As The Daily Wire&#8217;s Hank Berrien <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/report-teacher-training-program-used-across-the-u-s-is-hostile-to-whites">reported</a> yesterday, a far-left public educational initiative called Deep Equity is being increasingly adopted across the country.
As <a href="https://us.corwin.com/en-us/nam/the-program-deep-equity">described by Corwin</a>, an educational training initiative umbrella organization that describes itself as &#8220;aimed at producing real school improvement for equity and social justice,&#8221; Deep Equity &#8220;is a comprehensive and systemic professional development process aimed at producing the deep personal, professional, and organizational transformations that are necessary to create equitable places of learning for all of our nation’s children.&#8221; Using unmistakable leftist language, the program &#8220;addresses the dynamics of power and privilege in a safe, engaging, and inspiring environment in which all educators are honored and valued as professionals,&#8221; as further described by Corwin.
The Daily Wire also quoted Fox News host Tucker Carlson&#8217;s highlighting of the Deep Equity program on his platform. Carlson described Deep Equity as follows:
<blockquote>According to Deep Equity, America is based on a hierarchy of various oppressions: Men oppress women, Christianity oppresses Islam, English oppresses Spanish, white people oppress everyone. And, by the way, if you have a problem with this explanation, you are yourself entrenching oppression; you’re part of the problem. According to Corwin, differences in academic performance have nothing to do with culture or effort; they are purely the product of racism. &#8230;
In order to fight that racism, teachers are instructed on different types of ‘white identity orientations’ … many white people, teachers are told, according to Deep Equity, are defined by their ‘ignorance and supremacy.’ Other white people, ‘question the systemic issues that have caused whites to be so much in a superior position.</blockquote>
Following the publication of The Daily Wire&#8217;s report yesterday, a concerned parent in Chandler, Arizona, contacted The Daily Wire to provide further details about the nature of Deep Equity and the extent to which leftism seems to be seeping into Democratic State Superintendent of Public Instruction <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Hoffman">Kathy Hoffman&#8217;s</a> statewide education initiatives. Hoffman, who has previously implied that she was <a href="https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/elections/2018/10/12/does-kathy-hoffman-have-resume-lead-arizona-schools-frank-riggs-superintendent-public-instruction/1595498002/">only inspired to seek her current perch</a> after watching the confirmation of current U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, has already embarked upon a hard leftist path since taking office in January. In April, for example, Hoffman <a href="https://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/ny-arizona-promo-homo-law-repealed-lgbtq-20190412-5f6gkfhw65h7zbprkbjhbxcu6q-story.html?fbclid=IwAR2CFaKUFlCNqjwgiZRHpoJ11Pr8gesdzrwlb4gKGdPP0IWcSJ5qBiWFjTQ">celebrated</a> the repeal of Arizona&#8217;s so-called &#8220;no promo homo&#8221; law, and stood at a jubilant post-repeal press conference podium alongside a representative of LGBT advocacy group <a href="https://www.glsen.org/chapter/phoenix">GLSEN Phoenix</a>.
As flagged by the concerned Chandler parent and confirmed by verifiable evidence, the application form to join Chandler Unified School District&#8217;s (CUSD) Deep Equity Advisory Board specifically asks applicants whether they have sufficient &#8220;personal[]&#8221; or &#8220;professional[]&#8221; experience to understand prioritized Deep Equity values with respect to &#8220;intersectionality of race, gender, class, religion, and sexual orientation.&#8221;
Furthermore, the concerned Chandler parent provided verifiable evidence, submitted to the parent from a CUSD teacher who harbors deep concerns about Deep Equity, that the Deep Equity program in CUSD attempts to encourage such themes as &#8220;religious/spiritual pluralism&#8221; in lieu of &#8220;Christianity over other religions,&#8221; &#8220;affectional/sexual pluralism and equal rights&#8221; in lieu of &#8220;heterosexual over other gender/sexual identities,&#8221; &#8220;distributive justice&#8221; in lieu of &#8220;haves over &#8216;have-nots,'&#8221; &#8220;language preservation and respect&#8221; in lieu of &#8220;English only,&#8221; and the elevation of many other far-left social justice themes over traditional norms.
The concerned Chandler parent also provided verifiable evidence that CUSD sponsors such seminars during its Deep Equity Summer Symposium — meaning they are taxpayer-funded — as &#8220;Inclusiveness With LGBTQ+ Students&#8221; and &#8220;Building LGBTQ-Inclusive Elementary Schools.&#8221; As The Daily Wire reported yesterday, there does not seem to be a normal mode of recourse for parents objecting to this leftist indoctrination.
The Daily Wire will continue to monitor Deep Equity-themed developments.

Schoolhouse

Public Educational Initiative In Arizona Instills Far-Left, ‘Social Justice’ Values

Arizona

Betsy DeVos

Education

Homosexuality

Intersectionality

Leftism

LGBT

Sexuality

Social Justice

A new teacher training program called Deep Equity that is used across the nation reportedly has a hostile attitude toward whites, and there doesn’t seem to be any recourse for those who object. According to Tucker Carlson of Fox News, “No one will ask you if you like it or not, and don’t bother to complain. Deep Equity orders teachers, and we’re quoting now, ‘to explicitly reject and resist any parents who disagree with it.’”
Carlson reported that the program is created by Corwin, which describes it as a teacher training program that is “aimed at producing real school improvement for equity and social justice.” Carlson opined:
<blockquote>According to Deep Equity, America is based on a hierarchy of various oppressions: Men oppress women, Christianity oppresses Islam, English oppresses Spanish, white people oppress everyone. And, by the way, if you have a problem with this explanation, you are yourself entrenching oppression; you’re part of the problem. According to Corwin, differences in academic performance have nothing to do with culture or effort; they are purely the product of racism.</blockquote>
Carlson continued:
<blockquote>In order to fight that racism, teachers are instructed on different types of ‘white identity orientations’ … many white people, teachers are told, according to Deep Equity, are defined by their ‘ignorance and supremacy.’ Other white people, ‘question the systemic issues that have caused whites to be so much in a superior position. The curriculum offers what it calls a ‘White Allies Action Agenda.</blockquote>
The White Allies Action Agenda, as Carlson noted, lists various actions to take, including, “Acknowledge the reality of racism,” “acknowledge the reality of white racial privilege,” “educate other white people,” and “use your privilege to work for racial and social justice.”
Carlson noted that the curriculum is used from Virginia to Iowa to Arizona.
Deep Equity was developed by Gary Howard, who <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uu8s5MxS38o">stated</a>, “The Deep Equity process that we’ve been implementing with school districts throughout the country now is a systemic process we do at Equity, we haven’t done sometimes, we need to make it long-term, multi-year systemic work. It can’t happen as a program, as a single-dimensional intervention. It needs to be affirmational; it needs to be continuing.&#8221;
The <a href="https://arizonadailyindependent.com/2019/10/30/chandler-unifieds-deep-equity-program-came-with-shocking-price-tag/">Arizona Daily Independent</a> reported that Chandler Unified School District’s spokesperson, Terry Locke, stated, “approximately 2,600 certified teachers have participated in the professional development because we facilitated a ‘train the trainer’ model. Approximately 270 received direct training.”
<a href="https://us.corwin.com/en-us/nam/the-program-deep-equity">Corwin</a> states:
<blockquote>Deep Equity is a comprehensive and systemic professional development process aimed at producing the deep personal, professional, and organizational transformations that are necessary to create equitable places of learning for all of our nation’s children. This capacity-building program helps educators dismantle disparities through sustained, collaborative efforts and courageous leadership …
The Deep Equity program is different. Developed and implemented nationally by Gary Howard, the Deep Equity program addresses the dynamics of power and privilege in a safe, engaging, and inspiring environment in which all educators are honored and valued as professionals. By engaging in the program, you and your colleagues will learn to dismantle educational disparities through your own sustained, collaborative efforts and courageous leadership.</blockquote>
&nbsp;

