Common Core Standards: Sky is not falling, but ground is shifting
Mel Riddile is the associate director for high school services at the National Association of Secondary School Principals. His work in turning around schools in Virginia earned him the 2006 MetLife/NASSP National High School Principal of the Year award. This is his first piece for the AJC Get Schooled blog
By Mel Riddile
To answer a couple of the education questions on the minds of Georgia citizens these days:
Yes, we can expect to see a significant drop in the first year of the new Georgia Performance Standards assessments.
No, the sky is not falling.
But the ground is shifting.
Previous Georgia standards and assessments aimed merely to validate a high school diploma. Nothing more.
The new Georgia Performance Standards, which incorporate the Common Core State Standards, call for a much higher level of student performance as indicators of college-and-career-readiness.
Georgia was one of the first states to adopt the new Common Core standards in English, language arts and math. In fact, the standards were rolled out in 2010 at Peachtree Ridge High School in Suwanee, reflective of the major role of former Gov. Sonny Perdue, a leader in the effort.
The standards are designed to provide teachers and parents with a common understanding of what students are expected to learn at each grade level.
Students will be taking new tests, calibrated to new, higher standards, and assessed on a new scale.
Factor in the short amount of time that Georgia students have been exposed to the GPS, and it becomes clear that the first round of scores should be considered not as a definitive summation of Georgia students’ abilities, but rather as a benchmark for gauging progress toward the standards.
While the results are imminent, we can choose how to react to them. Officials in many of the 45 other states that have adopted higher standards are anticipating that an initial wave of lower scores will give way to higher student performance in the future.
Kentucky, for example, pre-empted the drama months before scores were even available. Kentucky State Education Commissioner Terry Holliday delivered a consistent message that, as he predicted to Education Week, “scores would drop because students taking K-PREP [the new Kentucky assessments] now have to deal with longer, nonfiction reading passages, for example, and exhibit greater ‘technical fluency’ in their comprehension skills.”
My conversations with principals in Kentucky confirm that the message penetrated local communities, and while the nation gasped at the first round of K-PREP results, the state itself steeled for the drop and maintained its focus on improving student performance.
Florida assessments generated similar results, but the reaction was somewhat different. Horrified by the mere 27 percent proficiency rating fourth-graders, the state Board of Education called an emergency meeting, at which they decided to shift the proficiency scale so a much more comfortable 81 percent of students were proficient.
As one parent told the Wall Street Journal, “It calls into question the veracity of the entire enterprise.” Indeed. And worse, it robs Florida students of rigor and authentic assessment.
Of course, reactions will be dictated by agendas. Georgia is one of several states that recently made it easier for for-profit education providers to tap public education funds.
Those providers have a lot to gain from perpetuating the “failing public schools” narrative. Going into the assessments with clear expectations will neutralize those agendas and help us lock our focus where it really matters: Student learning.
–From Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog
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197 comments Add your comment
Dr. John Trotter
December 30th, 2012
9:42 am
@ Georgia Coach: Lame picket in Macon? Ha! Wow, this topic has indeed strayed. Actually, this was a rather lively picket, attracting many locals on the historic Mulberry Street in front of the Courthouse and was covered by the media, including Macon’s NBC affiliate. Hey, man, I was even decked out in beautiful seersucker suit and a resplendent madras tie. Ha! Lame? Not hardly, but, then again, you may actually be one of Romain Dallemand’s educrats making the teachers’ jobs so insufferable in Bibb County. We expect you guys not to like the pickets. We would be concerned if you did like them.
http://www.theteachersadvocate.com
http://www.georgiateachersspeakout.com
mountain man
December 30th, 2012
10:06 am
I say again – we would not need standardized testing if the grades given were truly reflective of material learned (mastery of subject, not “learning to think”). We could use regular grades, like we did in the sixties. But grade inflation is so rampant, not just from teachers, but from policies (no grade below 50), and administrators changing grades.
So if we test to new standards (common core) and the student fails, what do we do? Why, the same thing we always do, pass them along until they give up and quit school. Or keep them and give them a meaningless diploma at the end of 12 years. Employers know it means nothing, so they require a college diploma for any important jobs.
redweather
December 30th, 2012
10:39 am
@mountain man, a big chunk of education has always been aimed at getting students to learn how to think, and there is not one thing wrong with that. I get the distinct feeling some of you don’t know why we have students study subjects like algebra and geometry.
