Fraters Libertas

Your Tax Dollars at Work

From the publicly subsidized journalism professionals at Minnesota Public Radio, a lesson in media bias via the selective use of labels. The context is the continuing debate over social studies standards for high school students proposed by Governor Pawlenty and opposed by Democrats and the education establshiment.

First, the MPR neutral reference to an advocacy group whose mission is the continuation of the status quo in public schooling, but at greatly increased funding levels:

Mary Cecconi of the group Parents United says teachers are still expected to cover too many topics. She also objects to what she sees as standards that advocate a certain doctrine or type of behavior. “For example, a benchmark requires students to define what it means to be a citizen in terms of loyalty.”

Loyalty to the USA as antithetical to the concept of citizenship .... in the USA. See any "doctrine" or ideological agenda there? Well, MPR doesn’t, because Parents United for Public Education (which is the real name of the organization, MPR conveniently left out the “for Public Education” part) is apparently just a group of united parents.

However, it seems there are groups out there with some sort of agenda for education. Here’s the MPR reference in the very same article to an advocacy group whose mission is to reform the public school system:

Julie Quist of the conservative group Education Watch/Maple River Coalition says the latest revisions go too far. She claims changes were made that weaken the teaching of the Declaration of Independence.

An emphasis on teaching the Declaration of Independence to high school students?! Those partisan political hacks!

Speaking of which, here’s the end result of an education system supported by the likes of Parents United for Public Education:

Rep. Mindy Greiling, DFL-Roseville, tried unsuccessfully to replace the word "statesmen" with a more gender-neutral term. "We have sexist language in our documents here. This is not a quote, this is a statement: 'students will become familiar with the character traits of statesmen such as...' It needs to be statesperson, plain and simple," Greiling said.

Statesperson? What’s the plural of that - statespeople? Statespersons? Try to shove that into a sentence and see how plain and simple it is (let alone how accurate).

In a sane political environment, Rep. Greiling would have been laughed out of the room and a recall effort would be immediately organized by her constituents. But remember, we are talking about Roseville here.

UPDATE: King at SCSU Scholars has details on the strangely controversial Declaration of Independence aspects of the current standards debate.

UPDATE: Via King, more good stuff at Minnesota Education Reform News, including further examples of the selective use of labels at our other major media outlets.