Back to school supplies. Books and blackboard on wooden background

Report: Teacher Training Program Used Across The U.S. Is Hostile To Whites

Racism

Boston University&#8217;s minority student group Black BU issued an open letter to the university community Tuesday expressing their feelings of being &#8220;abandoned, triggered, frustrated, disheartened, devalued, infuriated, overwhelmed, ignored,&#8221; and &#8220;embarrassed of the university&#8221; because it is allowing Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief Ben Shapiro to give a speech on Wednesday titled &#8220;America Was Not Built On Slavery; It Was Built On Freedom.&#8221;
The letter, which was obtained and published by <a href="https://www.yaf.org/news/embarrassed-of-bu-shapiros-boston-university-lecture-title-triggers-black-bu/">Young America&#8217;s Foundation</a>, the organization sponsoring the Shapiro event, begins by stressing what Shapiro&#8217;s famous tagline directly addresses: &#8220;feelings.&#8221;
&#8220;Abandoned, triggered, frustrated, disheartened, devalued, infuriated, overwhelmed, ignored, embarrassed of BU. This is how we feel. This is how BU has made us feel,&#8221; the student group writes (screenshot of letter below). &#8220;This is how our peers, the Young Americans for Freedom and those who condone their actions have made us feel. Facts don&#8217;t care about feelings, but we look beyond the facts to the faces and fake smiles that greet us day in and out on this campus. This reminds us that we are not one BU, that BU is not designed for us, and this BU does not belong to use just as our bodies and our minds do not and have not belonged to us since our rights as human beings were stripped away in the wake of slavery.&#8221;
The student org then specifies what has elicited such strong emotions among members: the title of Shapiro&#8217;s speech. &#8220;We do not speak for the 900 Black faces on this campus, but we do speak for the 133 students who mobilized on November 11, 2019 within 151 minutes to denounce this school&#8217;s support of Ben Shapiro&#8217;s actions, words, and most importantly, the name of this event: &#8216;American Was Not Built On Slavery; It Was Built On Freedom.'&#8221;
Though Shapiro has repeatedly and forcefully condemned the evils of slavery and addressed its economic and societal role in the U.S. until it was finally abolished through the Civil War, the student group accuses Shapiro of &#8220;denying slavery&#8221; and its economic role in the creation of the U.S.
&#8220;To deny slavery, and its economic role in the creation of the US as a nation is to deny the systematic degradation of Black bodies, the generational trauma, natal alienation, and social death that has marked and affected Black communities in the US since 1619, the birth of slavery on US soil as we know, and consequently, the birth of America.&#8221;
<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/14/magazine/1619-america-slavery.html">The New York Times</a> has helped popularize the concept that the U.S. was not founded in 1776 with the Declaration of Independence, but in 1619 when the first African slaves arrived in the colonies. The alternative &#8220;founding&#8221; date allows the social justice left to describe the U.S. as indelibly defined by slavery and institutional racism despite the abolishment of the evil institution over a century and half ago and all the progress since the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in eliminating institutional racism.
&#8220;It&#8217;s important to reject and refute language that emboldens the ideologies of white supremacy,&#8221; the letter continues. &#8220;Rejecting and dismissing the impact of slavery furthers the plight of Black people, and it is on us to combat this racist hegemony that exists.&#8221;
&#8220;This school constantly boasts about their most famous alumni, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., but by endorsing a conversation titled, &#8216;America Was Not Built On Slavery; It Was Built On Freedom&#8217; this institution is ostracizing the very community that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. fought for,&#8221; the group claims. &#8220;What about our ancestors who were exploited and forced to work for free. Are they forgotten? Will we continue to deny the magnitude of this country&#8217;s past? The foundation of this country is instutionalized racism that continues to affect our community today, and by allowing a conversation with this title, they are ignoring a past, present, and hope for the future that affects us every day. We cannot escape this reality. Our voices will be heard. We will not be silent because it is our duty to combat the negligence that this title creates.&#8221;
The student group then issues &#8220;not a plea or a protest&#8221; but a &#8220;demand&#8221;: &#8220;So, we come to you with this. It is not a plea or a protest, but rather a demand that for once, BU turns to the students who decry instances of passive and active, micro-aggressive actions and acknowledge our disdain and the sour taste on our lips leftover by the administration&#8217;s compliance with hateful speech. We demand to be heard, to be listened to, and to finally be acknowledged as our own advocates.&#8221;
They then rebuke those &#8220;allies&#8221; who assume they need their &#8220;megaphone&#8221; to speak out. &#8220;To the students who extend their allyship, thank you, but we speak for ourselves and do not need your megaphone to amplify our already vocal voices.&#8221; Next, they turn their focus on the administration, to whom they issue a warning: &#8220;To the administration, know that our eyes are wide open, we see you, and know that your actions do not go unwatched.&#8221;
Finally, the group addresses their &#8220;true allies,&#8221; including Palestinian students and members of the LGBTQIA+ community, and by which they expressly do not mean students with &#8220;privilege to protest,&#8221; as if some groups are not allowed this First Amendment right. &#8220;To our true allies, the Palestinian students, the LGBTQIA+ students, and any of the other students whose power does not lie in their privilege to protest, we stand in solidarity with you and among you,&#8221; the letter reads. &#8220;We keep our minds and hearts open and welcome you with love into our community.&#8221;
&#8220;But before we close, we remind you why we began,&#8221; Black BU concludes. &#8220;America was, in fact, built on slavery, on the backs of Black people, plagued with pain, sorrow, and disregard, so this brings us to ask those who condone this event and title: whose Freedom?&#8221;
In response, Shapiro told The Daily Wire, &#8220;It&#8217;s supremely typical of campus radicals to dismiss the content of a speech they haven&#8217;t heard, and to pre-emptively mischaracterize its content. But listening is more difficult than posturing.&#8221;
&#8220;Suffice it to say, I have never and will never downplay the horrors or legacy of slavery,&#8221; said Shapiro. &#8220;America is, however, the greatest force for freedom in world history; the darknesses of our past are an essential part of our story, but they are not what makes America unique and special.&#8221;
&#8220;As to the question — whose freedom does America stand for? — the answer is, all of ours. Which is why they have the right to protest, and I have the right to speak,&#8221; he added. &#8220;I look forward to all of us exercising our rights tomorrow.&#8221;
Though in their letter the Black BU accuses Shapiro of promoting &#8220;white supremacy,&#8221; Shapiro&#8217;s speech at Boston University comes less than a week after his <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-shapiro-dismantles-the-alt-right-and-radical-lefts-dangerous-game">speech at Stanford</a> in which he dedicated a majority of his speech to dismantling the racist, &#8220;white identity&#8221; ideology espoused by the Alt-Right.
Below is a screenshot of the Black BU open letter via <a href="https://www.yaf.org/news/embarrassed-of-bu-shapiros-boston-university-lecture-title-triggers-black-bu/">YAF</a>:
<img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-31580 lazyloaded" src="https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-1024x503.png" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" srcset="https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-1024x503.png 1024w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-300x147.png 300w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-768x377.png 768w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-67x33.png 67w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-480x236.png 480w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-600x295.png 600w" alt="" width="1024" height="503" data-lazy-srcset="https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-1024x503.png 1024w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-300x147.png 300w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-768x377.png 768w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-67x33.png 67w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-480x236.png 480w, https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-600x295.png 600w" data-lazy-sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" data-lazy-src="https://www.yaf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Screen-Shot-2019-11-12-at-12.27.51-PM-1024x503.png" data-was-processed="true" />
&nbsp;

Ben Shapiro

Boston University Student Group &#8216;Triggered&#8217; By Ben Shapiro Speech Title; Shapiro Responds

American History

Boston University

Race

Slavery

The cultural Left&#8217;s ongoing battle to sexualize children and <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-using-children-advance-your-political-josh-hammer">deprive them of their innocence</a> is now raging in the Old Dominion.
On <a href="https://www.facebook.com/PriscillaForFairfax/photos/a.111043596987758/120923609333090/?type=3&amp;theater">Facebook</a>, Fairfax County, Virginia School Board candidate Priscilla DeStefano sounded the alarm on the news that, unless parents opt out, children in the County would be mandated to take the <a href="https://www.fcps.edu/resources/student-safety-and-wellness/youth-survey?fbclid=IwAR0jUGUdnGQ-n8iApPZVbVQbzSeqScimslGRCt8Ozig25zIPPpdwLiPAa2I">Fairfax County Youth Survey</a>. Lest that survey sound innocent enough, DeStefano highlighted how the questionnaire would reportedly grill children as young as eighth grade on whether they are sexually active, have engaged in oral sex, and how many sexual partners they have had. It would also reportedly probe children as young as sixth grade about whether they smoke marijuana or drink alcohol.
&#8220;Starting this week, 6th, 8th, 10th &amp; 12th graders will be given the Youth Survey unless you OPT THEM OUT!,&#8221; DeStefano <a href="https://www.facebook.com/PriscillaForFairfax/photos/a.111043596987758/120923609333090/?type=3&amp;theater">warned</a>. &#8220;The 6th grade survey asks about drug use, like if they’ve ever huffed aerosols to get high; please look through it to see if you are comfortable with your 11/12 year being asked the 84 questions in the survey,&#8221; she continued.
DeStefano then noted how the Fairfax County Youth Survey is even more intrusive for older students in the county&#8217;s public school system: &#8220;The 8th, 10th &amp; 12th graders are asked much worse questions like if they’ve ever used heroin or LSD, their prescription drug use, and their sexual activity — like if they use condoms, if they’ve had oral sex, and how many sexual partners they’ve had.&#8221;
In total, the survey for 8th, 10th, and 12th graders has 174 questions — quite the rigorous inspection of children as young as sixth grade. At least opt-out forms are available on the Fairfax County Public Schools <a href="https://www.fcps.edu/resources/student-safety-and-wellness/youth-survey?fbclid=IwAR0jUGUdnGQ-n8iApPZVbVQbzSeqScimslGRCt8Ozig25zIPPpdwLiPAa2I">website</a> in each of English, Arabic, Chinese, Farsi, Korean, Spanish, Urdu, and Vietnamese.
Many of those commenting on DeStefano&#8217;s Facebook post expressed shock, disgust, or outrage.
&#8220;My request is to continue this fight and to hold the recently elected accountable!!,&#8221; commented one. &#8220;This is the beginning in my opinion. We must stay vocal and active and not allow the degradation of our society to happen without a fight. If all the candidates who did not get elected can form an alliance and network or action league we can remain in their faces. I know that our priorities are family. We now know that their priorities are breaking up of family and all holy beliefs and traditions.&#8221;
Another user observed how this activity seems to her to be nothing new: &#8220;This is, unfortunately, nothing new. I graduated high school in Oregon in 2000 and I recall a survey very similar to this given my freshman or sophomore year.&#8221;
A <a href="https://abc11.com/4506227/?fbclid=IwAR1gtHMK9zedbmm5v_0ltILr-mpToBotXhEvdjt0AQ6SrBYUtyucpqZBfAY">similar story</a> unfolded last month in North Carolina, when a survey given out to local sixth graders inquired about the students&#8217; sexual orientation. Local ABC affiliate ABC 11 <a href="https://abc11.com/4506227/?fbclid=IwAR1gtHMK9zedbmm5v_0ltILr-mpToBotXhEvdjt0AQ6SrBYUtyucpqZBfAY">reported</a>:
<blockquote>The mother of a Terrell Lane sixth-grader is upset after a survey given to her son included a question asking about his sexual orientation.
&#8220;Why are you asking 11-year olds these questions?&#8221; asked Connie Jo Hutchinson.
The program is called Shifting Boundaries, which is funded through a federal grant. In the survey handed out to students, the sixth question asks &#8220;What is your sexual orientation?&#8221;
It lists 10 possible options: Bisexual, Gay, Fluid, Heterosexual, Lesbian, Pansexual, Queer, Questioning, Prefer not to disclose, and Self-identify.</blockquote>

survey pencil

Virginia School Board Candidate Blasts Survey For 8th Graders Asking About Sexual Activity

