uber...the "real media" parroted the phony "voter fraud" mantra of these thugs, for more than five years.

If you know of a better way for me to do what I did here to object to and to counter the "crap" in the thread OP, I'd like to read it, In the interim, consider:

c'mon....these are the same zealots who conned (hijacked ?) the DOJ into running a five year investigation/prosecution campaign against "voting fraud" by potential voters expected to vote in oppostion to republicans....a five year campaign against a 'threat" that did not even exist.

I'm certain there is a one percent chance that this is not what it appears to be:

T. Kenneth Cribb is on the "FIRE" board of advisors, and he's also vice president of CNP.
He also is president of Delaware based, "Intercollegiate Studies Institute".

How strong do you think the possibility is that FIRE's involvment here is a result of grassroots disatisfaction with U. of Delaware student residence "programs", when folks like Cribb already embraced this as their "life's work", and their Intercollegiate Studies Institute is in the neighborhood? Check out who funds Intercollegiate Studies Institute...the usual suspects.

<h3>uber, you constantly react to my posts as if I am "premature" in my "take". Is it really so necessary to handle thugs, like these...with "kid gloves"? Their intent is to blur the lines between snippets of fact that can be assembled into fairly reliable conclusions.</h3>

Since we all depend on third party reporting to shape our conclusions and our world view, isn't what these folks are on a mission to do.... discredit through propaganda "Ops" like this, part of a larger crime against society?

You have to ask yourself if you're making it easy for them to get away with it, or more difficult. CNP is a criminal org, IMO, and they've been a primary part of a process that had turned the contemporary GOp, into an org that displays many signs of being a criminal org., too.

Uber said he could see such a thing happening having been in that environment, so I dont' know what you are talking about there.

Let me quote him...

I don't think that supports anything host said, or you.

Additionally I rarely read hosts posts for what should be obvious reasons, and I think Cynthetic covered it nicely.

You avoided my question, so you didn't play my game at all.

Lets pretend the courses were in fact exactly what was laid out by the OP. Do you think the reaction against them was justified and that the university should review them?

The question here is not the source, but a pure hypothetical.

i seriously wouldnt put much weight in the way delaware reacted to this...universities tend to cower proactively in the face of negative press...part of this has to do with concerns about keeping the alumnii happy and by so doing maintaining a significant funding source.
look at any alumnii magazine, particularly the letters to the editor section, and you'll see quick the political problems they face in this regard.

delaware is a very conservative state, too.
it's kinda frightening, like a twilight zone.
at least it was to me when i would be commuting from civilization (philadelphia) to the wilds of newark.

so the university response is so heavily bounded that you cant take much away from it in terms of an official admission about anything to do with the contents of this ludicrous story. its a reaction to negative press attention of any kind, i would wager.

Maybe, except there's not really any negative press. There's like one or two original sources and virtually no syndication. To me, THAT'S what makes the situation curious. I just don't think there's enough information to really draw conclusions.

Host, I don't see your direction as being particularly relevant. SOMETHING happened. We don't really know what, whether or not we take the reporting at face value. And yes, based on my experience in the real world, I do believe that the original complaint probably issued from a student. I have no way of knowing how that transitioned to anything else because, as I noted above, there's just not enough information out there.

And no, I don't feel that I have to ask myself if I'm making it easier for "them" to get away with "it". I don't think that asking questions about what really happened and applying my knowledge of working directly in the field makes me complicit in anything. In fact, I think that your suggestion of me enabling or being complicit because I'm skeptical of both sides pending more information is comical almost to the point of farce. Really, to rule this out of bounds despite the ambiguity and my personal experience would be an ideologically-based knee-jerk. I try not to roll that way.

**EDIT**

I'm going to lay aside any issues of "national agenda" on the part of FIRE or CNP for now because I followed the FIRE links to archived versions of UD's internal documents regarding the program. I'm reading through them now and gaining a much clearer understanding of what was going on. If you are interested in doing the same, you can look at this link. Look past the fact that it is a partisan diatribe from FIRE - in the numerous links within the text, FIRE has provided links to pdf files of documents from UD, including correspondence between the two organizations.

I'll come back later when I've read more, but the summary documents from UD as they were assembling the program do make me wonder how they didn't see the objections coming. You'd have to be at least a little detached from reality to work with students all the time and not forsee the completely predictable effects of implementing something like this, even if you did it well, which they didn't.

I'll agree with you that in general there's nothing to be worried about when it comes to similar programs, but this specific case could be different and there are imo logical reasons to be against it.

