Be Fully Sensitive

For John, BLUF:  A fundamental question we should ask is why people come to this Country, and then we should ask how we can make that rewarding for them, keeping in mind that they have, de facto, rejected their previous culture.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Lowell School Committee hears plans for culturally and linguistically sustaining practices

Here is the sub-headline:

Member Mike Dillon blasts as “Marxist”

From The [Lowell] Sun, by Reporter Alana Melanson, 5 May 2021, 10:31 PM.

Here is the core of the issue, the Slide Presentation by Chief Equity & Engagement Officer Latifah Phillips.  Is it about helping students or is it part of an effort to implement teaching based on some form of Critical Race Theory.

I, personnally, am sensitive to School Committee Member Mike Dillon's point about a "Marxist" orientation.  In parts of this nation that debate is playing out, often with the local School Board being pitted against the Voters.  Such is the case in Loudoun County, Virginia, where the School Board is up in arms about the voters.♠  In municipal elections in Southlake, Texas, with issues regarding Critical Race Theory, the vote went anti-CRT by roughly 70 to 30 percent, and turnout ballooned to almost three times the normal rate.

Yes, we need to be aware of the ghost of Antonio Gramsci, but we also have to be aware of the need to educate our students and help their parents prepare them for adulthood.

To that extent we need to look at how the Lowell Public School Department is implementing its program of Culturally and Linguistically Sustaining Practices (CLSP).

Because our students come from a number of diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds it is important that we understand how those cultural and linguistic factors impact our students and their ability to learn.

For example, a recent study found that minority teaching assistants in STEM subjects reduces course drop rates and increases course completion rates among minority students.  That should be an important sign that we need to pay attention to cultural and linguistic issues as we set about teaching our students.

At the same time, we should be careful not to replicate, for immigrants, their previous cultures or linguistic settings if the parents are not interested in that kind of accommodation.

People emigrate for a reason and that reason is often disatisfaction.  In turn, they immigrate to the United States for a reason.  It may be as simple as this is where the Coyotes dumbed them.  Perhaps this is the only Country that would accept them.  They are here not by choice, but by happenstance, and that is sad.

However, many people immigrate to the United States for a reason:

• They come because the territory represents a richness of natural resources, set for exploration and exploitation,
• They come because there is a rich jobs market and they wish to take advantge of that market to land a job and earn a living.
• They come because they have some sense that the the People and the Government offer a relatively free envoironment for thought and religious practice.

The second two sets of immigrants may not wish to see their children educated in ways that are reminiscent of the parents old culture.  They may be chary of their children developing a yearning for "the old ways", the "old sod".

Some descretion is required in application.  But, we must be trying to find ways to make the educational experience highly productive for all our students.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Loudoun County reminds me of East German Poet Bertolt Brecht and his satirical poem "Die Lösung" (The Solution).