Children

Progressivism

Virginia

The following is satirical.
It was a wonderful Veterans Day at colleges around the country. Students gathered around the Veterans Tree singing old Veterans Carols like “I Hope I Don’t Get Killed Defending the Rights of People Who Don’t Even Appreciate those Rights, Fa la la la la.”
College students were taught special Veterans Day lessons. For instance, some young people were startled to learn there were other ways to be a hero than screaming at someone on Twitter — although some of those other ways sounded kind of dangerous, so maybe it’s best to keep your heroism confined to Social Media for now.
After all, what’s the point of getting wounded over things like the First Amendment when free speech just lets you say upsetting stuff? And why on earth would you risk getting killed over freedom of religion when God is so mean to gay people? And, of course, getting shot over the right to bear arms is crazy since, once guns are banned, no one will have to get shot at all.
College students were also surprised to learn about such Veterans Day subjects as World War II, where race-obsessed, anti-Jewish, big government supporters who called themselves National Socialists somehow turned out to be the bad guys. How weird is that? Today, anyone who isn’t a race-obsessed anti-Jewish big government national socialist is worse than Hitler.
But then World War II was in the old days when Hitler wasn’t Donald Trump but instead was Hitler, and you couldn’t even call him Hitler on TV because he would kill you because he was Hitler instead of Donald Trump, which is just plain confusing.
Although sometimes, it’s true, soldiers do bad things like shooting &#8220;austere religious scholars,&#8221; mostly college students enjoyed Veterans Day because they got a holiday from gender studies class and could stay in their dorm rooms watching porn instead and wishing they could ask someone on a date without getting expelled. And isn’t that the American life our veterans fought so hard to preserve?
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/58280">Washington Post Changes Headline About Terrorist Leader’s Death, Calling Him An ‘Austere Religious Scholar’</a>

U.S. Flag F-35 Fighter

College Students Learn How Veterans Fought For Dumb Stuff Like Rights [Satire]

Satire

Veterans

If you want to know how Mike Rowe feels about something, just ask him. He&#8217;ll tell you in no uncertain terms.
Rowe, the host of “Somebody’s Gotta Do It” and former host of of the hit TV show &#8220;Dirty Jobs,&#8221; appeared Thursday on Fox Business to promote his new book “The Way I Heard It.&#8221; On the show, Rowe was asked by host Stuart Varney what he thought about the $1.5 trillion federal student loan debt.
“We have unintendedly maligned an entire section of our workforce by promoting one form of education, in my opinion, at the expense of all of the other forms,” he said.
&#8220;Forty years ago, colleges needed a PR campaign,” Rowe added. &#8220;We needed more people to get into higher education, but when we gave the big push for college back the in ‘70s, we did it at the expense of alternative education. In other words, we told people, ‘If you don’t get your degree, you’re going to wind up turning a wrench.&#8217; &#8221;
Rowe said the decision by many school systems to do away with shop and metal-working classes has led to a &#8220;skills gap&#8221; in which millions of vacant jobs have no qualified applicants.
“The skills gap today, in my opinion, is a result of the removal of shop class and the repeated message that the best path for the most people happens to be the most expensive path,” he said.
“This is why, in my opinion, we have $1.6 trillion of student loans on the books and 7.3 million open positions, most of which don’t require a four-year degree,” Rowe added. “We’re just disconnected. We’re rewarding behavior we should be discouraging. We’re lending money we don’t have to kids who are never going to be able to pay it back to train them for jobs that don’t exist anymore. That’s nuts.”
In October, Rowe appeared on Fox and was asked about the recent Democratic debate. He had an opinion on that, too.
“Look, in the end you’ve got millionaires arguing with millionaires over who hates the millionaires the most,” Rowe said.
Rowe said the Democrats who push massive tax hikes, including Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, are wrong.
“And I guess it’s a conversation we’ll have,” he said. “But I remember a couple of years ago, I took my meager staff over to the Reagan Ranch … One of the stories they tell is the time when Ronald Reagan just finally decided he was done doing movies. He was just done because he was paying 92% of every dollar he made on films. And it was just math. He wasn’t done acting, he just looked at it and did some basic calculus and said, ‘Not for me anymore. It makes no sense to do this,’” Rowe said.
Rowe also noted that high-tax states are losing residents.
“I live in California. I just read a report that said the exodus this year as a result of a 13.5% state tax and some other tweaks to the system is unlike anything they’ve ever seen before,” he said. “So I know it’s convenient. It’s fun to kind of hate the rich and all, but in the end they’re just people and they’re going to do the math and they’re going to go where the math is better.”

Celebrities Visit Build &#8211; February 5, 2019

Mike Rowe Rips Student-Loan Crisis: &#8216;We&#8217;re Rewarding Behavior We Should Be Discouraging&#8217;

Mike Rowe

Student Loans

A Hays Consolidated Independent School District (CISD) substitute teacher was fired on Friday after video emerged that allegedly showed her violently attacking a teenage student in a classroom.
&#8220;The video shows Tiffani Shadell Lankford, 32, approaching the 15-year-old sophomore girl and then punching the student in the face,&#8221; KXAN <a href="https://www.kxan.com/news/local/hays/hays-cisd-fires-lehman-high-school-substitute-teacher-for-hitting-student/">reported</a>. &#8220;The substitute then continues hitting the student as others look on in shock.&#8221;
Lehman High School Principal Karen Zuniga said in a statement to parents:
<blockquote>Dear Lobos,
As a family, we share both the good news and bad news together. Today, I have to tell you about an incident that is disconcerting.
This afternoon, we fired one of our guest teachers for hitting and fighting with a student. Under no circumstance is that behavior tolerated at Lehman High School or in Hays CISD. Additionally, the former employee was arrested by the Hays County Sheriff’s Office and faces potential criminal charges. Her actions will also be reported to the Texas Education Agency.
We take the safety and security of our students seriously. We took swift action when this incident occurred and will do everything necessary to protect our students.”</blockquote>
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/BREAKING?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#BREAKING</a>: Hays CISD fired a substitute today after this video surfaced online <a href="https://t.co/U5OYx6JXpe">https://t.co/U5OYx6JXpe</a> <a href="https://t.co/bqYuYeTt4Q">pic.twitter.com/bqYuYeTt4Q</a>
— KXAN News (@KXAN_News) <a href="https://twitter.com/KXAN_News/status/1192954471120297984?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 8, 2019</a></blockquote>
In a statement obtained by KXAN, Zuniga added, “Under no circumstance is that behavior tolerated at Lehman High School or in Hays CISD. We take the safety and security of our students seriously. We took swift action when this incident occurred and will do everything necessary to protect our students.”
Lankford has reportedly been arrested by police officers from Hays County Sheriff&#8217;s Office and charged with aggravated assault.
CBS Austin <a href="https://cbsaustin.com/news/local/hays-cisd-substitute-teacher-arrested-after-allegedly-assaulting-student-in-classroom">reported</a>: &#8220;The victim was taken to a local hospital by her father for evaluation. Lankford was transported to the Hays County Jail. The sheriff&#8217;s office said the victim is 15 years old. But a statement by the district says she is a 16-year-old sophomore.&#8221;
Students posted other videos of the incident on Twitter that CBS Austin reports were viewed by law enforcement officials.
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😂😂 <a href="https://t.co/kmJ1Q65xXP">pic.twitter.com/kmJ1Q65xXP</a>
— AZ 💋 (@ahhsuesena) <a href="https://twitter.com/ahhsuesena/status/1192937636605890563?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 8, 2019</a></blockquote>
Tim Savoy, chief communication officer for Hays CISD, <a href="https://www.kvue.com/article/news/local/kyle-substitute-teacher-fired-after-video-shows-her-fighting-with-student/269-9d0cec6e-8ed6-4c4d-bf9c-826646c837b9">said</a>, “We are appalled at the actions of this former employee. There is absolutely no excuse or circumstance that can justify what you see unfold on the video. It is unconscionable what this adult did to one of our students.”
KVUE ABC <a href="https://www.kvue.com/article/news/local/kyle-substitute-teacher-fired-after-video-shows-her-fighting-with-student/269-9d0cec6e-8ed6-4c4d-bf9c-826646c837b9">noted</a> that &#8220;according to Hays CISD, Lankford attended her teacher orientation on Aug. 30, 2019. Her first job with the district was on Sept. 13. Friday was her 18th time working for the district. All substitutes in the district are required to undergo and pass fingerprint criminal background checks in order to work in the classroom.&#8221;
The San Marcos Daily Record <a href="https://www.sanmarcosrecord.com/node/204676">reported</a> that the student &#8220;was released to her father who took her to a local hospital for evaluation and Lankford was transported to the Hays County Jail where she awaits magistration tomorrow morning.&#8221;
The incident reportedly happened in a foreign language class.