It's hard to see how could you not have a problem with it, if the program really was as sinister as is implied(living in a state college in the northeast I can say that this is probably suspect, but I have no specific information on this case)? The problem is not with the ideas taught but with the method. It’s reminiscent of a the type of thinking outlined in Plato’s republic. Which I myself found disturbing, good city my ass. It(the program) rests on methods that treat people like sheep. An almost abolition of individual freedoms for the greater good. I don’t think enlightening people can be achieved by imprinting on them enlightened ideas; rather giving them the tools to reach their own conclusions should be the preferred method of education. You won’t get everyone this way, but maybe you’ll teach a few to think critically. Generally though this is what I find available to me at my university, and I assume is available elsewhere.

there is no centralized decision=making chain in this sort of situation within a university, so chances are that a residence life committee decided to institute this program and the central administrative structure wouldn't know anything about it in particular, nor would they be terribly concerned about it, as individual administrative zones have a fair degree of autonomy.

such programs are typically really boring affairs and people dont necessarily enjoy sitting through these sessions. i am not sure that the complaints, such as they are, cannot be understood as responses to the dullness of such affairs.

i dont see a problem with the program, however: even if one were to throw judgment out the window and assume for a moment that the far right wingnut interpretations floated in the op were in some sense of the term "accurate" i still am not sure i see the problem. students have to do alot of things they dont necessarily like in a residence hall===and i would wager that no matter how boring these sessions are, they are still better than eating dining hall food.

at any rate, this brings me back around the the question i posed to ustwo twice, and which he has dodged twice, even going so far as to play that silly projection game wherein he gets to say that i am the one not answering the question.

so where is your objection to the programs, really, ustwo?
do you oppose the idea that racism is a bad thing?
do you oppose the idea that sustainable practices are perhaps good to know about and maybe even to implement where possible?
do you oppose notions of social justice?


=========
albania: you were posting while i was---the details of how the program is implemented seem to be at the center of this--but this is also what ibertuber has been saying.

personally, i dont think this type of program has to be patronizing--i would think that any good it could possibly do would be undermined if it was--they should be presented in ways that encourage debate, encourage critical reflection and argument.

i've done a fair amount of work in programs like this. but usually on particular issues in the world (iraq) rather than on problematic attitudes within the university. when i have done them, they are generally organized as spurs for debate, so the trick is to provoke the students, encourage them to not believe you, to do research for themselves and articulate their own positions.

whether it works or not isnt clear---you hope that the conversation continues after the sessions are over, but there's also the lure of watching television of hanging out or doing whatever else one does to amuse oneself in a residence hall.
personally, i think many many undergraduates tend to be intellectually lazy as well. that is a problem at all kinds of levels, but probably isnt terribly germaine here--unless it factors in to explaining such "reactions" as there were to the delaware program.

Honestly I'm really perplexed why anyone is arguing about this.

Someone greatly expands sensitivity training at a state university dorm.

Some students complain that its a waste of time and stupid.

Complaints reach main stream via the internet.

University claims things are not really that bad but they will stop anyways just in case to review.

So whats the issue? How does this become a conservatives are hate filled evil people thread exactly? Why do the same people always jump off the deep end?

Here's where I see issues things that seem like they aren't very well thought out. This is structural stuff about the department, but I think it leads to predictable reactions from students (who like to react to things) and to predictable criticisms to which UD has a hard time refuting.

Curricular vs. Programming Models

The difference is in the type of educational setting. Programming is generally voluntary, which means that you have to couch your education inside something that is attractive, like food, games, or social events. Curricular modals are generally mandatory in some way (usually by providing a range of things to choose from and requiring completion of a set of them), and typically features lectures, seminars, etc. Most places use a programming model or a mixed model. The mixed model is what I'm most familiar with. There is a great reason that the curricular model is not widely used by itself - the people who work in residence life and student affairs aren't education professionals - they're administrators in an educational environment. Residence Hall Directors aren't really trained to understand how to design and implement a curriculum, much less actually teach the content. They just aren't experts on the subject matter. So what you typically do (what I did when I was in this position) is go out and find a bunch of experts to come in and talk about packaged topics - the overall composition of the package of topics makes the content of your curriculum and you somehow induce students to go to an appropriate variety of these things. Going out and getting experts was easy for me because I had the resume carrot - people wanted to be able to say that they had presented or taught something at Juilliard. Because of this, I was able to get people from places like the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and do 75+ seminars for less than $2k. Schools without that prestige draw have to do it the old-fashioned way, which is buy experts' time. That's expensive. The UD program is problematic from the get-go because they are designing, implementing, and teaching a program with 100% in-house talent. That's not the most solid ground upon which to build something that may be controversial.


