#i am a public school accessibility education teacher

[acespaceacepilot]

this is how i feel about my job as of today

[inkskinned]

it is totally okay to be hurt and tired and fed up with the american schooling system but i need you to understand that we need to be better about loudly and routinely defending public education.

yes, many teachers suck, many schools utterly suck. i also got bullied and was absolutely not given the right support for my needs. i am not defending public education because it was kind to me. i am defending it because it needs to exist.

right-wing republicans do not want an educated population. they want kids to be homeschooled or in private school. there is a huge religious undertone to this.

the most common argument is that despite high costs, the "result" is not "good" enough. they point to failing schools as proof that public education is just never going to work out. there will be arguments made here that you actually agree with: that teachers can be bullies, that we taught online for 2 years and still charged the same amount of tuition, that we have no recourse for students to actually have agency or a voice, and that schools are now unsafe for kids due to risk of illness and gun violence.

these are all placing the blame in a fraudulent way, one intended to get your parents to homeschool you. the less kids in a school, the less federally-awarded funding for that school, the less any school succeeds. they will not mention the fact it is their legislation that takes away important funding opportunities, that teachers are living at or below the poverty line, that buildings are not kept up to code, that administration is overpaid and forces specific curriculums, that corporations like (my personal enemy) Pearson Education control certain classroom goals because teachers can't afford other options. they pretend to be ignorant of the gun violence and say "oh just get a gun" - but these are the same people who will be sending their child to a private school with a bulletproof backpack. they don't care if your kid dies, though. they "don't believe" in covid, but they did get their kid vaccinated, because of course they did.

it is a closed loop. conservative parents hear the fearmongering and remove children from the system. frequently these parents are also deeply religious. the kids are raised without access to other media & learn to parrot their parents. you have now created a new generation of conservatives. additionally, one of the parents/caregivers must stay home and homeschool the children, usually for free. i will give you 1 guess which parent tends to stay home to homeschool the children. these parents are encouraged to have many, many children. those children are most likely not getting access to safe sex ed.

we might laugh at fox news suggesting teachers are forcing children to use kitty litter but: first of all, there is kitty litter in the classroom. it's part of an emergency kit in case children are locked in due to a shooter. so that's fucking dystopian, and the fact they've completely reimagined the scenario to somehow make the teachers look bad when it's instead a fucking huge symbol of our failure as a country to protect our children.... it feels a little intentional.

secondly: don't just dismiss the situation. because, yeah, obviously, no teacher is encouraging kids to be a catboy. but the actual undertone that fox news is trying to sew is an outright distrust of teachers and of public education. they rely on the dehumanization of trans people as a common touchstone to hide the fact they're pushing two agendas at once. (which is ironic. because the thing they accuse teachers of. is pushing. an agenda.)

whenever someone tells you they want you to read less, you should be suspicious of that. when someone tries to separate you and your education, you should be suspicious of that. i don't even like incel rhetoric nor would i want my kids exposed to it - but i would not take away my child's (age-appropriate) access to the internet. i would just provide more educational materials, not less. the difference here is that i believe we can resolve ignorance with knowledge; whereas conservatives believe that ignorance is bliss.

they misappropriate funding and demonize teachers. they pull the same trick each time - the same thing we are seeing with anti-trans rhetoric. they do not want you to have access to safe sex ed, so they act horrified, claim sex ed teaches you how to thrust deep, claim that we have no idea what "age-appropriate" means. since the mid-nineties, the united states has spent at least 2 billion dollars on abstinence-only education, even though to quote the above link: "a preponderance of studies has found no effect of abstinence education at reducing adolescent pregnancy". conservatives want you to think less of any person struggling with addiction so they can continue their racist "war on drugs", so they spend up to $750 million dollars a year on the DARE program which has absolutely no effect. acting like teachers "must" be "grooming" children is just the same thing - so they can demand that funding either goes to their causes or the funding doesn't "exist" ("i'm not paying for our kids to learn that thing!")

and they want you to feel uncaring about this. they are aware that you will hate some parts of your school experience. pretty much everyone does. they want to lean into the parts that you hate so that you don't put up a fight about it when they take it away for not being "good enough."

i know i maybe sound like a conspiracy theorist. but truly. truly. it is beneficial for conservatives to reduce your faith in the american public schooling system.

one of the explicitly stated campaign promises of the conservative party: to axe the Department of Education in 2024.

i know we are all tired and burnt out and there is so much else wrong with their entire platform. but maybe just - pay attention to this one.

[balioc]

Oh, boy! It's Education Theory o'Clock again!

...I have a lot of thoughts on this topic. At some point, when I'm less busy and tired, I should probably try to write them up. Natively, I'm one of the school-is-a-nightmare-prison people, like so many others in this little discourse-sphere -- but I'm married to a middle school teacher, so I regularly encounter both the good arguments from the other side and the facts on the ground, and those things have altered my perspective somewhat.

But I am, in fact, busy and tired. So for now I'll just content myself with saying:

School is an institution that serves many, many, many purposes at the same time. A lot of those purposes are load-bearingly important. (A couple of years ago, I wrote this about college, and...it's double-plus true for primary and secondary schools.) If you don't try to account for all of that stuff in your theory of What School Is and How School Works, you will generate incoherent garbage thoughts. If you have a New Concept for school entailing top-down design that is optimized for a single function (like "increasing test scores" or "causing kids to love learning" or whatever), you'd better have a plan for how you're going to do all the other important things that schools do. And even if you think that some of those things aren't actually important or necessary, you'd better have a plan for dealing with all the people who disagree. Because...

-----

...school, as it exists today, is an inherently political institution. Both in the "soft" sense that everyone has strong opinions about what it's supposed to do and how it's supposed to work, and in the "hard" sense that it is actually controlled by democratically-accountable governments. (This is double-plus true in the US, where it is controlled by local governments, and therefore doesn't even have the protective insulation of a massive bureaucracy.) Everything about the way schools work is a compromise brokered amongst ideologues and self-dealers. Everything about the way schools work involves a lot of decision-makers trying not to get yelled at by the yelliest people around. If you're looking for elegant purpose-driven top-down design, you won't find it. You could probably make a case that any elegant purpose-driven top-down design would be better than the thing we actually have, but getting there would require finding a way to remove the political element.

-----

Most importantly: public schools are (1) compulsory, (2) universal, and (3) for children. [People who are legally children, anyway, whether or not they are actual children in whatever sense matters to you.]

This means that they cannot let students leave, and they have to keep control of all the students that they aren't allowing to leave.

In the most literal not-a-judgment-but-a-fact sense, they are indeed prisons. They are coercively keeping people inside. They have to do that thing, as per their most fundamental mandate within the current system. The alternatives involve letting kids run around unsupervised, and/or failing to give some kids even the most cursory kind of education, and those things are absolute non-starters under present conditions.

All the normal institutions-for-adults operate on the principle of -- If you really don't want to be here, you can leave, and deal with whatever consequences there may be for leaving. This is not an option for schools, and that fact accounts for...everything.

Classroom structure is built around the necessity of keeping the most-hostile, least-engaged student in the class present and supervised, and then trying to prevent him from disrupting things for everyone else. Because the obvious solution that any other institution would use -- "just cut him loose, he doesn't want to be here and we don't want him here" -- isn't available.

