EVILTEACH!
HORRORKNOWLEDGE!
April 1, 2025: Two highly
paid consultants, one from Wireless Generation, a leading company in the sale
of education software, the other from Pearson, a major player in the testing
industry, are seated in the back of John Galt’s seventh grade American history
class. Neither consultant has ever taught. Yet they are here to assess how new
technology, guaranteed to boost standardized test scores and company profits,
is functioning. Did we just say, “Boost test scores and company profits?”
We meant: “To enhance true
learning.”
Several surveillance cameras,
all set to follow Galt’s every move, are running in the room. This is part of
the push to improve schools by holding teachers totally accountable. Because
let’s face it. The only person who matters in the room is the teacher.
That’s what school reformers
like to say.
In this class every child has a
computer, purchased from Amplify, a division of Wireless Generation. (Corporate
motto: No Dollar Left Behind.) Galt and his students are hooked to a series of
electrodes. Today, the class is trying to hold a discussion about the battle
for women’s rights in the 1800s.
“Mr. Galt,” a student named
Dagney inquires, “I’ve been wondering. Who were the leaders in the fight for
equality?”
“One would be Susan B. Anthony,”
Galt responds gingerly. He consults his computer to be sure Anthony is
specifically mentioned in the Common Core Curriculum. She is. “Susan B. Anthony
may be on the standardized test,” Galt says. “The other leader, who will not be
on the test, would be Elizzzz…”
Before he can finish his
sentence, the electrodes attached to his scalp deliver a powerful shock. The
smell of singed hair fills the room.
(He was going to say: Elizabeth
Cady Stanton.)
Every student receives a
flashing red warning on their screen: DANGER! MATERIAL NOT INCLUDED ON
STANDARDIZED TEST! DANGER!
A voice similar to HAL, the
deranged computer in 2001: A Space Odyssey, delivers the message
verbally, as well.
Joaquin, seated in the desk
closest to the door, waits for Galt to recover. He raises a hand to add to the
discussion. “I can’t understand why women weren’t granted equal rights when the
U.S. Constitution was first written. My grandmother told...”
The poor boy should have known
better!
A loud buzzing noise, followed
by Joaquin’s spastic jerking, and another computer warning, teaches Joaquin and
all his curious classmates an important lesson. If it can’t be tested … it
isn’t education.
Carolyn wants to know: “What
year did women finally win the right to vote?”
ZAPPPPPP. Another shock for a
foolish student. Again, computers flash warning: DANGER! MATERIAL NOT
INCLUDED ON STANDARDIZED TEST! DANGER!
Galt wants to answer. He
wants to say “1920,” and note that his mother was in kindergarten by the time
men got around to deciding that women were capable of voting. He wants to say
to the girls in the room, “Just think. In all the long centuries of human
history the dumbest man walking the face of the earth had more rights than any
woman.” Galt had used this line for years – before Common Core – and remembers
how it always riled up the ladies and got them interested. Now he knows if it’s
not on the test, it doesn’t matter. Considering that Ohio enacted laws in 2013
to tie teacher pay to test scores, maybe it’s for the best. Still, he’s a
professional. He wants his kids to learn.
“It wasn’t just women who
couldn’t vote,” he says. “Poor white men.…”
That’s as far as he gets.
Another shock is administered, and Galt jumps where he stands like a fish on an
electrified line.
He’s a stubborn man where
learning is involved. He tries again, disguising his reply: “No vote. Pale
skin. Poor…” ZAPPPPPP. The computer gets wise to what he’s up to and delivers a
jolt.
The consultant from Pearson
makes a note: “May need to increase voltage.”
Perhaps in his confusion, Galt
forgets where he is, in a modern U.S. classroom with all the reforms of recent
years welded firmly into place. He forgets he’s expected to follow what is
virtually a script. He is going to tell students that in the summer of 1964,
Congress debated a massive civil rights bill designed to guarantee equal
treatment to people of all races, religions, and ethnic backgrounds. He is
going to explain that Representative Howard W. Smith from Virginia stepped
forward to block the legislation. Smith feared a world in which blacks might
win equal rights. (Galt is also thinking he may bring up the Loring v.
Virginia case, which overturned state laws against interracial
marriage three years later.) As Galt knows, Smith devised a clever ruse to
derail the bill. He suggested on the floor of the House that the word “sex” be
added to the bill.
Surely, he imagined, no sane
person could vote for a bill which granted equal rights to blacks and
women!
Galt is going to tell this story
because he thinks it reveals the ludicrous nature of prejudice in all its
forms. He tries to get it out by talking fast – telling the story at
preternatural speed – and the cameras and electrodes and computer are baffled
for precious seconds. He gets in “summer of 1964” and “Howard W. Smith” but
when he mentions the word “sex” the system catches up and gives him a mighty
shock.
When the smoke round his head
clears Galt sees a brave seventh grader in the front row put up a hand. The boy
wants to ask a question about gay marriage and discrimination. But he decides
it’s not worth the risk and lowers his hand.
Galt tells the class he needs to
sit. You know, recover his wits. He consults his materials, prepared over the
course of forty-five years in the classroom, and tries to figure out what
he’s allowed to cover. He has a lengthy reading prepared on
the fight for women’s rights but realizes that on a standardized test there
won’t be more than a single question on this topic. Should he include extra
material? If his classes learn , but what they learn isn’t tested, does that
count as learning?
If someone asks a question in
the forest and the tree falls on his head and no one hears the answer, does it
matter?
Isn’t that how the riddle goes?
Maybe there’s still some way to
slip this reading past the Common Core censors. He knows, over the years, that
students have always found it interesting.
It reads in part:
The ideal woman [in the 1800s]
was a wife and mother. And wives must be content within this sphere. One expert
on women, a man, by chance, argued that bed-making was “good exercise.” He
continued: “There is more to be learned about pouring out tea and coffee
than most young ladies are willing to believe.”
“A woman is a nobody,” one
newspaper commented. “A wife is everything.”
The handout Galt has always used
continues in that vein for ten pages. One writer compares men to elm trees and
women to ivy vines. They need a man to lean on for support. The husband
controls all property, including his wife’s paycheck (if any). Judges uphold
the right of husbands to beat their wives for nagging. A Massachusetts judge
does order a husband not use a stick any bigger around than his thumb.
At this point, in an era before
standardized everything, standardized tests, standardized texts, standardized
humanity, Galt would have illustrated the point by picking up his pointer and
whipping it through the air. The “whooshing” noise would make it clear how much
damage a rod of similar thickness might do.
Now, Galt knows better. Too much
depth. Depth has nothing to do with Common Core Curriculum. Depth of knowledge
can’t be tested.
He remembers how he used to tell
classes about that writer in 1850, who wrote about elm trees and ivy vines, and
warned that without a man, a woman was doomed to fall in the dust. The girls
who played sports always laughed at that story … but again, it’s not going to
be on any Pearson test.
No sense telling it now.
Then Galt thinks about all the
damage fools who claim to be fixing education do and it makes him angry to the
core. (Irony intended.) Like all good teachers, he has dedicated himself to
imparting all the knowledge he can. He is determined to broaden today’s
discussion. He will tell his classes how it was for women in this country even
in the 1960s and 70s. He will explain how his old high school tried to start a
girl’s track team in 1967, and how almost everyone thought the idea was absurd.
Only two girls showed up for tryouts. Galt will emphasize how much attitudes –
what we think we can do and what we think we cannot do – shape our lives. He
believes this is a lesson he can impart to students. He feels it in his bones.
He feels the lesson matters.
They will discuss the idea that
women were once considered too delicate to run long distances. He will throw
out the example of Paula Radcliffe, who set the record for women in 2003,
running the London Marathon in 2 hours and 15 minutes, a pace of 5:09 per mile.
He will circle back again to the idea that women are weak like ivy vines. He
thinks he can plant a seed, hint to all the girls that they should take on any
challenge … and Galt will make it clear the same attitude equally applies to
boys.
“When I was in high school,” he
begins.
ZAAAAP.
“They said girls were too
weak.…”
ZAAAAAAAAAAP!
“Paula Radcliffe.…”
ZAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAPPPPPPPPPPPPPP!!!!
Student computers are now
blinking wildly: DANGER! NON-STANDARDIZED LEARNING! EVILTEACH!
HORRORKNOWLEDGE! ACADEMICKILL! DANGER! DANGER!
By now Galt is prone on the
floor. He looks bad. He raises his head slightly and gasps. “Women … not
… ivy vines.…”
ZZZAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP!!
*
The consultants shoot each other
knowing looks. The Pearson rep makes a note to include one question on the
standardized test about Susan B. Anthony. After all, you want the tests to
align with the Common Core Curriculum.
Oh hell, who cares! Pearson is
making hundreds of millions of dollars annually designing more and more
standardized tests.
The consultant from Amplify is
happy, too. Galt is out cold. Now the kids have no choice but to rely on their
computers for some warm student-machine interaction.
It’s U.S. education for the
future.
