I recently commented on the Peace/Global curriculum in my neighborhood school. I was not aware then that this is an international movement sponsored by the United Nations and is actively taught in the Minneapolis Public Schools under the title of the International Baccalaureate program. Below is some additional information about this movement and some comments as to why it might have a negative impact on American students.
So...was there a public debate as to whether this is an appropriate program for the Minneapolis Public School to be sponsoring or like many other contemporary philosophical influences has it just crept in unawares? Michael Atherton Prospect Park -----Original Message----- From: EdWatch [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, January 25, 2004 4:46 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Global education EdWatch [formerly Maple River Education Coalition] 1402 Concordia Avenue St. Paul, MN 55104 651-646-0646 http://www.edwatch.org January 25, 2004 Two articles: 1. "Learning Globally" about the International Baccalaureate (excerpts) 2. UNESCO influence on the U.S. Federal Curriculum. "In the past century, the civic mission of schools was education for democracy in a sovereign state. In this century, by contrast, education will become everywhere more global. And we ought to improve our curricular frameworks and standards for a world transformed by globally accepted and internationally transcendent principles." Center for Civic Education (CCE) upon which most state standards are based. [See 'FedEd: The New Federal Curriculum and How It's Enforced,' http://www.edwatch.org.] --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Washington Times, January 18, 2004 "Learning Globally" http://www.washtimes.com/specialreport/20040117-112841-6750r.htm Excerpts: The Bush administration has begun issuing grants to help spread a United Nations-sponsored school program that aims to become a "universal curriculum" for teaching global citizenship... Some educators are skeptical. An official in the Reagan administration says he was "a wee bit put off" by the program's approach. An education adviser to the current Bush administration calls the approach "an educator fad," and a retired official of the National Science Foundation says many of the peer reviewers in the program are "hard left-leaners." The Education Department grant will expand the IB program initially in Arizona, Massachusetts and New York... An IB regulation accepted by participating American schools requires that all tests and written papers of American students sent to Europe for grading or evaluation "become the absolute property" of the International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO) in Geneva... The IB curriculum, UNESCO said, would promote human rights and social justice; the need for "sustainable development"; and address population, health, environmental and immigration concerns. "Changing patterns of national and international migration and political and social transformation have given cultural diversity a new importance," the statement said. Bradley W. Richardson, director of International Baccalaureate North America in New York City, said the program's "ties to the United Nations and UNESCO are both historic and collegial." ... George Walker, IB's director-general in Geneva, said in June that the program remains committed to changing children's values so they think globally, rather than in parochial national terms from their own country's viewpoint... The IBO background paper said the curriculum is a multicultural approach that differs from traditional direct instruction of facts and historically learned knowledge... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ U.N. influence in U.S. schools January 24, 2004 http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=36752 C 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Henry Lamb Since its beginning, the United Nations Education, Science and Cultural Organization has been trying to impose an international curriculum to prepare students for world government. More than 500 U.S. schools are now using the International Baccalaureate program, and the Department of Education has just awarded a $1.2 million grant to expand the program in middle schools in Arizona, Massachusetts and New York. In one of its first efforts in 1949, the UNESCO textbook, titled "Toward World Understanding," used to teach teachers what to teach, said: "As long as the child breathes the poisoned air of nationalism, education in world-mindedness can produce only rather precarious results. As we have pointed out, it is frequently the family that infects the child with extreme nationalism." In the 1960s, Dr. Robert Muller, U.N. deputy secretary-general, prepared a "World Core Curriculum." Its first goal: "Assisting the child in becoming an integrated individual who can deal with personal experience while seeing himself as a part of 'the greater whole.' In other words, promote growth of the group idea, so that group good, group understanding, group interrelations and group goodwill replace all limited, self-centered objectives, leading to group consciousness." The U.N.'s global education program took a major step in 1968, when UNESCO provided the funding to create the International Baccalaureate Organization, a non-government organization, in Geneva, Switzerland. The IBO is now providing the curriculum for 33,000 teachers in nearly 1,500 schools around the world, 55 of which are middle schools in the Washington D.C. area. UNESCO says the IB curriculum promotes human rights, social justice, sustainable development, population, health, environmental and immigration concerns. "We're living on a planet that is becoming exhausted," says George Walker, IB's director-general in Geneva. "The program remains committed to changing children's values so they think globally, rather than in parochial national terms from their own country's viewpoint." Jeanne Geiger, an outspoken critic of the program in Reston, Va., wrote to a local newspaper: "Administrators do not tell you that the current IB program for ages 3 through grade 12 promotes socialism, disarmament, radical environmentalism and moral relativism, while attempting to undermine Christian religious values and national sovereignty." The IB program was dropped at Woodson High School in Fairfax, Va., when critical parents told local school officials that the best universities in Virginia did not give full credit for the IB program. The goals and methods of the IB program reach much further than the 502 U.S. schools now officially enrolled. The Center for Civic Education, which, by law, writes the curriculum for civics education in the United States, says: "In the past century, the civic mission of schools was education for democracy in a sovereign state. In this century, by contrast, education will become everywhere more global. And we ought to improve our curricular frameworks and standards for a world transformed by globally accepted and internationally transcendent principles." This global influence can be clearly seen in the new mission for the National Curriculum Standards for Social Studies: "The United States and its democracy are constantly evolving and in continuous need of citizens who can adapt to meet the changing circumstances. Meeting that need is the mission of social studies. Students should be helped to construct a pluralist perspective based on diversity [and] should be helped to construct a global perspective." A critical review of "We the People; the Citizen and the Constitution," a civics textbook written by the Center for Civics Education, reveals that the teaching of historical facts is replaced with teaching attitudes and values about multi-culturalism and world-mindedness. A review of science, and even math texts, reveals that sustainable development, environmental protection and social justice dominate the material children are taught. No longer are American children learning about the structure of a federal republic compared to a parliamentary democracy. No longer are children learning the difference between capitalism and socialism. No longer are children being taught why the United States became the most powerful economic engine the world has ever known. Instead, they are being taught that with less than 5 percent of the world's population, the U.S. uses 25 percent of the world's resources and produces 25 percent of the world's pollution. They are being taught that the U.S. is the No. 1 terrorist nation. They are being taught that the rest of the world is mired in poverty because of the greedy capitalists in the United States. The effectiveness of generations of this U.N. globalist curriculum is evidenced by many of the talking heads interviewed on the nightly news, and even by some of the presidential hopefuls. [Henry Lamb is the executive vice president of the Environmental Conservation Organization http://www.eco.freedom.org/el/20040102/ and chairman of Sovereignty International http://www.sovereignty.net/.] ################################################### EdWatch (formerly MREdCo) is entirely user-supported. The continuation of our research and distribution work is entirely dependent on individual contributors. 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