Exposure vs. Indoctrination

There's a difference between exposing students to ideas and indoctrinating them. That difference is especially acute with college-age people because they are very prickly, moderately activist about their laziness, and quick to become self-righteous. The UD program is mostly on the side of exposure, but there are a few places in which they cross the line - and here I'm only talking about the design on paper, not the implementation, which itself can invite more trouble. It is one thing to expose people to ideas of social justice, inequity, and even things like sustainability. I mean, those are relatively slam-dunk issues in our society... However, it's another thing to require them to espouse a certain package of beliefs as a condition of the curriculum. Put it this way - an academic class about Christianity can require you to recount beliefs for a test, but they can't really make you go out and get baptized. Requiring students to say certain things, participate in particular projects (without having alternatives or justification), and reveal personal information crosses the line.


Implementation

This is the real doozy, and it's the place where I have to wonder WTF the UD residence life folks were thinking. They went out and designed a very extensive program. Formally speaking, they did their homework. There is a pretty good amount of material supporting how and what they were planning to do. HOWEVER... They aren't really staffed to accomplish the things they wanted to accomplish. The biggest problem is that they were using their RAs, who are students, to accomplish their indoctrination. This is problematic in and of itself, because getting a bunch of student staff members on the same page and performing at an adequate level is like herding cats. It's much worse when you're really talking about requiring change in personal views. The RAs are not trained to teach, they aren't experienced in these types of interactions, and frankly, they don't have any authority with the content. The lunacy here is that a large part of the program was being enacted through one-on-one meetings, essentially interviews. So you require students to meet with someone who is untrained, unqualified, and inexperienced - in essence their peer - and discuss extremely personal information. Information that skirts topics which, in actuality, you can't pry into - like sexual identity, etc. That's a recipe for disaster. No matter how good your training of your student staff is, this is going to produce problems - and the student staff, in that they are acting in the fulfillment of their job descriptions represent UD to the students, definitively. So you end up with a situation in which, in a situation explicitly described as "curricular" and "outcome based", UD asks someone when they discovered their sexual identity. It's not really rocket science to figure out how people will react to this.

There's more to the situation, and I'm still reading through the documents. However, I don't really think it is possible to characterize the whole thing as nothing more than a political "hit". There were actual problems with the program as designed and implemented.

Oh yeah, roachboy is right in that the central administration probably didn't know the extent of the idiocy being enacted. They hire residence life folks and student affairs folks to not do things in a way which is effective but also keeps them out of trouble. In this case, those people stuck the university's neck way out, and I bet that the full nature of it wasn't understood until after the shit started hitting the fan. In that circumstance, I might also offer a flaccid defense. A more vigorous one would invite questions about how something so complex gets enacted without more common sense.

just trying to get you to explain where your objection lay, ustwo.
if you dont want to do it, you can simply not do it.
recourse to hyperbole isnt the most direct way to avoid answering a question or 3.


==============

ubertuber: very interesting.

what i dont understand exactly is where the assumption comes from that ra's have no training in doing this sort of work. the program would have had to include training, yes?

if there's none--no matter how goofy it might be--then yes, there is a problem.
but it wouldnt follow directly from using ra's in this role--rather from how the university trained (or did not train) them to occupy the role they were expected to occupy.

Typically you train them on everything they have to know within about 6 days, which also includes all university policies, procedures, how to identify problems and make appropriate referrals, the necessary role-playing exercises to get them up to speed, getting to know each other, and the operational details of opening the facility up - so things like maintenance requests, decoration, condition assessments, etc. You also do in-service things periodically, but in practice those mostly end up being in support of seasonal activities for which you need spot-training. Add to this the fact that they're really just college kids and their levels of qualification (social skill wise), competence (common-sense wise), and motivation vary dramatically. In other words, training them enough to do the things they were asked to do isn't really practical.

So really, they aren't trained in a way that you'd want them to represent the school in most sensitive matters. The way you handle that is by making sure that their job description and protocols never allow them to do something that may involve liability or representing the school officially without having professional staff present or involved in the decision making process.

I've read quite a bit of those now and there is nothing evil or indoctrinating in it, just an amazing steaming pile of stupid and poor judgment.

If I were a student I'd be annoyed with such a colossal waste of time, and I really feel sorry for the RA's who need to monitor and teach this crap.

I had a taste of this with some sort of 'rape sensitivity' training we all had to take as males at the school.

I'm so glad someone told me that rape was wrong and that no means no, I mean how would I have ever known I was doing something against her will!

Thats the level of these activities, only without the clear concept of preventing rape. If they weren't scanned I'd quote some of the better ones.

For fun, read page 67 of the Russell Curriculum as the worst 1-1 :)

My RA only had to keep the noise down and make sure no one was drunk, boy he missed out on some fun I say!

There is a difference between mistrust of education itself and mistrust of those in charge of and involved with the education system...who have proved on more than one occasion to be biased.