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Credentialed to Destroy: How and Why Education Became a Weapon
Credentialed to How and Why Education Became a Weapon provides the necessary information to confront what is intended to be a wholesale transformation of the US economy and our society without any of our consent. Author and attorney Robin S. Eubanks lays out what was supposed to remain hidden until it was too late to stop the sought 'irreversible change.' She tells Education is a means to an End, what is the Real Vision for Transformation?--How the reading and math wars were never about how to teach--How the new Common Core is actually not about content--Why the logical, rational mind is the real target of education reforms--Why higher ed had to be changed to push equity in credentials as the goal--What's wrong with a 21st Century Skills focus--Why the classroom objective keeps coming back to the student's values, attitudes, and beliefsFinally, Credentialed to Destroy provides repeated proof of how education was seen by the Soviets as their favorite weapon against the West during the Cold War. This book details extensive evidence from the 80s that education became an invisible and purposeful means of restructuring the West, especially the US, away from individualism and capitalism towards a more collectivist orientation in the future. A goal that guides the actual Common Core implementation and planned economic transformation described in detail in troubling quotes that lay out a global push.This book gives everyone the information they will need going forward to appreciate what has changed in education, when, how, and for what purposes. Precisely the information necessary to actually be internationally competitive and prosperous in the 21st Century.
- GenresEducationNonfiction
396 pages, Paperback
First published October 12, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
December 22, 2013
This is certainly not light reading, but it gives one of the most in-depth look of where our educational system developed from, how it developed into the monster it is, and what we have to look forward to. This book makes a wonderful companion to Blumenfeld's "NEA: A Trojan Horse in American Education", Iserbyt's "The Deliberate Dumbing Down of America", and most everything by John Taylor Gatto.
A million thanks to Robin Eubanks for her tireless efforts on the issue of modern public education. Be sure to check out her blog, "Invisible Serf's Collar" for twice-weekly updates.
A million thanks to Robin Eubanks for her tireless efforts on the issue of modern public education. Be sure to check out her blog, "Invisible Serf's Collar" for twice-weekly updates.
November 11, 2018
I read this book twice. The first was Kindle, the second paperback. The paperback version is much better because you can flip back and forth easier. I gave it five stars because I have not found another book that covers this material. The book could have used an editor. Another set of eyes would have improved the final product.
I read this book years ago so my review is from memory. The author goes into the philosophical and political roots of modern education, going back to at least John Dewey and progressive philosophers. When she mentions the communist roots of modern education she is not claiming a commie plot. She is tracing back the roots of the current drive toward group think, collective and emotion based education. She also describes the educational fads that have been discredited, only to rise again and again uder new names. The move away from objective tests and subject knowledge is described.
I read this book years ago so my review is from memory. The author goes into the philosophical and political roots of modern education, going back to at least John Dewey and progressive philosophers. When she mentions the communist roots of modern education she is not claiming a commie plot. She is tracing back the roots of the current drive toward group think, collective and emotion based education. She also describes the educational fads that have been discredited, only to rise again and again uder new names. The move away from objective tests and subject knowledge is described.
March 8, 2014
This book is effectively a 350 page rant about the weaponization of pedagogy. I am partial to the subject, hence the two stars instead of one. It's probably the worst written book I've ever read. The author completely fails to put together a coherent thesis. It's too bad, because she has some very important things to discuss. This reader was eager to be elucidated, but was ultimately disappointed instead.
I'll mention three topics touched on in the book.
1. Whole word reading instruction - as if Ruloph Flesch's Why Johnny Can't Read didn't destroy this method, Eubanks writes about how it systematically creates dyslexics and prevents people from ever being able to read thus leading to a failure awaken intellectually. The book mentions that as many as a third of readers are permanently crippled this way. I've been of the belief that the true percentage was around a fifth. Meanwhile, the latest research suggests that roughly 5% of the population has the "dyslexic" type of neurology (brain wiring) before and regardless of teaching method. The argument is weak that this method of instruction is a purposeful weapon precisely because at most it negatively affects a moderate percentage of students. It is a problem, but getting from point A to point B is never accomplished.
2. Differentiated Learning produces poor results - I'm listening with ears wide open. The problem is, that's the gist of the argument as its left as a naked claim. I will point out that this is part of a larger issue of valuing learning differences which the author claims masks the true anti-intellectual and anti-learning taking place in the classroom. On its face, differentiation is the valuation of the individual. The individual is precisely what's under attack according to Eubanks. The argument demonstrating how differentiation masks an undercurrent of collectivism is at best tenuous.
3. Lev Vygotsky, John Dewey, and several other pedagogical heroes were socialists looking to use pedagogy to achieve a communistic goal. Eubanks mostly succeeds in demonstrating that this is true. I was dismayed, however, when it wasn't pointed out that the Soviets abandoned Dewey's methods a few years after adopting them. While a person's social and political views certainly will influence their beliefs, it doesn't necessarily follow that their theories hold no relevance or are otherwise tantamount to instituting those views. As a parent, I use Vygotsky's zone of proximal development continually.
Those are just three topics in an ocean of issues that Eubanks discusses in this book. I will certainly read her blog postings in the hopes that she is able more clearly articulate these connections. I do believe these concerns warrant merit, but the book is so labyrinthine that the message molders.
I'll mention three topics touched on in the book.
1. Whole word reading instruction - as if Ruloph Flesch's Why Johnny Can't Read didn't destroy this method, Eubanks writes about how it systematically creates dyslexics and prevents people from ever being able to read thus leading to a failure awaken intellectually. The book mentions that as many as a third of readers are permanently crippled this way. I've been of the belief that the true percentage was around a fifth. Meanwhile, the latest research suggests that roughly 5% of the population has the "dyslexic" type of neurology (brain wiring) before and regardless of teaching method. The argument is weak that this method of instruction is a purposeful weapon precisely because at most it negatively affects a moderate percentage of students. It is a problem, but getting from point A to point B is never accomplished.
2. Differentiated Learning produces poor results - I'm listening with ears wide open. The problem is, that's the gist of the argument as its left as a naked claim. I will point out that this is part of a larger issue of valuing learning differences which the author claims masks the true anti-intellectual and anti-learning taking place in the classroom. On its face, differentiation is the valuation of the individual. The individual is precisely what's under attack according to Eubanks. The argument demonstrating how differentiation masks an undercurrent of collectivism is at best tenuous.
3. Lev Vygotsky, John Dewey, and several other pedagogical heroes were socialists looking to use pedagogy to achieve a communistic goal. Eubanks mostly succeeds in demonstrating that this is true. I was dismayed, however, when it wasn't pointed out that the Soviets abandoned Dewey's methods a few years after adopting them. While a person's social and political views certainly will influence their beliefs, it doesn't necessarily follow that their theories hold no relevance or are otherwise tantamount to instituting those views. As a parent, I use Vygotsky's zone of proximal development continually.
Those are just three topics in an ocean of issues that Eubanks discusses in this book. I will certainly read her blog postings in the hopes that she is able more clearly articulate these connections. I do believe these concerns warrant merit, but the book is so labyrinthine that the message molders.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews