Roundup: I've Got a Lot of Learning to Do

Roundup: I’ve Got a Lot of Learning to Do

Feb 11, 2010, 7:56am

Are you smarter than a 5th grader? These people don't think you are, including the college professor who uses the Bible to teach his science classes.

Education. It’s something I think about a lot. We’re already planning where our two year old will hopefully go to kindergarten in a few years, and we’re slowly amassing a 529 to get her through college.

But is there a point to learning? Is ignorance bliss? The folks in today’s roundup sure seem to think so…

First, Ex-Real World San Francisco participant Rachel Campos Duffy writes on why we shouldn’t give up on abstinence only education, even though it’s providing to be a failure:

Instead of arguing over whose [sex-ed] poll is right, I propose we consider
something most parents can probably agree on: Abstinent teens are
happier and more likely to succeed in school.
Do moms and dads really need a study to tell them that teens who
abstain from sex until at least the age of 18 are more likely to go to
and finish college? Plenty of studies confirm this, but we also know from our own observations in high school that teen sex and high academic achievement are rarely compatible.

Much like the reality-tv star, I could also pick my own study. In this case, an informal survey of all of my high school friends who graduated at the top of our class as (somewhat) well-adjusted, sexually active teenagers, who also all managed to use protection and not impregnate or infect ourselves (Yikes, hope my mom doesn’t read this one. Sorry, Mom, but you sort of figured, right?)

But in the real world (heh), who really wants to go to college anyway, right? After all, it makes you stupider, according to this column on Fox News:

On an individual level, less than 60% (sometimes far less) of college graduates can identify on a multiple-choice test the three branches of government; seminal passages from the Declaration of Independence and Gettysburg Address; basic events from the Revolutionary, Civil, and Vietnam Wars; and the primary features of our free enterprise system. Several of these questions are actually required knowledge for new American citizens, signifying their relevance to what we as a nation demand for informed citizenship.

On an institutional level, ISI discovered that at many of our most
elite schools, like Yale, Princeton, Duke, and my alma mater
Georgetown, not only did those surveyed fail to get above a “D,” seniors at these top schools did worse than freshmen on the same test, a phenomenon dubbed “negative learning”!

Conventional wisdom, along with the hard-earned savings of American
families, has long supported the notion that “with more college comes
more knowledge.” ISI’s research has punctured the validity of such
simple claims, drawing back the curtain of academia’s Land of Oz to
reveal the smoke and mirrors of a veritable vacuum of civic ignorance.

Instead of learning the pivotal events of wars and capitalism, those nasty kids are walking away "more likely to identify as Democrats," according to the author. Institutions of learning, My Aunt Fannie!

Luckily, not all college instructors are brainwashing our future with the nasty byproducts of potential liberalism.

The Northern California branch of the ACLU has publicly released their
correspondence with Fresno City College that requests Professor Bradley
Lopez cease instruction that, "inculcate[s] sectarian doctrine in
violation of federal and state constitutions."

Lopez has been accused by his students of numerous violations of
teaching his own religious viewpoint as science "fact." Accusations in
the letter to Fresno City College include the following actions by
Lopez. Lopez allegedly:

* Presented a slide listing “homosexual facts,” including that
homosexuality is a “biological misapplication of human sexuality” and
said that the “recommended treatment” is “psychological counseling” or
“hormone supplements.”

* Presented LGBT people as a burden on and/or threat to society,
claiming, for example, that anything but a heterosexual union provides
a “one-sided foundation for raising children.”

* Presented bible passages as “empirical” evidence that life begins at
conception in support of his assertion that abortion is murder and “the
leading cause of death in this country” (because there are over a
million abortions a year).

* Followed a slide on climate change in a presentation on
“environmental health” with a slide containing a Biblical quote about
the world ending in fire, and said “that is the real global warming we
should be worried about.”

* Repeatedly referenced the Bible and used it as a teaching tool, for
example assigning as homework a question as to Jesus’ genetic makeup.