Education... or Indoctrination?

(Hat tips to Drudge and Beck)

Teachers...too difficult to fire the bad ones, and the good ones don't get paid enough.

Listen to the taped remarks made by Overland High School teacher Jay Bennish in a 10th grade World Geography class... click here. (The first part of the recording is muffled as the student moves his recorder, but it becomes more clear)

They were recorded by student Sean Allen, who frequently recorded his teachers to back up his notes. Allen recorded Jay Bennish, his 10th grade World Geography teacher, making comments about President Bush's State of the Union Address.

Allen's father claims the comments made in the recording are biased and inappropriate for a geography class.

"I'm not saying Bush and Hitler are exactly the same, obviously they're not. OK? But there are some eerie similarities to the tones that they use,"

...says Bennish in his critique of U.S. economic and foreign policy.

Towards the end of the class, Bennish goes on to say,

"I'm not in anyway implying that you should agree with me, I don't even know if I'm necessarily taking a position. But what I'm trying to get you to do is to think about these issues more in depth and not to just take things from the surface."

The Cherry Creek School District is conducting a thorough investigation of the complaint from the Overland High School parent and student concerning comments.

The school district says at first glance it does appear the teacher acted inappropriately at the very least.

A spokesperson for the Cherry Creek School District said they have placed Bennish on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation. This is not a disciplinary action; the school district wants to remove him while they sort through the rest of the investigation, which they expect to finish by the end of the week.

Click here for the official statement from the Cherry Creek School District.

Click here for local coverage and student reactions.

Top ten conservative colleges here.

The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America by David Horowitz

**UPDATE**

Expose the Left has the Hannity & Colmes interview with Sean Allen last night. Watch it here.

FrontPage Magazine has in-depth coverage and related news here.

The Leftist Indoctrination Campaign in Our K-12 Schools

This incident was apparently not the first offensive action by Bennish in class. It certainly was not the Left’s first foray into indoctrinating minors at taxpayer expense. To cite but a few such examples:

The Pacific Palisades High School English department intended to force 300 students to sit through a 105-minute lecture from far-leftist Ray McGovern, who told his underage audience Iraq was a “war for oil” and that Ariel Sharon ran President Bush’s foreign policy.

An American History teacher at Santa Monica High School branded America “a terrorist nation.” A visit by David Horowitz was first cancelled, then protested.

On February 13, 2003, Miller High School of Corpus Christi, Texas, required all students to attend a political rally held by presidential candidate Al Sharpton.

Many high school students have had to endure the one-sided presentations of Wheels for Justice, a group focused on Middle Eastern issues.

Even elementary school students are vulnerable to leftist proselytization. In 2003, after an eight-year-old boy wrote a paper saying he wanted to be a soldier like his grandfather, the boy’s second grade teacher snapped, “If you ever write anything like that again, you are going straight to the principal’s office.”

This incident clearly illuminates the problem gripping many classrooms. Unfortunately, not all students have Sean’s courage – to record and document the offense, then expose the best disinfectant. Most acquiesce to the pressure to go-along and get-along, to smile and nod through the teacher’s political rants, regurgitate the teacher’s leftist bias on tests, learn nothing, and reach college prepared for four more years of the same.

The cure is clear: more students need to follow Sean’s lead, more K-12 schools need to form chapters of Parents and Students for Academic Freedom, and more state legislatures need to adopt the Academic Bill of Rights. And Jay Bennish should get his next opportunity to spout his extremist views as a columnist for Z magazine, not as a geography teacher paid by Colorado taxpayers.

**UPDATE 3/7/06**

Bennish get's a makover...click here.