by Jerome du Bois
Straight talk scares some people, with revealing results. Yesterday, when Catherine King fisked SUSD Governing Board President Christine Schild --using her inimitable stlye to crack Mrs. Schild's ceramic facade, to get her to answer our questions-- she responded by climbing up on an even higher horse, where she looks even more ridiculous.
I'll be fisking her email after the jump, but first I want to bring us back to the subject at hand, what the last two postings have been about: the consistent presentation of a distorted Islam --a benevolent one-- to middle- and high-school students. Neither Christine Schild nor, more importantly, Superintendent John Baracy himself, responded to that issue. The six-figure man is hiding behind the "unpaid volunteer."
As of now, with History Alive! removed from the classroom, the only "materials" available must be Across the Centuries, another distorted volume. Unless the school district has a few thousand new social-studies books that just happen to be available. If so, what is the title of that social studies volume? Somebody tell me. Comments are open.
As a bonus, we append a list of specific questions for John Baracy, Christine Schild, the other members of the SUSD Governing Board, and any and all American citizens. There's a Board meeting March 29th at Coronado High. I hope some brave parents attend that meeting with this list at the ready. We invite them to do so.
First, for easy comparison and because it's so straight and snarky, let's reprint Catherine King's last email to Christine Schild:
Mrs. Schild:
"I understand your frustration."
Comment from Catherine King: "Drop the fuzzy fake empathy."
"However, there are a number of issues on my plate & I have to pay attention to all of them."
Comment from Catherine King: "Boo hoo. That's why you get paid the big bucks. Besides, getting back to one of Jerome's original questions, Who is paying you for this? And exactly what is 'this'?"
"The Superintendent gave me his word and I believe him."
Comment from Catherine King: "How does it follow that we should believe him, unless we were born last night? Also, suspiciously, why would you think other people are so stupid as to be so effortlessly dismissed? About questions concerning the Islamic indoctrination of our youth?"
"However, I will follow up with the Superintendent. I expect him to call me today on an unrelated matter."
Comment from Catherine King: "We are talking about a whole generation of minds in an unprecedentedly crucial time, not about your cozy, 'informal,' 'unrelated matter,' 'I believe him' relationship with Dr. Baracy. Your stance is suspect, and we'll be examining your background, and your affliations."
Signed,
Catherine King, with Jerome du Bois
[Here's Mrs. Schild's "last" email]
From: "Christine Schild"
To: "'Jerome du Bois'"
Subject: RE: more questions than ever
Date: Thu, 10 Mar 2005 13:19:55 -0700
Dear Mr. du Bois and Ms. King,
This is the last time I will respond to your email regarding this subject.
For your information, I am an unpaid volunteer who devotes over 30 hours per week to advancing educational opportunities for 26,000 public school students. In addition, I am responsible for overseeing a $150 million budget and a $217 million capital improvement project. Like any public school district in the United States, we have a myriad of issues facing us this year including significant budget shortfalls, how to best service the needs of our students, and meeting ever increasing standards for academic accountability. While I embrace these tasks wholeheartedly because of my commitment to our community, they take up a lot of my time. Frankly, I am much more concerned with the needs of my students and constituents than I am with the fact that this book, which people who don’t even live within my district believe is inappropriate, is present in a handful of classrooms across the district.
I trust the superintendent to do what he promised. I have indicated to you that I would follow up to ensure the job was done. If you still take issue with my stance, I invite you to express your opinion in person at our next Board meeting which will be held on March 29, 2005 at Coronado High School in Scottsdale, Arizona.
However, please anticipate that by that time, I will obtain a public confirmation from the Superintendent that the books were voluntarily removed from our classrooms thereby defusing any threatened action you may take against me.
Please be advised that if you publicly attack myself, other Board members, or the school district in any way, I will take all appropriate measures to protect my district.
Best wishes,
Christine Schild
Scottsdale USD Governing Board President
Scottsdale Neighborhood Enhancement Commission member
[fisk begins]
This is the last time I will respond to your email regarding this subject.
You have yet to respond to the subject --Islam in textbooks-- but this is the fourth time you have avoided it.
For your information, I am an unpaid volunteer who devotes over 30 hours per week to advancing educational opportunities for 26,000 public school students.
I am an unpaid volunteer, too, who devotes around twelve hours a day exploring important social and political and legal issues, then writing about them sometimes. I don't know how many people my efforts reach, but today, March 11, 2005, if you Yahoo "History Alive! The Medieval World and Beyond", our work is the second citation. The Tears of Things is still microblogospheric, but as I've warned before, beware the power of the blogs of the Long Tail.
