Posted on 03/02/2006 3:38:43 AM PST by Glacier Honey
The Overland High educator is on administrative leave. Cherry Creek's superintendent said a balanced viewpoint will be given to students.
An Overland High School teacher who criticized President Bush, capitalism and U.S. foreign policy during his geography class was placed on administrative leave Wednesday afternoon after a student who recorded the session went public with the tape.
In the 20-minute recording, made on an MP3 player, teacher Jay Bennish described capitalism as a system "at odds with human rights." He also said there were "eerie similarities" between what Bush said during his Jan. 28 State of the Union address and "things that Adolf Hitler used to say."
The United States was "probably the single most violent nation on planet Earth," Bennish also said on the tape.
Bennish, who has been part of Overland's social studies faculty since 2000, did not return calls seeking comment Wednesday. Cherry Creek School District officials are investigating the incident, but no disciplinary action has been taken, district spokeswoman Tustin Amole said.
Bennish was placed on leave "to take some of the pressure off of him" during the investigation, which could wrap up in a week, Amole said.
Superintendent Monte Moses, who received a copy of the recording on Monday from 850 KOA-AM radio show host Mike Rosen, said it appears "a breach of district policy" occurred.
"Our policy calls for both sides to be present ... in the interest of intellectual discourse," Moses said. Bennish's presentation appeared to be unbalanced, he said.
The district is looking into whether the incident was an isolated one and will ensure that a balanced viewpoint of the president's State of the Union address is provided to students, Moses said.
Moses also said the district will be fair to Bennish. "People in life make mistakes occasionally," he said. "We address them. We learn from them."
The 20-minute recording of only a portion of the class was made by 16-year-old sophomore Sean Allen the day after the president's speech. The recording has raised questions about what level of academic freedom is acceptable for high school teachers. It also has generated discussions about Bennish on dozens of websites.
Sean, who appeared on Rosen's show Wednesday morning, said in an interview he had been disturbed by the "political rants" he heard in Bennish's class. He added that he wanted to tape the session for his father, who later shared it with the media.
Sean, who described himself as a political independent, said the comments seemed inappropriate for a geography class.
"If he wants to give an opinion in class, I'm perfectly OK with that," he said. "But he has to give both sides of the story."
James McGrath Morris, an author who has written about academic freedom issues, said Bennish's comments are acceptable for an adult audience, but they are hard to defend in a high school classroom.
In a number of legal cases, courts have ruled that "up until the age of majority, children are easily influenced ... in a way that they don't have the faculties to sort out rights from wrongs," Morris said.
Poor thing.
I only have 1 question. Where are you?
LOL!
If you've said, my apologies for missing it, but your homepage doesn't say.
:-)
*Oklahoma*
They thought those big flying things would make nice pets. Too bad they were mosquitos.
*California*
Stopped when they hit the ocean.
*North Carolina*
Still trying to figure out a reason.
Northeast Ohio. Part of the "Western Reserve". Look that up! It's an important part of UNITED STATES history :) LOL!
It is sad that you corretly left off the < /sarcasm > tag.
I started early with my daughter, tricking her on things, making stuff up, etc., and letting her catch me or exposing what I was doing. Now she has the best BS detector I've ever seen in a seven year old, probably better than many adults.
It's kind of sad because it's very hard to trick her anymore, and that was fun for both of us. I have to come up with ever more complex stunts to get her.
Only if the current, antique MSM is replaced by something more responsive
Isn't that the site that crappy teachers were suing because they got low marks?
The main difference being that those who send their children to madrassahs expect that they are sending their children to madrassahs
Maybe I'm jaded but I think Superintendent Monte Moses only problem here is that their Komissar got caught
Doubtful that any teachers anywhere in this country had a class on the effect on the culture when a President of the United States lies to a federal judge in a legal court case.
After listening to the tape...I sat there and wondered how many kids out of 25...actually paid attention to his amusing speech. It was terrible boring...without really connecting the dots...and these were 10th graders. I doubt that more than five of them actually could repeat the top 10 topics of the speech. Even my 15-year old son would have been sleeping in this class. Makes me wonder if schools have so many of these dimwits around...could explain why learning isn't happening. Why would you want to listen or learn from this guy?
You're confusing totally different type of education.
Classical education: the study of philosophy, history, geography, literature, science, math etc., which teaches the student how to come to a logical conclusion when presented with facts.
'Progressive' education: the study of how feelings trump facts, everyone is still equal no matter how horrendous their actions, and facts are only what you think they are, which teaches the students the philosophy of 'it's all about ME'.
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Progressive just means to change, not necessarily to change for the better.
Yeah, I didn't think I needed it. Pathetic.
THE #1 problem, right there. They don't.
ROFLMAO!
What I want to know is what does his tyraid have to do with Geography. Had I been in that class that is what I would have asked.
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