Minnesota University Teachers Must Repudiate American Dream To Get Teaching License

[Epic]

http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentary/70662162.html


Do you believe in the American dream -- the idea that in this country, hardworking people of every race, color and creed can get ahead on their own merits? If so, that belief may soon bar you from getting a license to teach in Minnesota public schools -- at least if you plan to get your teaching degree at the University of Minnesota's Twin Cities campus.

In a report compiled last summer, the Race, Culture, Class and Gender Task Group at the U's College of Education and Human Development recommended that aspiring teachers there must repudiate the notion of "the American Dream" in order to obtain the recommendation for licensure required by the Minnesota Board of Teaching. Instead, teacher candidates must embrace -- and be prepared to teach our state's kids -- the task force's own vision of America as an oppressive hellhole: racist, sexist and homophobic.

[0zzy]

http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentary/70662162.html

I am not living there!
f my life.

[risk_reward]

I am not living there!
f my life.

I live here just fine. My 1st grader's teacher is wonderful.






Did I mention we homeschool. :D

[tangent4ronpaul]

I live here just fine. My 1st grader's teacher is wonderful.






Did I mention we homeschool. :D

LOL!

-t

[heavenlyboy34]

So I guess public school isn't the same as private school, as some claim. :eek:

[__27__]

What is this 'American Dream' you speak of? Do you personally know each of the 300,000,000 American's, and personally know what their dream is? Do you know for a fact that this dream that YOU seem to like so much is liked or even wanted by all of them?

I don't know what exactly they may be pushing in the absence of 'your' American Dream, nor do I defend them pushing anything at all, but I reject the entire notion of any one-size-fits-all American Dream by very definition. The only dream in America should be to create your OWN dream, for each person [as ultimate ruler of his or her own self] to define what success and happiness means to them, not accept what YOU (or anyone else) push on them. The tone of your post, and the tone of the excerpt from the article, is not anger that something is being pushed on individuals, just that what is being pushed is not what YOU want to be pushed.

[dr. hfn]

Where the hell did "The American Dream" come from? Who made it up?

[__27__]

Where the hell did "The American Dream" come from? Who made it up?

White suburban moms.

[tremendoustie]

I live here just fine. My 1st grader's teacher is wonderful.






Did I mention we homeschool. :D

My 1st grade teacher was bad. My third grade teacher was awful. My fourth grade teachers, however, and teachers for grades thereafter, were excellent.

Can you guess when we started home schooling? ;):D

[Promontorium]

What is this 'American Dream' you speak of? Do you personally know each of the 300,000,000 American's, and personally know what their dream is? Do you know for a fact that this dream that YOU seem to like so much is liked or even wanted by all of them?

I don't know what exactly they may be pushing in the absence of 'your' American Dream, nor do I defend them pushing anything at all, but I reject the entire notion of any one-size-fits-all American Dream by very definition. The only dream in America should be to create your OWN dream, for each person [as ultimate ruler of his or her own self] to define what success and happiness means to them, not accept what YOU (or anyone else) push on them. The tone of your post, and the tone of the excerpt from the article, is not anger that something is being pushed on individuals, just that what is being pushed is not what YOU want to be pushed.

I'm going to go out on a limb here, and assume that most teachers in most places DO NOT swear allegiance to any particular ideological philosophy in order to become teachers.

So the change would be this, from nuetrality to specifically swearing against various concepts of liberty and equality.

So your comment makes no sense to me. It's all spin, and no substance, and it is rather irritating to read.

It seems you are trying to justify this, by claiming it's already being done, but with a different philosophy. Which it isn't.


You can hate every concept of the American Dream all you want. Burn your flags, damn the military, inside job your 9/11s, but fuck if you have any right to make teachers spew that bullshit in order to be certified.

These people broke the nuetrality, or in logical terms, the "liberty of thought" in requiring allegiance to an ideal, albeit a very negative and hateful one. And you are supporting it, specifically because you agree with the ideal, not the practice, yet damn the OP for exactly what you are literally doing, and the OP isn't.

[devil21]

That's the beauty of the American Dream. It's whatever you want it to be. Don't get sidetracked by the consumerist hijacking and turning it into "The American Dream(tm)". I see a move to renounce anything as being the same as the indoctrination into something else. Otherwise, you're just requiring teachers to wipe their minds and become slave robots, free of any and all independent thought.

Being a mindless slave is definitely no one's dream, whether American or not.