NYT: Philadelphia Mandates Black History for Graduation (you can't make this PC stuff up)

New York Times ^ | June 25, 2005 | MICHAEL JANOFSKY

[OESY]

Angry that public schools here have always taught American history through a Eurocentric prism, parents of black children began pleading with local school officials to offer a course in African-American history.

Paul G. Vallas, head of the school district, said a required black history course was essential. Above, the text that will be used this fall. That was nearly 40 years ago.

This year, their pleas were finally - and emphatically - answered. Starting in September, students entering city high schools as ninth graders will be required to take a course in African-American history, making Philadelphia the first major city to require such a course for high school graduation.

School officials here say the course carries huge benefits for all students and offers a perspective on American history that has been largely absent from most contemporary teaching guides.

"You cannot understand American history without understanding the African-American experience; I don't care what anybody says," said Paul G. Vallas, the school system's chief executive, who is white. "It benefits African-American children who need a more comprehensive understanding of their own culture, and it also benefits non-African-Americans to understand the full totality of the American experience."

Critics of the policy shift say it will further polarize the city by focusing attention on just one race and not dealing with other racial and ethnic groups like Mexicans, Chinese or Poles.

According to a course outline developed by district officials, the course will focus on how Africans became Americans through the colonial period, efforts of slaves to achieve freedom, the Civil War and its aftermath, economic development for blacks through the last century, the civil rights movement and the growth of modern black nationalist movements in the United States and Africa....

[OESY]

Sandra Dungee Glenn, member of a school reform commission,
shown Wednesday in Philadelphia, advocated a black history requirement.





Paul G. Vallas, head of the school district, said a required black history course was essential for graduation, if nothing else.

The above textbook will be used to ensure our children learm they are "victims" unable to make in this world on their own
(because their schools failed miserably at teaching them skills that would be valued by their potential employers).
To continue their blight and government dependency, the children must be taught to vote for Democrats only.

[Commander Salamander]

They should just rename the term "Public School" to "Liberal School" and be done with it. No need in masquerading any longer.

[Reactionary]

I'm sure there were plenty of black parents going on about the evils of "Eurocentrism."

Sure. People in the ghetto are down with that whole Nietzschean/Marxist postmodernist cultural critique so popular in our universities these days.

[zarf]

"You cannot understand American history without understanding the African-American experience; I don't care what anybody says," said Paul G. Vallas, the school system's chief executive, who is white.

This comment cannot be denied under any circumstance.

[G.Mason]

George Washington Carver, or Snoop Dogg?

Decisions, decisions.

[dufekin]

Students unfortunately cannot understand American history or any other high-school class without [English] reading, writing, and/or arithmetic. When will Philadelphia begin to turn out graduates (not dropouts) who can master these basic skills?

And any sensible school district would integrate African-American history into the the general United States history curriculum. Although neither an educator nor an historian, I would support a strictly chronological discussion of American history.

[Tacis]

This will get more complex when the fairies realize they, too, can jump on the propaganda wagon and insist there be a class explaining how superior fairies are. Then there will be the class for Scientologists, then black tranvestites and then...

Of course, the black history course can only be taught by, well, blacks. Then we'll see black fighting black over the course content. Then the district will become 95% black and black thug teachers/administrators will whine about segregation. It will take a lot more cash to run the district as black administrators steal increasing amounts. The good thing is that it will improve employment in the community as relatives/friends are hired once skin color is the only qualification required to teach. I know the students will be better off.

[Unam Sanctam]

School officials here say the course carries huge benefits for all students and offers a perspective on American history that has been largely absent from most contemporary teaching guides.

When I went to public high school in the 1980s, racial issues were covered prominently in my American history courses. Of course the issues are important to US history, but I'm not sure why it has to be a separate course. Are we going to require a course in Hispanic American history soon? And I do feel that my ethnic heritage (Anglo-Saxon) is given short shrift in American history courses, actually.

[ReadyNow]

What are the "huge benefits?" Sort of like the benefits of diversity in general, I imagine. (In other words, no benefits at all.)

[IronJack]

I wonder what "African-American history" is. Is it the story of how black tribal chieftans conspired with the Portugese and Belgians and Dutch to sell their "brothers" into bondage? Is it the story of the abiding faith in God that sustained these slaves through some of the bitterest travails in history? Is it the story of the moral ambivalence whites in America felt about slavery, and the consequent social upheaval that reached its zenith in the Civil War, but whose residue still abides today? Is it the volumes of police blotters and prison rolls that bear mute witness to the fact that you can't strengthen the weak by weakening the strong? Is it the saga of the blunted civil rights movement that went from a galvanizing social awakening to a sleazy shakedown racket? Is it the tale of WEB DuBois and Frederick Douglass, or is it the tale of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton? Will it be "history" or History?

[NathanBookman]

Chicago Mayor Daley canned Paul G. Vallas about four years ago for incompetence. It was spun as a "resignation".

[NewHampshireDuo]

Does anyone know if the "Portland Baseline Essays" are still around or have any influence?

[teawithmisswilliams]

Angry that public schools here have always taught American history through a Eurocentric prism...

Ummm, it's called Western Civilization, and Americans, including those whose ancestors were African, are the beneficiaries of it. To focus on the failed culture(s) of Africa rather than learn about what created our great country will not help African-Americans succeed.

[John Will]

Amazing, Liberalism has done more to hurt Blacks than the KKK.