Posts on Education

The Roanoke Times has an interesting article on the changes taking place at Jerry Falwell's Liberty University as it seeks to broaden its appeal to potential students:

The college campus that the late Rev. Jerry Falwell founded is not known as a particularly fun-filled place. Falwell himself occasionally referred to Liberty University as a "Bible Boot Camp." But the school's new image includes ski boots -- and a $2 million synthetic slope.

Saying goodbye to some of its straight-laced stereotype, Liberty's fresh face also includes a track for off-road motorcycles, a paintball battlefield, an equestrian center with horse trails and organized student shopping trips to Richmond.

"Our mission was never to be a Bible school just training teachers," said Jerry Falwell Jr., a son of the founder who is Liberty's chancellor and president. He is leading a multimillion-dollar campaign called "Ultimate LU" to enhance the university's appeal to a broader range of prospective students.

I have a sneaking feeling that future classes might contain a fair number of students who were lured by Liberty's shiny new amenities and failed to do some basic research regarding LU's restrictive environment and mission to produce "champions for Christ": 

But Liberty's emphasis on spare-time diversions won't change its strict code of conduct, which includes possible reprimands and fines for such activities as attending dances, entering the bedroom of a member of the opposite sex and viewing R-rated movies.

"We're known as a conservative religious school," Falwell acknowledged. The school's expansion of leisure options "can be done without compromising our Christian beliefs."

"We don't have coed dorms," he added. "We don't have beer bashes."

...

Outsiders did not suggest such nontraditional events for Liberty until recently, and the ideas might underscore a misperception of how much the school's personality is changing, said Chris Misiano, director of campus programming. "We're open" to new concepts, he said. "We're not wide open" ... Liberty officials still filter out HBO at the nearby Ramada Inn that the school leases and manages. Occasionally, Misiano hears someone voice a yearning for campus theaters to show R-rated movies.

It’s not everyday that you come across an erudite argument such as this one that claims that it is not only wise, but fundamentally necessary to teach creationism in science class:

If science is limited to only natural explanations but some natural phenomena are actually the result of supernatural causes then science would never be able to discover that truth — not a very good position for science. Defining science to allow for this possibility is just common sense.

Science must limit itself to testable explanations not natural explanations. Then the supernaturalist will be just as free as the naturalist to make testable explanations of natural phenomena. The view with the best explanation of the empirical evidence should prevail.

In essence, the argument is that some things might have supernatural causes and if we don’t look to the supernatural to explain and understand them, then that is just bad science.  

If this sort of nonsense were written by some right-wing blogger, it could be mocked and dismissed as the ramblings of an ill-informed creationism advocate.  Unfortunately, as the Texas Freedom Network reports, it was actually written by Don McLeroy  who, last year, was named Chairman of the Texas State Board of Education by Gov. Rick Perry and whose credentials regarding evolutionary biology are limited to whatever he happed to pick up while attending dental school.

The Illinois Family Institute, former stomping grounds of militant homophobe Peter LaBarbera before he launched his own Americans For Truth About Homosexuality, has unveiled its new Division of School Advocacy program designed to ensure that public schools do not teach anything about homosexuality, religion, socialism, abortion, or any “immoral, unhealthy, and dangerous ideologies” that might conflict with what the IFI considers “biblical truth”: 

The Illinois Family Institute helps to fight against pervasive secular humanism that exists in our public schools. Through the newly developed Division of School Advocacy, parents will be able to find answers and resources to help identify areas where the school curriculum strays from Biblical Truth and to recognize the influence from outside organizations such as Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), which pressures administrators and educators to present this organization's views and agendas.

The purpose of the Illinois Family Institute's (IFI) new Division of School Advocacy (DSA) is to protect children from immoral, unhealthy, and dangerous ideologies and agendas in public schools. In the service of that critical goal, the DSA is committed to assisting Illinois residents to address issues related to the breakdown of Judeo-Christian family values and community standards in public education.

In addition to assisting each citizen who contacts IFI regarding school issues, Illinois Family Institute's Division of School Advocacy will continue to work tirelessly toward affecting morally sound legislation in Illinois public schools.

The DSA will provide constituents with the training, resources, and counsel needed for positive changes in public schools. Through this training, resources, and counsel, taxpayers will become better equipped to address administrators, faculty members, and school board members in appropriate and effective ways. The Division of School Advocacy will address such public school problem topics as Human Sexuality, Religion/Atheism, Race/"Social Justice", Marxism/Socialism/Income Redistribution, Gender/Feminism, Environmentalism, Abortion, Fetal Stem Cell Research, Population Control, and Miscellaneous Political Topics.

