More than A Few Good Men Dear Editor, Veteran’s Day just passed and like good veteran sailors my husband and I did our duty as proud former US Navy patriots and watched A Few Good Men. What a great movie! It is a classic. As my husband and I sat and watched Jack Nicholson lose it on the stand by the sheer awesomeness of Tom Cruise in his crisp impeccable dress blues, we beamed with Navy pride. And then the verdict was read by the jury to Marines Dawson and Downey. They were, of course, found not guilty of murder, but to Downey’s astonishment, dishonorably discharged from the Marines which lead to this dialogue: Downey: I dont understand... Colonel Jessup said he ordered the Code Red. Galloway: I know but... Downey: Colonel Jessup said he ordered the Code Red! What did we do wrong? Galloway: Its not that simple... Downey: What did we do wrong? We did nothing wrong! Dawson: Yeah we did. We were supposed to fight for people who couldnt fight for themselves. We were supposed to fight for Willy. Downey could not understand why he wasn’t released of all responsibility of his act that resulted in the loss of life because he was ordered to do so. In his mind and also in Dawson’s prior to the ruling, when a direct order from a superior came, no matter the nature of the order or the ultimate consequences of the ordered act, as long as someone told them to do it, they were without blame. They believed they were to obey orders at all times, for all things. . . always. The entire movie was about fighting a mentality of following orders at the cost of personal, moral compromise. That movie’s thesis rings true today, especially in the area of our current education initiative. We, as parents, as schools, as a community, are being pommeled with orders from above spouting that Common Core is best for our kids. This is when the words of Dawson hit me. He knew that despite the order, their job was to fight for those that couldn’t fight for themselves. I feel that way about the children affected by the Common Core standards. Yes, the orders are coming. It is pouring down from the top that these standards are best; they are what we should be doing. Unfortunately looking at these orders from freshly opened eyes like those of Dawson, there are consequences for following orders that must be examined by the lowest ranking, the executors of the orders. I believe that falls on us, the parents, the schools, the community. How are these orders affecting those that can’t fight back? I am seeing that these orders, these standards, aren’t necessarily the best for my kids nor my friends’ kids. These kids are showing us that we need to reevaluate our execution. These standards came to us outside of proper legislative channels. That’s red flag number one. These orders, these standards, have high monetary costs that are associated with their implementation. Our communities, the executors of these orders, these standards, will be left to fill in the gaps monetarily for their implementation. That’s red flag number two. And also, almost the worst of the worst, red flag number three, these orders, these standards, are developmentally inappropriate. We’ve all seen the fuzzy math. We’ve spent the hours as entire families with scientific calculators, Ask Jeeves, and Dial-a-Tutor all combining forces to help our third graders’ complete two word problems. This fuzzy math is stripping our babies from their love of learning. This overzealous desire to focus almost solely on math and language arts leaving very little time for the joy of history or science. Our kids are doubting their ability to succeed; they have lost their zest for reading rich historical moments in American history. They no longer passionately speak of time spent in scientific experiments. This is the line in the sand, community. We cannot continue to blindly obey orders that are so blatantly against our core values, especially our value in creating the lifelong love of learning. We as a community, unlike Dawson and Downy, are not bound by military chains of command or life and death situations. We, as a community, are given freedom of choice and freedom to voice our concerns to those in authority. We, as a community, must exercise these freedoms and voice to our governor, to the Commissioner of Education in MO, to our Federal Secretary of Education that we have weighed our orders, the Common Core standards, against our personal values and they do not balance. We must fight for our kids, those that can’t fight for themselves. Jenn Leyden Caldwell County resident Lathrop School District
Posted on: Fri, 22 Nov 2013 13:36:18 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015