 For Deseret News, Luke Nathan Phillips of Braver Angels suggested that America’s political polarization may in part be a reflection of two different ways to love one’s country. While conservatives tend to emphasize America’s glorious past, liberals emphasize America’s glorious potential. Accepting that these two approaches are both equally valid and patriotic may be one way to help shrink America’s widening political divide. “There might be a unified American identity beneath everything, and maybe we can discover it; but we should not premise our tolerance and affection for our fellow Americans on their submission to our own ideas of patriotism.” Read the full article here.  For The Spectator, Toby Young chronicled the failing of the Orwell Foundation to protect one of its own prize winners, Kate Clanchy, from a censorious online mob. Following an apology for the ‘hurt’ caused, Clacnchy’s publisher, Picador, has announced that her book, Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me, will now be updated by ‘an appropriate group of specialist readers’ in order to appease a small coterie of online offense opiners. “Surely if a charity bearing Orwell’s name has a purpose, it is to keep the flame of intellectual freedom alive?” Read the full article here.  For The Wall Street Journal, Tony Woodlief outlined why state-level bans of critical race theory may not be the most effective approach for pushing back against problematic school curricula. Instead, a more community-based approach focused on local school districts could be a more successful model. “Local communities can regain authority over what their children are taught. Schools in progressive cities can teach critical race theory if that is what they want, while the rest of the country can keep such dogmas out. It’s a solution that ought to appeal to anyone who believes in democratic self-governance.” Read the full article here.  For The Wall Street Journal, John Beatty wrote about the shoehorning of neo-racist concepts into public schools against the wishes of parents and teachers. With the Association of American Educators finding that less than half of its members favor educators teaching these concepts, and with six of the nine members of Mr. Beatty's school board now under threat of recall by local parents, it might be time for those seeking to implement these ideas to reconsider their approach to education. “Our children aren’t racist or prejudiced. They are just kids. They need formation and guidance. By treating others with respect, even those with whom we disagree, we will begin to heal our schools, our counties and our country.” Read the full article here.  For National Review, Frederick M. Hess of the American Enterprise Institute discussed the sudden and widespread adoption of racial segregation policies being promoted under the label of “racial affinity groups.” While the implementation of these new segregationist practices are claimed to be based on solid scholarship, Hess shows that the evidence frequently cited in support of their purported benefits is of “dismal quality.” “[G]iven the thousands of education professors in American schools of education, one might imagine there’d be a mass of research on this hot-button question. Yet a comprehensive search of the academic databases ProQuest and Google Scholar returns just five articles purporting to examine the benefits of ‘racial affinity’ spaces in K–12 schooling… As striking as the utter dearth of research is, the dismal quality of the little that exists is even more telling.” Read the full article here. |
