Jun 13 2009
Teacher Fired for Not Fitting In
A Navy buddy of mine shared with me the story of Mr. Latham, a Kansas teacher who was fired from his Lawrence High School teaching job purportedly for pushing his conservative political point of view. Of course conservatives are upset. I guess only Fox News has picked up the story.
As a Kansan, what I find a little interesting is that he was fired for his conservatism in Kansas. This blogger challenges his reader to play an easy parlor game: find Douglas County, the home of Lawrence, in this map of county-by-county 2008 election results. Go ahead, check it out. It won’t take long, I promise. (If you’re unfamiliar with Kansas geography, I’ll give you a hint it’s in the eastern half, not Kansas City)
Well the main-stream media other than Fox News might not pick this up, but it is gaining attention in the social networking world. Facebook has a group on his behalf.
I do find it interesting that the history teacher didn’t show the Obama Inauguration to his class; certainly a historic event regardless of whether or not you supported the candidate.
Some questions: Do you think it is important for a faculty member to “fit in” with others on the faculty and administration? Is the board out of line with his dismissal if the story is as it’s been presented, his politics don’t match the school? (We hardly ever get the entire story) Am I the only one to see irony in where he decided to teach? This is not the first time in history that Lawrence has been a hotbed of dissenting viewpoints. (Sacking of Lawrence, Quantrill’s Raid) Finally, why would anyone want to work in a place where they are not wanted?
Would love to hear some thoughts on this.
9 responses so far
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IMHO it is important that students are exposed to a range of opinions & again IMHO any school, college, centre of learning that dismisses someone whose opinions do not “toe the party line” is depriving students of their right to be exposed to different opinions. However I don’t think it appropriate as a teacher to use my position to canvas my own opinions without giving students the opportunity to access opposing ideas. However as a trained scientist I have a preference for presenting facts and any relevant and valid statistical supporting information. Opinion is the students’ own business!
Great point, Jo. My very best history teacher was able to express both sides of an issue without giving the slightest hint of a personal opinion. I was never able to guess his political leanings as his student; it was only after I joined the faculty as a teacher myself that I began to learn how he felt personally.
Teachers have a duty to be fair, but I like your preference for presenting facts and supporting information. My state has in the past become embroiled in controversy over teaching evolution & intelligent design in the science classroom. To me, one is a scientific theory, the other an article of religious faith cloaked in “science.” I don’t envy teachers struggling to juggle that particular issue in the name of openness to differing opinions.
For me, it depends on how one defines “Not Fitting In”. In my own terms, any fanatic, either religious (=the Bible is the whole of the truth) or scientific (=rejection of the human need for religion) is unacceptable. Like Voltaire, I defend your right to say what you believe, with the added (and un-Voltairian) rider, that you acknowledge the right of your intellectual adversary to hold the antithetical view.
Failure to acknowledge the right of your intellectual adversary would amount for me to legitimate grounds for a sacking.
That is the question. Did the teacher encourage alternative points of view? If you have ever sat in the classroom of a teacher who clearly doesn’t agree with you, (I have) it can be most worrisome, especially if you get the feeling you will be punished for disagreeing.
I do think it’s the job of a teacher to make students uncomfortable through challenging dogmatic beliefs. It’s ok to believe something, but you ought to have a better reason for believing than simply because that’s how your parents believe.
A conservative teacher in liberal Douglas County might be exactly what those kids need, but evidently something went wrong with how he presented those views. I really don’t want to believe his firing is as simple as having an unpopular point of view (though I suppose it could be). Sometimes how your message is presented is every bit as important as the message itself.
Thank you for your reply to my comment. Interesting that you raise the evolution issue – as a former teacher of biology in UK I found it totally bemusing when I came across (in Australia) a debate about this with respect to science teaching and a focus on the creationist view that did not acknowledge evolutionary theory. Evolution was taught as standard curriculum in UK in biology, human biology and environmental science up to yr 13 (age 18). Creationism was (if anywhere) the province of teaching on Religious Knowledge – which was supposed (I have no knowledge of the actuality) to address a range of religions from a comparative point of view.
PS I think I must have been very lucky and my teachers must have been very good role models – I was taught evolution by one teacher who in later years I discovered was very religious and almost certainly leaned to the creationist viewpoint but was also scientist enough to teach the curriculum without imposing his own views – at the time I had no idea of his view.
Jo, they weren’t separate in Kansas. The State Board of Education adopted Intelligent Design as a “science” standard to be taught in the science classroom. It was eventually overturned a couple of years later but only after drawing unneeded attention to the state.
As a child, I was the victim of some horrific experiences at the hands of some fundamentalist teachers. It took me decades to purge my soul of their, err, “teaching”.
[...] KS High School Government teacher Tim Latham was fired after his first year of teaching in the district. A veteran teacher, some speculated that his [...]