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M.c.P posted:I'm here because Prestor John's experience was a travesty, and the School of Tomorrow is a monstrosity that's hurting a lot of children. I have access to a lot of their official materials, and can provide an insight into the official policies and operations of it, which I thought would be interesting to the thread. Thing is, if School of Tomorrow burned down tomorrow and every single PACE on the planet vanished in a flash of light, my school would still be okay. Though I imagine there are goons who still want to jump down my throat because were still sending them money. Chill with the persecution stuff. We just wanted some clarification because your opinions seemed to clash strongly with what the organization stands for. It does seem odd that if your organization recognizes the faults inherent in the PACEs that you still use them instead of some other religious private school curriculum, but i suppose there is the possibility that the US organization offers support in some way and you work with the curriculum to keep getting that, whatever it may be.
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Aug 25, 2014 01:29
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M.c.P posted:I have access to a lot of their official materials, and can provide an insight into the official policies and operations of it, which I thought would be interesting to the thread. I would love a writeup on this. Most of waht I know comes second hand from my Mother being a Supervisor. What exactly do they teach and what justifications do they give for things like the whole "leaders of tomorrow are office workers" thing?
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Aug 25, 2014 02:06
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ComradeCosmobot posted:Sorry to derail here, but I find it a little interesting that a third grader in 1998 would be able to make that argument cogently (even if it was starting to get some discussion in academic circles at the time). Was your dad Mike Brown? (Or did you just read something talking about it in a science article for public consumption?) I also apologize for going offtopic for a moment: My dad was the kind of scientifically literate parent who liked to do things like get the kids to watch Nova with him or explain the basic concepts of whatever he read in Scientific American lately. Afterward, I would excitedly try to share this new knowledge with everybody (even if my understanding of the topic was shaky at best). I don't doubt that interrupting class with "WELL MY DAD TOLD ME" nonsense was very irritating, but that hardly called for the kind of treatment that helped stamp out my extroverted childhood self. 
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Aug 25, 2014 03:02
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M.c.P posted:I have access to a lot of their official materials, and can provide an insight into the official policies and operations of it, which I thought would be interesting to the thread. I am interested in anything you have to share. I appreciate your input to this thread.
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Aug 25, 2014 03:29
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I hope I'm not impugning on the good will the thread has shown me here, but my laptop is really rally gonna die soon. I'm putting up a Gofundme to buy a new computer so I can Even if this doesn't work, you guys have been awesome, and the catharsis I have experienced as a result of sharing this with this board, and moreso the knowledge that perhaps someone else might be prevented from going through what I went through is far more valuable to me. You guys are awesome! But still, internet is my main source of recreation and I'll go nuts without it. Click the link here if your feeling in a generous mood.
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Aug 25, 2014 03:31
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RagnarokAngel posted:Hitler created a Church of Germany to bring Protestants into the fold with pro-Nazi party values preached at church, but it didn't really take. I don't think it was Hitler specifically, but one of the propagandist's in the early Reich tried to introduce a new Nazi version Bible that made Christ less than god and conformed to Nazi social and political teaching. So, there's a small kernel of truth in there, but it's quite a stretch.
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Aug 25, 2014 03:35
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RagnarokAngel posted:Hitler created a Church of Germany to bring Protestants into the fold with pro-Nazi party values preached at church, but it didn't really take. Not sure how this would work considering Hitler was a devout Catholic. The classroom set-up really bothered me. The desks being called offices and students never interacting with the others made me think they were training these kids to work in cube farms for God.
