The Core Problem – Preventing the United Nations Takeover of K-12 Education in America

Dear Editor,

As a parent and taxpayer, I have been investigating and researching IBO (International Baccalaureate Organization) since Sept ’09.

I saw “IB” on the school calendar and did not know what it was. I discovered most people I’ve spoken with do not know either. Administrators say they have been very informative and open about this process, but my research finds there is a definite pattern whereby the IB curriculum implementation in schools around the Country, attempts to remain under the radar as long as possible. IBO’s curriculum has been in play in the Monticello School District for approximately 3 years. Watch for the IB debut in neighboring districts.

The IB curriculum is a UN (United Nations) UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific, Cultural Organization) inspired and endorsed program, being sold to schools across the country (under 700 currently). All student tests and papers are owned by IBO in Europe. This effectively blocks parents from seeing their child’s essays or tests.

These schools are required by IBO to teach the beliefs and values of UNESCO, that are… one world government, world citizenship, redistribution of wealth, disarmament, and it continues. This is the intentional dumbing down of our children to ready them for a “global society” in order for them all to be on the same level with each other. At the PYP level, IB is implemented in the entire school. There is no choice but the IB themes imposed upon the curriculum.

Your child at the PYP level (primary year’s program), MYP level (middle year’s program) and DP (diploma program) are all taught IBO principles and values all day, every day. This is NOT education, it is INDOCTRINATION. This, without a doubt, takes away from the ABCs and the 123s which are taught in the AP (advanced placement) program. The IB program is extremely controversial and is being disputed across the USA. School administrators won’t tell you any of this. If they do allude to it, they will sugar-coat it.

Do you, as parents, taxpayer’s, and American’s want the UN teaching our youth THEIR beliefs and values? The UN promotes, SOCIALISM, not FREEDOM, certainly not our God-given rights as AMERICANS under our CONSTITUTION, which IBO would like to see disappear. They do not care for our Constitution, and by indoctrinating our children, would undermine it.

There are at least two schools, King Fahad Islamic School in the UK and the Islamic Saudi School in Fairfax, Virginia under great scrutiny for anti-American and anti-Judeo/Christian teachings. The Director General, Jeff Beard awarded IB authorization to the schools in 2008, and is okay with the teachings which have strong anti-Semitic content.

On another note, this program is one of the most expensive, if not THE most expensive on the market. It is about $200,000 (U.S. average cost) per annum per school. Why pay this when AP has a much lower cost, has no political agenda and has college creditworthiness.

This information is all well documented. Please see IBO.ORG and decide if this is what we need in the USA and our schools. For the real story, please go to, TRUTH ABOUT IB. See also, PARENTS HAVE RIGHTS. There are many informative links on these sites.

We are all aware of looming school closings and their dire financial situation, but we must not allow the continued stealth implementation of IB into the school district. Let us demand a full accounting of the funds already spent by the Administration (Pat Michel, District Superintendent) on their march to a curriculum of INDOCTRINATION OF OUR CHILDREN and the future cost of continuing this garbage. Perhaps this reckless spending is partially responsible for the financial problems now faced by our schools.

IBO requires schools to insure that they will be able to FULLY FUND the IB curriculum. The Board of Ed is in turn, LEGALLY RESPONSIBLE to require a financial guarantee from the IB supporters that their funds will continue past a single school year.

It will be interesting to see if IBO’s “authorizations” of new IB schools can outpace the number of schools dropping the curriculum across the Country.

There is no proof other than from IBO, that this curriculum is beneficial in any way, unless you hold to their values and beliefs. This curriculum is anti-American and not educational. You need not have children to understand this. If this assault on our schools continues, America as you know it will cease to exist forever. Only you can teach your child to be AMERICAN.

~ Bill Croissant Jr.

I’m unfamiliar with this author, Raymond Lotta (an advocate of socialism/communism), but I found his topic to be of interest. He wrote about what he believes is needed for transformation from a socialist society to a communist society. For example, he writes:

“The educational system under socialism will have a core curriculum. This will be based on what is known to be true in particular spheres of human knowledge. At the same time, there must be substantial space for inquiry and instruction that fall outside that curriculum, and for theories and intellectual currents that ‘go against the grain.’ That is important because this is the kind of society, pulsing with new ideas and discovery, that socialism needs to be. . . .”

My comments:

The “substantial space for inquiry” is already present in U.S. education. It exists through so-called “critical thinking,” “critical literacy,” “critical pedagogy,” “critical race theory,” “critical theory,” etc — and present in past decades under other labels. Issues addressed are viewed through the narrow lens of the communist perspective of “social justice”.

And it exists in ethnic studies (In Tucson Unified School District — including the “Social Justice Education Project” under Mexican American Studies), as well as in the International Baccalaureate Diploma Program (through the Theory of Knowledge) that is in many U.S. public schools.

In short, under the guise of teaching thinking [sic], students are learning to think like communists: to focus on social issues, conduct critique through the lens of “social justice” (includes the oppressed/oppressor paradigm), and then encouraged to go into communities to act as [communist] agents of change.

As you read the below, keep in mind that communists/marxists do not believe in “absolute” truth, but rather “truth” is ever-changing/evolving.