The rise in popularity of the online, collaborative reference Wikipedia has posed a challenge to librarians and teachers who are trying to teach rigorous research methods to high school students. But while these educators have directed their students to use more traditional sources or, at least, to read Wikipedia with skepticism, one teacher decided the solution was to let his students write their own encyclopedia.

That teacher was Andy Schlafly—son of the famous culture warrior Phyllis Schlafly—the class was a group of home-school students, and the result, Conservapedia, immediately become the Internet equivalent of a laughingstock. The problem according to Schlafly was not Wikipedia’s fundamental unreliability—by design, there is no authoritative editing and factual inaccuracies may creep in despite a vigilant volunteer base—but its supposed bias against America and Christianity. Thus, Conservapedia’s obsession with right-wing politics, evolution, and homosexuality.

In spite of the ridicule, Schlafly and his young followers soldiered on, and they are still at it today. Eagle Forum just released a video promoting Conservapedia as an affirming alternative to the Wikipedia world:

STUDENT: They have an article about evolution, and when conservative or Christian editors tried to add information to that about the other side of the argument and the argument for creationism or Intelligent Design, it was censored or taken out of there.

SCHLAFLY: On Conservapedia, you’re going to get the other side of that. You’re going to get evidence against evolution. Same thing for homosexuality. We bring in all the health harm that’s caused by homosexuality, all the biblical quotes against it—you get that on Conservapedia. You’re not going to get that sort of fair treatment on the Wikipedia entries.

“I don’t have to live with what’s printed in the newspaper. I don’t have to take what’s written in Wikipedia,” said Schlafly. “We’ve got our own way to express knowledge.” Whether it’s the use of “A.D.” instead of “A.C.E.” to mark dates, or anti-gay propaganda instead of science, Schlafly’s “way of knowing” offers the Religious Right familiarity, and a respite from the oppressive world of newspapers and reference works. Or, as Stephen Colbert termed it, their own Wikiality.

Not too long ago, Paul Weyrich complained that he was duped into signing an anti-Mitt Romney letter and now he is complaining that he was duped into endorsing the Bible Literacy Project: "When I was made aware of the 'Bible Literacy Project' I rejoiced, thinking that this was a way for students to study religion in the Godless public schools. I endorsed the Project. Now that I have been made aware of what this Project is really about ... I hereby withdraw my endorsement. Once again liberals stole what began as a worthwhile initiative. This is worse than public schools without God. This may well cause young impressionable young people to lose their faith and to be contemptuous of those who have faith."

From the Miami Herald: "In the latest evolution battle, pop-culture figure Ben Stein will show his new documentary challenging mainstream science to Florida lawmakers Wednesday as they consider legislation that makes it easier for teachers to question Darwin's theory in science classes. The legislation, like Stein's documentary called 'Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed,' has been bashed by critics as a front for advancing the agenda of biblical creationists who want to sneak religious teachings into the classrooms."

That is what Phyllis Schlafly and others are urging: "Many of us have worked to reform public schools. Unfortunately, SB 777 and the related legislation represent a repudiation of 2,000 years of Christian moral teaching on human sexuality, marriage, and the family. The result is that California's schools are now promoting behaviors and lifestyles that are physically and spiritually dangerous for children. Consequently, in California, parents must try to find alternatives to the public schools."

A lawyer for Adam Key sent a letter to the American Bar Association asking them to examine the accreditation of Pat Robertson's Regent University School of Law, saying that Regent is "creating a bunch of lawyers who don't believe in free speech."

A few weeks ago we noted that Mike Huckabee was going to be appearing alongside right-wing pseudo-historian David Barton at an event in Iowa and wondered if a Barton endorsement would be forthcoming. That endorsement has not yet come through, but Barton might want to get on the ball because, if Huckabee ends up becoming the next president, he just might be rewarded with a top-level position in his administration.

