Anybody in the education business knows that the subject you learn in a classroom is not the most important thing that you learn for success in life. When students return for alumni weekend at EA, they don’t say much about what subject helped them the most in life. They talk about their relationships with faculty and fellow students. They talk about their experiences outside of the classroom as well. It could be their endeavors on an athletic team, a Robotics Team, a role in a musical or what they learned in chapel as examples. A basic premise of true education is you teach a student not a subject.
So, what are students learning from Governor DeSantis as an example of bully culture? He makes edicts about the fact that nothing about race can be part of class discussions or a discussion of sexual orientation issues. Granted he didn’t want sexual issues taught in lower grades, but what if it comes up in class which it will. He punishes Disney for daring to challenge him as he does a nice imitation of the past president. He is focused on curricular issues forgetting that research shows that successful people possess integrity, respect, trust, and honesty. They learn those things at home and at school while in class, in hallways, on a playing field, or in a drama production.
Several states have adopted this bully culture so kids are learning that as a model. DeSantis doesn’t know kids and neither do other leaders in other states like Texas. Students are much smarter than he or others think in confining them to conversation that is just about geometric theorems or tenses of verbs. Those are important to know but not to the exclusion of what research suggests is necessary for success. Bullies in politics are used to getting their way as do people who carry out their mandates from on high.
Those ethical traits necessary for success including integrity, respect, trust, and honesty, inform how to engage in civil discourse which is a trait needed for a democracy to survive if not thrive. Students watch what you do not what you say, and they never forget when someone says one thing and does another such as the political leaders who are maskless or having large gatherings when they are sending the opposite message to their constituents.
It really isn’t rocket science to create an environment for civil discourse in a classroom. How do you teach a course on ethics without getting into controversial territory when ethics is about choiceless choices meaning choices that you wish you didn’t have to make?
Here are the guidelines for my Ethics class: (1) There isn’t a subject that we won’t cover, (2) my job is to create a safe place for you to express your views. All the sides of an issue will be covered so that you know conservative views as well as liberal ones, (3) only one person speaks at a time, (4) what we discuss in class and who says what is confidential; otherwise, there will be no trust or safety, and I will quit asking you for your opinion. That will be unfortunate because you will learn as much from other points of view from your peers than you learn from me, (5) you can disagree with an opinion but you can’t attack the person giving it, and you can always ask me what I think after a topic is covered, and I will tell you, but not before as that may influence your perspective.
When you trust students, they rise to the occasion because civil discourse is fun If not thrilling. Washington has forgotten that ingredient as basic to our democracy. I never had a class break that covenant for ironically that is the natural way that people can function or we wouldn’t have gotten this far as a human race. We are built to cooperate and not win at others expense. If this were not true, we would never have gotten this far on the evolutionary road to have meta learning or the ability to think about thinking and what was best for a group of people.
I had one student who was rather rambunctious and came to class with a reputation to uphold. After the first class, he came up to me and said that he apologized from stepping over the line. I told him that he didn’t but if he did, he and I would have a different conversation. I further told him that conversation would be just between him and me and no one else in the class would be privy to it. He was a student loaded with questions and ideas and became a key student leader in the class discussion. He left his reputation at the door before coming into the classroom.
Students need to know that you trust their better selves. That is a lesson that DeSantis needs to learn or our future will not contain the aforementioned ethical traits for success in life as we will be subjected to more Trumpism, more revenge, and a bully culture filled with performances and not legislation.
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