Police

Brutal Video Emerges Of Female Teacher Violently Attacking Teen Girl, Report Says

Crime

Teachers

This week I delivered a speech at Boston College. The subject was the way in which leftists manipulate people’s minds. They teach them that disagreement is hatred so that they will not listen to the opposition. Thus they transform those who follow them into raging idiots — raging because they see hate-filled enemies everywhere, idiots because they never have to test their ideas in honest discussion with those who see things differently.
As I spoke, a mob — the police told me there were over a hundred people — gathered outside, pounding on the walls and screaming slogans. When the protestors tried to storm the door, I caught glimpses of their faces, twisted in white-eyed rage. They were trying to disrupt my talk but in fact they were illustrating it, proving my point.
This is a terrible thing the academic left does to our young people: transforming them into the zombie enforcers of their fierce miscreed. And what the left does to them, it would do to all of us. They are using their virtual monopoly on the means of communication — the news, social and entertainment media along with the academies — to assault our minds. And their weapon of choice is words.
My trollish young friend and colleague Michael Knowles sometimes gives a speech called “A Man is Not A Woman.” The protestors show up for that too and rage at him too. But of course a man is not a woman. A man can never be a woman, because man is a word and woman is a word and the words refer to two different things. Different things can’t be the same because different is a word and same is a word and they have opposite meanings.
The mob at my speech was incited by a newspaper article that called me Islamophobic.  But phobic is a word meaning beset by irrational fear. I have no irrational fear of Islam. I have questions about whether some tenets of Islamic thought have led to the oppression and violence rampant in the Islamic world today. There is nothing irrational — or hateful — about that.
I believe it is a good thing that gay people can now live their lives unafraid of the law and I encourage them to engage in long-term, committed, faithful relationships. But do I think that’s marriage? No, because marriage is a word, it has a meaning, and that’s not what it is.
This may seem like some abstruse, obscure theoretical consideration, but is it? The Supreme Court is now considering a number of cases in which plaintiffs are seeking to redefine the word sex in anti-discrimination law to include homosexuality and transgenderism. But if the court can redefine words to mean something other than what they meant to the legislators who made the law, what power do the legislators have? If the court can change the meaning of so basic a word as sex, it can redefine anything to mean anything and no law is safe from being rewritten to suit elite prejudices.
Likewise, those who seek to force us through law or social shame or censorship to use the pronouns they prefer are really seeking to force us to describe reality as they wish it were, rather than as we see it to be. Anyone who has that power over you has turned you into his mental slave.
The freedom we have, the justice we seek, are based on concepts that were handed down to us by our founders — written down for us in words. In order to continue free, in order to become more just, we must continue to reason within those traditions. In order to reason and communicate our reasoning, we must use words — words with agreed-upon meanings.
And yet whenever we try to describe the world as it is, the left cries out that such language is violence. It’s not though — because language is a word and violence is a word and they do not mean the same thing.
The left’s war on the west is a war of words and a war on words. Our best weapon in such a war is the truth. We must speak it plainly.

Protest in City

KLAVAN: We Are In A War Of Words

Free Speech

Political Correctness

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) has now proposed a 10-hour school day, which could give children more time in the classroom than with their parents.
According to <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/469226-harris-proposes-keeping-schools-open-for-10-hours-a-day">The Hill</a>, Harris&#8217; Family Friendly Schools Act would create a &#8220;pilot program to give schools funds to stay open during the entire workday throughout the school year, as well as to invest over $1 billion to boost summer learning programs.&#8221;
Harris said that the Act would lift the burden off parents who have to juggle between a working schedule and taking care of children.
&#8220;My mother raised my sister and me while working demanding, long hours,&#8221; said Harris. &#8220;So, I know firsthand that, for many working parents, juggling between school schedules and work schedules is a common cause of stress and financial hardship. But, this does not have to be the case. My bill provides an innovative solution that will help reduce the burden of childcare on working families. It is time we modernize the school schedule to better meet the needs of our students and their families.&#8221;
Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers, hailed the bill for addressing a real and persistent problem for working parents.
&#8220;By investing in before, and after school programming, summer enrichment and 21st Century Community Learning Centers, this legislation addresses a chronic and long-neglected problem: too many working parents can’t access affordable care for their kids during the workday,&#8221; said Weingarten. &#8220;Roughly one million mothers of elementary school children cut their hours at work because of a lack of affordable child care. This bill would enable school districts and communities to find solutions that work for them, and would make sure teachers and paraprofessionals aren’t filling in the gaps without respect and fair compensation.&#8221;
The left-leaning site Mother Jones <a href="https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/11/the-school-day-is-two-hours-shorter-than-the-work-day-kamala-harris-wants-to-change-that/">described</a> the bill in further detail:
<blockquote>Her plan: A pilot program that gives money to 500 schools that serve a high proportion of low-income families to develop a school schedule that better matches the work schedule. Each recipient school would receive up to $5 million dollars over five years to keep their doors open from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., with no closures except for weekends, federal holidays, and emergencies. Professional development, parent-teacher conferences, and the like would have to happen, at minimum, alongside a full day of enrichment activities. At the end of the five years, the Education Department would publish a report documenting the best practices, as well as changes in parental employment, student performance, and teacher retention rates to be used to inform a future broader program.</blockquote>
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<div id="google_ads_iframe_/49189977/ROS_ATF_300x600_0__container__">Schools are encouraged to use the funding to collaborate with community partners to develop “high-quality, culturally relevant, linguistically accessible, developmentally appropriate academic, athletic, or enrichment opportunities for students.” The directive is purposefully vague: Schools are to spend the first year surveying parents, teachers, and community members to determine what sort of extended school day would work best for their particular school population.</div>
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Co-sponsors of the bill include Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), and Michael Bennet (D-CO).

Leading Presidential Candidates Attend Finkenauer Fish Fry In Iowa

Kamala Harris Proposes A 10-Hour School Day

Kamala Harris

In 2018, Saddleback College student Marcus Knight was suspended after he gave a female student a “fist bump” and took a “selfie” with another.
Knight, who is autistic and has cerebral palsy, often attempts to make friends with his classmates by taking selfies with them or offering fist bumps. His attempts at friendship are usually accepted, but in two cases, he was reported for Title IX violations. One of the women who reported Knight said he took 300 photos of her, but that was due to him pressing the “burst” option when taking the selfie. The student also claimed Knight “forcefully placed [his] hand on her shoulder while taking a selfie with her.”
Knight, due to his disabilities, has limited ability to recognize and understand social cues. His mother, Aurora Knight, started <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/legal-support-for-marcus">a GoFundMe account</a> in an attempt to raise money for legal fees to fight Marcus’ suspension. The suspension ended up being overturned, but the negative marks still appear on his transcript.
As Aurora has said, Marcus never received a fair hearing. The investigator in his case had no formal training (though Title IX training is designed to find students responsible, so formal training likely would not have helped Marcus). No one testified against Marcus, yet he was found responsible.
Now, prolific Title IX attorney Mark Hathaway <a href="https://www.hathawayparker.com/news-page/2019/10/21/autistic-college-students-fist-bump-and-selfie-turn-into-unbelievable-nightmare">has taken Knight’s case</a>. Toni Airaksinen, writing for The Post Millennial, <a href="https://www.thepostmillennial.com/they-treat-my-autistic-son-like-a-caged-animal-student-takes-university-to-court-over-title-ix-ruling/">reported</a> that a hearing regarding Knight’s lawsuit will take place on November 18.
“We believe that Saddleback College failed to comply with the law and their own policy in improperly disciplining Marcus Knight and no sanctions should ever have been imposed against him,” Hathaway told Airaksinen.
The Daily Wire has spoken with Aurora Knight multiple times, and she always tears up when talking about what has happened to her son.
“Marcus is an amazing person! He has never ever been inappropriate with anyone. All he desires is to make friends and be treated like everyone else. He works so hard to keep up in a normal classroom setting. He works so hard to overcome his social obstacles. And the administration is throwing him on the cross to simply make him go away,” Aurora wrote on the GoFundMe page. “With his special needs, many people have tried to put him down over the years. He has fought for his right to have friends and an education. His one dream is to have a college degree and they are trying to take that from him unjustly.”
She told the Millennial that Marcus had “been robbed of two first years in college” and that Marcus’ “dreams have crashed.”
Marcus has resumed classes but must be accompanied by an assistant at all times. As Airaksinen reported, Marcus is taking four classes this semester and needs another six more to complete his associate’s degree. He eventually wants a Bachelor of Arts in Musical Theater. He currently sings at his local church group and with the school choir, but ever since the Title IX allegations against him, he has been nervous around other people.
“He was just trying to make a friend … and now he is so lonely,” Aurora told me earlier this year.
Aurora on Wednesday told me that the damage done to her son from the situation “is so deep,” yet she hopes their fight will help other disabled students who may face a similar situation given today’s environment.
“We hope that what we are doing now will open the door to others,” Aurora said.

