Teach My Daughter How to Think, Not What to Think

My daughter is enrolled in Honors English this year. Her first assignment is to review a work by Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich. The author seems to expound a position where we are all inherently either racist or victims or racism. The students are told to analyze the work and show how the evidence presented supports what the author is claiming - specifically “...state her purpose...” and “... you will explain what she does to prove this claim”. If the student doubted her evidence, there is no pathway for using critical thinking skills to present a divergent viewpoint.

The teacher wrote the first paragraph (which the students must incorporate). In part, it reads - “...Rhuday-Perkovich is...a member of the group, Brown Bookshelf, which advocates for representation of African-American writers for children. In her essay...she slowly becomes aware of the racism she is subject to in the world. (She)...demonstrates there are nearly invisible biases in society that are impossible to penetrate, or sometimes to even see...and then the bias is revealed...”

Needing more than just my own viewpoint, I asked another educator (with two decades classroom experience) his opinion. The assessment? - “As for the punctuation, I don’t know. I can't get past the blatant progressivism and social activism in what's supposed to be an English course”.

I continue to plead with CVHS to teach my daughter how to think, not what to think. In the interest of DEI, I will see if future assignments convey (compel?) centrist and conservative viewpoints as often as progressive ones. We shall see.

–Stacy Spink, Castro Valley