www.afaar.orgLetToEd6InconsistenciesInDaggettQuotes.htm
Inconsistencies In Dagget's Quotes
(Daggett Heads Up Character Education in Arkansas)
Letter to the Ed.
I noted several inconsistencies in the quotes by Willard Daggett in Travis Justice's article in the "Daily Press" and the quotes in the newspaper ads by the American Family Association. Daggett is a consultant to the Arkansas Department of Education and is heading up character education in Arkansas. He was paid $7,000 for a recent presentation to teachers from several schools in the Northeast Arkansas Educational Cooperative.
Justice said Daggett told the teachers in this workshop, "We can't put one more thing on the plate of American educators until we take something off." However, in his book, Daggett said teachers are elitists, "A Club with an Attitude Problem" who don't understand the needs of their community. He applauded a superintendent in North Carolina who held administrators and teachers subject to dismissal if test scores didn't improve to stipulated improvements at the end of the first year and said teachers could face massive suffering through loss of jobs if they resisted the new reforms. What he said in his presentation and wrote in his book are totally contradictory.
Justice quoted Daggett as saying, "I was never part of OBE," and that he spoke at four OBE events only to stress the importance of high academic standards - not to push the "value based" OBE initiative. However, Daggett was an advertised OBE speaker in at least nine cities. Further, in his book Daggett applauded a Polk County, NC school for establishing a series of behavior based areas for grading (academic grades counted 50% of student grade and behavior the other 50%.) Education Is Not a Spectator Sport, pp 110-112. Many of the graded behaviors certainly fit into the "value based" initiatives of OBE.
Bill Clinton told sponsors of Arkansas's OBE law, Act 236, that he just wanted to get some values back into the classrooms. How many parents would want Bill Clinton's regime grading their child's behavior on tolerance, attitudes, diversity, community service, multiculturalism, sexual orientation, etc. Children's belief systems are way too sacred to have those in authority grading them.
Daggett also wrote in his book, "[I]t would benefit our students and country to abandon the traditional courses, curricula, and assessment programs in place in our schools," and "the work of the outcome based educator [OBE] groups across the nation can serve as a spring board for developing new curricula", Preparing Students for the 1990's and Beyond, pp 19 & 25. How can he possibly say he was never part of OBE. Even on his website (www.daggett.com) he promotes OBE techniques and instruction.
Who should people trust anyway, people who get high paying salaries or AFA volunteers who don't get a dime for their time but who do get a whole lot of grief just for trying to get out the truth?
Iris Stevens
Jonesboro, Arkansas
(Published Sept,2000)
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