In a lengthy interview with Terence Jeffrey, Editor in Chief of the right-wing Cybercast News Service, Huckabee discussed his views on education and the two debated the role of religion in public schools, with Huckabee saying he doesn’t support state-sponsored prayer in school mainly “because I'm afraid in this kind of culture we live in you will have some namby-pamby squishy thing that doesn't even resemble a prayer.” That view then led to this exchange:

Governor, our whole system of government is based on an understanding of natural law that comes from God. The Declaration of Independence says that our rights are inalienable and we are endowed with them by our Creator. Shouldn't our public schools at least recognize that there is a God, and that our rights come from God, and that the ultimate source of our law is God?

Absolutely, and that's what our Declaration of Independence said. That's what our Founding Fathers believed. And we shouldn't have a revisionist history that denies the part of our spiritual heritage.

So the public schools should teach children there is a God, and our rights come from God? They should teach them that?

If they teach our history, they have to teach that. But they don't have to teach them how they are going to specifically believe in that God. That's where the line comes. But the thing is, we shouldn't be afraid of giving kids the truth about our American history and heritage. We ought to make sure they know what it is. David Barton, who is one of my dear friends, and probably, I think, maybe the greatest living historian on the spiritual nature of America's early days, is a person who I wish was writing the curriculum. But unfortunately, we have a time where people just don't even acknowledge what our curriculum is.

For those who don’t know, Barton is a right-wing, Republican Party activist and self-taught “historian” intent on showing that the Founding Fathers intended to create a nation that was “firmly rooted in biblical principles” Lately, he has been peddling a book and DVD that claim to explain the history of the Democratic Party and it responsibility for everything from slavery and segregation to lynchings and the birth of the Ku Klux Klan - a history that conveniently ends with the passage of the civil rights legislation in the mid-1960s makes absolutely no mention of the political transformation that overtook the country in its wake and the rise of the Republican Party’s “Southern Strategy.”

Barton’s “historical” work has been discredited as rife with distortion and “laced with exaggerations, half-truths and misstatements of fact” - but Huckabee thinks he just might be one of the “greatest living historians” and wishes that he was writing public school curriculum.

In fact, Barton has been involved in shaping public school curriculum through his position on the National Council On Bible Curriculum In Public Schools’ Advisory Board. The NCBCPS is dedicated to getting Bible courses taught in public high schools around the country and produces curriculum for just that purpose - curriculum that is flagrantly unconstitutional.

While it is debatable that God is really responsible for Mike Huckabee’s recent rise in the polls, as he claims, it is clear that something is at work which has propelled the one-time “also ran” into a legitimate contender for the Republican presidential nomination – and that something appears to be a network of disparate but committed right-wing grassroots activists and organizations.  As the Dallas Morning News recently explained:

Mike Huckabee's political rise has been fueled by a vast network of local Christian leaders largely unknown to the general public but powerfully influential in evangelical circles.

That strategy – methodically rolling up the support of these grass-roots networks – has paid big dividends, helping catapult Mr. Huckabee ahead in Iowa and boosting his prospects in the Republican field.

"All these leaders that most of the national media don't recognize, they're all coming to Huckabee," said supporter Kelly Shackelford of Plano-based Liberty Legal Institute.

…

"You've got the home-school network. You've got the right-to-life network. You've got networks of megachurches," said John Green of the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.

"The Huckabee campaign apparently understands something about the evangelical community that people outside don't – that it's highly decentralized," he said.

So far, Huckabee has been rolling up an ever-growing list of B-list right-wing figures while courting even fringier figures such as Steve Hotze and John Hagee, whom Huckabee praised as "one of the great Christian leaders of our nation."  Meanwhile, his supporters were all geared up to travel around Iowa and put on “non-partisan” rallies benefiting him until they ran into problems with the weather and their tour bus.   

But Huckabee’s biggest and most active boosters, at least in Iowa, seem to be home-schoolers who are, as the Des Moines Register described them, “Republicans … united by core principles, especially their rejection of public schools in favor of their own religious-based teaching”:

"They stand for the same things, and they trust each other," said Christine Hurley, a Pleasant Hill Republican active in the state's home-school network.

"I think that's what's happening with the Huckabee thing," said Hurley, who supports Huckabee. "When you understand he's a Baptist minister, you don't have to ask what he stands for."

…

Michael Farris' endorsement of Huckabee in May, meaningless to much of the voting public, sent a strong signal to Crawford and other Christian home-school families in Iowa. Farris is founder and chairman of the Virginia-based Home School Legal Defense Association and the national figure for Christian home-school families.

"That was sort of the icing on the cake," Crawford said of Farris' endorsement. "It wasn't the be-all and end-all. But that was the thing that got me to take Governor Huckabee seriously."