Marcus Knight

Autistic Student Punished For Fist Bump And Selfie Will Get His Day In Court

Sexual Harassment

A North Carolina teacher has been suspended (with pay) after reportedly lining students up and segregating them based on religious beliefs and their political opinions, but it appears the reports about her are overblown.
The teacher, Julia Lopp, is a Spanish teacher at South Johnston High School (SJHS).
Students and parents reported that during her morning class last Friday, Lopp allegedly “asked her students to line up on opposite sides of the classroom based on whether they did or did not believe in God,” according to <a href="https://jocoreport.com/teacher-under-investigation-for-segregating-students-based-on-religious-personal-beliefs/">The Johnston County Report</a>.
“After the students were segregated based on their religious beliefs, Lopp allegedly asked the students if they supported or were opposed to abortion,” the outlet reported. “Then she asked her classroom if they were in favor or opposed LGBT rights and beliefs.”
Lopp also has been accused of threatening to withhold job and college recommendations from students who told anyone what happened that day in class. Further, she apparently segregated students based on their answers to health questions as well.
Those who know Lopp say the allegations against her have been grossly exaggerated. Benjamin Martin, who identified himself as a student at SJHS with friends in Lopp’s class, said the first-year teacher was actually a “victim of cherry-picking quotes.”
“The activity was an optional experiment and students stayed in these groups of beliefs for a short amount of time,” the student said in response to the Report article. “Anyone who has talked to Mrs. Lopp would know in a heartbeat this is nothing like her at all.”
Another response came from someone who pointed out that Lopp was previously a full-time Christian missionary, so reports that she “ridiculed” students for their belief in God was impossible. The Report appended an Editor’s Note to the bottom of their story explaining that particular allegation was removed.
Yet another respondent said the students were asked about 30 questions pertaining to today’s world and that students didn’t have to participate. This same respondent said the students then asked Lopp the same questions she asked them, and she answered.
Superintendent Dr. Jim Causby told the Report that the incident involving Lopp was “unfortunate” and “one I wish had not happened.”
“It is never appropriate for a teacher to segregate students based on religious, political or personal beliefs,” he added. “In fact, it is not appropriate for a teacher to even ask a student what their beliefs are. Our school system takes very seriously the rights of students in these areas and students should never be instructed to not share classroom activities with their parents.”
Causby added that the “current incident is under investigation by our Human Resources Department and the teacher is currently suspended with pay while the investigation takes place.”
The story that has been reported in multiple news outlets is just one side of the story. As with all allegations, there’s another side. An investigation might find that Lopp did nothing wrong, but her name has been dragged through the mud anyway. Being a first-year teacher, she has a high chance of not retaining her position next year, and these allegations certainly won’t help her.

Businesspeople walking in line on bar chart painted on asphalt, one person walking off.

Teacher Suspended After Allegedly Segregating Students Based On Religious Beliefs, Political Opinions. There’s More To The Story.

In late September, a 13-year-old student at Anderson High School in Ohio claimed a teacher at the school grabbed her right arm, unzipped her hoodie, and touched her breasts in a classroom.
The teenager also claimed that when the teacher let her go, he said, “if you tell anyone about this, I’ll kill you.”
Neither the teacher nor the student have been named in news reports about the incident. At least one media outlet, <a href="https://www.fox19.com/2019/10/25/charges-filed-against-anderson-student-who-falsely-accused-teacher-sexual-assault/">Fox 19</a>, is still referring to the girl as a “victim” even though she has now been charged with “first degree making false alarms,” a misdemeanor.
The teacher was placed on administrative leave during the investigation, but cleared to return to teaching after police determined the accusations against him were false.
On October 11, the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office (HCSO) released <a href="https://www.hcso.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/AndersonTwp-HighSchoolTeacher-10-11-2019.pdf">a statement</a> saying the investigation was concluded.
“As a result of the investigation it was determined that no criminal or inappropriate activity of any kind occurred, and that the alleged incident was fabricated by the accuser. Forest Hills School District and Anderson High School are aware of the situation, and the investigation into the false accusations is ongoing,” the statement said.
On October 25, Sheriff Jim Neil released another <a href="https://www.hcso.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/AndersonTwp-HighSchoolTeacherUpdate-10-25-2019.pdf">statement</a> saying the girl had been charged.
While local media outlets reported on the charges and that the girl had made a false accusation, they did not report what led police to determine she had made up the incident. In response to a Daily Wire inquiry, a spokesman for HCSO said the girl “disclosed the allegations were false.”
Forest Hills Superintendent Scot Prebles <a href="https://www.wlwt.com/article/sheriff-anderson-student-fabricated-sex-assault-claims-against-teacher/29442351">told WLWT5</a> that the school district was “working through” the ordeal.
&#8220;Although we&#8217;ve had a tough day, we&#8217;re all working through it,&#8221; he said. &#8220;The repercussions of this do have long term impact.&#8221;
Prebles added that school staff are now “jittery,” due to the false allegations.
“We have a staff who is jittery right now, because this could be done on any day to any one of us,&#8221; Prebles said. &#8220;We&#8217;re also going to make sure that we are supporting our staff member. We have a staff member who has been hurt by an accusation. It was not an accurate accusation.”
As with many false accusations of sexual assault made by women, rather than treating the accuser as a criminal, the school district is concerned with helping her.
&#8220;We&#8217;re going to do everything we can to help our students, to help this particular student, to work with their family, to make sure that they&#8217;re in a good place and they&#8217;re maturing and they&#8217;re growing from this situation,&#8221; Prebles said.
Such consideration is rarely afforded to males who commit misdemeanors.
Since the teenager was only charged with a misdemeanor, despite the serious nature of the allegations, she will likely face community service or a fine, if any punishment at all.
This is common for women who make false accusations of rape and sexual assault, since they are only considered misdemeanors relating to filing a false police report. Making such a false report is a unique kind of crime, however, one that causes severe harm to those falsely accused. The flippancy with which police departments can handle such accusations does nothing to help real victims of sexual assault or the victims of false accusations.

Man head in hands

13-Year-Old Girl Charged After Falsely Accusing Teacher Of Sexual Assault

Hoax

Sexual Assault

It seems like at least once a year we’re subjected to another claim that women on college campuses in America are at an exponentially higher risk of sexual assault than the world’s most dangerous countries.
Scientists often talk about the need for a study to be replicated to prove its results, but as we’ve seen time and time again with sexual assault surveys (that’s what they actually are) a flawed survey can be replicated a thousand times using the same flawed and disingenuous methods.
As I’ve <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/sorry-activists-another-flawed-survey-doesnt-prove-rape-culture">written</a> multiple <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/lies-damned-lies-and-campus-sexual-assault-ashe-schow">times</a>, surveys that use an overly broad definition of sexual assault are guaranteed to get large, headline-inducing, numbers. The latest version of this debunked survey method comes from the <a href="https://www.aau.edu/sites/default/files/AAU-Files/Key-Issues/Campus-Safety/FULL_2019_Campus_Climate_Survey.pdf">Association of American Universities</a>. Outside of the frightening headlines, the survey, like all others of its kind, does not really show what it is purported to show.
The vast majority of the “sexual assault” allegedly reported by respondents (in reality, they’re asked if they’ve experienced a particular action and the researchers then call that sexual assault) are instances of “unwanted” contact such as a stolen kiss or possibly even an accidental touch. These instances are rolled in with forcible rape to make it seem as though the problem is larger than it really is. As multiple critics have observed, asking about “unwanted” conduct is unfair, as people do not know something is unwanted unless they try. Misreading social signals should not be considered sexual assault along the same lines as forcible rape.
We see this in certain results from the AAU study. At one point, students were asked if they had witnessed sexual assault and misconduct against other students.
“The most common situation respondents reported they observed was someone making sexual comments that made others feel uncomfortable or offended (26.0%), followed by witnessing a situation they believe could have led to sexual assault (15.0%), witnessing someone behaving in a controlling or abusive manner (13.0%), and witnessing sexually harassing behavior (7.0%),” the authors of the study wrote.
One of the other major things to keep in mind with these studies is that they are so often not representative of the national population. This study points that out, and also states that studies that have looked into the matter have found that students are safer than non-students.
“The variation across schools emphasizes the importance of not generalizing from these 33 schools to a larger population (e.g. national),” the authors wrote. “The schools participating in the survey were not randomly selected, and the rates discussed in this report should not be seen as representing student populations beyond this group of schools.”
“Furthermore, the prevalence rates discussed in this report should not be interpreted as an indication that attending one of these four-year schools is extraordinarily dangerous. There have been very few studies using similar methodologies that have compared the sexual assault rates of college students to sexual assault rates among adults of similar age who are not in college or graduate school,” the authors continued. “Of the few studies that have been conducted, researchers have concluded that, if anything, college students have lower rates of sexual assault than those not in college (Coker et al, 2016b; Axinn, et al. 2017; Sinozich &amp; Langton, 2014). While this does not minimize either the seriousness of the problem of sexual assault and misconduct while attending a four-year school or its consequences for students’ well-being, it does provide a wider perspective on its correlate.”
One interesting finding in this survey that didn’t get a lot of media attention is related to certain findings showing how men are victims.
A large majority of students often say they didn’t report the alleged sexual assault because they didn’t think it was “serious enough.” AAU wanted to know more about this finding. The AAU survey found some interesting response. Nearly 70% of women said they didn’t report because they weren’t injured. But deep in this section is the finding that men don’t report sexual misconduct because “my body showed involuntary arousal.” And 30% of men who said they didn’t report an offense said it was “because of the person’s gender, I thought it would be minimized or misunderstood.” This is understandable, as men who have accused women of sexual assault are often ignored unless the woman claims she was sexually assaulted as well.
There are more problems with the survey, however, as Greg Piper at The College Fix <a href="https://www.thecollegefix.com/incapacitated-is-not-defined-in-latest-national-survey-of-campus-sexual-assault-thats-not-its-only-problem/">reported</a>. As I mentioned earlier, the broad definition of sexual misconduct helps pump up the numbers in these surveys to terrifying levels. From Piper:
<blockquote>The first major red flag: “sexual contact” includes “sexual touching,” which includes kissing, touching a “breast, chest, crotch, groin, or buttocks,” or touching someone “in a sexual way, even if the touching is over the other’s clothes.”
In other words, that last category depends on how a reporting student perceived any act of touching – with no regard for intent, duration or even body part touched. An accidental grazing of a shoulder could be reported by a student as “sexual touching.”
“Inability to consent or stop what was happening” appears 174 times in the survey results. It is defined as the student being “unable to consent or stop what was happening because they were passed out, asleep, or incapacitated due to alcohol or drugs.”
“Passed out” and “asleep” seem fairly objective. But “incapacitated due to alcohol or drugs” – which are involved in the vast majority of Title IX due process lawsuits I’ve reviewed – is not.</blockquote>
As Piper goes on to note, schools across the country have treated “any alcohol consumption by an accuser as strong evidence that she (and it’s invariably “she” in heterosexual disputes) could not consent.”
Incapacitated should be along the lines of “passed out” or “asleep.” Lowered inhibitions is not the same thing. Supporters of broad definitions of sexual assault like to use the analogy of drunk driving when asked why the accuser’s alcohol level matters but not the accused’s. But the analogy should go both ways. A woman can’t get out of a drunk driving offense by claiming she was too drunk to know what she was doing. It’s not an excuse.