Mary Elizabeth
December 30th, 2012
10:52 am
Per my December 28th, 9:46 am post, I have tried to demonstrate how different students will take differing rates to master the same curriculum concepts.
That being true, perhaps educators should rethink having all students graduate from high school within a set 12 year time period. Some students may be able to master the required curriculum content, for a high school diploma, within 11 years, whereas other students may take 13 years, or longer, to master the same required content for the diploma. The important factor is that all students do graduate, with mastery of the required curriculum having been achieved.
If a given student is identified as needing to take longer than 12 years to master curriculum concepts to graduate, then perhaps that student would be better served by taking 3 academic courses in a given quarter (as well as 2 on-the-job training courses, or 2 remedial courses) instead of taking the standard 5 academic courses per quarter, every quarter. To master all of the academic curriculum requirements, that student might need, then, to take 13 years to graduate from high school, with true mastery of all of the curriculum content having been achieved. Better to extend the time to master all of the curriculum, than to force some students to drop out of school because the required rate in which they must master concepts is too rapidly set for them. As a result, these particular students are being taught on their frustration, not instructional, levels.
It is time for educators (and the public) to stop blaming the students, and find a more feasible educational model for them to meet with success throughout their years in school. Look to a continuous progress model, with mastery of concepts tailored for each student throughout the student’s tenure in school.
redweather
December 30th, 2012
12:06 pm
@ Mary Elizabet, Graduating students from high school once they have achieved mastery might provide some additional incentive to learn. And if we are going “to stop blaming students” we should also stop blaming tachers.
redweather
December 30th, 2012
12:07 pm
I meant “Mary Elizabeth” and “teachers.”
Mary Elizabeth
December 30th, 2012
12:28 pm
@redweather, 12:06 pm
“And if we are going ‘to stop blaming students,’ we should also stop blaming teachers.”
=============================================
Amen to that!
“We” should simply change the instructional design of our schools to accommodate a realistic, continuous progress, mastery of curriculum, model for every student in grades k – 12 (or more), in the ways that I have tried to explain, and then “we” should educate teachers, administrators, parents, and students as to how that effective design would operate, in practice, for each student.
Private Citizen
December 30th, 2012
1:48 pm
Paulo / Mary Elisabeth, the culture deficits model link is really good information. A#1. http://www.education.com/reference/article/cultural-deficit-model Definitely the right information from the right perspective. Thanks!!
Private Citizen
December 30th, 2012
3:21 pm
Do you think repeated testing is “in conflict” with students’ needs and values and therefore contributes to student agitation / behavior?
” Irvine introduced the concept of cultural synchronization to describe how teachers’ beliefs about certain student groups may be in conflict with the actual motives, values, and needs of those students.” http://www.education.com/reference/article/teacher-beliefs/#C
Mary Elizabeth
December 30th, 2012
3:54 pm
@ Private Citizen, 1:48 pm
You are most welcome. Paulo shared the information in the link. I merely confirmed its value.
mountain man
December 30th, 2012
10:25 pm
“I get the distinct feeling some of you don’t know why we have students study subjects like algebra and geometry”
I learned geometry so I can lay out house corners. I use trigonometry to calculate volumes to do monthly inventory. I use mathematics to solve problems every day. I use English to write comprehensible reports and correspondence. I understand history so I know what people are arguing about when they talk about the Second Amendment and gun control.
Now, tell me how you judge if a student has “learned to think”? How do you test for that? Or is this just some vague term that only teachers can see and judge (ever read “The Emporer’s New Clothes”?)
mountain man
December 30th, 2012
10:29 pm
Tell me how many tons of rock are in a stockpile (cone-shaped) that is 100 feet across the base and has an angle of repose of 38 degrees (given the bulk density is 100 lbs/cu. ft.). If you have “learned to think”, you should be able to calculate this without having learned any facts about geometry or trigonometry. “Learning th think” will not tell you the formula for volume of a cone.
mountain man
December 30th, 2012
10:31 pm
You are in a restaurant and you get the bill for $38.26. You want to add a 15% gratuity (tip, that is). How much do you add? Or do you have to pull out your “smart” phone? Will “learning to think” tell you the answer?