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Aug 25, 2014 03:59
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Kazak_Hstan posted:I don't think it was Hitler specifically, but one of the propagandist's in the early Reich tried to introduce a new Nazi version Bible that made Christ less than god and conformed to Nazi social and political teaching. So, there's a small kernel of truth in there, but it's quite a stretch. Nazi religious "thought" was more or less the domain of Alfred Rosenberg (who I swear I mentioned recently, though it may have been in another thread) who came up with the "Positive Christianity" nonsense, and to a lesser extent Himmler where it touched on SS ideology. HUGE PUBES A PLUS posted:Not sure how this would work considering Hitler was a devout Catholic. I'm more than willing to accept the man was religious in a Christian fashion, since he talked so much about being chosen by providence for a great destiny and whatnot, and did namedrop that what he was doing was in the service of true Christian religion from time to time, but "devout" implies that he was regularly observant of those various things devout Catholics are supposed to do on a regular basis, evidence for which I think is fairly lacking.
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Aug 25, 2014 04:20
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Captain_Maclaine posted:I'm more than willing to accept the man was religious in a Christian fashion, since he talked so much about being chosen by providence for a great destiny and whatnot, and did namedrop that what he was doing was in the service of true Christian religion from time to time, but "devout" implies that he was regularly observant of those various things devout Catholics are supposed to do on a regular basis, evidence for which I think is fairly lacking. No, Hitler was the perfect Catholic and that's why Protestants have been warning us about them for 500 years.
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Aug 25, 2014 04:50
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Venusian Weasel posted:No, Hitler was the perfect Catholic and that's why Protestants have been warning us about them for 500 years. Just like the great prophet Jack Chick told us, Catholics are a satanic cult and the original church founded by Jesus are the Baptists.
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Aug 25, 2014 05:06
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Kaasen posted:I also apologize for going offtopic for a moment: I remember my pastor teaching me about negative numbers (he'd been a math major) when I was in first grade and getting in trouble at the little religious school I went to (different church) that used the ABEKA materials on the grounds that I hadn't been given permission to know that yet. I'm still trying to wrap my head around that one.
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Aug 25, 2014 05:17
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Prester John posted:I hope I'm not impugning on the good will the thread has shown me here, but my laptop is really rally gonna die soon. I'm putting up a Gofundme to buy a new computer so I can Once students asked me, when I was teaching about poverty and homelessness, what homeless people went through on a daily basis, and I relied on your posts to help describe how homeless life went. So if you think your stories have only just informed us, you're quite wrong. I'll send you a few bucks once the paycheck comes in Pope Guilty posted:I remember my pastor teaching me about negative numbers (he'd been a math major) when I was in first grade and getting in trouble at the little religious school I went to (different church) that used the ABEKA materials on the grounds that I hadn't been given permission to know that yet. I'm still trying to wrap my head around that one.  they think you need to be given permission to know things.Seriously, I struggle to understand how people can be so afraid of knowledge. I'm an atheist but if I believed I'd be damned sure that all the awesome, complex poo poo in the world was precisely because God wanted us to discover all these loving awesome things.
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Aug 25, 2014 05:22
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HUGE PUBES A PLUS posted:Not sure how this would work considering Hitler was a devout Catholic. Hitler's religousness is brought into debate a lot. He would preach being religious because this was still an era where being a Christian was a necessity in the public eye and a powerful tool to manipulate the masses, but looks into his private life seem to really betray the idea he actually believed it.
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Aug 25, 2014 05:35
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Are psycho Christians so authoritarian because they're just that self righteous or is it more like they believe God controls so much of their lives they desperately need to boss others around or something?
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Aug 25, 2014 05:48
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andrew smash posted:It does seem odd that if your organization recognizes the faults inherent in the PACEs that you still use them instead of some other religious private school curriculum, but i suppose there is the possibility that the US organization offers support in some way and you work with the curriculum to keep getting that, whatever it may be. ACE has a monopoly on Christian education in China. They're the only ones shipping materials out here, and there's enough missionary expats here to make it worth their time. That monopoly is helped by the fact that it honestly attracts a lot of non-Christians. International schools in China are subject to a lot of laws and scrutiny for who can attend them, so ACE has found a niche of providing an 'international' education more easily available to Chinese citizens. Effort post later then. The training camp was the closest I got to SoT America, so I'll talk about that first.