Couple in bed

Another year, another bogus campus sexual assault survey

Oxford University&#8217;s student union has instituted an unofficial ban on clapping during student functions over fears the loud noise may trigger anxiety and the rapid hand movements and noise could alienate students who are unable or unwilling to clap.
<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7605991/Snowflake-students-Oxford-University-latest-demand-clapping-banned.html">The Daily Mail reports</a> that students and faculty are instead being encouraged to use &#8220;jazz hands&#8221; and other silent means of assent, and to explore using alternatives to clapping for meetings and gatherings.
The edict came from Oxford&#8217;s Student Union, which claims to be leading the way to a more &#8220;inclusive&#8221; environment at the thousand-year-old institute of higher learning in Britain.
&#8220;The first Student Council meeting of the academic year, yesterday, passed the motion to mandate the Sabbatical Officers to encourage the use of British Sign Language (BSL) clapping, otherwise known as ‘silent jazz hands’ at Student Council meetings and other official SU events,&#8221; <a href="https://www.oxfordstudent.com/2019/10/23/su-adopts-bsl-clapping-to-replace-traditional-applause/">a statement from the Oxford Student Council read</a>.
They continued, &#8220;BSL clapping is used by the National Union of Students since loud noises, including whooping and traditional applause, are argued to present an access issue for some disabled students who have anxiety disorders, sensory sensitivity, and/or those who use hearing impairment aids.&#8221;
The statement briefly mentions that the New York Times believes &#8220;snapping is the new clapping,&#8221; but it seems the Oxford Student Union passed on the opportunity to incorporate snapping fingers as one of its alternative motions of assent, possibly because snapping fingers might also be triggering to or exclusive of some students.
The statement concludes with an action statement, mandating that Student Council members use &#8220;jazz hands&#8221; in official meetings and at events, and encouraging Student Union officers to press Oxford University to adopt the &#8220;inclusive&#8221; jazz hands policy across the board: &#8220;As well as mandating the Sabbatical Officers to encourage the use of jazz hands at Student Council, the motion also mandates Sabbatical Officers to ‘lobby the University’ to use jazz hands in place of applause at University and college level events, with an explanation of why the change is important.&#8221;
As <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/completely-ludicrous-oxford-bans-clapping-for-being-an-anxiety-trigger-and-suggests-jazz-hands-instead">the Washington Examiner points out</a>, Oxford University has been in operation since the 1050s, and is one of the oldest and most storied institutions of higher learning in the world. However, its centuries long record of scholarly pursuits and rigorous intellectualism was no match for trendy social justice warrior-ism.
Oxford is the second such university in the UK to adopt the &#8220;ban&#8221; on applause; the other, Manchester University, passed a similar rule last year. The Oxford Student Union makes clear, in their statement, that they were inspired by Manchester&#8217;s courageous students.
Unfortunately for both Oxford and Manchester, their proposed &#8220;jazz hands&#8221; alternative to clapping may not be the clean, social justice option they believe it to be. None other than UK television presented Piers Morgan weighed in on Twitter, pointing out that &#8220;jazz hands&#8221; appears to be a racially charged term and that a solely visual means of declaring assent excludes the blind and disabled &#8212; and also that the Oxford Student Union is a bunch of &#8220;imbeciles.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
H <a href="https://twitter.com/OxfordSU_WEO?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@OxfordSU_WEO</a>, re your ban on clapping to stop students with anxiety being triggered, &amp; use of silent &#39;jazz hands&#39; instead.. a) Performing &#39;jazz hands&#39; is racist. b) Your new rule excludes blind people, so will make them feel marginalised. c) Grow a pair you imbeciles.
&mdash; Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) <a href="https://twitter.com/piersmorgan/status/1187348107836579840?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 24, 2019</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
The Student Council, though, says it remains committed to its decision. &#8220;The policy was proposed in order to encourage the use of British Sign Language clapping during our democratic events to make those events more accessible and inclusive for all, including people who suffer from anxiety,&#8221; one Student Council officer said in a statement. &#8220;Inclusivity is one of the Students&#8217; Union&#8217;s founding principles.&#8221;

Oxford

Oxford University Student Council Bans Clapping Over Fears It May Trigger Anxiety

Oxford University

Two white University of Connecticut students were arrested Monday after playing a game where they shouted vulgar words, including racial epithets like the n-word.
Stupid? Yes! Racist and vulgar? Yes! But Illegal? Not usually, but Adam Steinbaugh of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education <a href="https://www.thefire.org/university-of-connecticut-police-arrest-students-for-use-of-racial-slur/">reported</a> that Connecticut has “a rarely-used, unconstitutional state law prohibiting ‘ridicule.’”
This “relic,” of a law, as Steinbaugh explained, is from 1917 and was “intended to address advertisements for businesses, not every use of derogatory language.” It states:
Sec. 53-37. Ridicule on account of creed, religion, color, denomination, nationality or race. Any person who, by his advertisement, ridicules or holds up to contempt any person or class of persons, on account of the creed, religion, color, denomination, nationality or race of such person or class of persons, shall be guilty of a class D misdemeanor.
Steinbaugh noted that the law was rarely enforced because “it is plainly unconstitutional.”
“The use of racially-derogatory language — without more — is protected by the First Amendment,” he added.
The two students were filmed while they shouted the racist terms in an apartment complex parking lot. The video sparked outrage on campus. The UConn chapter of the NAACP wrote a letter to the editor of the school’s newspaper, The Daily Campus. The letter demanded school officials “fully investigate this incident and apply the proper justice.” Campus Reform <a href="https://www.campusreform.org/?ID=13898">reported</a> that the university confirmed to it that the two students shouting vulgar and racist words in the video were arrested under the “ridicule” law.
NBC News <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/2-white-uconn-students-arrested-after-video-showed-them-shouting-n1069891?">reported</a> that the two students, each aged 21, could face “a $50 fine or up to 30 days in jail.” Not to mention a criminal record that may have to be explained in the future.
A third man seen in the video was not arrested as he did not appear to shout with the other two, NBC reported.
Legal Insurrection reported that this is just the most recent example of people being punished for words &#8212; even if most people would find those words objectionable.
“Last month, New York made it illegal to use the term ‘illegal alien’ in a derogatory manner,” the outlet reported. “This week, a lawmaker in Massachusetts is proposing outlawing use of the word ‘bitch.’
As The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/massachusetts-bill-would-make-calling-someone-a-b-a-criminal-offense-including-jail-time">reported</a> Wednesday, the Massachusetts bill was introduced by State Rep. Daniel Hunt, a Democrat representing the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston, on behalf of a constituent. Massachusetts is the only state that allows citizens to introduce bills to the legislature. Hunt told The Boston Globe that he forgot to check a box on the filing form indicating it was for a constituent.
Hunt also said he has been mocked for the bill by State Republicans and people from across the country.
“I got at least 50 phone calls today calling me a ‘bitch’ or the ‘C’ word, and I’ve also gotten probably 50 e-mails,” he told the Globe.
When asked if the emails and phone calls bothered him, Hunt said it was “their right to express themselves to an elected official.” Acknowledging that right negates the bill he introduced.