(I once talked to my wife about the rationed bathroom access thing, which is one of the most flagrant nightmare-prison aspects of the school experience. Her response was, "If you let kids use the bathroom whenever they want, as much as they want, then you don't have mandatory universal education anymore. Some of them will never return to the classroom, because they don't want to be there." Which is...obviously true.)

So you have something that replicates many of the features of prison, because it has to accomplish the same basic tasks that prison accomplishes. Yay, Foucault.

[violetasteracademic]

On Being a Published Writer: Without a Degree

This is a bit of a vulnerable share today, and I am writing it after a sleepless night, the monster of anxiety and shame weighing heavily on my chest. However, I have come far in life and undergone an incredible amount of healing, and refuse to be ashamed of my past. I hope sharing this can help even one person like me remember that when it comes to craft, when it comes to art, the only thing stopping you from being worthy is you.

This year, I became a published writer. After years of hard work and dedication to my craft, I finally felt good enough to begin submitting my work to literary magazines. I'm proud of that accomplishment. It's a little tag I get to add to my bio now as I submit work that helps make me feel *valid.* But that quickly, all it takes is for someone to remind me that I did not have access to a degree, that I did not learn from the best, and I will spend the rest of my life without a formal education behind my writing, and they achieve the goal they set out: to make me feel less than for not having their background.

In America, the education system is for profit and public school system inconsistent. There are many factors that can contribute to whether or not a person gets through it successfully, and it often has little to do with intelligence, work ethic, or strength of character and drive before the age of 18.

So here is my story:

I graduated high school with a 2.1 GPA.

My first hospitalization (out of the 17 I would have in my life) for edometriomas happened at age 15. I spent the majority of high school struggling with chronic pain, stage four endometriosis and the accompanying endometriomas cysts, and illness. By age 16, social services was threatened by my school to be called on my home for suspected neglect and abuse. I moved out of my house that year, and was given temporary guardianship by a friends family.

By the end of my senior year, I continued to bounce around between friends houses, sometimes sleeping in my car, and struggled to keep on top of my coursework. I was enrolled in the work study program designed for students who had to keep a job during their high school years, and earned school credits for staying employed.

Despite all of this, I still maintained high grades in Advance Placement literature and language, proceeded to get 5's on my AP tests (a perfect score, and a rare accomplishment) as well as near perfect scores on my ACT's. I spent every spare second reading and writing from the moment I learned how. My intelligence and comprehension were not the issue. My health and my home life were.

The only reason I got into college at all was because I decided to audition for a school play freshman year. Much to my surprise, I was cast in the lead role, and thus the course of my life was set. I poured everything I had into acting, I finally had a purpose and something to keep me out of having to go home after school. Still, applying for colleges was one of the most stressful and shame inducing experiences of my life. I got into many top performance programs in the country, then would not get into the university itself with my GPA. The conservatories that did not look into school performance did not provide the financial assistance required for me to attend.

There was one university that offered limited talent admissions that would allow the university admission requirements to be overlooked for students that had displayed exceptional talent in their specialized field of study. I had to put together a request for the school board, complete with letters from my high school teachers providing context for my low GPA paired with high test scores, character assessments on my likely ability to maintain the minimum required GPA in college, as well as a letter from the head of the performing arts department of the university stating that I was worthy of this talent exception. The wait was unbearable. But I was accepted. And I was approved for the work study program that allowed me to gain employment at the university to help offset the cost.

I felt like my whole life had changed in college. I had gotten in. I had gotten out. I was a new person, no one knowing about my past or the stain of my struggles. I had a fresh start. While I continued to battle my illness throughout college, it was manageable with a consistent bed to sleep in every night, as well as access to physical and mental health services. And although I tested out of being required to take any English classes with AP, I still filled my elective credits with writing classes. Screenwriting, playwriting, poetry, creative writing. Performing became my work, and writing became my joy. I took every class that sounded remotely interesting, often filling my schedule more than required on top of my work and performance load.

I am withholding some of the more personal details of my life, but when I finally moved out to LA, I hit the ground running. I accomplished more in a few years than fellow artists and performers who had been out there for more than a decade. And I valued every person I met. I was in small, independent theatre shows with Juliard grads. I was on professional sets with wildly naturally talented people working to get their GED with no formal education but that undeniable *it* factor. People from all walks of life set out for the Angel City to make it, and I was one of them. I also began writing again, this time short films and audition monologues. I began writing pieces for friends and classmates at their request. I secured my first talent agent with a performance piece that I wrote, along with an offer to renegotiate my contract to include literary representation should I complete a script worth shopping. I began to organize applications for writing fellowships at top studios, when my condition became so severe the only option to move forward with my life was surgery. And then my life completely changed again.

I came out of that surgery with nerve damage that left me unable to walk for six months, as well as developed a new permanent nervous system disorder.

My career and my life never recovered. I was permanently changed. However, during that time, I turned one of my sci-fi short films I had written into a 160k word novel, with outlines for a trilogy. While it was one of the darkest times of my life, writing got me through it. I moved out of Los Angeles to a more affordable city and threw myself into writing. I learned that ivy league schools like Stanford, Harvard, and Yale shared their syllabi for continued study coursework online, including the required textbooks for the courses. Example here. I took myself through the textbooks and coursework of top schools, I took every local workshop possible when it was in budget. Any education on craft that was within my means, I reached for.

I will never be able to change the course of my life. I will likely never be able to go back to school. However, this amazing video by Bandon Sanderson helped me overcome my shame, my lack of access to returning to higher education when my life and career were irrevocably changed: Be Anything But an English Major

I had already done what he had encouraged, pick a subject I was passionate about, fill my college coursework with things I found interesting, and let it inform my writing. While this is not to disrespect or degrade English majors or say successful authors think the degree is worthless, I am simply sharing to say this video helped ME combat against English majors who made me feel worthless for not having access to their diploma.

So to anyone feeling insecure today, you do not need a degree in the arts. Whether you want to be an author, an actor, a painter, a fashion designer, a poet. And I say this as someone whose greatest privilege and joy in life was getting a performing arts degree.

We must continue to prioritize art being accessible, value diverse backgrounds, and wish for it to be open and available to all. We must continue to treat art as subjective, and reject ideals that learning from a certain set of paid individuals makes all other opinions, choices, or ideas invalid.

There is no dollar amount I could give to a piece of paper that would make my mind, my intelligence, and my ability to organize and understand words in an impactful way that would make me more valid than I am today. There is no degree that could replace my work ethic, my empathy, my desire to write stories to do good. To give something to the world and help people survive in the ways that I had needed to survive.

Maybe I'll tell this story again one day, and it will help another young person with my background believe there may be more in life than the cards they were dealt. Maybe this will be the first and last time sharing these words. Maybe I'll never get another piece published, but will continue to write fanfic and poetry and prose pieces to share on the internet for free because I believe in my heart it is valuable. To look at myself, and my work, and deem myself worthy of my efforts and passion.

I am proud to be a member of the community of published writers without a degree.

I am even more proud to be a member of online fandoms full of writers, artists, creators, contributors and more who give their free time and energy towards something that does nothing more than make others happy.

So,

to the people who look at the stars and wish.

to the stars who listen— and the dreams that are answered,

this one is for you.