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
2:21 am
@Mary Elizabeth
You might enjoy this encouraging story. Eboni defies the “culture deficit model” and gets accepted to Columbia University:
http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/education/normandy-high-senior-overcomes-hardships-to-land-slot-in-ivy/article_d6b9f853-73ad-57af-9d71-6635a9a8b76b.html?mode=story
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
3:47 am
I was talking to a guy this past evening, asked me how it is going. I said, “Good!” He asked about the schoolhouse. I said, “Many places, there’s no textbooks.” He said for his kid in high school in Cobb County, for sports medicine class they watched all of the episodes of the tv series “House.”
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
4:11 am
?hey truth, It is unlikely that Eboni got the entire administrative staff removed from her school because they didn’t throw a party for her to recognise her acceptance at Colombia.
Which brings to mind, that along with BF’s complaint about Beverly Hall getting a superintendent’s award after the largest organised cheating scandal in the United States, there has still been no closure or explanation on Mr. Davis’ use a “racist remove” to remove staff at a school. I find this unacceptable and a blight on Atlanta. The message is: If you are non-black, do not work for Atlanta Public Schools of any other school system in Georgia with majority black management because you are a target for harassment. As far as I am concerned, this is the current legacy of Mr. Errol Davis and he appears to have zero interest in altering it. If I was rich, I would commission a bronze statue of him with the inscription, “Racist Player – A Blight on Atlanta.” Oh, is that too harsh? I think someone needs to do a government open records request to get the documents or justification used for the force-removal of those staff.
Message to non-blacks looking to work at schools in Georgia – due to the example set by Mr. Errol Davis of flagrant use of power, do not work in Georgia schools. You risk worker harassment and rough treatment with no explanation from the highly compensated managers who practice this abuse and who have no checks and balances on their professional activities. Avoid.
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
4:57 am
Professional Engineer exam guide: http://www.peexamguides.com/
10 Reasons to Become a Professional Engineer http://www.ieeeusa.org/careers/files/How%20To%20Become%20A%20PE.ppt
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
5:11 am
Taking the mechanical engineering Professional Engineer test http://felixwong.com/2007/04/mechanical-pe-exam/
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
6:05 am
Mr. Davis’ treatment of labor is akin to when Mr. Romney tied a dog onto the roof of the car for a family trip. Any professional would be crazy to put themselves in the position of working in that condition.
redweather
December 31st, 2012
8:04 am
@mountain man, You have proved my point, although I have one quibble. Students don’t learn geometry so they can build houses, but it sure enough comes in handy. You are on much firmer ground when you contend that you have used your education in various ways. Ergo, you passed the test of learning how to think.
mountain man
December 31st, 2012
9:19 am
“Ergo, you passed the test of learning how to think.”
No, I have always known “how to think”. Any six-year old who fashions a pretend pistol from a tree branch in order to play Army knows “how to think”. What I learned in schools were the skills and rules to apply my thinking in ways that can be beneficial.
And you still didn’t answer the question about measuring “thinking” apart from academic skills.
bu2
December 31st, 2012
10:10 am
“A guy who owns a store in Buckhead told me one time of when he was a little kid in the government schools, they had to do drills and crouch underneath their desks because “the Russians were coming.” I think it would be better today if big power stopped using marketing to try and “massage” everybody. Just do what you’re going to do. Get on with it.”
It was called a fallout drill. You’re obviously too young to remember the time when we expected a nuclear war. After WWI and WWII, most people expected III. I did fallout drills in my public elementary school. Sometimes you did fallout drills, sometimes fire drills (fallout-the radioactive material after the big blast).
It wasn’t any brainwashing experiment. You’re conspiracy theories require the government to actually be competent.
redweather
December 31st, 2012
10:18 am
@mountain man, “And you still didn’t answer the question about measuring “thinking” apart from academic skills.”
Why would we need to “measure thinking apart from academic skills”? Could it even be done? Wouldn’t there have to be an academic subject involved? And wouldn’t thinking have to be part of learning any academic subject? I can’t see how they can be separated. And I am not trying to be obtuse by asking these questions.
Mary Elizabeth
December 31st, 2012
10:23 am
@ Truth in Moderation, 2:21 am
“@Mary Elizabeth
You might enjoy this encouraging story. Eboni defies the “culture deficit model” and gets accepted to Columbia University. . .”
