This is our Sputnik moment.

School’s all across the nation are either starting or about to start a new academic year. It’s suppose to be an exciting time for students and teacher. However, this year may be much, much different.  This has been the summer of Trump. Our students  have been subjected to Trumpism all summer.

Before this weekend’s horrific events in Charlottesville, I was wondering where did we go astray. How could our nation elect someone like Trump? After this weekend, I think I have the answer.

As a teacher, it’s hard for me to admit this. I view this past year as a failure of our education system. As educators we have not fought hard enough to protect our curriculum, our methods, our standards and our public schools.

All too often we  observe teachers dutifully, following directives that they don’t agree with. We observe teachers, following standards that are not research based and often inappropriate for the children they teach.

I have watched  Social Studies lessons being put aside for high stakes testing skills and subjects. I have observed Social Studies standards morph into ‘big ideas’ that often lack correlation with history. For example, teaching about the Articles of Confederation without taking the necessary time to teach the events that led up to them.

Social Studies is being put aside. Now we hear STEM is the new ‘ big idea’. Science Technology Engineering and Math is turning into this year’s new focus. We’ve already witnessed literature, take a back seat to non-fiction in Common Core.  Look at the results, look at society, and ask yourself, “ can we really afford to abandoned the humanities”?

We need to refocus our teaching towards Social Studies. Link your lessons towards teaching history. Not a whitewashed version, but real history. The history of the peoples of the world.

We now have a President that has no understanding of our nation’s past. We have thousands marching in the streets protesting things they do not understand.

This is our Sputnik moment. We need to emulate the counter protesters of this weekend by resisting any attempt to water down our curriculum. We need to stand against those that want us to teach a revisionists version of history.

Forget the damn high stakes tests. It’s time to roll up our collective sleeves and do what we need to do to save our nation. Resist and teach like our future depends on it, because it does.

Get over it? No freaking way!

We have  been told over and over again  “get over it!”   I won’t get over it, I won’t sit back quietly, I won’t stand idle while our country is in trouble.

How can we stand by when our illegitimate Commander in Chief puts our nation’s standing in the world at risk every day? On Thursday, his  Ambassador to the United Nations told the world representatives at the UN that she will be taking names.  Our national security is at risk due to his traitorous  appointment to protect our nation. His continued attack of the press corp threatens the very fabric of our national identity. His appointments to his cabinet are direct attacks on our environment, workers’ rights, regulatory protections, our judicial system, and many of our God given human rights. Even his latest selection to be our National Security Adviser turned down the important job. It’s reported that he refused because, as he put it, this administration is a real “shit sandwich.”

Trumps response to these concerns consists of lies, repeated lies of his election, attacking the questioner, and holding rallies. Folks, when asked about the uptick of antisemitism and the growing violence to Jews, he responded by telling the reported to sit down.  When questioned by a black reporter if he is willing to meet with the Congressional Black Caucus to discuss violence in the inner cities, he acted as if he didn’t know what the CBC was then asked the reporter to set up the meeting with her friends.Trump is mentally ill!

His appointment of Betsey DeVos should raise alarms across the nation. Do Trumpkins really want children with special needs to go without needed services? Do they really believe evolution is made up science fiction? Do they really believe schools should be privately owned ventures that are funded with taxpayer monies and that these schools should not be held accountable for these funds or the success of their programs?

Do Trumpkins really believe that 100’s of thousands of National Guard troops should go door to door, school to school, office to office, hospital to hospital as a deportation force? Are we ready to hid our neighbors in our attics, hidden rooms, barns, and basements? Is that what we are about to become?

Are Trumpkins prepared to live in a nation, where there will be no protections on the job site, where basic employee rights will be stripped, or where they will not be able to negotiate a collective bargained agreement that would protect the company as well as the employee. Are they prepared to return to the workplaces of the late 1800’s where they have no choice but to owe the company store?

Are Trumpkins prepared to watch people die due to the lack of healthcare? Will they be willing to return to the era of only those with money get treated and watch others suffer or  die? Is this making America great?

Folks I will not get over it!  Trump and Pence needs to be impeached. I am not willing to sit back and watch this egomaniac systematically destroy our country. I won’t sit in the corner, I won’t sit quietly, I refuse to accept this blatant attack on our national conscience.

Join me at rallies, join me at organization meetings, join me making calls, join me on social media. Don’t get over it.. get organized. Resist!

 

 

 

 

We are becoming the America I know, not the America I want!

We are becoming the America I know, not the America I want.

The America I know is a nation with a checkered past. Yes, we are the greatest nation on the face of the earth! Yes, I love our nation and honor those who made the ultimate sacrifice to protect our guiding principles of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. As true Americans and true patriots we must always strive to make our great nation a place where those guiding principles apply to all.  Unfortunately, the America I know has not been that place.

We should be drawing on our checkered past to protect and practice those guiding principles not bastardize them. Our Founders knew we had flaws and they knew our nation would be facing challenges that would threaten our guiding principles. They created our guiding document, The Constitution, that would ensure our nation would always be governed with those guiding principles. They knew times would change and the Constitution should be a “living document’ that would be amended and changed as needed to ensure the maintenance of our nation’s guiding principles

Unfortunately, we now have a nation that is deeply divided and is at a very dangerous ‘fork in the road”. Will we go down the road towards the America we all know, or towards the America we want?

Will we return down the road of racism, ignorance and fear? I fear President Trump and his supporters are driving us down the road towards the America we know, not the America we should be.

Within a week of taking office we have seen a return towards  taking Native American sacred lands. We have seen an “America First” policy that has closed our welcoming door that repeats our pre WWII actions. We have seen an executive order that has institutionalized discrimination based on religion, much like the Puritans did. We are seeing a return to the Gilded Age where corruption and greed overshadowed the needs of the masses. We are seeing Trump’s Cabinet shaping into a group that will try to shut down the press, create an enemies list, seek retribution for those who dare disagree, funnel public revenues to their own, and destroy the concept of public education for all.  Their early actions and statements have  signaled that they will be changing our guiding principles, much like Andrew Jackson did, when he ignored a Supreme Court ruling and murdered thousands of Native Americans.

We cannot escape our past. We need to confront it and learn from it, not repeat it. The America I know is far from perfect. Let’s go down the road that draws upon our past successes. The Road that embraces the “wretched refuse to our teeming shore.” Let’s go down the road that leads to our guiding principles of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all. No matter who you are, what you are, or what you worship or not.  That’s the road we should be on, not the road towards our dark past with the toll gate controlled by the gilded class.

The way to get on the right road is to resist. Resist every attempt to go down that toll road towards our dark past. Hold your elected representatives accountable. Protest, call, write, run for office. Do whatever you need to do. Do not let them drag us down that dark road. Resist, resist, resist.