The Washington Post reported on the same phenomenon, as has the Los Angeles Times, and even CBN’s David Brody. And while Mike Farris might not be a household name, he is a longtime right-wing activist (having served as general counsel for Concerned Women for America and as executive director and general counsel of the Washington state chapter of the Moral Majority) and obviously extremely influential within the home-school movement.  

In the end, what really excites these home-schoolers about Huckabee is that he is the most “biblically qualified” candidate out there:

"[Home-school families] see it as a civic duty and it's important to try to elect leaders who hold the same values families do. They get behind a candidate and support them," said [Justin] LaVan, who supports Huckabee as a "biblically qualified" figure "who doesn't want to put up barriers or increase control over home-schooling."

The Virginian-Pilot reports that Regent University’s School of Psychology and Counseling is plagued by "turmoil [that] has led to the exodus of respected faculty members and sent morale plummeting among many students in the master’s degree counseling program."

Amid all the turmoil plaguing Oral Roberts University, it appears as if things might be turning a corner because, in addition to a Christian businessman’s pledge to bail out the debt-ridden institution with a $70 million donation, it seems as if Pat Robertson is set to take advantage offer his assistance:

A team from Regent University will travel to financially troubled Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Okla., on Monday to explore “options” for ties between the institutions.

“We are pleased to report that Dr. Pat Robertson, president and chancellor of Regent University and long-time friend of Oral Roberts University, has contacted members of the board of regents and has expressed interest in exploring options for the future of ORU with Regent University,” George Pearsons, chairman of the ORU Board of Regents, said in a statement posted on the university’s Web site.

“Dr. Robertson is sending a team on Monday to Tulsa to meet with ORU Regents and administrative representatives,” he said

It should be noted that Robertson’s Regent University Law School got its start back in the mid-80s when ORU, like today, was facing financial difficulties:  

The Regent law school was founded in 1986, when Oral Roberts University shut down its ailing law school and sent its library to Robertson's Bible-based college in Virginia.

Regent didn’t just get ORU’s “entire law library, [but] some students and faculty” as well.  

Who knows what part of ORU Robertson has his eye on this time.

Speaking of Robertson and Regent, Adam Key, the Regent Law School student suspended and ordered to undergo a mental evaluation for posting an unflattering photo of Robertson on his web page, has apparently decided to sue:

A Regent University law student who was suspended for posting an unflattering photo of school founder Pat Robertson on the Internet sued the university and Robertson on Thursday.

Adam M. Key, 23, claims in the federal suit that Regent officials violated his free speech and due process rights for expressing his "Christian religious and political opinions" when it suspended him in October.

…

"I went there because I wanted an environment conducive to learning that had a respect for religious liberty, but the only liberty they are interested in defending is theirs and people like them," Key said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press on Thursday.

Because the private university receives federal funds, it is required under the U.S. Higher Education Act to respect students' freedom of religion and expression.

The lawsuit also alleges Key was "fraudulently induced" to attend Regent. "Adam relied on Regent's many claims of religious liberty and speech" and the law school's American Bar Association accreditation, the lawsuit states.

The Colorado Springs Gazette profiles The John Jay Institute for Faith, Society and Law, founded by a former Family Research Council and Focus on the Family associate: "[Students] are learning how to spread their moral beliefs in a thoughtful manner, without beating people over the head with their faith. The yearlong program combines their calling to public life with their conservative Christian worldview. After a semester of academics, they will be interns at conservative think tanks in Washington, D.C., and elsewhere, where they can further hone their skills in Christian persuasion."

Following the death of its longtime leader, D. James Kennedy, Coral Ridge Ministries decided to focus it efforts on "increasing its worldwide audience to 30 million by 2012, mainly by expanding its Internet, TV and print presence.”

But in order to do that, CRM needs money and so they have sent out this email seeking donations:

I invite you to follow in the footsteps of the Pilgrims . . . to consider those who huddled inside the Mayflower and faced an icy winter that would claim half their number. I’m asking you to honor the heritage they handed down to us at such tremendous cost.



You see, the freedoms you and I enjoy today were born aboard their dimly lit ship, as 102 stalwart souls signed the Mayflower Compact. They began with these words— “In the name of God, Amen.” They wrote of making their voyage “for the Glory of God, and Advancement of the Christian Faith….”



