"De-Radicalising" Public schools

The attack on public schools has been increasing in intensity over the past few years. Public schools, you see, don’t teach values, are hotbeds of radical leftism, and if you ask Julie Bishop about the curriculum, well, “straight from Chirman Mao”. Her solution? A standardised national curriculum set by a government board. See Five Public Opinions for dicussion on this proposal.

Other proposals for managing our public schools, however, are far more worrying. For example, let us hope that Bill Muehlenberg never has any say in how public schools are run. I’ll get to his suggestions in a moment, but first let us take a look at what he thinks about public schools and education to begin with.

In one of his recent posts at Culture Watch entitled Time to De-Radicalise Our Schools, Bill laments the influence of “education unions, officials and bureaucrats” and...

...their long-standing advocacy of every radical theory and cause. It is the constant pushing of political correctness and leftist social agendas that has many parents concerned about the state of education today.

Examples of political correctness and leftist social agendas are usually not required, usually because the “silent majority knows it exists”, but Bill really goes above the call of duty and attempts to provide us with some examples.

Back in 1987 the Australian Teacher’s Federation called on teachers to educate students on male and female homosexuality as part of basic sex education.

Mentioning homosexuality = a politically correct leftist social agenda. Okay. Bill is obviously one of those people who believes that it is possible to “catch gay”. Hear about it enough and you’ll be turned to the Dark Side. He just can’t bear the thought of homosexuals being portrayed as normal members of society – it’s called homophobia.

In 1995 the Australia Education Union (AEU) called for mandatory AIDS and sex education for all students, beginning in primary school.

Oh no! Just like the “gay disease” eh Bill? Hear about AIDS and you’ll probably catch it. Which of these situations is more desireable – people being aware of AIDS, its transmission, its effects and how to avoid it, or people not knowing about it at all? I choose the former. Hey Bill, maybe we should stop teaching children about skin cancer – we don’t want them catching that too.

Bill spends most of his post copying verbatim from the right-wing rhetoric playbook:

...radical social experiments aimed at our young children...educational bureaucrats...radical social engineering...nothing to do with education and everything to do with indoctrination...feminism, Marxism, and radical social experimentation...

...and so on. Instead of writing a lengthy post why can’t he just write “Public education is bad, mmkay?” and be done with it?

“So what’s Bill’s solution to all this?” I hear you ask? Well, we need much more than a Howard government approved board stating what is (or more importantly isn’t, in the case of the Muehlenbergs of the world) to be taught in schools. No, that’s simply not enough. Bill asks us to look to the US for a possible solution:

...(an) activity undertaken in the US which could be implemented here is an independent assessment of the radical trends and teachers at our schools. For example, a number of conservative American groups monitor the universities, alerting parents to the various radical causes and courses offered there.

You see, conservative groups like, say, the AFA, can be trusted to give an independent assessment of the “radical trends and teachers at our schools”. Obviously, non-conservative groups can’t offer an independent assessment because they have an agenda, whereas conservative groups don’t.

But it gets better...

One author, David Horowitz, himself a former radical, has even penned a book, documenting the most left-leaning profs in America. His book, The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America (Regnery, 2006), has caused controversy, of course, but is nonetheless a much-needed expose of the way the US academy has been hijacked by radicals and revolutionaries.

I suspect a similar audit of our school system would be in order. (My emphasis)

There’s a reason the book’s caused controversy Bill – it’s a pile of shit.

It’s funny how conservatives think the best way to deal with the reds under the bed is to get Stalinist on their ass. “Purge the universities!” they cry. Teachers, and other professionals in the education system simply cannot be trusted to devise curriculums and appropriate teaching methods. They don’t have the necessary qualifications – conservative government boards advised by (or perhaps featuring) Kevin Donnelly and Bill Muehlenberg do.