[sempermoi]

Rant about generative AI in education and in general under the cut because I'm worried and frustrated and I needed to write it out in a small essay:

So, context: I am a teacher in Belgium, Flanders. I am now teaching English (as a second language), but have also taught history and Dutch (as a native language). All in secondary education, ages 12-16.

More and more I see educational experts endorse ai being used in education and of course the most used tools are the free, generative ones. Today, one of the colleagues responsible for the IT of my school went to an educational lecture where they once again vouched for the use of ai.

Now their keyword is that it should always be used in a responsible manner, but the issue is... can it be?

1. Environmentally speaking, ai has been a nightmare. Not only does it have an alarming impact on emission levels, but also on the toxic waste that's left behind. Not to mention the scarcity of GPUs caused by the surge of ai in the past few years. Even sources that would vouch for ai have raised concerns about the impact it has on our collective health. sources: here, here and here

2. Then there's the issue with what the tools are trained on and this in multiple ways:

Many of the free tools that the public uses is trained on content available across the internet. However, it is at this point common knowledge (I'd hope) that most creators of the original content (writers, artists, other creative content creators, researchers, etc.) were never asked for permission and so it has all been stolen. Many social media platforms will often allow ai training on them without explicitly telling the user-base or will push it as the default setting and make it difficult for their user-base to opt out. Deviantart, for example, lost much of its reputation when it implemented such a policy. It had to backtrack in 2022 afterwards because of the overwhelming backlash. The problem is then that since the content has been ripped from their context and no longer made by a human, many governments therefore can no longer see it as copyrighted. Which, yes, luckily also means that ai users are legally often not allowed to pass off ai as 'their own creation'. Sources: here, here

Then there's the working of generative ai in general. As said before, it simply rips words or image parts from their original, nuanced context and then mesh it together without the user being able to accurately trace back where the info is coming from. A tool like ChatGPT is not a search engine, yet many people use it that way without realising it is not the same thing at all. More on the working of generative ai in detail. Because of how it works, it means there is always a chance for things to be biased and/or inaccurate. If a tool has been trained on social media sources (which ChatGPT for example is) then its responses can easily be skewed to the demographic it's been observing. Bias is an issue is most sources when doing research, but if you have the original source you also have the context of the source. Ai makes it that the original context is no longer clear to the user and so bias can be overlooked and go unnoticed much easier. Source: here

3. Something my colleague mentioned they said in the lecture is that ai tools can be used to help the learning of the students.

Let me start off by saying that I can understand why there is an appeal to ai when you do not know much about the issues I have already mentioned. I am very aware it is probably too late to fully stop the wave of ai tools being published.

There are certain uses to types of ai that can indeed help with accessibility. Such as text-to-voice or the other way around for people with disabilities (let's hope the voice was ethically begotten).

But many of the other uses mentioned in the lecture I have concerns with. They are to do with recognising learning, studying and wellbeing patterns of students. Not only do I not think it is really possible to data-fy the complexity of each and every single student you would have as they are still actively developing as a young person, this also poses privacy risks in case the data is ever compromised. Not to mention that ai is often still faulty and, as it is not a person, will often still make mistakes when faced with how unpredictable a human brain can be. We do not all follow predictable patterns.

The lecture stated that ai tools could help with neurodivergency 'issues'. Obviously I do not speak for others and this next part is purely personal opinion, but I do think it important to nuance this: as someone with auDHD, no ai-tool has been able to help me with my executive dysfunction in the long-term. At first, there is the novelty of the app or tool and I am very motivated. They are often in the form of over-elaborate to-do lists with scheduled alarms. And then the issue arises: the ai tries to train itself on my presented routine... except I don't have one. There is no routine to train itself on, because that is my very problem I am struggling with. Very quickly it always becomes clear that the ai doesn't understand this the way a human mind would. A professionally trained in psychology/therapy human mind. And all I was ever left with was the feeling of even more frustration.

In my opinion, what would help way more than any ai tool would be the funding of mental health care and making it that going to a therapist or psychiatrist or coach is covered by health care the way I only have to pay 5 euros to my doctor while my health care provider pays the rest. (In Belgium) This would make mental health care much more accessible and would have a greater impact than faulty ai tools.

4. It was also said that ai could help students with creative assignments and preparing for spoken interactions both in their native language as well as in the learning of a new one.

I wholeheartedly disagree. Creativity in its essence is about the person creating something from their own mind and putting the effort in to translate those ideas into their medium of choice. Stick figures on lined course paper are more creative than letting a tool like Midjourney generate an image based on stolen content. How are we teaching students to be creative when we allow them to not put a thought in what they want to say and let an ai do it for them?

And since many of these tools are also faulty and biased in their content, how could they accurately replace conversations with real people? Ai cannot fully understand the complexities of language and all the nuances of the contexts around it. Body language, word choice, tone, volume, regional differences, etc.

And as a language teacher, I can truly say there is nothing more frustrating than wanting to assess the writing level of my students, giving them a writing assignment where they need to express their opinion and write it in two tiny paragraphs... and getting an ai response back. Before anyone comes to me saying that my students may simply be very good at English. Indeed, but my current students are not. They are precious, but their English skills are very flawed. It is very easy to see when they wrote it or ChatGPT. It is not only frustrating to not being able to trust part of your students' honesty and knowing they learned nothing from the assignment cause you can't give any feedback; it is almost offensive that they think I wouldn't notice it.

5. Apparently, it was mentioned in the lecture that in schools where ai is banned currently, students are fearful that their jobs would be taken away by ai and that in schools where ai was allowed that students had much more positive interactions with technology.

First off, I was not able to see the source and data that this statement was based on. However, I personally cannot shake the feeling there's a data bias in there. Of course students will feel more positively towards ai if they're not told about all the concerns around it.

Secondly, the fact that in the lecture it was (reportedly) framed that being scared your job would disappear because of ai, was untrue is... infuriating. Because it already is becoming a reality. Let's not forget what partially caused the SAG-AFTRA strike in 2023. Corporations see an easy (read: cheap) way to get marketable content by using ai at the cost of the creative professionals. Unregulated ai use by businesses causing the loss of jobs for real-life humans, is very much a threat. Dismissing this is basically lying to young students.

6. My conclusion:

I am frustrated. It's clamoured that we, as teachers, should educate more about ai and it's responsible use. However, at the same time the many concerns and issues around most of the accessible ai tools are swept under the rug and not actively talked about.

I find the constant surging rise of generative ai everywhere very concerning and I can only hope that more people will start seeing it too.

Thank you for reading.

[glitterobsessive]

the ultimate paranatural theory of ever: death cult sesame street

aka why razor rex is connected to shred eagle — aka the crack theory that regretfully made more sense the more i thought about it.

1. the names! shred eagle and razor rex both follow the naming convention of (skating related word) + (animal).

yes i am taking rex as short for t-rex, and yes this means razor is as in razor scooter. a fitting namesake for a deity of death

2. the horrific deaths! dimitri’s POV this chapter included this little excerpt:

whether the death cult caused this incident or was formed because of it is anyone’s guess. either way horrible deaths -> death cult is a very easy connection to make.

reminding the audience about shred eagle by bringing him up again would also be smart from a writing standpoint if he ends up being plot relevant

3. public access educational television! a lot of razor rex’s lackeys match that vibe. fitting for parkour sesame street

- baxter and coach are both school teachers. yay education!

