[IP] more on Scholastic Rethinks Path to 9/11 Study Guide
Begin forwarded message:
From: John BARTAS <Jbartas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: September 11, 2006 2:59:04 PM JST
To: dave@xxxxxxxxxx
Cc: ip@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [IP] more on Scholastic Rethinks Path to 9/11 Study Guide
Hi Dave,
You are correct that it could be quite a useful exercise, but
unfortunately neither the schools nor Scholastic is trying to do this.
The schools don't have a mandate for it - in fact, there's case
law declaring that K-12 public school teachers are there to teach a
lesson plan set by the community, not their personal beliefs. This is
good - reversing this law would result in billions of dollars in
teaching scholarships for young radical conservatives from Focus on
the Family, Richard Mellon Scaife <http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/
1998/04/27/scaife.profile/>, and other well heeled groups who want to
indoctrinate the next generation in their views. This doesn't happen
(much) because teachers are supposed to stick to the curriculum and
leave personal politics outside.
Similarly, Scholastic Books has profited from a trusted position
leveraging public schools for their book sales. Promoting any overtly
partisan film, whether an anti-Clinton fantasy like "Path to 9-11" or
an anti-Bush documentary like "Fahrenheit 9-11" is way overstepping
their moral authority. It may not violate any laws, but it's gonna be
bad for business - if I were a stockholder (NASDAQ - SCHL) I'd be
selling. As a (former) customer, I'm boycotting.
Scholastic's latest position on the subject (link below) still
refers to this fictional film as a "docudrama" and tries to connect
invading Iraq with fighting "Terror". The very fact they offer a
"study guide" is an implicit endorsement of the movie.
I'm still waiting to find out why a once reputable company would
risk their whole business in such a reckless manner. Was it just
dumb? Have they been bought by Ruppert Murdoch? In the meanwhile I"ll
be asking the school board members I campaigned for last year to drop
Scholastic as a bookseller.
Does anyone know a good company that can serve as a replacement?
The kids should have ready access to books, but us moderate parents
can no longer trust Scholastic. I think there's a huge market
opportunity here.
Scholastic's link:
http://www.scholastic.com/medialiteracy/
David Farber wrote:
Begin forwarded message:
From: Dave Crocker <dhc2@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: September 9, 2006 8:54:34 AM PDT
To: dave@xxxxxxxxxx
Cc: ip@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Alice Kehoe <akehoe@xxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [IP] Scholastic Rethinks Path to 9/11 Study Guide
Reply-To: dcrocker@xxxxxxxx
Rather than washing its hands entirely due to the fallout with
former president Clinton, the company will still provide a guide
to the show, but will try to incorporate the controversy into
the guide by focusing on media literacy, critical thinking, and
historical background.
“After a thorough review of the original guide that we offered
online to about 25,000 high school teachers, we determined that
the materials did not meet our high standards for dealing with
controversial issues,” said Scholastic President Dick Robinson on
the company's Web site.
“At the same time, we believe that developing critical thinking
and media literacy skills is crucial for students in today’s
society in order to participate fully in our democracy and that a
program such as ‘The Path to 9/11’ provides a very ‘teachable
moment’ for developing these skills at the high school level.
This could be quite a useful exercise.
The effect of propaganda -- material that contains a small amount
of truth and a great deal of tailored untruth -- is strongly
reversed by having a credible commentator offer insight about the
material while it is being watched.
In other words, properly educating the viewer about a distorted
program, while they are watching it, can result in a strong
reaction against the program's creators. In effect it can
innoculate viewers against the program's creators...
d/
--
--
John Bartas, CTO, Praemio, Inc.
www.praemio.com - Home of TheAgent
(408) 857-0605
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