Definition: Limiting: Any process by which a specified characteristic of the output of a device is prevented from exceeding a predetermined value.
I saw PBS' Independent Lens show entitled Precious Knowledge on TV today. And just when I read the text that follows, which is included in the show: "While 48 percent of Mexican American students currently drop out of high school, Tucson High’s Mexican American Studies Program has become a national model of educational success, with 93 percent of enrolled students, on average, graduating from high school, and 85 percent going on to attend college,"- the show then went into an unbelievable direction. That direction was how people, how politicians in the USA state of Arizona outlawed this educational course.
The program taught Mexican and American history, as well as Central and South American literature and culture.
Ignorance. Fear. Unaware of racist thinking. This is what I see when I hear those who disapprove of this wonderfully successful educational course of study of a culture. But what I understand as blatant racists and racism as in this case, the racists are clueless to their bigoted thinking. Which if it didn't harm others, would be okay. But it isn't harmless. It is harmful.
These courses didn't teach racism. Denying the right to teach them is racism.
For years, our educational systems have taught white history is the only history. Disregarding the history, for example of the native, indigenous peoples who were here before the European immigrants came here and then "dominated" over the indigenous peoples. So when the politician is saying there are "other ways" in the first video below, he means that the white way is THE way. And OTHER ways must be denied. Outlawed. Just like we did to the native indigenous people, denying them their own cultures, their hair style, their native language use, their children living with their families and being sent off to boarding schools to learn the white man's ways in order to assimilate. Which is just another way to end, exterminate a culture, a history of a people. Only people who feel weak, mandate others to absorb their ways as their own and give up their own ways.
Below is from this link ~
Independent Lens - Precious Knowledge
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Watch The Case Against Ethnic Studies on PBS. See more from Independent Lens.
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Watch Closing the Achievement Gap in Tucson Schools on PBS. See more from Independent Lens.
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Watch Planting the Seeds for Precious Knowledge on PBS. See more from Independent Lens.
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Watch online at PBS Video ................................................................................
Watch Ethnic Chauvinism or Modern Civil Rights Struggle? on PBS. See more from Independent Lens.
Independent Lens TV Schedule
Watch online at PBS Video
About the Film
The program was a national model of educational success — 93 percent of its enrolled students graduating from high school and 85 percent going on to attend college, bucking a statewide trend that saw only 48 percent of Latino students graduating at all. The program taught Mexican and American history, as well as Central and South American literature and culture.
But the political tide shifted in Arizona in the 2000s. The state passed extremely controversial immigration laws, which some civil libertarians equated to racial profiling. Legislative sessions in the state became heated and rife with recriminations. And when lawmakers turned their attention to Tucson High’s ethnic studies program, it became a lightning rod in the public conversation about race. Opponents of the program launched a campaign to convince the public that ethnic studies teach everything from communism to terrorism to “reverse racism.”
Students and their teachers fight hard to preserve their program, marching to the statehouse, holding vigils, and testifying before lawmakers. They invite their legislators to visit their classrooms, and all but one refuse. When he does visit, he criticizes the poster of Che Guevara on the wall, and suggests that a poster of Benjamin Franklin would be more appropriate.
At the center of the debate was Paulo Freire’s textbook, The Pedagogy of the Oppressed, which the school’s instructors used for the ethnic studies classes. The book is a famous example of critical race theory, which looks at and acknowledges the influence of institutional racism in America on non-dominant groups. The theory has been criticized as Marxist.
In 2011 Arizona lawmakers passed a bill giving unilateral power to the state superintendent of schools to abolish ethnic studies classes. The fight to restore ethnic studies continues in Arizona and in other states, as education continues to adapt to a changing population.
The Filmmakers
Ari Luis Palos and Eren Isabel McGinnis of Dos Vatos
Productions began working together in the green tobacco fields of
Kentucky during the production of POV’s Tobacco Blues.
While living in Oaxaca, México, they selected the work of virtuoso
guitarists and chanteuse Lila Downs for the soundtrack of their Global Voices and True Stories PBS series hit show Beyond the Border.
Developing their continued interest in documenting civil rights
battles, they recorded the voices of some of the finest opera singers in
the world while creating The Spirituals.
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Below is from this link ~
Precious Knowledge - Education in Arizona - PBS' Independent Lens
Independent Lens: Precious Knowledge
Above: Crystal leads demonstrations to save the ethnic studies classes in front of Tucson High.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Above: Students and community members participate in a traditional ceremonial run from Tucson to Phoenix.
Above: Mexican American/Raza studies student Mariah at an immigrants rights rally in Phoenix, Arizona.
While 48 percent of Mexican American students currently drop out of high school, Tucson High’s Mexican American Studies Program has become a national model of educational success, with 93 percent of enrolled students, on average, graduating from high school, and 85 percent going on to attend college.
The filmmakers spent an entire year in the classroom filming this innovative curriculum, documenting the transformative impact on students who became engaged, informed, and active in their communities.
As the nation turns its focus toward a wave of anti-immigration legislation in Arizona, the issue of ethnic chauvinism becomes a double-edged weapon in a simmering battle, making front page news coast to coast.
Above: Arizona State Superintendent Tom Horne calls for the banning of ethnic studies classes in Tucson.
Talkback
Do you think that teaching the history of specific ethnicities promotes a sense among students of their own ethnic superiority? Do you think it is important to dedicate class time to the history of minority groups? Share your thoughtsWhen Arizona lawmakers pass a bill giving unilateral power to the State Superintendent to abolish ethnic studies classes, teachers and student leaders fight to save the program using texts, Facebook, optimism and a megaphone.
Lawmakers and politicians respond with a public relations campaign to discredit the students, claiming that a textbook used in the classes, Paulo Freire’s "The Pedagogy of the Oppressed" teaches victimization and sedition. Officials ask that the classroom’s Che Guevara posters be replaced with portraits of founding father Benjamin Franklin.
Meanwhile, the students answer back by fighting for what they believe is the future of public education for the entire nation, especially as the Latino demographic continues to grow.
Independent Lens is on Facebook, and you can follow @IndependentLens on Twitter.'
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