- mr sun. happiness sing song spirit, basically elmo but round.

-death cultists love math

- ….i’ll be honest this kind of falls apart for the fortune teller cultist and the trophy lazer goblin (The Mandrake). i feel like mandrake could be a muppet guy under the cloak? but let’s be real that doesn’t count as evidence

4. it would be funny

[chronic-cane]

Judy Heumann passed away on March 3rd, 2023

She said she believed it was her parents’ experience [fleeing from Nazi Germany and the Holocaust as children] that led them to reject doctors’ advice to have their daughter institutionalized after she contracted polio and lost the use of her legs. “They came from a country where families got separated, some children sent away, others taken from their families by the authorities and never returned — all part of a campaign of systematic dehumanization and murder,” she wrote in her memoir, “Being Heumann.” “Their daughter, disabled or not, wasn’t going anywhere.”

If you have Netflix, Heumann is in Crip Camp, an amazing documentary on disability rights.

Here is her website that lists her publications, including her recent 2020 memoir called "Being Heumann" (please do not pirate her publications out of respect. Buy them or find them at a library).

This woman is one of the main reasons why disabled children in the US can attend public school. She fought for accessibility in Federal buildings and work places before fighting for the ADA, for accessibility in all spaces.

I am heartbroken to hear of her passing. She has impacted the lives of millions if not billions of people for the better. May her memory be a blessing.

[mariacallous]

(JTA) – The Biden Administration’s new point person for combating book bans at school districts and public libraries across the country is a gay, Jewish progressive activist who has served as a government liaison to the Jewish and LGBTQ communities.

The appointment of Matt Nosanchuk comes as the thousands of book challenges nationwide have focused on books with LGBTQ as well as Jewish themes, in addition to works about race. Nosanchuk was named a deputy assistant secretary in the Department of Education’s civil rights office earlier this month. In that role, he will lead training sessions for schools and libraries on how to deal with book bans — and warn districts that the department believes book bans can violate civil rights laws.

An Education Department official recently told the 74, an education news site, that the bans “are a threat to students’ rights and freedoms.”

“I am excited to return to public service to work on behalf of the American people,” Nosanchuk posted to LinkedIn earlier this month. “There is a lot of important work to do!”

The Education Department declined to make Nosanchuk available for an interview. He has already taken heat from conservative outlets, which have pushed the narrative that the books being removed from schools and libraries are too sexually explicit for children. Kayleigh McEnany, the Fox News host who served as Donald Trump’s press secretary, called him a “porn enforcer” on-air.

But his appointment has been celebrated by librarians and book access activists. “This is a step forward for the Biden Administration, who has heard the concerns of parents and taken action, but it is just the beginning,” the National Parents Union, a progressive parental education activist group, said in a statement.

Nosanchuk’s career has largely focused on working with the LGBTQ and Jewish communities. In 2009, after serving in a number of roles in Washington, D.C., Nosanchuk was appointed as the Department of Justice’s liaison to the LGBTQ community — a position he held while Obama was still publicly opposed to same-sex marriage. He later worked on the Obama administration’s opposition to a law barring same-sex couples from receiving federal benefits.

He subsequently served as the White House liaison to the Jewish community during Obama’s second term, and in 2020 was the Democratic National Committee’s political organizer for Jewish outreach and LGBTQ engagement. That same year, he cofounded the New York Jewish Agenda, a progressive policy group that he led until earlier this year.

Nosanchuk’s first webinar in his new role was held Tuesday in partnership with the American Library Association, an organization with which a number of Republican-led states have recently cut ties. He begins his work after a year that has seen several school districts take aim at books focused on Jewish experiences or the Holocaust.

Two weeks ago, a Texas school district fired a middle school teacher reportedly for reading a passage from an illustrated adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary to eighth-grade students. Other schools’ removals of “The Fixer,” a Jodi Picoult novel about the Holocaust and other texts have been likened to Nazi and Stalinist book burnings —  comparisons that proponents of the book restrictions reject.

Democratic politicians, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, have accused Republicans of wanting “to ban books on the Holocaust.” A recent Senate hearing on book bans included testimony from Cameron Samuels, a Jewish advocate for access to books, along with numerous references to “Maus,” a graphic novel by Art Spiegelman about the Holocaust that was pulled from a Tennessee middle school curriculum last year.

PEN America, a literary free-speech advocacy group, welcomed Nosanchuk’s appointment.

“Book removals and restrictions continue apace across the country, as the tactics to silence certain voices and identities are sharpened,” the group said in a statement. “Empowering the coordinator to address this ongoing movement is critical.”

[xgummibearx]

Hit by a Quirk

All Might x F reader. 

author’s note: I AM FINALLY GONNA TRY TO FINISH THIS SERIES, I have been procrastinating on this one cause I admit I do not like Endeavor and I felt like I had to write one for him but...I kinda don’t want to. SO, instead I am gonna write another All Might X reader and I’ll write the Endeavor one if people request it.

In case you were unfamiliar with this series, this little blurb explains the general concept. I have written stories in the series so far for: Fatgum, Aizawa, Present Mic, Hawkes, and Nighteye. 

https://at.tumblr.com/xgummibearx/hit-with-a-quirk-pro-heroes-x-teacher-reader/pbaoi17qx9e5

OKAY, here ya go: 

Summary: All Might has been reverted to his early childhood years, and...there are many that would love to get their hands on a helpless, defenseless All Might. You can’t let that happen. 

Note: The reader for this is I suppose, kinda aged up? I’m picturing they grew up with All Might. 

-----------------

Cameras were flashing in the distance as Kamui ran to the scene, a villain in a large trenchoat was being lead quivering and shaking under Midnight’s watchful eye. Pink smoke was slowly ebbing away as the villiain was lead in daze to a well armoured vehicle. “The media! They’re coming, someone uploaded a video of civillians coming across Hawkes and Endeavor after their attack...this place is going to be blown up with paparazzi any minute...” He looked around frantically, another sleek black vehicle pulling up. “Where’s All Might?!” Midnight was opening the door of the black car to reveal Nezu, looking around to access the damage. He had lost two, and according to Midnight’s report now three crucial staff members -not to mention one if his own students-to this attack. 

Special ops agents fanned out as another spoke with the police, asking the villian questions about his encounter with the retired Number One hero. Midnight approached Nezu as he peered around trash cans and casually walked around. “Sir, what have you heard about the other heroes? Is there any information?” She asked gently as Nezu paused at a wall that was...quite busted, and sure enough there was Toshinori. In a dark yellow suit that was now much, much too big. He was bruised, and shaking, his eyes wide with fear and confusion. Midnight stepped forward immediately but Nezu gently offered his hand. 

“I can take things from here, the other heroes are fine...In fact, I have made arrangements for most of them, but little Taishiro is currently passed out in the back seat of the staff car, would you mind taking him to our quirk specialist? I already texted you her address...I’ll need to meet you back at the school right away.” Midnight nodded, looking up at All Might one more time with worry. "That stubborn goat...he's supposed to be retired." Se thought, walking back to the staff car.

Nezu approached Toshinori, smiling gently. “Hello Yagi..."

