conducting elaborate social engineering project:
A white social studies teacher attempted to enliven a seventh-grade discussion of slavery by binding the hands and feet of two black girls, prompting outrage from one girl’s mother and the local chapter of the NAACP. After the mother complained to Haverstraw Middle School, the superintendent said he was having “conversations with our staff on how to deliver effective lessons.”
“If a student was upset, then it was a bad idea,” said Superintendent Brian Monahan of the North Rockland School District in New York City’s northern suburbs.
The teacher apologized to the mother who complained and her 13-year-old daughter during a meeting Thursday that also included a representative of the local NAACP. But the mother, Christine Shand of Haverstraw, said Friday she thinks the teacher should be removed from the class.
“I think the teacher should have gotten some discipline,” Shand said. “I know if that was me, I would be uncomfortable going back to that class. Why should my daughter have to switch?”
Monahan refused to say what, if any, measures were taken against the teacher, Eileen Bernstein, who was still working on Friday. The school district said she was not available for comment.
“We encourage our teachers to deliver the curriculum in a variety of ways, to go beyond just reading the textbook,” the superintendent said. “We don’t want to discourage creativity. But this obviously went wrong because the student was upset.”
Yes, it makes me laugh.
Demeanwhile (from last year):
A SCHOOL was yesterday accused of MAKING teachers dress up as Asians for a day – to celebrate a Muslim festival.
Kids at the 257-pupil primary have also been told to don ethnic garb even though most are Christians.
The morning assembly will be open to all parents – but dads are BARRED from a women-only party in the afternoon because Muslim husbands object to wives mixing with other men.
Just two members of staff – a part-time teacher and a teaching assistant – are Muslim.
Yesterday a relative of one of the 39 others said: “Staff have got to go along with it – or let’s face it, they would be branded racist.
“A white social studies teacher attempted to enliven a seventh-grade discussion of slavery…”
Instead of simply breathlessly caterwalling and handwringing about the horrors! of the middle passage like slavery was still in effect today; you know, NEA standard operating procedure. Of course, the first strike against her, a priori, was her lack of melanin; she wasn’t feeeelin’ it, dawg…
I mean, what kind of diversity is that, where a white teacher has black pupils…
“The teacher apologized to the mother who complained and her 13-year-old daughter during a meeting Thursday that also included a representative of the local NAACP. But the mother, Christine Shand of Haverstraw, said Friday she thinks the teacher should be removed from the class.”
Hmmmmm…I wonder which group sat in with the principal of the NC school where the teacher drove the little girl to tears over her support for McCain. I guess that teacher was just lucky that those parents, of which she indirectly insulted bith and said the father would not be coming back from Iraq for many years if O! lost the election, had a more forgiving nature than Ms. Shand; who seems to be seeking a bit of her own retribution from the teacher Ms. Bernstein…
Next we’ll have Rev. Al swooping in for the coup-de-main, to insure that this teacher is fired…
I sure hope Ms. Bernstein is Jewish…She’ll need several cards from the identity politics deck to get past this episode…
Because after all, we learned this past year that the race card trumps gender!
Overall, a bad move by the teacher, but I loved this:
“If a student was upset, then it was a bad idea,â€Â
Boy, if I knew of this standard back when I was being pummeled by the nuns…
OK, I’ll jump in. I agree with Percy; the things I could have gotten away with had I only known. But as boneheaded as this little stunt was, it was really stupid for another reason: safety. Does tying people up in a public school make sense? Jeez.
Thanks, 3R. Jump in more often.
I knew some folks back in college who were really into that kind of thing.
A white social studies teacher attempted to enliven a seventh-grade discussion of slavery…
Mission accomplished!
[…] Go read: A white social studies teacher attempted to enliven a seventh-grade discussion of slavery by binding the hands and feet of two black girls, prompting outrage from one girl’s mother and the local chapter of the NAACP. After the mother complained to Haverstraw Middle School, the superintendent said he was having “conversations with our staff on how to deliver effective lessons.†[…]
I’m just glad I’m not in school anymore. That part about “rum, sodomy and the lash” has got to hurt. Maybe Sullivan is available for the role…
They should have just followed in the spirit of the second example, taught slavery from the Muzzie perspective and let the African-American kids tie up the European-Americans. Could have also used it to show how history repeats itself.
That part about “rum, sodomy and the lash†has got to hurt.
Where I’m from they call that a fun Saturday night.
Okay, I’ll say it. Stupid stupid stupid. Slavery is history, not the present, and humiliating a student in order to give other students a graphic portrayal of humiliation is the most arrogant and boneheaded thing I’ve ever heard. If a teacher did that to my kid I’d be screaming for her head. This one displayed the same hubris as the NC teacher that went off on the student that supported McCain.
I dropped out of high school almost 30 years ago because I was disgusted with the utter waste of time that our public schools have become, and they’ve only gotten worse. Every time my 13 yo asks why he should have to go to school I have more difficulty coming up with an answer. Because I want to consign you to the whims and indoctrination of a pack of idiots that I wouldn’t trust with my fish tank because I’m not yet convinced that all educators are a waste of skin? Yeah, I’m almost to the point of saying that out loud.
Rebecca obliquely raises another point. While the parents may be screaming bloody murder now, where were they when they should have been teaching their children that no one, from Uncle Ernie to kindly Miss Bernstein should be tying them up. Under any circumstances. If one of my teachers had tried that the entire school would have known about it, and my parents would have been on the phone to the school board.