limits usually avoid doing things that might seriously embarrass or disappoint their parents. But this is something the adolescent, not the parent, must choose to do. Remember too, parental advice can be as unrealistic as Arab advice to rainforest dwellers about surviving sandstorms. Remember too, teens often ignore even the best parental advice. As a German proverb reminds: "Everyone knows good counsel except those that have need of it." 

Parents must keep in mind too that teen brains are incompletely developed. Cognitive development is still ongoing.  This mental immaturity, especially when accompanied by new hormonal surges, can result in risky behavior. That quite properly worries parents. But trying too hard to eliminate teen risk-taking is risky too. The trick is learning when, and how much, to loosen control. Finding that elusive balance. That's the trick. And that is much, much more difficult than properly folding a fitted sheet.