-----

He was sitting in what appeared to be a a waiting room, with other children passed out all around him. Yagi was unfamiliar with any of them, or even where he was. He was the eldest of the other four in the room...well, three now as he watched a nice looking lady lead the boy that had been passed out on the floor out of the building. He had heard the boy's name, "shouta". There was something so familiar about that name.

Yagi was too tired to think about it, his eyes closing from exhaustion.

There was a gentle tap on his shoulder, and his eyes met a gentle face. She was wearing a hero costume, and her hair was a mess. Most of the heroes attacked that night were being monitored by early quirk development specialists, essentially workers who had studied and trained to handle working with children with still developing quirks. With the rise of quirks that were becoming more powerful with each generation, it was becoming a popular profession and held in the same regard as child workers, Educational Assistants, and teachers. Most public schools had at least two or three on hand, but this...this was a special case.

"He is at his most vulnerable...he's only just retired, we don't think the media discovered that he was part of the attack but we cannot take any chances!" Nezu had insisted. "If the wrong people find out that All Might has been reduced to this there is no telling what could happen."

Yagi turned his tired gaze up to (x), he yawned. "Mrs. (L/N)?" He asked, "Why are you dressed like that...aren't you a bank teller?" Yagi mumbled. (x) couldn't help but chuckle, she supposed that she did resemble her mother a bit.

"It seems his memory is still pretty good..." She thought. "Well Yagi, I had a costume party to attend to with work, but I was heading home...did you want to come with me?" Yagi nodded, taking her hand. (x) didn't know how to feel, did this even count as lying? If she tried to explain everything that would probably just confuse him, and scare him even more. She looked in the rearview mirror, as Yagi slept in the backseat to her car. It really had been almost a lifetime ago since she had last seen him like this, his face unburdened and free. They would chase frogs along the rivers, and come home with handfuls of snails. As she tucked him into bed, and closed the door one thought was stuck on repeat. "I won't let anyone hurt you Yagi..." She clenched her fist. "I promise..."

"Excuse me, Mrs. (L/N)... where is (x)?" The morning had come warm, bright, and sunny. She had honestly forgotten how soft spoken and polite he had been as a child. Bright blue eyes hidden behind that mess of long blond hair.

"(x) is back home, I'm house sitting for my sister at the moment." She gently explained, seeing Yagi nod, and not even question her words...the conflicted guilt continued. She was unsure how long she could keep this up.

Keeping him entertained was thankfully easy, as a child his favorite place had always been the library, sitting in squashy bean bag chairs to read his favorite picture books. "And when the prince found the Sleeping beauty in her tower...he found the sight of her, alone in her chambers so sad and beautiful that he thought to depart from her with a kiss." (x) blew a raspberry on Yagi's cheek. His giggles were so loud, they found themselves outside the library with the book in hand and stern librarian closing the door behind. (x) sighed. "Nothing for it I suppose...it was getting close to closing time anyway..." Yagi shrugged.

"Yeah...but could we read the story before bed?" He asked. (X) nodded with a gentle smile. Bedtime...how long would this last anyway? She held his hand tight, her mind wandering as they walked home. As glad as she was to see her friend so bright, she missed him...the him she had grown old with, their memories and history...what if he didn't change back?

"Excuse me miss?" She turned, her hand still gripping onto Yagi's tightly. A tall man stood, with piercing eyes that seemed to see right through her. "I could use some help, I seem to be a bit lost..." He smiled, approaching slowly. "I came in from Saitama; my brother lives here in Musutafu." (x) stared him down. She didn't trust him. "Well, there is the transit train station about two blocks from here that way." She gestured down the street. "You should be able to find a map, and if you have a working cell phone you could call your brother and have him send you the address."

"I'll be sure to keep that in mind..." An arm suddenly hit her square in the back, catching her by surprise. She let go of Yagi's ahand and her blood ran cold.

"MISS (L/N)!" Her head whipped around as the man asking for directions grabbed her by the arm. She could see another individual, seemingly they had snuck in from behind to hit her and they had grabbed him.

"TOSHINORI!" She screamed, her other arm restrained as the kidnapper made for a waiting car.

"So, the rumours were right, he really was turned into a helpless little brat just like the others...I know a lot of people who would pay big bucks to bring the retired golden boy to safety, thanks for delivering the package hag." (X) snarled, her eyes flashing with rage as the car sped off.

"You haven't done your homework... DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM YOU SCUM!?" With a roar she broke from the assailant's hold. All he saw were stars and a flash of golden light as her fist collided with his face. She didn't even bother to take the time to see his body fall to the ground before she was off like a shot. She had a simple power up type quirk, nothing to write home about but she was not one to be reckoned with. "White...the car was white, blocked out windows..." They would be speeding. Her heart was racing as she screamed into her communicator, a direct line to the Fat Office hero agency. " This is (H/N) I was ambushed! Golden Eagle was taken! I repeat, Golden Eagle has been taken, I am in pursuit!" Her eyes caught a vehicle, a white car diving into a back street. "I HAVE VISUAL! Locking in my coordinates, send reinforcements as soon as you can!"

In the car, Yagi was shaking. His attacker was still holding him with an iron grip. "Dammit...that old hag is still after us!" Yagi craned his neck, his eyes wide as he looked out the back window. There she was, surrounded in gold and scarlet flames like a comet. "I guess the boss couldn't take her...dammit I thought they hired some daycare bitch like they did for the others! Not a pro!" Yagi's eyes flashed with anger at the insult.

"How dare they! (X) is an amazing hero, she's..." He froze, looking back. "(X)...that's (X)! Wait...why am I..." He looked down at his hands that suddenly felt too small. Yagi looked up as one of the other men in the car grabbed a huge looking gun.

"Doesn't matter, I'll take care of this!" Yagi watched in horror, covering his ears as it went off. His screams were drowned as the back window was broken, bullets raining down on (x).

"NO! (X) LOOK OUT!" She was too late, two of the bullet piercing her shoulders and making her fall to the ground, sliding painfully across the pavement. Yagi was shaking, tears rolling down his eyes. "YOU MONSTERS!" He screamed, he was met with laughter as one of them picked him up by the hair.

"Pipe down you brat!" They screamed into his face, throwing him to the floor of the car. He sobbed, his head aching where they had pulled as he felt the rumble of the car underneath. There had to be something he could do, there had to be. He was surrounded by smoke.

"Please...one last bit of strength..." was his last thought before the attacker's found themselves met with blue eyes that glowed like headlights, his memories flooding back as he towered over them. "One hit...I have one hit, make it count!" All Might, fully grown and already steaming as he strained to get in that one hit leaped to the front seat, crushing the steering wheel in one punch before falling to his knees.

(x) looked up, shaking as she watched in horror. The car swerved violently to the left, turning sideways. "YAGI! NO, YAGI!" She screamed, limping as she ran towards the vehicle, and overhead searchlights splashed over the scene like beacons as police sirens closed in. She froze, a figure climbing out of the window on the other side. He was frail looking, and thin with familiar golden hair. "Yagi...that's him!" Relief washed over as she tried to pick up the pace. With a wince she tripped, falling over onto the pavement once more.

"(x)! Hold on, don't strain yourself!" He coughed, turning his face as spat blood to the ground. "Could the say the same for myself I guess..." He cursed, kneeling beside her as the police inspected the vehicle, pulling out three unconscious but still very much alive men. (X) Cradled her arm, the blood from the two bullet wounds staining her clothes. "Shit...can we get some paramedics over here!?" Toshinori shouted, helping her sit up.

