A parent responds: We will not vanish

A parent responds: 

 

http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20060228&fname=witzel&sid=1

 

As I reached the end of this article, I felt myself thinking: This is just the beginning. That's not meant to sound sinister, I hasten to add, for the benefit of the authors. The only thing grim about me is my determination!

Parents tend to be a determined bunch, and thanks to all the red-blooded notoriety this issue has assumed, more parents have become aware that they need to remain aware.

Whatever the sages perched on the lofty spires of Harvard may say, we parents are the ones who deal with the steady deterioration in the quality of education in US schools. Don't get me wrong, most schoolteachers are wonderful. But when we happen upon the ones that make shocking spelling errors, mislead children about a word rather than admit they do not know, or simply do not care to help those lagging behind, what are we parents to do?

Well, for starters we work like hell with our kids at home, and open our veins to pay for supplemental instruction elsewhere. But we also have every right to stand up, speak out and hold the system accountable.

This need not be a negative and hateful act. If made and received in the proper spirit, critique can rejuvenate and enrich educational content. In reviewing a sixth-grade astronomy textbook, my research turned up a website corroborating my reservations about its content, listing several pages of glaring errors. I promptly made a copy and shared it with the principal as well as the science teacher.

Not even Professor Witzel, I am sure, would read malevolence into my doing that. Then why is it that the moment the text involves history and culture, the defenders of Business as Usual stop listening and start swarming about like hornets? We need to move this debate to higher ground.

The first question I had after reading this article was-- What exactly is meant by "Hindutva?" To me, the word suggests knowledge, consciousness and pride in what it means to be Hindu. As a parent, my hope is to convey that sentiment to my child. Is that evil?

On St. Patrick's Day at school my daughter is asked to wear green clothes, eat green apples, green doughnuts, read about the tradition, make artwork with that theme. Does this amount to inculcating " Irish ism ?" Or, in order to participate in performances onstage with her class choir, when she is made to sing selections from the Catholic Mass and many other works with an overtly religious motif, should I do a Paul Revere among my fellow Hindus warning of a hidden conversion agenda in schools? Let's shelve the paranoia, shall we?

Professors Witzel, Thapar and their supporters have selectively picked on and repeatedly rehashed for ridicule just a few elements from many changes proposed by HEF and VF. Fine, if certain edits are not entirely acceptable as proposed, let there be further dialogue and investigation of mutually acceptable resolutions; let the theater of debate be opened to more experts with impeccable credentials. And let those who cry "politics" and "hindutva" at every excuse cooperate in keeping unilateralism out of education.

By harping on politics as being the driving agenda of HEF and VF, and expending much verbiage on "exposing" their "hindutva" affiliations, Professors Thapar and Witzel transparently reveal their own priorities to be political. If it were not so, their article would have focused more upon the specifics of those textbooks, and less on character assassination of the opposition.

I think of the climate in the US after 9/11, when airwaves and print were overtaken by apologists for Islam, when spokespersons for that faith were given a fair opportunity to proclaim Islam a religion of peace, to interpret the Koran in the proper light. Despite all the seething in private, I don't remember anyone from Harvard or anywhere else jumping in with their own selective and subjective excerpts from the Koran. It seems only we Hindus need external help to fathom our own faith and culture, and to tell us who we really are.

This is not a video game, where a participant can walk off with a higher score and gloat about how many "hindutva" phantoms he slew. These are our kids, and this is our culture. We will not vanish at the flick of a switch.

 

CHITRA RAMAN