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Aug 25, 2014 05:49
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Kaasen posted:Are psycho Christians so authoritarian because they're just that self righteous or is it more like they believe God controls so much of their lives they desperately need to boss others around or something? I'm certainly not qualified to answer this, but it reminded me of something people reading this thread might enjoy: The Authoritarians. It's been some years since I read the book, but I remember a good, thorough, and easy to follow examination of the psychology of authoritarianism, but in terms of the leaders and the followers. The entire book is available free at that link.
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Aug 25, 2014 05:55
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The audio book for the Authoritarians is great too if you feel like dropping the cash. Altimeyer reads it himself and is a very charming and lively performer who includes some material (not much) updating the book. I have seen more than one fundamentalist favorably compare his relationship with God to his relationship with his dog. They see it as fitting and complimentary to think of themselves as God's pets, who benefit from His glorious obedience training. I guess the idea is that God reasoning with or trusting them is as absurd as them reasoning with a dog. Explains a lot about this school system, now that I think about it.
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Aug 25, 2014 06:10
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Kaasen posted:Are psycho Christians so authoritarian because they're just that self righteous or is it more like they believe God controls so much of their lives they desperately need to boss others around or something? The kind of authoritarianism being discussed mostly comes from a fear of ambiguity and the unknown, which leads people to demand that any nonconformity, and in general anything that makes them uncomfortable or inspires self-reflection, be stamped out. By the way, the Adult Swim show Moral Orel (seriously) is a really really good portrait of this particular kind of American fundie Protestantism icantfindaname fucked around with this message at 07:00 on Aug 25, 2014 |
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Aug 25, 2014 06:57
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icantfindaname posted:The kind of authoritarianism being discussed mostly comes from a fear of ambiguity and the unknown, which leads people to demand that any nonconformity, and in general anything that makes them uncomfortable or inspires self-reflection, be stamped out. The third season...good god the third season. The first two seasons are basically "haha Christians are stupid" with completely one-dimensional supporting characters. Then almost out of nowhere it gets really dark, and really deep, and they start getting into why many of the characters are the way they are, and suddenly they're all way more sympathetic. I don't think if you just watch an episode or two of the first two seasons it is what you say it is, but if you watch the whole series, definitely. Basically, if you aren't going to stick with it to the end, don't bother. (Do stick with it, it's worth it.)
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Aug 25, 2014 07:34
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This was a few pages back, but this:quote:After 32 hours in the lockup, DeAnne finally relented and wrote her sentences. The following day, when she complained that her ribs were hurting, Wiley Cameron called her mother to say that he was sending DeAnne home. "The only reason they put me on that plane is because they knew that if they called a doctor, they were going to have to answer a lot of questions," DeAnne said. She had lasted only three weeks at the Rebekah Home. reminds me extraordinarily of how oppressive governments operate. My parents grew up in fascist Portugal, and one of the stories they've told me is about their friend who broke her own glasses and swallowed them to stop her torture. The secret police had "only" used sleep-deprivation on her, because if it's one thing oppressive governments fear it's people realizing exactly what kind of monster they are when they see what they've done.
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Aug 25, 2014 09:04
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Shbobdb posted:Have any of the graduates of the China ACE program taken the gaokao? How did that work out? Ah, sorry I missed this. As near as I can tell, School of Tomorrow, China shuffles students off to schools abroad in high school or college. I've not heard of an ACE China student who went on to a Chinese college. I did ask around a bit, and the ACE students here have managed to get accepted into American universities, though this was secondhand so they didn't remember the specific university they ended up going to.
