Thomas Sowell, an American author, economist, social theorist wrote “Education is not merely neglected in many of our schools today, but is replaced to a great extent by ideological indoctrination.”
That is so, so true, you could be excused for thinking it was written about New Zealand’s education system!
Our education system is already in a perilous state. But here we are allowing academics and educationists to install the vision of a minority at the centre of a revised Education Curriculum.
You know the academics I mean, the ones who predominantly wear the carved bone or greenstone “taonga” around their necks on display for all to see. AKA Virtue Signalers!
New Zealand’s education system will soon be predominantly racially distorted towards Te Ao Maori.
Educational wokeism excessively focuses on being sensitive to social and political injustice. And educational wokesters are firmly in control of the levers of power in education.
At first glance, this may appear to be a positive thing. Of course, none of us want to be insensitive to injustices in our country. The problem with educational wokeism is that it demands total ideological conformity.
Parents are becoming aware of the scary depths to which the “woke” ideology has permeated into their children’s classrooms and curricula. Increasingly, they are beginning to wake up to the danger.
We need to be objecting to inappropriate and fanatical use of words such as “equity”, “diversity” and “inclusiveness”.
What is it that I am calling educational wokeism?
Educational activists employ an array of words and phrases to describe their beliefs and goals. If you hear any of these phrases and are unsure of their meaning, that’s because it’s by design. Their vocabulary is intended to mislead and is structured to make cutting and extreme ideas sound admirable and commendable so as to conceal their true meaning through ambiguity.
Equity. This is a word we would commonly understand to mean fairness or justice. But the word equity is now used by educational activists to mean something threatening and much more specific. To activists, equity denotes equality of outcomes between different racial groups.
When you hear activists demand “equity,” what they’re really saying is that our basic value of equality, where the rules should apply equally to everyone, regardless of race, is actually racist!
Why? Because they say equality of opportunity doesn’t always produce equality of results. Of course, it doesn’t. But they conveniently ignore the opportunity that is implicit. Their solution is “equity”, where they attempt to achieve equality of results through what has been dubbed “positive discrimination”. A simple example of “equity” would be the adoption, by a university, of a lower pass mark for a certain ethnic group to qualify for a degree.
Social Justice: This phrase is cleverly designed to make radical political views sound non-political and virtuous. You’re not opposed to justice, are you? Asked because an answer in the negative would make you a supporter of injustice.
The phrase “Social Justice” itself is vague and has no concrete meaning, which makes it so useful to the activist. If you hear academics, school officials or teachers advocating “social justice”, just ask them what they specifically mean by the term. Nine times out of ten their answer will be that anyone who disagrees is an advocate for injustice.
This type of progressive ideology weaponises petty personal grievances that masquerade as genuine social concern. Wokeism knows only outrage; there is no room for considered debate. It is “our way or the highway”.
Nowhere is this educational wokeism better characterised than at Te Pukenga.
Te Pukenga is the organisation born out of the calamitous centralisation of polytechs and which now runs the country’s polytechs and institutes of technology.
So far, this ill-thought-out scheme has cost the education sector around $200 million and reports suggest Te Pukenga needs a further cash injection of almost half a billion dollars!
And now Te Pukenga is exhorting staff to dash headlong down the educational wokeism rabbit hole!
Te Pukenga has just over 8000 full-time equivalent staff, who receive a fortnightly newsletter from chief executive Peter Winder called Nga Taipitopito.
As if the financial debacle isn’t enough, academics were recently warned, through their fortnightly newsletter, to remain ‘politically neutral’ ahead of the general election.
This warning has prompted a swift backlash from lecturers.
The row over academic freedom at Te Pukenga emerged because staff have been issued with a list of words they should and should not use.
The thirty-page internal “style guide” was published in February, two months after Peter Winder became chief executive, to ensure its “written and verbal communication is uniform” and “in line with Te Pukenga values and reflects the needs of our priority audiences”.
In other words – Educational Wokeism rules!
Winder and the rest of the clowns in his management team – which includes functions such as Deputy Chief Executive Ako Delivery, Deputy Chief Executive Tiriti Outcomes, Deputy Chief Executive Learner and Employer Experience and Attraction – have constructed this guide, which can only be described as ridiculous and bizarre educational wokeism.
Under these new guidelines, the words “student” and “trainee” are discouraged, the preferred terminology being “akonga” (student) or “learners”.
The use of “employee” and “staff” should be limited unless “in a formal setting” or “required by legislation”.
“We refer to each other as kaimahi, colleagues, work friends, whanau, or Te Pukenga people”, the document said.
Another guide section refers to teaching staff as “learning facilitators”.
They are bloody teachers you pompous fools!
Staff were told they should not refer to the organisation as a “megapolytech” or say “merge” – even though those terms describe how it was formed. “We always refer to ourselves as Te Pukenga.”
The guide discourages gendered language, for example: “We also use: spouse or partner – not husband, wife”.
“Manmade” is out, with alternative options including machine-made, artificial or synthetic.
The document includes a section headed “words and acronyms we don’t use”.
Amongst them are “it’s early days” (“those were earlier, we’re in the here and now”) and Treaty of Waitangi.
“We use Te Tiriti o Waitangi or Te Tiriti”, staff were told.
How do we push back on this idiocy?
First and foremost, you need to want to. You need to want to see a level of normalcy back in your children’s classrooms. You need to want your children to be taught facts. You need to want to see emphasis placed on the ‘3Rs’.
Schools need to teach pupils to learn, to think critically, how to problem solve and to understand how to respectfully discuss and resolve differences of opinion.
The next step for parents is to push for a meritocratic system to be installed in their schools. What is so wrong with celebrating achievement? What is so wrong with coming first or being the best?
“Fine” is a child’s common answer when a parent asks how their day went, but it is important to ask specific questions and understand what the child is being taught in school.
Parents must present a powerful, unified and empowering alternative to their school boards.
Parents should be their children’s greatest advocates and have a right to know what schools are teaching. Parents should feel free to raise concerns about a child’s curriculum.
Unless we find the courage to question and push back on educational wokeism, the absurdity will only become further entrenched!
“Much of the social history of the Western world, over the past three decades, has been a history of replacing what worked with what sounded good.”
Thomas Sowell