"You're here..." She took his hand, leaning against him as he held the back of her head with a small chuckle and a firm squeeze of her hand.

"Yeah...I'm here."

Author's Note:

OKAY that finally concludes the hit by a quirk series, with this out of the way I am looking forward to focusing on my other fic ideas! However, I am always open to ideas and suggestions! I also will be doing an announcement on some possible changes to the blog to expand our options outside of just My Hero.

[lavenderleahy]

Curious about the literacy crisis in the US?

Taking a break from my regular fandom-centric posts to share this. If you're from the United States, you've probably heard of or witnessed the literacy crisis we are currently experiencing. There is a lot of discussion surrounding the causes of this. Covid, technology, failing schools, and TikTok have all been blamed.

But our literacy crisis didn't just begin in 2020. It's been happening for a very long time. Right now, only about 30% of 4th graders are reading proficiently. And another ~30% can't read at all. Roughly 22% of adults in the U.S.A. are functionally illiterate. What on earth is happening? If this has been going on for decades, TikTok can't be to blame.

Keep reading below the cut for a podcast recommendation about this topic.

Source

Emily Hanford, an education journalist, has been following this story for quite some time. One of her most valuable articles, titled "Hard Words: Why Aren't Kids Being Taught to Read?" was published in 2018 and can be found here. It made the details of the literacy crisis well-known and accessible to parents and the public. Here's a snippet from the article:

The teachers were talking about how kids should attack words in a story. When a child came to a word he didn't know, the teacher would tell him to look at the picture and guess. The most important thing was for the child to understand the meaning of the story, not the exact words on the page. So, if a kid came to the word "horse" and said "house," the teacher would say it's wrong. But, Harper said, "if the kid said 'pony,' it'd be right because pony and horse mean the same thing."

Harper was shocked. First of all, pony and horse don't mean the same thing. Second, the idea that you look at pictures and guess when you don't know a word seemed odd to her. "I wouldn't have been able to use that strategy at the secondary level," she said. There were no pictures in the books her high school students read.

If you're a proficient reader, you should be shocked, too. Guessing words based on the pictures? That is NOT reading. And yet, it is one common tool of an instructional method called the theee-cueing system. This method is dangerous and harmful to students who are at risk for poor reading or who have learning disabilities such as dyslexia.

But there is a better way!

In 2022, APM Reports produced a limited podcast titled Sold a Story, in which Emily Hanford discovers the widespread literacy crisis and its causes. Hanford also shares about a ln approach called structured literacy, which is an approach based in the science of reading. The process of learning to read has been heavily studied by educational researchers and neuroscientists alike, and so we know what instructional methods work! Sadly, the research has not made it any to every classroom. But Sold a Story is looking to change that.

The original podcast was 6 episodes long with two bonus episodes being released the following year. Sold a Story is releasing two more episodes, the first on Thursday, April 4, 2024. I highly recommend listening if you are a parent, teacher, or know a child in the public education system. This podcast will shock you, but I hope it will also provoke you to take action.

The only way to help our children read is to know better and do better. And that starts with knowing better.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask. I am a reading specialist with an endorsement in dyslexia intervention, so this is a topic about which I am very passionate.

[emp-711]

Triumphs and frustrations with a complex physical disability and a brain at nearly midlife… Searching for a champion to share and grow with

My Cerebral Palsy made life without diapers very traumatizing for me. From age 4–21, I was in underwear with bladder accidents from spasms at least once a week. Toilet training was a point of pride for my mom, even though most doctors and my preschool and elementary teachers told her not to focus on it. She thought I could outthink my body. Instead, having to plan my relief breaks around other people has given me kidney issues at 42 and that is after choosing to go back into diapers as a junior in college. Based on this experience, wearing diapers is healthier than waiting on people to help me to the bathroom. Also, as a guy who is 6 foot 4 and 170 pounds, toilet transfers several times a day are exhausting and potentially dangerous for me and my support people.

There is no correlation between incontinence and intelligence. Mom said she didn’t want me diapered after the typical age because she thought people would perceive me as being stupid…Well I have been wearing 24/7 for over 20 years including under my gown at my Ph.D graduation… 😘 … My advice to emerging adults with disabilities is that your ability to accomplish great things is a product motivation, not the undergarments you are wearing. In my observation and experience, the responsibility of motivation evolves throughout the developmental process. Initially, this responsibility lies with parents and other supports, to explore and educate themselves about success stories of adults with similar challenges, focusing on understanding the strategies that have led to positive outcomes. As youth with disabilities approach preadolescents (middle school), the responsibility gradually for exploration and experimentation gradually shifts from solely residing with the parental figure to a joint venture that increasingly becomes more driven by curiosity of the individual themselves. Today’s adolescent preteen and teenager is constantly engaged with personal technology and electronic media. The focus of at least some of this screen time can be given to meaningful discovery of not only strengths, interests, and abilities but also the possible strategies that can be used to bring abstract dreams into reality. As the time for high school approaches, a portion of this exploration time should be dedicated to experiential learning, this includes testing strategies that will allow the person with self-care challenges to participate in their community with minimal effects from their limitations. Some examples of considerations include exploring methods for community access through transportation, strategies for accessing nutrition while public and elimination (bladder/bowel) management.

My decision to use diapers full-time again with the occasional addition of male catheters, as I eluded to earlier, was the product of a New Year’s resolution in 2002. Ironically, I felt as if this was a means of asserting control over one aspect of my life. It was around the age of 25 that I began to realize that there were some unintended social consequences of my decision that I am still struggling to overcome. I have learned that midstream people are not very receptive to a guy in a wheelchair who needs fed and his diapers changed, but otherwise is completely cognitively intact, even bright with a sarcastic and very dry wit.

 I had to learn to have fun with it along the way, finding companionship from people who will understand my needs and embrace my choices has been difficult. After some research, I discovered that there was a group of people who enjoyed doing the same things I needed and mostly by choice, the ABDL and medfet communities. Happiness for me will be finding a woman who considers the AB and medical needs as normal and has fun doing it. The lifestyle or fetish angle removes the awkwardness for both of us. It would be awesome to be in a crowded public place (i.e. restaurant, sporting event) and know that there is at least one other person there who is experiencing the same sensation I am feeling inside as well as from the diaper against my body and clothing. At last I will not feel alone in the world. There is also some intrigue and humor in the idea that only we know that each other is wearing. For those of you who prefer more crude or masculine visualization, as I used to say in one of my profiles on a certain ABDL dating site, a diaper nor wheelchair should not also be a chastity belt. Just because I must wear for medical reasons does not mean I am stupid or otherwise not worthy of sharing myself with someone. Sexual intimacy alone is rarely the basis for a solid long-term relationship, however human touch is essential for me. Having no inhibitions about giving or receiving a hug or cuddle is a must for me because I have been deprived of it so much because of misconceptions about body and mind. I am looking for a partner who understands my ambitions and is not afraid to explore their own. The ability to have someone who you can share your most intimate thoughts and feelings with even on the worst days would be a blessing for me. I hope to find someone who is willing to learn and grow together.