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Aug 25, 2014 09:50
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Right, staff policy and training. First, a disclaimer. I am on the other side of the planet from the festering heart of this thing that is School of Tomorrow Corporate. The only thing they care about is that they get money from the buyers, and the distance means nobody cares what we do with the materials. I don't know how these schools operate in the US, or anywhere other than China. This information is straight from the ACE manual, but that doesn't include the unspoken cultural assumptions that fill the American Christian community. I have only ever interacted with one person from SoT America, though the way he acted spoke volumes in and of itself. So, no human interest horror stories from me. But, lets start with the first step of every prospective ACE educator, the training. The manual calls it 'Five power-packed days' of 'ACE's time-proven procedures'. What that means is everyone is put in the student's shoes, except it's only for a week and the subjects are knowing the contents of the manual, business organization, parent interaction, and 'wisdom'. It's as authentic as they can make it, though, with cubicle desks, the flag system, and needing permission for everything. It's roughly 4 hours of PACE work every day, along with 2 hours of prayer, games, breaks, and lectures interspersed throughout. On a side note, very few of the 50-60 trainees had any previous teaching experience outside of ACE. And my principal confided that other ACE schools suggested against hiring people with experience. So that's lovely. So, 50 adults seated in cubicles reading manuals and filling blanks, but they're subject to the same bureaucracy described up thread. Progress through these PACEs must be approved, so you work on the other PACEs until the supervisor or monitor can come along. Failing to push in a chair, or taking a pencil to the scoring table, or forgetting to take your flag down was worth demerits, and if you got three you had to write an essay about the importance of discipline in the classroom. Between the waiting and the demerits for small things, it was really frustrating for a lot of trainees. Regretfully, I think the lesson most of them took away from it is how important it is to follow instructions. Of course, there was a way you could get out of the bottleneck bureaucracy; the aptly named 'privilege' system. To wit, trainees that could memorize a Bible verse, complete a PACE, and avoid getting too many demerits would get privileges, the most important of which was no longer needing permission to score or proceed through PACEs. The only interaction you need was asking the supervisor to take the final test. ACE schools are supposed to have similar systems for their students. Those who can memorize Bible verses, work through PACEs quickly, avoid demerits, and maybe do some extracurricular things get the coveted privilege of not needing permission to do everything. "But wait," you might say, "If doing well academically means you don't need to sit and wait, doesn't it mean that those students good at the system get further and further ahead, while those students who can't quite work as fast or aren't as obedient get stuck sitting around, causing restlessness and violations of this stultifying rule set?" To which my answer is, Congratulations. You broke the code. I'll go more into the stuff in the training PACEs later, but here's a quote. Procedures Manual posted:One reason why the ACE program works is the development of critical thinking skills... [The student] is encouraged in his ability to think creatively and independently within a Biblical framework. I just noticed every pronoun in reference to a student is 'he'.
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Aug 25, 2014 11:03
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Prester John posted:I hope I'm not impugning on the good will the thread has shown me here, but my laptop is really rally gonna die soon. Check your PMs.
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Aug 25, 2014 15:03
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I went to an A.C.E. school. It honestly wasn't that bad.
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Aug 25, 2014 17:34
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I suppose the degree of variance from one school to the next is part of how they maintain their image.
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Aug 25, 2014 17:50
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What is the math material like? 2 + 2 = Jesus Find y where y = Godidit edit: all of this sounds like it would make students into complete idiots, even those with real talent. Grand Theft Autobot fucked around with this message at 18:12 on Aug 25, 2014 |
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Aug 25, 2014 18:05
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Grand Theft Autobot posted:What is the math material like? Apparently the math stuff is decent until you get to algebra and up.
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Aug 25, 2014 19:01
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M.c.P posted:One reason why the ACE program works is the development of critical thinking skills... [The student] is encouraged in his ability to think creatively and independently within a Biblical framework. Devious. They're throwing in the "critical thinking" line to make you think that any of this poo poo has any relevance to critical thought or pedagogical theory, but then they deliver the sucker punch of "only within this arcane religious text" and then you go aaaaaah. Almost had me there!
