My Daughter, the Blogger-exposed teacher for mistreating her to the whole cyberworld

FrontPageMagazine.com | February 25, 2004 | Catherine Seipp

[CatoRenasci]

Hmmm. Sounds to me like a politically correct revisionist short story version of Heinlein's Farnham's Freehold.

[Trinity_Tx]

Heresy! LOL

I'm not a big fan of Hardy either, and I do love Twain and especially Mann... but to not like Elliot or Trollope...that's just...yeah, it's heresy lol.

Wilkie Collins is another great, as is Thackeray (talk about vivid!) And at the risk of cliche, I love watching the renewal of Austin's well-deserved honor.

...and the Bronte's...

[Trinity_Tx]

Oh, and don't forget Defoe...

not vivid enough... pshaw...

<G>

[Chad Fairbanks]

This was about 18 years ago... They saved the out-of-school suspension for the really bad stuff ;0)

[70times7]

True story - the planet is "Africa". Whites there now are reporting that it is a utopia, and that South Africa, in particular, will achieve nirvana just after Mandela dies.

Sheesh! I thought everyone knew this!

[Oberon]

Have you ever Kippled? ;~))

Every chance I get. I can even quote whole snatches of some of his poems by heart.

However, I have never Quizzled, and don't ever intend to.

[Oberon]

The skank said the classroom was like communism.

Had I been that teacher, I would have replied something along the lines of "Actually, it's much more like a constitutional monarchy."

[70times7]

In school suspension.

I laugh about In school suspension for a different reason. In the mid 70's a classmate named Tom had done something that got him the choice of a 3-day out or one day in school suspension - don't remember what he had done, but he took the in-school. The principal had him spend the entire day in a medium sized room across from the auditorium where the all of the school play costumes were kept. Tom planned well, perhaps he brought brownies with his lunch, I'm not sure, but let's just say he was very happy all day.

I will never forget when Mike, another friend, and I opened the door to that room to check on Tom. He was in that oversized closet with a huge sombrero on his head "flemencoing" around the room. I don't recall if there was a plastic rose in his teeth or not - there may have been. We were roaring.

It was not a particularly effective punishment.

[CatoRenasci]

Defoe, of course, is 18th century. And, I do like 18th century English novels: what's not to like in Fielding, Defoe, Swift, or Richardson?

Actually, I do rather like Hardy, it's just so many of those others: Dickens, Elliot, Trollope, Austin and teh Bronte's: for me they're the 19th century equivalent of "chick flicks".

I have enjoyed some Wilkie Collins, and Thackery is not bad. But, give me the vigor of American or German novels of that period almost any time! While adequate in translation, novelists like Fontane, Kleist, Goethe and Mann are all far better in the original German. (tho' I confess to having had a hard time with the plattdeutsch dialect in Effi Briest -- gives me a new appreciation of the difficulties non-native speakers of English must have with the dialect in Twain)

[O.C. - Old Cracker]

Did the positive reviews of your essay by likely leftist-leaning college professors help to improve your grade? I guess you really showed your sophomore English teacher, huh?

[nuconvert]

thanx for the ping

[CatoRenasci]

Actually, the principal did change the grade.

My sophomore English teacher was over 70 and should have retired a decade before I encountered her. And, as to the college faculty, this was 1963 and the faculty was quite a mixed bag politically -- probably mostly '50s moderate liberals, but at least a few were 'pubbies -- but this was back when most professors still tried to keep their politics out of the classroom: the one who liked the paper best, as a paper, also told me he was concerned I was taking too cynical a view.

The broader point is that teachers should not impose their own political or religious agenda on their students, whether it be a leftist agaenda or a conservative agenda.

[O.C. - Old Cracker]

The broader point is that teachers should not impose their own political or religious agenda on their students, whether it be a leftist agaenda or a conservative agenda.

Would you extend this to private schools?

[CatoRenasci]

That would depend on whether the private school was explicit about it's programme when students were enrolled. If a school were to bill itself as a "communist" school or a "christian" school, and made it clear in its literature and in interviews with prospective students and their parents that that point of view would be taught, then I would not have a problem with it. If the private school billed itself as nonsectarian and nonideological (as most of the better prep schools do), then I have an issue with indoctrination.

For the most part, my point applies primariliy to state supported schools. My personal view is that teachers generally should assist students in learning to think for themselves, rather than inculcate a particular ideology, but I would not restrict the right of those who disagree to offer private ideologically-based instruction assuming they are candid about what they are doing.