Man yelling

Two Students Arrested For Shouting Vulgar, Racist Words

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, running for the 2020 Democratic nomination, is desperate to craft a public image that includes her time spent as a public school teacher, even if it was undeniably short. To that end, she&#8217;s spent time in Chicago this week, appearing with striking members of the Chicago Teachers Union.
On Monday, Warren released a video of herself calling striking teachers, offering words of support as a &#8220;former public school teacher.&#8221;
&#8220;I&#8217;m calling to say thank you for contributing to my campaign multiple times and second, be strong in the Chicago teachers&#8217; strike. I know that this has gotta be a hard time for the teachers and I know that no one involved does this lightly, but that you&#8217;re out there fighting for the future of our children,&#8221; she said in the video, posted to social media.
Warren has been pushing her one year of experience as an unlicensed special education teacher hard over the last month, perhaps in the hopes it distracts from the rest of her biography, which includes high-paid stints as a law professor, house flipper, and, eventually, as a career public servant. She&#8217;s already faced criticism for the focus on her public education career, after she tried to claim she was fired from her job for becoming pregnant, rather than for failing to get a required accreditation.
On Wednesday, Warren headlined a CTU rally, where she choked up a bit talking to a massive union rally in downtown Chicago, while around 300,000 students went without classes for a fourth day.
&#8220;Everyone in America should support you in this strike,&#8221; Warren told the crowd. &#8220;The reason is because when you go out and fight, you don&#8217;t just fight for yourselves. You fight for their children of this city, and the children of this country. I believe in public education. I believe it is time in America to make a new investment in public education.&#8221;
&#8220;I got a plan for that,&#8221; she continued.
She certainly does: an $800 billion plan that would &#8220;quadruple Title I funding for poor students to $450 billion over 10 years, increase funding for students with disabilities by $20 billion, invest $100 billion in so-called &#8220;excellence grants&#8221; for schools to invest in programs and resources they think are the most important for their students and provide $50 billion in infrastructure spending,&#8221; according to <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/elections/articles/2019-10-22/elizabeth-warren-joins-teachers-strike-in-chicago">U.S. News and World Report</a>. It also calls for replacing the Secretary of Education (something that&#8217;s the prerogative of a new president, regardless), and <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/elections/articles/2019-10-21/elizabeth-warren-k-12-plan-would-end-federal-funds-for-charter-schools-quadruple-title-i-funding">cracking down on charter and private schools</a>.
S<a href="https://townhall.com/tipsheet/bethbaumann/2019/10/21/fauxahontas-clings-to-chicago-teachers-strike-to-play-up-her-public-school-teac-n2555129">he outlined her plan on Twitter on Tuesday</a>, right before she made her call to striking Chicago teachers. There&#8217;s little it doesn&#8217;t include, and most of the elements are a direct handout to powerful teachers unions, who are backing Warren, and will likely provide millions in funding and thousands of hours of labor for her presidential campaign, if she wins the nomination.
&#8220;The unions are how we have a voice. The unions are how we have power,&#8221; Warren said during her speech in Chicago. &#8220;The unions are how we make sure that the needs of every single one of our children are heard loud and clear. So today, I&#8217;m here because the eyes of this nation are upon you. They have turned to Chicago for you to lead the way, for you to show how the power of standing together is the power of making real change in this country.&#8221;
Like the unions in Chicago, though, Warren is tight-lipped on how anyone plans to pay for her massive education spending increase.
Striking teachers in Chicago are calling for pay and benefits hikes, smaller class sizes, and hundreds more employees for the school system, including nurses and social workers (who also happen to be represented by unions affliated with CTU), but Chicago&#8217;s mayor, Lori Lightfoot has made clear that there&#8217;s no money for such a massive hiring binge &#8212; because there&#8217;s no money for, well, anything.
&#8220;There is a finite pot of money. We don&#8217;t have unlimited cash to keep funding the things that are aspirational and maybe things that, on values that we share,&#8221; Lightfoot said in a press conference Tuesday, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/22/us/chicago-teachers-strike-tuesday/index.html">according to CNN</a>. &#8220;We have to live within our means. That&#8217;s what the taxpayers expect of us, and that&#8217;s what we&#8217;re going to do.&#8221;
Striking teachers, no doubt, would like Lightfoot to hike Chicago property taxes, but even that money is spoken for.
Warren is expected to outline how she plans to pay for her huge education package later this week, but she already appears to be at a loss over how to fund the other huge spending programs she&#8217;s proposing, including a student loan bailout, a &#8220;green new deal,&#8221; and a Medicare for All universal health care plan.

Elizabeth Warren

Elizabeth Warren Butts In On Chicago Teachers&#8217; Strike To Boost Education Plan

Chicago

In higher education’s ongoing quest to appeal to the “woke” crowd, colleges and universities across the country are now training professors about “inclusive grading” as part of a larger focus on diversity and inclusion.
The College Fix <a href="https://www.thecollegefix.com/public-university-tells-professors-not-to-grade-based-on-merit/">reported</a> that Boise State University (BSU) is the latest in a long line of schools to jump on the ‘inclusive grading’ bandwagon. This week, the university is hosting an event called “Inclusive Teaching Means Inclusive Grading, Too.” The event is part of a larger certificate program, called Boise State Uniting for Inclusion and Leadership in Diversity (BUILD).
Information regarding the event could not be accessed, but other events with the same name offered insight into what is now being taught. From the Fix:
<blockquote>BSU’s event has the exact same name as a previous University of Tennessee-Knoxville faculty <a href="https://calendar.utk.edu/event/inclusive_teaching_means_inclusive_grading_practices_too#.XaTOB-dKi_I">workshop</a>. It was aimed to “engage instructors in conversations and activities designed to foreground diversity and inclusion in considerations of assessment and grading practices.”
The University of Michigan held a faculty workshop with a near-identical name as well. The Center for Research on Learning and Teaching <a href="http://crlt.umich.edu/events/inclusive-teaching-means-inclusive-grading-practices-too-inclusive-teaching-michigan-series">stated</a> on its website that attending teachers would “be asked to review their own practices” on grading throughout the event.
This workshop is reminiscent of one <a href="https://www.thecollegefix.com/university-seminar-teaches-faculty-not-to-judge-quality-of-writing-when-grading/">held</a> in February at American University, designed to teach faculty “how to assess writing without judging its quality.”
Titled “Grading ain’t just grading” and promising to help teachers rethink “writing assessment ecologies toward antiracist ends,” the workshop <a href="https://edspace.american.edu/ariwa/">warned</a> that “the practices of grading writing” maintained “White language supremacy.”</blockquote>
BSU, the Fix reported, has been on a “woke” kick lately, including hosting a book circle that makes participants “dig deep into ourselves to explore the ways in which we all, as individuals, sometimes unknowingly, support racism and white supremacy.”
The Fix also highlighted other programs coming up as part of the BUILD certification. One workshop is titled “Implicit Bias in the Academic Workplace” and suggests faculty attending reflect on “messages that are fed to us via news and popular culture may cause us to create an inequitable environment.”
Another workshop, titled, “‘Why are You Reacting that Way?’: Unpacking Identity Development &amp; it’s Impact on Interactions in the Classroom &amp; Workplace,” promises to “give participants opportunities to examine the lens they use to interact with others and understand why there is resistance.”
So, it’s now a professor’s responsibility to change their behavior to reduce “resistance” from students? What ever happened to teaching children and young adults how to properly behave?
Another upcoming program asks: “How accessible is your syllabus? That is, to what extent is it able to be used by all intended users, each with differing capabilities?”
Schools across the country have been giving into the woke crowd with increasing frequency. Multiple schools have held “white privilege workshops” designed to teach white people that they are racist and must repent. In <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/huge-university-holds-white-privilege-workshop-joseph-curl">one recent example</a>, the University of North Carolina’s workshop was attended by just nine students.
No subject is safe from the woke brigade, either. In Seattle, curriculum has been proposed that would teach students that math – yes math – <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/seattle-public-schools-teaching-math-ethnic-studies-asks-who-gets-to-say-if-an-answer-is-right">is racist</a>.

