“Those who refuse to learn from history are condemned to repeat it.”
–George Santyana
The following proposal by an elected school board in Colorado prompted walk outs and protests by both teachers and middle-school students.
Jefferson County, in the suburbs of Denver, is one of Colorado’s most populous counties, and is the largest school district in the state, with 84,000 students. Following the election of the new school board in Jefferson County the new majority appointed a new superintendent, Dan McMinimee,and also allocated funds to bail out two ailing charter schools. They took a hard line stance on teacher evaluations, choosing to count the results from the test of a new evaluation regime. There was also a proposal written by one of the conservative majority on the school board which calls for a review of the Advanced Placement history curriculum using the following set of criteria:
“Materials should promote citizenship, patriotism, essentials and benefits of the free enterprise system, respect for authority and respect for individual rights. Materials should not encourage or condone civil disorder, social strife or disregard of the law.”
Jonna Levine, the co-founder of Support Jeffco Kids, a pressure group set up this year, told the Guardian she found the language in the proposal “scary to say the least”. She thinks there is a conservative agenda at play in the school board. “You can’t help but assume that.”
“I think you could call it extreme. Extreme conservatism,” she added. She thinks something sinister is at play.
Something sinister? Citizenship, patriotism, free enterprise, respect for authority and individual rights is scary? Discouraging or not condoning civil disorder, social strife or disregard for the law is extreme?
Perhaps, part of the problem is that while there is much media discourse about “rights” there is little, if any understanding of the underlying basis including United States history and the legal foundation of our republic, the US Constitution. It’s becoming the norm to erase the parts of history that we find uncomfortable.
It has been said that knowledge is power, and, since the understanding of our Constitution has fallen from common knowledge the following series of blog posts will attempt to remedy that deficit.
The next post in the US Constitution series will deal with the content, but also the “why and wherefore” of the Preamble to the US Constitution.
“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
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