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Aug 25, 2014 19:16
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RagnarokAngel posted:Hitler's religousness is brought into debate a lot. He would preach being religious because this was still an era where being a Christian was a necessity in the public eye and a powerful tool to manipulate the masses, but looks into his private life seem to really betray the idea he actually believed it. I would argue that, in America at least, this is the case even today. When the local newspapers in my area run "getting-to-know-you" articles about candidates for office, one question that often gets asked is, "What's your favorite book"? Three guesses as to the most popular answer among all candidates. (Hint: If you didn't answer "the Bible," you're doing it wrong.) But even on a broader national scale, politicians and candidates for office often feel like they have to make a show of how "godly" or "Christian" they are. It's a matter of "know your audience." The things that get done in the name of any deity or religion are horrifying. I can't tear myself away from this thread.
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Aug 25, 2014 19:37
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King of Internet posted:I went to an A.C.E. school. If I may ask, what was the discipline policy like at your school? I understand the rewards and privileges students earned, but was discipline anything like Prestor John described?
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Aug 25, 2014 19:51
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Smudgie Buggler posted:Are you all saying it's perfectly legal in America for teachers at private schools to beat students? This is a couple pages back and it has been over a decade since I was in primary school, but where I grew up in rural NC it was quite permissible for public school teachers to spank students with wooden paddles given parent permission (which was present for many if not most students). I was never aware of anyone who was hit hard enough to actually cause any sort of lasting injury (by which I mean more than a red stripe across your rear end for the rest of the day), but it sure as hell hurt the few times I was subjected to it as a ~6-8 year old. I would imagine it's not done anymore, but I don't know. I thought of it as perfectly normal if backwards until my late teenage years when I started noticing that most people from other places are aghast at the thought. I don't think I ever thought of it as an effective way to change a child's behavior though. Eletriarnation fucked around with this message at 21:27 on Aug 25, 2014 |
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Aug 25, 2014 21:17
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AVeryLargeRadish posted:Apparently the math stuff is decent until you get to algebra and up. Is it because The Calculus was invented by a godless Copernican? Someone should tell them the heathens invented arithmetic about 18,000 years before the earth was created, and that other heathens were using fairly complex operations at or around the time that God was apparently demolishing the world with floods. Oh wait, it probably starts to suck at Algebra because that's all the further any of these shitheads who wrote the curriculum were educated. To prove I'm serious, here are the BA requirements at PHC. Note the obvious lack of any rigorous mathematics.
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Aug 25, 2014 22:43
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The bible says the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter is 3. Take that pi!quote:1 Kings 7:23King James Version (KJV)
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Aug 26, 2014 00:41
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It should surprise noone that God only loves whole(some) numbers. Fractional parts were put there by Satan to test our faith.
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Aug 26, 2014 00:47
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JeffersonClay posted:The bible says the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter is 3. Take that pi! I'm sure that some literalists get all bent out of shape about this but honestly i don't see it as a big deal, estimating pi to be about 3 is pretty close for a bronze age culture with no understanding geometry or real system of measurements. I would imagine that .14159... is within the margin of error for some bearded dude getting out a really long string and trying to loop it around the rim of a boiling cauldron of lava or whatever.
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Aug 26, 2014 01:02
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andrew smash posted:I'm sure that some literalists get all bent out of shape about this Those are the only people we're talking about. Anyone with even a lick of common sense or historical perspective is not under discussion.
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Aug 26, 2014 01:23
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JeffersonClay posted:The bible says the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter is 3. Take that pi! Does that necessarily mean a circle? An oval is round all about.
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Aug 26, 2014 01:39
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M.c.P posted:Stuff about teacher training. So did the adults in training get whacks? In a related vein, were any of the instructors or trainees sexy women?
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Aug 26, 2014 01:42
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Numerical Anxiety posted:Why are they using both though, in that text. It looks like the long-S is standard, except when it's in the final position of the word? Small "s" was used at the end of words, and the long f-looking one was used when not at the end. That was only for the lowercase, the uppercase was always "S"
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Aug 26, 2014 02:21
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Kazak_Hstan posted:Does that necessarily mean a circle? An oval is round all about. Ovals aren't round. Read your PACE, bro.
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Aug 26, 2014 02:34
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