Hands raised

‘Inclusive Grading’: Colleges Teaching Professors Not To Grade On Quality

Diversity

Idaho

If you need an accurate update on some of the madness at the nation&#8217;s institutions of higher learning, check out Minding the Campus, a nonprofit independent organization. John Leo, its editor in chief, says that <a href="https://tinyurl.com/yxww7gth">the organization&#8217;s</a> prime mission is dedicated to the revival of intellectual pluralism and the best traditions of liberal education at America&#8217;s colleges and universities. Leo&#8217;s most recent compilation of campus madness leaves one nearly breathless.
In a USA Today op-ed, Emily Walton, a sociology professor at Dartmouth University, said that all college students should take a mandatory course on black history and white privilege. She says that by taking her class, white students &#8220;come to understand that being a good person does not make them innocent but rather they, too, are implicated in a system of racial dominance.&#8221; Walton adds, &#8220;After spending their young lives in a condition of &#8216;white blindness,&#8217; that is, the inability to see their own racial privilege, they begin to awaken to the notion that racism has systematically kept others down while benefiting them and other white people.&#8221; This is inculcating guilt based on skin color. These young white kids had nothing to do with slavery, Jim Crow or other horrible racial discriminatory acts. If one believes in individual responsibility, he should find the indoctrination by Walton offensive. To top it off, she equates the meritocratic system of hard work with white discrimination against minorities.
If you thought integration was in, check out the University of Nevada. Based on a report in the College Fix, John Leo describes how integration on that campus is actively discouraged — and at taxpayer expense. The university provides separate dorms for different identities including Howell Town for black students, Stonewall Suites for LGBTQ students, the women-only housing of Tonopah community, the Healthy Living Floor for tofu and kale lovers and study-intensive floors for those who want to graduate.
According to a New York Post report, New York City school administrators have been taught that pillars of Western Civilization such as objectivity, individualism and belief in the written word all are examples of white supremacy. All school principals, district office administrators and superintendent teams were required to attend the anti-white supremacy training put on by the city Department of Education&#8217;s Office of Equity and Access. They learn that a belief in an &#8220;ultimate truth&#8221; (objectivity) leads to a dismissal of &#8220;alternate viewpoints or emotions&#8221; as &#8220;bad&#8221; and that an emphasis on the written word overlooks the &#8220;ability to relate to others&#8221; and leads to &#8220;teaching that there is only &#8216;one right way&#8217; to do something.&#8221; Administrators learn that other &#8220;hallmarks&#8221; of white supremacy include a &#8220;sense of urgency,&#8221; &#8220;quantity over quality&#8221; and &#8220;perfectionism.&#8221; Richard Carranza, New York City school superintendent, says the workshops are just about &#8220;what are our biases and how we work with them.&#8221;
Michael Bloomberg, former New York City mayor, says that political rage and increasingly polarized discourse are endangering our nation. Americans used to move forward productively after elections regardless of which side won. Now, we seem paralyzed by absolute schism and intolerance. Bloomberg pointed to colleges as a prime example of a rising level of intolerance for different ideas and free speech. Steven Gerrard, a professor at Williams College in Massachusetts, serves as an example of campus intolerance. Students declared Gerrard &#8220;an enemy of the people&#8221; after he suggested that Williams College join other schools in signing onto what&#8217;s called <a href="https://tinyurl.com/y7hxrgf9">the Chicago Principles</a>. The statement, published by the Committee of Freedom of Expression at the University of Chicago, calls for free speech to be central to college and university culture. Williams college students said free speech is a part of a right-wing agenda as a &#8220;cover for racism, xenophobia, sexism, anti-Semitism, homophobia, transphobia, ableism and classism.&#8221; Bloomberg pointed out that fewer than 70 of America&#8217;s 4,000 colleges and universities have endorsed or adopted the Chicago statement.
State governors and legislators can learn something from their Alaskan counterparts, who slashed public spending on the University of Alaska by 41%. There&#8217;s nothing better than the sounds of pocketbooks snapping shut to bring a bit of sanity to college administrators.
Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University. To find out more about Walter E. Williams and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.

Graduation cap.

WILLIAMS: Intolerance In Academia

A University of Southern California (USC) student was awarded $142,100 in attorney’s fees after the California Second District Court of Appeal found the student was “denied a fair hearing” after being accused of sexual assault and rape.
The student, referred to in court documents reviewed by The Daily Wire as John Doe, was accused of sexually assaulting and raping a woman referred to only as Jane Roe after a night of partying and drinking. The two met while attending a “paint party” during which participants threw cups of paint on each other. Multiple colors of paint were used, including red. One student later interviewed as a witness during John’s Title IX investigation said she had red paint on her body, including behind her ears, for days after the party.
John and Jane were both drinking that night. Jane reported fell down a few times during the night, but the only video surveillance footage of her shows her walking fine. Witnesses from the party said she began to lean on people throughout the night and act in a matter inconsistent with her shy nature. At one point in the night, she sat on a strange man’s lap and was described by one of her friends as “very flirty.”
Jane was dating another student, referred to as “Andrew,” who was not at the party. Eventually, the group of students, including John and Jane, left the party. The other members of the group left, and John and Jane returned to her apartment. Footage from inside the elevator shows Jane pushing the wrong button for her apartment floor and looking around several other floors before finding her own. It also shows her interacting with others in the elevator and walking on her own. In her apartment, Jane vomited.
John left after their sexual encounter and apologized twice for his behavior, saying he had “no right to do what he did.”
The morning after the encounter, Jane claimed to have found puddles of blood on her sheets, air mattress, carpet, rectum, and thighs. She also acknowledged she still had paint on her body and wore a dress to cover but preserve the marks. She had texted Andrew, the man she was dating, during the night and he picked her up from the rape treatment center the next day. At Jane’s apartment, at her direction, Andrew threw out the sheets and deflated the air mattress.
Witnesses gave conflicting accounts about the marks in Jane’s apartment. Andrew agreed that there was blood in the apartment, but one of Jane’s other friends said she didn’t see blood. Photos of the apartment taken after the sheets were thrown out did not show blood on the carpet, though Jane claimed it did.
Jane refused to report the encounter to police. She instead reported it to USC administrators but did not provide her clothing or medical records. John was unable to independently test these items. The main investigator did not independently interview several key witnesses and dismissed one witness’ statements after she said she didn’t see blood in the apartment after the encounter.
John was found responsible and expelled. He sued the school, but his lawsuit was dismissed. He appealed to the California Second District Court of Appeal and won. That decision found in part that John’s inability to cross-examine the witnesses and evidence against him denied him a fair hearing. The case was remanded to the Superior Court of California and John was awarded attorney’s fees totaling $142,100. In her ruling, Judge Mitchell Beckloff rejected USC’s claim that students are harmed by fair investigations because it makes it more difficult to remove dangerous students from their campus.
“In opposition, Respondent suggests the Court of Appeal decision actually harms three million students by making it more difficult for schools to expel students the school believes committed harmful conduct,” Beckloff wrote. “The court disagrees. Ensuring a fair adjudicatory process for those accused of serious misconduct is not a societal harm. Instead, it is a key component of ensuring overall trust in an adjudicatory process. The court also disagrees with Respondent’s contention the decision here benefitted only a tiny percentage of students within the state. All students benefit from Respondent following its own policies and procedures.”
Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated which Court of Appeal reversed the lower court&#8217;s decision.

Paint brush in red paint

Accused Student Awarded $142,000 In Attorney’s Fees After Court Finds Campus Procedures Unfair

Title IX

University of Southern California

A small group of students at the University of Minnesota protested outside the school president’s office Friday demanding campus police officers be disarmed.
The College Fix <a href="https://www.thecollegefix.com/students-hold-sit-in-at-u-minnesota-presidents-office-to-demand-campus-cops-be-disarmed/">reported</a> that the sit-in was a follow-up to last year’s protest outside the University of Minnesota Police Department (UMPD). This year, just eight students attended. Last year, nearly double that protested outside the police department.
“This is essentially a reminder that we expect these demands to be met,” the student organizer <a href="https://www.mndaily.com/article/2019/10/n-students-host-study-in-outside-gabels-office">told The Minnesota Daily</a>.
Lest one think this sit-in was just about guns, the students also demanded an “increase [in] the diversity of the student population,” reported the Daily.
The protest was led by Students for a Democratic Society, and was referred to as a “study-in” because participating members had homework and studying to do.
“The goal is to occupy space … to keep it chill and study,” another organizer told the outlet.
“I have a midterm in half an hour,” said another. “I agree with the resolutions [from SDS], I just have to balance social justice with school.”
The Daily reported that students “snacked on Halloween-themed donuts and coffee as they studied.”
During last year’s small protest, a student said the call to disarm the UMPD was the “perfect opportunity for the University to leverage themselves on a progressive course in society and … nip in the bud any circumstances where police can murder people,” the Daily <a href="https://www.mndaily.com/article/2018/04/acdisarm">reported</a>.
During that protest, the Daily reported that no UMPD officer had fired their weapon since 2012, “when an officer shot a dying raccoon on the St. Paul campus.” It was the only reported incident in the past decade.
SDS handed out fliers last year claiming UMPD &#8212; a campus police force &#8212; had a stock of 57 automatic rifles and spent $500,000 per year purchasing new weapons and supplies.
“The more you have police officers armed to respond to folks in the community who are armed and potentially pose a threat, the more that there&#8217;s a risk of that threat actually coming from the police officers,” a sociology professor told the outlet in April 2018.
A UMPD spokesperson told the Daily that the department did not plan to disarm, as law enforcement must be ready for potential active shooters.
The Fix reported that the UM student government voted down a resolution to disarm the UMPD by nearly 400 votes last year.
The campaign to disarm campus police officers spread early last year. Students at the University of Chicago also <a href="https://www.thecollegefix.com/university-of-chicago-students-demand-campus-police-be-disarmed/">wanted police officers disarmed</a>, claiming through their protest signs “UofC kills.” In reality, there had only been one report of an officer firing their weapon in the past 30 years &#8212; and body cam footage proved it was self-defense. A student with a mental illness had charged the officer with a metal pole. The student was shot in the shoulder and charged with assault and property damage.
Similarly, students at the University of California-Davis approved a resolution to disarm police officers. Shortly after the resolution passed, a Sacramento Police officer <a href="https://www.thecollegefix.com/uc-davis-police-chief-decries-resolution-to-disarm-campus-cops-as-officer-killed-in-line-of-duty/">was killed</a> by an assailant with a rifle in the line of duty.

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