Many parents are in the process of visiting schools with their college-bound children trying to decide which one is a good fit. It is an exciting time, but also can be quite discouraging. Parents quickly learn most every college and university have increased tuition costs, often not affordable to the average family. Also, in general, these schools are inundated with liberal teachers and administrators that believe it their responsibilities to preach political opinions to their students, and they make little attempt to hide this fact. They not only preach their doctrines, but unfortunately, it is not unusual that they also bully and even use grades to persuade students to their leftist political opinion.
How do students respond to these often blatant efforts? Those who have not been interested in politics are easy targets for such persuasion. Others who come from conservative homes try to maintain their political views, but soon learn their grades are impacted by any assignments that allow the teacher’s judgment to determine the grade. Considering the high cost of tuition, most of these students aren’t willing to stand their ground and risk retaliation. They want to graduate with grades that will attract high paying jobs. Considering students and/or parents are often forced to borrow money for their tuition, students understand the need to secure a job quickly upon graduation to pay back the loan. Thus, their priority becomes pleasing teachers and working for good grades.
As recently as the early 1990s, most students did not take out college loans. Contrast that to today, when nearly 71% of students must borrow to pay for college. It is fitting to suggest this needs to be investigated and facts exposed. What caused the unreasonable tuition rate hike to happen in such a short period of time? Some speculate schools are providing free or near free educations to large numbers of low income students, thus the need to charge some students more.
Dr. Richard Bishirjan in his book, The Coming Death and Future Resurrection of American Higher Education, exposes and confirms the higher education establishments impose tuition costs that force parents and students into crippling debt. In Brainwashed: How Universities Indoctrinate America’s Youth, Ben Shapiro also addresses this subject. There is a need for more investigations and suggestions for ways to reduce the costs so that all students have the ability to receive the education that seek.
Another problem, equally disturbing, is that the administrations and teaching staff have become exceedingly, blatantly liberal.
My co-writer, Bonnie O’Neil, was at first hesitant to relate a personal example of a college’s hypocrisy after her grandson, Caleb O’Neil, faced an unfortunate situation as a freshman at Orange Coast College in California. However, after Caleb’s story went viral on the Internet with articles receiving a huge number of hits, O’Neil relented. After all, there is something appealing about a student standing up to a radical Liberal teacher blatantly preaching her political views. If a college freshman is willing to stand up to liberal professors who use their position of authority to indoctrinate students, shouldn’t we all do our best to expose known problems?
Burt Prelutsky, Southern California-based political commentator, offered his own unique take on the kangaroo court proceedings against Caleb at Orange Coast College:
We have all witnessed the signs of the anti-Trump virus that has run rampant across America. We have all seen the various elements of the biased media join forces to delegitimize his administration. We have all seen Chuck Schumer and his trained seals in the Senate slow-walk Trump’s cabinet choices through their hearings. We have all seen the Soros-financed rioters going through their paces in the streets and on college campuses.
But something that may have slipped under the radar is the anti-Trump kangaroo court that recently doled out injustice at Orange Coast College. Although most of us were privy to what initially led to the legal lynching, you may not have been aware of the unfortunate, but not too surprising, conclusion to the story.
Several weeks ago, a professor, Olga Perez Stable Cox, under the guise of conducting a class, said, among other things: ‘I will not tolerate any person in my life that voted for Trump,’ ‘I’m not going to Utah where my family lives because of their views on Trump,’ ‘President Trump is a white supremacist,’ ‘Vice-President Pence is one of the most anti-gay humans in the country,’ ‘I know you’re stuck in homes, you’re stuck in families, you’re stuck in places of employment where you’re surrounded,’ ‘It’s scary living in Orange County because so many people are hateful,’ ‘I hope that we can counter what this new administration is going to do.’
Because he was so outraged by the hatred spewing from the mouth of this self-identified lesbian, Caleb O’Neil taped her and made her screed a matter of public record.
You would have thought Ms. Cox would have been suspended or fired for wasting class time with her partisan bellyaching. But that would only prove that you were a visitor from a past era who had landed in 2017 thanks to your time travel machine. Instead, the administration decided that Mr. O’Neil was the one who needed to be disciplined. His crime?
‘Recording a class session without the permission of the instructor.’
His defense — although one shouldn’t be necessary because every teacher should be taped or recorded (what do they have to hide from the people who pay their salaries?) — was that he didn’t record the entire session, but only the 15 minutes or so after she went off the rails and abused her authority.
In the meantime, I have written the following letter to Dean Lugo: “I have read of the disciplinary action you have taken against young Mr. O’Neil. The part that grabbed my attention is that you asked him how he felt about his video having damaged the College’s students, faculty and staff. It seems to me that if a 15-minute video of Prof. Cox in action could be that damaging to your school’s reputation, the problem rests with her and not the student. How is it you don’t see it that way?
Evaluating the Outcome
Thanks to Burt and similar media sources, Caleb’s situation went viral. Represented legally by a non-profit conservative group, Freedom X, and massive public support, School authorities decided to drop their suspension of Caleb. However, similar cases have not ended well for students who overtly express their Conservatives viewpoints.
Did the school and/or Ca. Teachers Union learn anything from the unfortunate problem that happened on the Orange Coast College campus in Costa Mesa, California? Apparently not! According to Teacher Union representative, Rob Schneiderman who stated:
“The Coast Federation of Educators is deeply disappointed that administrators have capitulated to individuals and groups who threatened and bullied students, faculty, and administration.”
Mr. Schneiderman chose to ignore the improper behavior of the teacher and instead accused the student and those who supported him. This Teachers Union Representative did not offer any evidence of bullying by supporters of Caleb, unless he is referring to the thousands of people who disagreed with the school’s decision to punish this student with a suspension and contacted the school to express those views.
No action was taken against the teacher in question, causing the public to believe the Teachers Union and O.C.C. school officials have no problem with a teacher who spends15 minutes, off-topic, to express her personal political views which included maligning our new President and all who voted for him.
Perhaps this incident explains why schools have a rule prohibiting students from recording a teachers’ lecture without his/her permission. This secrecy rule is not acceptable! Lectures should be recorded in every high school and college classroom that accepts government funding. It is time to assure the public that schools are teaching and not indoctrinating our children.
This is just one of the many blatant examples of Liberal bias in colleges/universities throughout America. There are many more areas in need of revision. Teacher Unions have become way too powerful, as they protect bad teachers at our children’s expense. Investigations need to be initiated in order to analyze why the cost of a college education has skyrocketed. Fair hiring practices should be enacted, but they are not enforced. Diversity is a positive, which most schools welcome. However, that does not seem to extend to teachers’ political positions. Students deserve to know the differences among us as well as what unites us in order to be better prepared for the World they will encounter. That simply is not happening today.
We now have a President who wants to hear from those of us who have not had a voice for quite some time. Let’s use this gift to demand fairness of representing all political views, equality, and more reasonably priced tuition in our schools.
[Originally Published at Illinois Review]
Nancy J. Thorner is a writer, cellist, and Tea Party activist based in suburban Chicago.
