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A comment on More Students Are Turning Away from College and Toward Apprenticeships. Parent comment

Re:More Students Are Turning Away from College and Toward Ap... by wolverine876 on Saturday March 18, 2023 @05:51PM (#35213449)
> I had a class that really critically analyzed native American cultures. Today the class would be considered racist, it would have to a priori be an admiration of those cultures

If we are going to be collegiate, let's critically examine our own posts. What is that based on? It doesn't match what I know.

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Re:More Students Are Turning Away from College and Toward Ap... by _gabe_ on Sunday March 19, 2023 @12:22AM (#35216005)
If you want to be collegiate this literally happened a year ago[0]:

> When Professor Stuart Reges challenged the University of Washington’s position on land acknowledgements, administrators punished him, undermining his academic freedom

But don't worry, you don't have to go so far as critically teaching about all the aspects of different cultures to risk being accused as a racist on college campuses. I also remember the racist rock from a couple years ago[1]:

> The University of Wisconsin removed a 42-ton boulder from its Madison campus Friday after complaints from students of color who called the rock a symbol of racism.

[0]: https://www.thefire.org/news/lawsuit-professor-sues-universi...

[1]: https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/09/us/chamberlin-rock-removed-un...

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Re:More Students Are Turning Away from College and Toward Ap... by quadrifoliate on Sunday March 19, 2023 @11:37PM (#35226967)
Stuart Reges seems like a well-known controversy generator, looks like he was in the news about this other thing [0] a while ago as well.

Given this background, I think it is a mark of academic freedom that literally all the university did was offer a separate course section for people who wanted it. I fail to see how he is being retaliated against in any way -- if the university is offering an alternative to his course for people who want to exercise their academic freedom, why is he against that?

Sounds like it should be useful to promote free thought -- you can either take the course where the whackjob professor argues against acknowledging Native American tribes in a computer science course, or you can take the course that, you know, focuses on computer science. And hey, maybe the whackjob professor is a good enough teacher that his content outweighs the land theory nonsense, and people actually take his course? I certainly know a lot of good professors I learned from at college were eccentric.

I admit the second one is far-fetched and weird; but almost entirely removed from academia. Sounds to me like a bunch of administrators making work to justify their own inflated salaries.

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[0] https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/education/why-dont...

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Re:More Students Are Turning Away from College and Toward Ap... by wolverine876 on Monday March 20, 2023 @01:21AM (#35227603)
Your evidence:

* The Fire appears to be an advocacy organization for one side o that debate, not a credible source of news.

* What is wrong with removing the rock? What do you know about it? I read a couple articles, including the CNN article, and nobody seems to dispute its racist symbolism. The campus administration supported its removal and the students who raised the issue. What do you know better? And who was censored or otherwise harmed by its removal?

As is common IME for these sorts of claims, smoke machines but rarely a fire.

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