If you’re still smiling after reading this… DM me or comment below :-)

[sexcromancy]

saw a post that had some tweet screenshots with true but shallow info about issues affecting native hawaiians so I am gonna share some news articles from honolulu civil beat, the best (and really only 😑) source of investigative reporting in hawai'i!

on the topic of 'olelo, the native hawaiian language, in schools:

^ this article describes a state bill that is unlikely to go anywhere but is such an exciting step towards 'olelo becoming a staple in schools! it already is an option in 32 public high schools, not even counting the many private/charter immersion schools. in general 'olelo is spoken literally 1000%+ more than it was in the 1970s, when it was officially unbanned and the hawaiian language and cultural revival began.

on the school to prison pipeline and disproportionate, punitive incarceration of native hawaiians:

if you read some/all of these articles, please consider dropping some $$ to civil beat! they are entirely subscriber and donor funded and have no paywall, ever. their reporting on the ongoing bureaucratic mishandling of the lahaina victims is also very strong.

[beardedmrbean]

KENOSHA COUNTY, Wis. - A Kenosha County elementary school staff member was taken into custody, accused of sexual misconduct involving a child, on Wednesday.

Parents at Riverview Elementary in Silver Lake told FOX6 News they feel shocked and outraged – and are still trying to process the news.

"I'm disgusted, you know? These are young kids," parent Jessica Sade said.

"It just blows my mind that something like this would happen at this school," said parent Jessica Dechow, who told FOX6 the staff member was an aid to her child. "My heart just sunk. It fell. We're still trying to deal with it."

The Kenosha County Sheriff's Department's Sensitive Crime Unit began an investigation into the 33-year-old woman on Wednesday. Officials said the alleged misconduct involved a current and former student of the school. Officials said, while it is early in this investigation, they determined the misconduct did not happen during school hours or on school property.

"I was very upset that she would choose to use, potentially, her position to abuse a child, when she's supposed to be seen as a mentor," said parent Ashlyn Witting.

Public records show the 33-year-old woman was booked on pending charges of first-degree child sexual assault with a person under the age of 13, exposing genitals/intimate parts to a child, child exploitation and possession of child pornography. The Kenosha County Sheriff's Department identified her as Anna-Marie Crocker and provided a photo.

"She deserves to be in jail. It's gross, and people like that don't deserve to be out, because who knows how many times it's going to happen," said Sade.

According to the school district's website, the woman started as a substitute in 2020 and became a full-time educational assistant the following year. Parents, like Witting, said situations like this are uncomfortable but spark necessary conversations with children.

"We explain to them sometimes there are adults out there who choose to make scary choices for children, and here are some of the warning signs," Witting said.

More charges may be forthcoming as the investigation unfolds. Investigators encourage anyone with pertinent information on this case to come forward. Simply contact the Kenosha County Sheriff’s Department Detective Bureau at 262-605-5102.

Letter from Kim Taylor, school district administrator, to families:

Dear Riverview School Families and Staff,

I want to follow up on the communication I sent you earlier today regarding the arrest of a Riverview School staff member by the Kenosha County Sheriff’s Department. The statement from the Sheriff earlier this evening indicated that the alleged misconduct did not occur during school hours or on school property. We remain in contact with local law enforcement to support their ongoing investigation.

We understand that this situation can be difficult for our students, families and staff to process. Please know that our school counselors are here and ready to provide support as needed. We strongly encourage any students who need some extra help to visit the counseling office at any time—they are here for you. We have asked our teachers to direct all questions and concerns to administrators or our school counselors.

We want to remind everyone of the importance of being vigilant and report any concerns to our administration. This is distressing news and we understand that emotions can impact behavior so we want to stress the importance of maintaining a respectful environment for all individuals. Our focus at this time is on our students and making sure they have access to the safe, supportive, and welcoming learning environment they need and deserve.

Thank you for your attention to this important update. I am available for questions and look forward to continuing to support all students.

[doctormastertardis]

Personal share:

My neighbor (who is a white, German American guy) is married to a native "Filipina" woman who was raised in a remote province in the Philippines as I was... and it's so refreshing to see his 6 year old "American" kids think differently from their (brainwashed/programmed) peers.

Like, for example, if you offer them candy or any sort of dessert, they would ask "does it have high fructose corn syrup?"

And me, being the daughter and grand-daughter of TRIBAL teachers in the Philippines, I asked her back: "what IS fructose corn syrup?" (I know what it is fyi, I'm just trying to engage).... to which she replied, "it's fake sugar and bad for your body." And they are the same way with television shows and books they're exposed to. And they are only 6. They remind me of how I was raised by my mom and grandma.

Most Americans like to downplay knowledge/wisdom (and when Americans do hype up "learning," it's usually in the name of EGO, i.e. "I'm better than you cause I'm educated")... And yall can excuse the shit and say, "because most Americans are in poverty" but my mom and dad literally lived in poverty in the Philippines? My dad was a squatter/homeless man in the Philippines before he became a custodian/chef for the US Navy. He was born in 1933 and my mom in 1944.... My mom was raised by a single mom of 10 kids IN THE MOUNTAINS where there were no libraries or easy access to food... My dad was literally a "war baby". He witnessed World War 2 at age 10.

Yet they both raised me in a household where we were exposed to the most complex and inter-cultural sorts of science, history, art, etc. AND IT NOT BECAUSE OF PRIVILEGE (I went to an "international school" in PI as a child around RICH European, Chinese, and Korean settlers) . My mom made sure to tell us everyday how poor they were growing up (she and my dad worked hard to save up US$89 a year to pay our tuition fee every year in the 90s).... but the reason why I am the way I am today is because they CHOSE to EXPOSE US to different cultures and knowledges due to the hardships they themselves faced growing up.

But most Americans OF ALL COLOR always TAKE THE EASY WAY OUT. And honestly, when my family moved to California when I was 13 (I am 38 now), I saw just how insecure and willfully stupid American kids are. That's why American public school is, to this day, the breeding ground for WILLFUL IGNORANCE. American kids GROW UP TO BE BULLIES.

And I'm not saying this in a condescending manner. I am saying this because it's in COLONIAL cultures like America that BREEDS the type of thinking that "critical thinking" is bad and "being a hard worker" is good.

[ausetkmt]

Teachers enraged that Florida’s new Black history standards say slaves could ‘benefit’

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/education/article277539723.html

The Florida Board of Education Wednesday, July 19, passed new standards for teaching Black history in public schools that included a controversial measure that says slaves could have benefited from their enslavement. pportal@miamiherald.com

The approval of Florida’s new Black history curriculum didn’t surprise Crystal Etienne.

A seventh-grade civics teacher in Miami-Dade County, she has seen it coming since 2022. She attended several civics training sessions over the last year — including the one where the instructor claimed presidents George Washington and Thomas Jefferson opposed slavery, even though both were slave owners — so the changes were somewhat expected. Still, the state’s newly adopted standards for teaching Black history left Etiennne mortified.

The Florida Board of Education certified the new standards Wednesday, causing an uproar among many. Some of the more concerning changes included teachings about how enslaved people benefited from their bondage, an attempt to contextualize American slavery within the global history of slavery and the false equivalence of anti-Black violence with acts of Black resistance.