======================================================
I did thoroughly enjoy reading Eboni’s story, Truth in Moderation. Thank you very much for sharing Eboni’s inspiring story with me. Eboni is a young lady with many gifts who wants all of her talents to bloom, as well she should. I am very supportive of her efforts, and I am equally impressed with her qualities. Eboni was especially drawn to the maxim that “circumstances do not define your destiny.” Hers is a beautiful attitude, and there is much truth in that maxim, especially when one has an attitude as positive as is Eboni’s.
I, also, want to share a section of her story in which Eboni describes how her young mother exposed her to reading and language development, when she was a baby. I encourage all parents, or guardians, to read to their children early in their lives. This practice, alone, could help your children learn to read well in school. You are exposing your child, early, to the cadences of language in its written form, as well as exposing your child to many storylines, varied experiences, and interesting characters. You are aiding in developing your child’s ability to sustain concentration, and you are enhancing your child’s early language development, and imagination, by reading to your child with enthusiam and interest. The next step will, naturally, be that your child will want to read his, or her, own books. Start with easy to read “picture books” (with sequential plots) from public libraries, and then advance to picture books with some minimal word use under the pictures. Read the book first with your child, and later your child will be able to read those minmal words, by sight, for himself or herself. After that, begin to build your child’s knowledge of consonant names and then sounds (i.e. “b” sounds like “buh” and “d” sounds like “duh”) so that your child can work through sounding out unknown words in the context of the easy-to-read book’s plot development.) Note to interested readers: In my personal blog entitled, “Mary Elizabeh Sings,” one of my posts has been developed – in outline form – to teach parents and teachers “Word Attack Skills” (title of my post) in how to instruct their children and students in phonics and word attack skills from consonant and vowel sounds through syllabication and the meanings of prefixes, root words, and suffixes.
See below for the excerpt from Eboni’s story in which her mother reads to her as a baby:
“But when Eboni was a baby, Flurry (Eboni’s mother) began reading to her. She read through many of their moves, though it stopped when the family was in homeless shelters. She used letter-shaped refrigerator magnets to work on spelling.”
——————————————————————————————————
I want to share Cyndie’s story with you, Truth, as well as with other readers who may not have read Cyndie’s story, earlier. This is a true story of one of my previous teaching experiences, when an African-American junior in my high school Advanced Reading class approached me, late on one Friday afternoon, with her story. Cyndie’s story is not as dramatic, in impact, as Eboni’s story, but Cyndie “gave” her story to me that Friday afternoon, after school, with the understanding that I would continue to share her story with other students who are behind their peers in their reading skills. I will share it again, today, in behalf of Cyndie, for all of those students – and for all of their teachers and their parents who want to find ways to help their children and their students – who are behind others in their grade level in their reading skills. The good news is that these students can “catch up” to their grade level peers, and that they can eventually even optimize their own potential, as Cyndie did. Cyndie’s story will show the way.
http://maryelizabethsings.wordpress.com/2012/02/11/cyndies-story/
mountain man
December 31st, 2012
10:25 am
“And wouldn’t thinking have to be part of learning any academic subject? I can’t see how they can be separated.”
Exactly my point. I apologize if I misunderstood you, but I took it that you were arguing for less testing because we should be teaching “learning to think” rather than academic skills (which can be measured by testing).
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
11:02 am
redweather, yes, there are all kinds of ways to measure thinking, reasoning and logic. go look at sample questions for the LSAT law school entrance test, most of it is testing reasoning and logic. I recently emailed to me friend a link to YouTube video of forklift accidents. My friend immediately emailed back, “Yes, most people can not think in three dimensions.” I was impressed by his answer. A forklift moves on an x/y Cartesian plane on the ground (named after Rene DeCartes) but when you add the forks going up and down, that is the third axis. Sort of the difference of a circle and sphere or ball. Two dimensions to three. I have before thought the same of humanities study, using thee dimensions to look at a subject, one being time, one being location. The same applies to music and persons who write music scores with eight things going on. How does that work?
Tests are not my thing, but certainly higher order skills up to “olympiad” thinking level can be “tested” and there are techniques for same. Testing can be view as a fine art, like expensive champagne. Not sure what testing has to do with anything relevant as long as kids do not have eyeglasses and support materials and organization is as spotty and vacant as it is now.