In addition, I am responsible for overseeing a $150 million budget and a $217 million capital improvement project.
And it isn't enough, is it? The students --I mean the parents-- flee anyway, into charter schools and religious academies.
Like any public school district in the United States, we have a myriad of issues [sic] facing us this year including significant budget shortfalls, how to best service the needs of our students, and meeting ever increasing standards for academic accountability.
Perhaps you have budget shortfalls (fewer butts in seats) because you're not "servicing" the needs of the students if your standards of academic accountability are low. You certainly haven't been accountable to some simple questions about academic standards. And you certainly have the right to keep your mouth shut. And we see that. This is a post-9/11 world at war, no matter how it may look from cushyville.
While I embrace these tasks wholeheartedly because of my commitment to our community, they take up a lot of my time. Frankly, I am much more concerned with the needs of my students and constituents than I am with the fact that this book, which people who don’t even live within my district believe is inappropriate, is present in a handful of classrooms across the district.
Wait a minute! It's still present in a handful of classrooms across the district? You do say "the fact," after all. Hmmm. . .
And how do you know we don't live in the district? A moot point, as you lawyers say, at any rate, since the original concern, and my first signal, came from FISH's email to Daniel Pipes, and FISH, parent of a seventh-grader, lives in SUSD. But you won't answer his questions either; or, if you have, it's been on the side.
Also, when you say "believe is inappropriate," referring to us, does that imply that you believe that orphaned tome is appropriate? (Oops. I asked a question.)
Frankly, you are much more concerned to tell us of your self-serving self-sacrificing image, using your time to shore up your defensiveness, remain dismissive, and then, in a subsequent passage, imply that we threatened you. But first:
I trust the superintendent to do what he promised. I have indicated to you that I would follow up to ensure the job was done. If you still take issue with my stance, I invite you to express your opinion in person at our next Board meeting which will be held on March 29, 2005 at Coronado High School in Scottsdale, Arizona.
I don't trust John Baracy, the Superintendent, one bit. He doesn't answer any of our emails, and I'm really concerned about his frivolous preoccupation with job titles, which is just new paint over old cracks. He does not impress me as a serious man. And you fronting points for him disappoints me as well.
Of course we decline your invitation. We already have get strapped just to go to the K for a quart of milk. We're not about to present ourselves as two clear targets before a significant proportion of the Scottsdale Muslim "community," bristling with picture phones. You really haven't done your homework on us.
However, please anticipate that by that time, I will obtain a public confirmation from the Superintendent that the books were voluntarily removed from our classrooms thereby defusing any threatened action you may take against me.
Please be advised that if you publicly attack myself, other Board members, or the school district in any way, I will take all appropriate measures to protect my district.
A bit tetchy, aren't you? "Threatened action"? We blog, Mrs. Schild. What are you going to do, stop us before we Google again?
The guy in the movie said, "You're part of the problem, or you're part of the solution, or you're just part of the landscape." Nobody gets to be the last part anymore. The landscape changed when the Twin Towers fell, and when two other planes plowed into hell --all filled with innocent souls, brought down by Muslims. Muslims. Muslims. They are the threat, not we two.
I will take all appropriate measures to protect my district.
We wish you would protect your district. Ditto Dr. John Baracy. We wish you would stand up a little straighter to protect your country, too.
Questions, Questions, Questions
1. Has any member of the SUSD Governing Board had any side or semi-secret meetings with Muslim groups about anything?
2. Have they met, for example, with Dr. Zudhi Jasser, representatives of The Islamic Speakers Bureau of Arizona, The American Islamic Forum For Democracy, or representatives of CAIR?
3. Have Muslim parents pushed for headscarves in SUSD? Has the issue ever been brought up, and through what channels? Whose position is being advanced?
4. How did History Alive! (HA!) come up for consideration of district-wide adoption? Who put it under whose nose?
5. And how did it get canned? This was, supposedly, a pilot program that all of the education honchos in California were keeping a keen eye on. Now, suddenly, it sputters out. Why?
6. And, in the interval, to raise the very first question on this three-article thread, Is it true that HA! was not allowed off-campus, that the student could not take the volume home? If true, then what the hell?
7. Does Mrs. Schild's consistent haughty dismissiveness represent the position of all members of the Governing Board when faced with serious, perhaps unpopular questions, even from a SUSD parent?
8. Finally, as a follow-up to #7, if a Muslim parent, or brace of them, comes to you --any of you-- with their concerns and questions, do you treat them as disdainfully as you have tried to do with us, or do you just bend over for them and say yes yes yes? Has it already happened? did they have their way with you?
Posted by Jerome at March 11, 2005 11:51 AM | TrackBack