Rep. Anna Eskamani, D-Orlando, who attended the Wednesday meeting, pointed to part of the middle-school standards that would require instruction to include “how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”

“I am very concerned by these standards, especially … the notion that enslaved people benefited from being enslaved. It’s inaccurate and a scary standard for us to establish in our educational curriculum,” Eskamani said.

Etienne, the West Homestead K-8 Center teacher, was equally disturbed.

“It’s disgusting to use children as pawns in their adult scheme,” she said, calling the changes an “indoctrination” into “white, Christian nationalism.” “They feel like if you’re teaching the bad, it somehow takes away from the good and it doesn’t. If I’m not allowed to teach the evolution of the country and the changes that have been made, what am I doing?”

“This is fascism at its best,” added Karla Hernandez-Mats, president of the United Teachers of Dade, which represents teachers in Miami-Dade public schools. “This is exactly what fascist governments do when they censor teachers, when they go after education, when they try and suppress content from being taught.”

Since the Florida Legislature passed a slew of education laws over the past two years — from giving parents power to challenge books to restricting how gender identity and sexual orientation is taught from Pre-K to eighth grade — teachers have been worried, Hernandez-Mats said.

But these changes related to Black history are “not a way that students should be educated,” she said.

“This is narrowing minds,” Hernandez-Mats said. “We want children to be well-rounded, well-educated, to have access to high-quality education... when you restrict teachers from teaching with honesty and teaching with truth, obviously that’s going to impact conversations that we’re able to engage in with our students.”

Follows changes to AP African American course

The controversy over how Black history will be taught in Florida’s public schools follows a decision by the College Board earlier this year to leave out references in its new AP African American Studies course to the Black Lives Matter movement and slavery reparations, among other topics. The Board’s decision came after Gov. Ron DeSantis criticized the pilot course.

READ MORE: Black leaders blast College Board’s changes to AP African American Studies course

Florida already underperforms at teaching Black history. Although the instruction has been required since 1994, only 11 of the state’s 67 school districts sufficiently teach Black history, according to Bernadette Kelley-Brown, principal investigator and former chair of the African American History Task Force, which monitors how districts heed the law.

“This new statute now basically says if African American history is being taught, it is going to be taught in such an inappropriate, historically inaccurate, watered down way that it makes it untenable,” said former State Sen. Dwight Bullard, a Democrat, who attended the Board of Education meeting in Orlando on Wednesday.

The meeting seemed designed to deter the average person from going, Bullard said. It was held on a weekday in the back of resort with $28 parking (more than $30 for valet). After the guidelines were explained, a public comment portion ensued during which the vast majority opposed the changes. Then the board voted to approve the curriculum.

A former high school history teacher, Bullard couldn’t fathom telling his students that there’s a “silver lining in slavery.” He then took it a step further.

“Imagine the blowback of the same teacher trying to give you the upside of Nazi Germany,” said Bullard, now the senior political advisor of Florida Rising, a voting rights group in Florida. “Not only would it not be allowed, there would be bipartisan outrage over the idea that any teacher, a teacher or a curriculum trying to give the sunny side of Adolf Hitler. Yet we now have an African American history statute that is supposed to now give you this notion of the benevolent master, or the upside or benefit of being enslaved in America. It’s crazy.”

To Marvin Dunn, a man who has made a career off of keeping Florida’s Black history alive, most recently through his “Teach the Truth” tours, the issues with the new curriculum were plentiful. He called the “attempt to reach some sort of equivalency for racial violence in our history” flat-out wrong. He called the idea that enslaved people benefited from their subjugation “evil.” And he called the sparse mention of lynchings, which was only found twice in an explanation of guidelines, downright disrespectful.

Awakening Black parents

Dunn also questioned why students had to learn about “slavery in China, slavery in Asia, slavery in Africa” in a Black history course, something he saw as an an effort to show that “we were just another country that had slavery.” American slavery, however, was very unique.

“It was the only system of slavery in the world in which the people who were enslaved were defined as property, were reduced to chattel property,” Dunn said.

“For a Black child to sit in a Florida classroom and hear that their ancestors benefited from enslavement, how do you think” they will react? Dunn asked. “They are going to be hurt, they are going to be angry, they are going to tell their parents that this is being taught in the school.”

That, if anything, is the only positive takeaway from the situation: “These standards have awakened a sleeping giant that’s Black parents in this state,” Dunn said.

Etienne agreed, adding that she’s already in contact with many parents who have voiced their displeasure. She, for one, doesn’t have a choice but to abide by the new guidelines.

What she will do, though, is encourage her students to do their own research. To think critically. To answer their questions honestly.

“My plan is to give them as much information as possible so that they can make their own decisions,” Etienne said.

[weepingpussywillowtree]

as an ex-homeschooled kid (ages 5-16), I have the somewhat unique viewpoint that homeschooling and the public school system in the US are both fucked up actually.

Frankly, all of the homeschool kids I met (myself included) had families that were using homeschooling to cover up some form of abuse. From severe physical abuse to psychological abuse and educational neglect. Most of them were not even receiving the same level of education they'd have access to in their school districts shitty public school. It is almost impossible to achieve responsible homeschooling, and the fact that there is absolutely no oversight on it in most states because children are seen as property causes a lot of suffering that I've seen firsthand, and had lifelong impacts on these kids' futures.

On the flip side, public school is eerily similar to imprisonment. I am far from the first person to point this out. Bodily functions, meals, and access to the outdoors are regulated. Many of the schools I grew up around had a huge police presence on campus which disproportionately targeted students of color. I remember my friends telling me that they couldn't administer their own lifesaving medication, even in middle and high school, it was taken from them and kept with the nurse. I smuggled my inhaler into school in my own backpack when I went to public high school.

I bled all over a desk chair in AP literature because the teacher said you would receive a zero on a "discussion quiz" that was worth a large portion of your grade if you went to the bathroom, even for an emergency. The mirrors in the bathrooms were removed because girls were "spending too much time looking at themselves". Bathroom doors were regularly locked. We had five minutes to get from class to class in our large building or else be punished. In Honors US history, my teacher called the school police on one of my only black classmates (honors and AP classes were gatekept to mostly white kids, and standard classes were glorified babysitting) because she thought she rolled her eyes at her and this was "a threat to her personal safety". She got dragged out of the classroom. I got in trouble for having read, seen, or done activities/books before. For "talking back" to staff, which was apparently just expressing my basic needs. And for reading library books instead of looking at my phone during free time. We did active shooter drills where we practiced barricading doors. One of my English teachers almost got fired for letting us out ten minutes early at the end of the day if we were finished with our work. We had 25 minutes to get lunch, eat it, go to the bathroom, and get to our next class. I got mono and almost got suspended for taking "too many sick days". Luckily, my family could afford to get me a doctor's note.

As a teenager who did not grow up in this environment, this was a complete shock to my system. How TF did other kids live like this? No wonder they had no interest in learning if this is what the learning consisted of. And this was a "nice" high school, that people moved to the district to send their kids to. Public school destroyed many of my classmates curiosities, confidence, and will to go against the grain. It started a lot of my classmates of color down the school to prison pipeline. Kids are right, school sucks. They aren't just being hyperbolic. At the same time, homeschooling your kids is not the answer. Not to mention, most families do not even have the means to have a parent at home homeschooling.

The way we treat children is fucking depressing. Kids need more rights.