Hey redweather, maybe you ought to have a look at the “MENSA” test. It is pretty popular for someone calling themselves smart. I knew on “Mensa” approved person who worked at CNN. This person didn’t seem too smart to me. They lived in a concrete bunker type apartment downtown and acted very cool. Meanwhile CNN was lying like nobody’s business, telling whole clothe lies repeating war propaganda. “Osama bin Laden has new golf clubs!” “Osama bin Laden has a new golf cart!” “Meanwhile, let’s blame him and then go bomb a different country, Iraq!” If industrial level lying and treating people that way. Well, let’s just say they must leave off morality and ethics from the “MENSA” test. Sample questions: http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1989-01-04/entertainment/8902220824_1_typists-chickens-eggs
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
11:13 am
If you want to teach “learning to think,” the way this is done is through the formal teaching of logic, a branch of philosophy. It is not taught in U.S. high schools. Some places it is?
Here is a paper from Israel technology school talking about the importance of teaching logic (how to think) to high school students. http://jite.org/documents/Vol8/JITEv8IIP001-016Bouhnik681.pdf
There is also information online about “Good Ideas for Teaching Formal Logic to Middle School & High School”
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
11:34 am
““Mensa” approved person who worked at CNN. This person didn’t seem too smart to me. They lived in a concrete bunker type apartment downtown and acted very cool. Meanwhile CNN was lying like nobody’s business, telling whole clothe lies repeating war propaganda.”
Are you talking about Wolf Blitzer?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2QMQi-m63E
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
12:18 pm
@PC
You are quite right about the need to teach logic. Many home schoolers now teach it. My public high school used applied logic to teach Euclid’s geometric proofs.
Christian author and professor C.S. Lewis championed the teaching of logic:
“Why don’t they teach logic at these schools?”
At one point in the classic book The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis, an exasperated professor utters the words, “Logic! Why don’t they teach logic at these schools?” 1Lewis not only believed in truth, but also in our ability to use logic as an aid in determining truth.
http://www.focusonthefamily.com/faith/faith_in_life/defending_the_faith/defend_the_faith_like_cs_lewis_part_1.aspx
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
1:33 pm
hey Truth, after reading a page of CS Lewis, I sort of saw this author as a Mark Twain knock off. ha. I know he is well regarded by many. Allow me to dial up a story for you, I printed out the first part for one of my “advanced” students (differentiated instruction?). Well that went absolutely nowhere. Anyway, I think of this as an example of superb writing. Maybe it will interest you. There is a “moral to the story” as well, but it is perhaps a more sublime approach that what we are accustomed to over her in the land of marketing, required store “discount” cards, and computer morphed talking animal commercials made by graduates of trendy “art” schools. Here’s a teaspoon of the real elixir: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1237/1237-h/1237-h.htm
Note, there are other, perhaps better, more crisp translations into English, but this is easily accessible.
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
1:42 pm
“I discovered Dorothy L. Sayers through homeschooling as the author of “The Lost Tools of Learning”. It was only after I read that, learned she was a contemporary and friend of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien that I stumbled on her original claim to fame–Lord Peter Wimsey.”
Comment on Goodreads blog
@PC
Your link to “Israel technology school” opens with this Dorothy Sayers quote:
“For we let our young men and women go out unarmed in a day when armor was never so necessary. By teaching them all to read, we have left them at the mercy of the printed word. By the invention of the film and the radio, we have made certain that no aversion to reading shall secure them from the incessant battery of words, words, words. They do not know what the words mean; they do not know how to ward them off or blunt their edge or fling them back; they are a prey to words in their emotions instead of being the masters of them in their intellects…” Dorothy Sayers, “The Lost Tools of Learning”, speech at Ox- ford, 1947.
Lewis and Tolkien were both Oxford dons.
BTW, some of the “Lost Tools” are the study of Latin (word origins, pre-fixes-root-suffixes) and LOGIC.
The public schools began removing these tools after WWll. All that was left of logic was the study of Euclid’s Geometry proofs. Now, they don’t even teach that.
True education has been replaced by Outcomes Based Education (Bloom’s Taxonomy) and its assessments.
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
1:43 pm
Interestingly, Benjamin Bloom served as “educational advisor to the governments of India (1957) and Israel (1963-1968)”.
http://www.citejournal.org/articles/v7i4CP1_module1.swf
Perhaps that is why the technical school was trying to recover the “lost tools of learning,” yes?