Thanks to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and modern revisionists, the faith of the Pilgrims is disappearing from our textbooks . . . and being erased from our national consciousness.



Want proof? New York University professor Paul C. Vitz studied 90 of the most used public school history textbooks. He found up to 30 pages devoted to the Pilgrims, yet not a word about their devout faith in God. “It is common in these books to treat Thanksgiving without explaining to whom the Pilgrims gave thanks,” Vitz writes. One textbook even described Thanksgiving as a time “when the Pilgrims gave thanks to the Indians.”



Americans are forgetting who we are—and drifting from our Creator. That is why Coral Ridge Ministries intends to broadcast the truth on The Coral Ridge Hour. We want to reveal that our freedoms have their roots in the Bible and Christianity . . . and expose the false claim that this nation is not and never was a nation under God.



With your support, we’ll use television, radio, the Internet, and our vast library of print and multimedia resources. We will share the truth that God has blessed and guided our country since her earliest days . . . and still longs to bless her today if we will only return to Him. Armed with the facts, Christians can help teach America her godly roots . . . and guide her destiny. By God’s grace, you—like the Pilgrims—can help make history . . . and God may still bless America!

In his book “Persecution: How Liberals Are Waging War Against Christianity,” David Limbaugh likewise cites this study by Vitz and helpfully provides an endnote explaining that the information was taken from Vitz’s book “Censorship: Evidence of Bias in Our Children's Textbooks” … which came out in 1986.  

If CRM is going to try and raise money by scaring it supporters with tales of “modern revisionists” erasing the religious heritage from our national consciousness, it might be useful for them to actually find some “modern revisionists” who are doing that instead of relying on a 20 year old study based on textbooks that are most likely no longer in use.  

There is an interesting story developing down at Pat Robertson’s Regent University.  It seems as if one of the students, Adam M. Key, doesn’t seem to like Robertson much and doesn’t really fit the stereotype of the typical Regent student:

Key, a bearded 23-year-old with a tableau of tattoos, would seem an odd fit at the evangelical Christian institution Robertson founded in 1978.

Key, a Lutheran, describes himself as a “liberal Christian” who heads the campus’ small “Christian Left” organization.

The tattoos reflect his passion for justice and the legal system. The colorful jumble of images features the U.S. Constitution written on a scroll, the Magna Carta, the Torah, phrases such as “due process,” and men of principle such as Martin Luther, Sir Thomas More and former Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

One startling image shows Osama bin Laden juxtaposed with Robertson.

“I believe they’re both reprehensible people,” Key said, “but I defend their right to believe whatever they want.”

Key, who is from Texas, said he had wanted to attend a Christian institution with a law school accredited by the American Bar Association, such as Regent. One motivating factor, he said, was “the opportunity to show people that liberalism isn’t a sin.”

Key said he has a grade-point average close to 3.0 and that he’s on track to graduate from the three-year program in 2½ years. He said he was only vaguely familiar with Robertson and his political views when he applied to Regent.

Key reportedly posted a photo of Robertson appearing to make an obscene hand gesture on his Facebook page, which he took from a freeze-frame of a YouTube video of Robertson scratching his face on “The 700 Club” - and apparently the folks at Regent didn’t find it funny:

Regent officials gave Key two choices: publicly apologize for posting the picture and refrain from commenting about the matter in a “public medium,” or write a brief defending the posting. He faces punishment that could include expulsion.

Key, a second-year law student, said he refused to apologize and “be muzzled” by the university, so he composed the document, which includes citations from noted First Amendment cases.

…

Key said that Jeffrey Brauch, dean of the law school, rejected his brief and that he now awaits disciplinary action under the university’s Standard of Personal Conduct. At one point during the controversy, Key said, he was escorted by three armed security guards from the university’s public relations office.

And now Robertson U. has gone a step further and ordered Key to submit to a Regent-approved mental health counselor:

Adam M. Key, 23, was ordered to undergo a mental-health evaluation before he can return to classes. He also was ordered to undergo counseling if a mental-health provider that is acceptable to the university deems it appropriate, and to provide a report showing that he has completed any treatment plan required.

Key also must agree to allow the mental-health provider to provide regular updates on his treatment to the school.

Presumably, Key’s case won’t be discussed when Regent Law School students gather for this:

LAW 774 First Amendment Law (3) Survey of the protections guaranteed by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Topics covered include freedom of religion, the establishment clause, freedom of speech and freedom of the press.