This is the story that garnered a great deal of discussion....
"An upper Manhattan public elementary school will be the first in the city to require that students study Arabic, officials said yesterday.
Beginning next semester, all 200 second- through fifth-graders at PS 368 in Hamilton Heights will be taught the language twice a week for 45 minutes putting it on equal footing with science and music courses.
One reason Principal Nicky Kram Rosen selected Arabic as opposed to more common offerings, such as Spanish or French is because it will help the school obtain a prestigious International Baccalaureate standing."
Upper Manhattan public elementary school becomes the first to mandate Arabic as a foreign language - NYPOST.com
I found the following op-ed in my local paper:
1. "The Big Apple is a proud U.S. melting pot not a cesspool for panderers and anarchists with an international agenda.
2. A dunces cap should sit atop PS 368 in Manhattan, which became the first taxpayer-funded school in the city to force Arabic down the throats of its students next semester by requiring that all 200 of them study the language twice a week in order to earn a United Nations-affiliated International Baccalaureate ranking.
3. Politically-obtuse Principal Nicky Kram Rosen, who chose Arabic over more widely spoken languages, should know that a simple stroll through the Big Apple the most globalized city in the world can achieve better results than instituting a costly and unnecessary curriculum that supports issues at odds with the Free World, including disarmament under the guise of peace, and a collectivist view of social justice.
4. An International Baccalaureate education ... is nothing to brag about: its application fee is $23,000 per school, it is taught by a UN-affiliated workshop leader whose expenses down to air travel, meals, and accommodation are footed by the unwitting taxpayer, and it strives to breed a global citizen using an international education that pushes for a particular kind of intercultural understanding and respect, overseen by the United Nations.
5. An International Baccalaureate education is a cake of many layers that hoodwinks westerners into embracing an educational policy that strips students of their individualities and entrepreneurial abilities, while chipping away at our sovereignty.
6. Americas prosperity and successes have not been achieved on the back of the global citizen, but the American worker, whose attention to hard work and fair play has made this country the envy of the world and certainly of the U.N.
7. [The U.N.] continues to undermine the U.S. while ignoring the travesties of corrupt international regimes whose kit and caboodle it now wants absorbed into the American classroom under the guise of multicultural education.
8. Principal Rosen is doing her students and the American taxpayer no favors by inviting a program that has no pronounced merit, and is vigorously overseen by a body that conflicts with American ideals.
9. International Baccalaureate, www.ibo.org/general/what.cfm">by its own admission, intends for teachers, students, and parents to draw confidently on a recognizable common educational framework, a consistent structure of aims and values, and an overarching concept of how to develop international-mindedness.
10. ... its real intention appears to be the deconstruction of the Free World as we know it classroom by classroom."
Teaching arabic in public schools Brooklyn Daily
Ms. Abruzzo certainly has strong opinions.....
...and, best of all, she has the ability to see beyond the trees to the deep, dark - and often dangerous- jungle.
"An upper Manhattan public elementary school will be the first in the city to require that students study Arabic, officials said yesterday.
Beginning next semester, all 200 second- through fifth-graders at PS 368 in Hamilton Heights will be taught the language twice a week for 45 minutes putting it on equal footing with science and music courses.
One reason Principal Nicky Kram Rosen selected Arabic as opposed to more common offerings, such as Spanish or French is because it will help the school obtain a prestigious International Baccalaureate standing."
Upper Manhattan public elementary school becomes the first to mandate Arabic as a foreign language - NYPOST.com
I found the following op-ed in my local paper:
1. "The Big Apple is a proud U.S. melting pot not a cesspool for panderers and anarchists with an international agenda.
2. A dunces cap should sit atop PS 368 in Manhattan, which became the first taxpayer-funded school in the city to force Arabic down the throats of its students next semester by requiring that all 200 of them study the language twice a week in order to earn a United Nations-affiliated International Baccalaureate ranking.
3. Politically-obtuse Principal Nicky Kram Rosen, who chose Arabic over more widely spoken languages, should know that a simple stroll through the Big Apple the most globalized city in the world can achieve better results than instituting a costly and unnecessary curriculum that supports issues at odds with the Free World, including disarmament under the guise of peace, and a collectivist view of social justice.
4. An International Baccalaureate education ... is nothing to brag about: its application fee is $23,000 per school, it is taught by a UN-affiliated workshop leader whose expenses down to air travel, meals, and accommodation are footed by the unwitting taxpayer, and it strives to breed a global citizen using an international education that pushes for a particular kind of intercultural understanding and respect, overseen by the United Nations.
5. An International Baccalaureate education is a cake of many layers that hoodwinks westerners into embracing an educational policy that strips students of their individualities and entrepreneurial abilities, while chipping away at our sovereignty.
6. Americas prosperity and successes have not been achieved on the back of the global citizen, but the American worker, whose attention to hard work and fair play has made this country the envy of the world and certainly of the U.N.
7. [The U.N.] continues to undermine the U.S. while ignoring the travesties of corrupt international regimes whose kit and caboodle it now wants absorbed into the American classroom under the guise of multicultural education.
8. Principal Rosen is doing her students and the American taxpayer no favors by inviting a program that has no pronounced merit, and is vigorously overseen by a body that conflicts with American ideals.
9. International Baccalaureate, www.ibo.org/general/what.cfm">by its own admission, intends for teachers, students, and parents to draw confidently on a recognizable common educational framework, a consistent structure of aims and values, and an overarching concept of how to develop international-mindedness.
10. ... its real intention appears to be the deconstruction of the Free World as we know it classroom by classroom."
Teaching arabic in public schools Brooklyn Daily
Ms. Abruzzo certainly has strong opinions.....
...and, best of all, she has the ability to see beyond the trees to the deep, dark - and often dangerous- jungle.