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
2:01 pm
@PC
LOL! YOUR DISTRACTOR STRATEGY BACKFIRED!
No one cares about your unprofessional opinion of Lewis’ book. THE TOPIC WAS LOGIC, remember?
LOL!
Observer
December 31st, 2012
2:36 pm
@ Truth. No-one cares about CS Lewis, either.
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
2:43 pm
“Observer” only appears when PC., Prof, or inHumanist go down in flames…LOL!
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
3:22 pm
Wow that hypocrite video is hilarious. What a bunch of voo-doo these actors are.
Synonyms
bewitch – enchant – witch – charm – spell
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
3:41 pm
@PC
Yeah. I hear lot’s of citizens won’t be spending their Federal Reserve notes supporting the Hollywood fools.
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
3:54 pm
“Thank you for telling me about Dorothy Sayers.”
@PC
Ummmm. YOU WERE THE ONE THAT POSTED THE LINK TO THE SCHOOL THAT HAD HER QUOTE AT THE TOP OF ITS PAGE.
I guess you post first, read later?????????????
I think your handlers need to get a new obstructionist. Do you make minimum wage?
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
4:02 pm
Well, maybe Selena G. will have to get back with Justin B. She just might need someone to support her lifestyle now. LOL!
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
4:02 pm
Dear Wacky Truth, I post a link to a paper about teaching logic. You’re the one who culled the Dorothy Sayers thing and expanded on it that she lectured CS Whazzit and JRR Tolkien. By the way, pretty much anyone I have know who reads/like CS Lewis and Tolkien seems to be hermetically sealed and it is like they read these works and are done. They have found “reading” and their “home base” and it ends at these two authors as if they have found heaven. Meanwhile, I think of them as bubble gum in the round glass bowl gum machine in the corner of the book store…
hey, flipping the coin, have you ever met an enthusiast for Madame Blavatsky? Now that’s a strange bunch, closed off in a different way.
Truth in Moderation
December 31st, 2012
4:46 pm
Well, maybe Sarah S. was a little set up in that vid. If you feel sorry for her, just watch her You Tube video so you can get the views up to 4 million….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3RYrQSir7k&feature=player_embedded
Private Citizen
December 31st, 2012
6:40 pm
Truth, I request that you immediately stop posting information as satire of me, paragraphs of nonsense speak. Okay? Sound good? You’ve done it twice now, like a new hobby. This is a proper / formal request asking you to observe good boundaries. If you have an idea to express, please do so. If you have a dialogue response to a post, please say so. If you wish to recreationally spam me, please refrain from doing so.
Truth in Moderation
January 1st, 2013
12:26 am
@PC
What are you talking about?
Prof
January 1st, 2013
11:23 am
@ Truth, Jan. 1, 12:26 am.
Evidently, Maureen has diplomatically removed your two posts from yesterday afternoon and evening, one on the “STEM degrees” thread and one on this one, in which you supposedly “quoted” Private Citizen as posting in some gibberish-Latin. But I can testify that you did post them, for I read them and so I guess did PC. I thought at the time: “That’s not a very Christian thing to do.”
Truth in Moderation
January 1st, 2013
12:50 pm
“That’s not a very Christian thing to do.”
Hmmm. Exposing the works of darkness, the obstructionists to truth, and using a little satire to do it sounds just like what Jesus would do. Well….actually, He was more direct! Forgive me.
27 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness.”
Matthew 23:27
Prof
January 1st, 2013
1:40 pm
Indeed.
Mary Elizabeth
January 1st, 2013
1:58 pm
For any who may perceive that my support of Eboni’s overcoming of her unfortunate “circumstances” to be admitted to Columbia University is in contradiction to my endorsement of the “cultural deficit model,” as shared by Paulo’s earlier link, I wish to state that there is no contradiction in my perception.
I have frequently avowed that improvement in the education, and in the class status, of the underclasses will take a combination of personal initiative and societal programs which are targeted to help the underclasses. Both approaches are needed for our nation to achieve the realization of the “more perfect union” to which are forefathers aspired for America. In order to achieve this more perfect union, imo, citizens must come to see that some dichotomies which are seemingly in contraposition may, in fact, work in harmony when we perceive with the larger vision of inclusion, not only of ideas, but of all people.
Happy New Year to all!