Critical Thinking and the Search for the Truth: Today and in Socialist Society
By Raymond Lotta, Revolution #81, March 11, 2007

http://revcom.us/a/081/search-en.html

Excerpt (emphasis added):

We believe it is possible for humanity to get to a whole new place—where it has put an end to all forms of exploitation, overcome the division of society into classes, eliminated all oppressive institutions and social relations, and cast off all the values and ideas that reinforce oppressive institutions and relations.

Leading forward the process of getting to this kind of world is what communist leadership and a socialist state must be all about. And this must be a process of diverse thinking and action from all corners of society, and great ferment, dissent, and upheaval.

Thus far there have been two major attempts at the socialist transition to communism: the Soviet Union (from 1917 to 1956) and the People’s Republic of China (from 1949 to 1976, and the death of Mao)…

Excerpt (emphasis added):

Socialism is the crucial first step in getting to a communist society where people consciously learn about and transform the world… But a truly emancipatory socialism must be much more than that. It must be a society in which the great majority are thrashing out questions of world affairs, philosophy, science, and art…taking increasing responsibility for the direction and future of society…and increasingly making all spheres of society their province.

Excerpt (emphasis added):

Socialist society requires the fullest possible contesting of ideas and wrangling to get at the truth, and in order to transform society in a liberating direction. All this has important implications for issues of academic freedom under socialism.

The educational system under socialism will have a core curriculum. This will be based on what is known to be true in particular spheres of human knowledge. At the same time, there must be substantial space for inquiry and instruction that fall outside that curriculum, and for theories and intellectual currents that “go against the grain.” That is important because this is the kind of society, pulsing with new ideas and discovery, that socialism needs to be. And what is known to be true today—important as it is to stand on and learn while applying it—may be shown to be partially or wholly wrong tomorrow. As for theories proven to be wrong, like “creationism,” they will not be part of the educational system, although people will still be able to voice those theories.

Marxism will be promoted in the universities and throughout socialist society. The reason is that Marxism provides the most scientific approach to understanding the world, and for achieving the richest possible synthesis of different ideas and insights from particular disciplines and fields. Many scholars and intellectuals do not embrace Marxism and will be pursuing scholarship in different philosophical frameworks. And other philosophies will be taught and studied. In fact, they will challenge and contend with Marxism. Marxism will be taken up and applied, will further develop, and influence people in this kind of atmosphere.

Excerpt (emphasis added):

As Bob Avakian has said, if you really understand this epistemology—the unfettered search for the truth in relation to moving humanity to a whole new stage—you want people to challenge you. And if we are true to this, things will get unruly and wild.

Dissent, Protest and Ferment in Socialist Society

This presents big challenges to the socialist state. Let’s say people organize movements and struggles protesting the socialist state’s environmental policies. What if this takes a new turn with blockades and sit-ins causing disruptions to the economy? Well, you do have to continue to run an economy to meet people’s needs and the requirements of the socialist state. But you also have to thrash out the issues driving this protest, and what this means for developing a sustainable socialist economy, and draw more people in society into debate.

Excerpt (emphasis added):

There is a crucial difference between people who are advocating that socialism should be replaced by capitalism, and forces organizing and carrying out actions to sabotage or overthrow socialism. And the importance of this distinction has to be popularized throughout socialist society and will be spelled out as a matter of law in the constitution.

Excerpt (emphasis added):

It has proven relatively easy for the socialist state to suppress reactionary opposition—for a time. But what is difficult, and this is the great challenge, is to foster debate, experimentation, and ferment and to risk upheavals without losing power. We want a socialist state which is a powerful and necessary tool for the oppressed — as an active transition to get to a society of freely associating human beings, and a world without states and apparatuses of repression. We won’t get there without a socialist state and a communist leadership that values and fosters critical thinking and the wild contestation of ideas; without wide-ranging dissent and tumult; and without the unfettered search for the truth.
—

Related: Robert Muller’s “World Core Curriculum”

Big Brother is Teaching You
By Richard A. Ries

I am considered to be an inspiring teacher. I taught in independent schools all of my life, because they champion individual attention, feature their own good values, and accept teacher creativity and academic freedom. They are usually free of the strictures of public school curricula. I came to a school in Florida to teach in an independent school, only to see the school sadly strive to become as independent as a Dunkin’ Donuts franchise when it “went IB.”

The International Baccalaureate Organization, headquartered in Geneva, has no school of its own, but rather sells its philosophy to buyers worldwide. Many American schools either feature an IB track, or have become entirely IB. The IB’s mission statement ends with the politically correct and hard to dispute “other people, with their differences, can also be right.” However, after this viewpoint is implemented, an ironic iron curtain falls on teachers and students alike, in which everything and everyone must conform to the IB way. Teachers, often fearful of losing their jobs, begin adopting the IB lingo and pretend to support it in a way that eerily resembles scenes from George Orwell’s 1984 when mid-level workers blindly accept whatever “truths” the oligarchy in Oceania tells them. Doctrinaire IB coordinators — school employees charged with overseeing curriculum to ensure a school is in fact IB — make surprise visits to the classroom, just to make sure everything is running as smoothly as a Swiss watch, and that no deviations from IB philosophies or methodologies are occurring. Welcome to the franchising of the K–12 school: the IB is the McDonaldization of human development.

In order to become certified as an IB school, a school must prepare for an IB authorization visit. During such a visit, inspectors (either IB employees or educators from other schools doing field work for the organization) com to take tours; examine written lesson plans; observe classrooms (both the teaching and the IB décor); interview teachers, students, and personnel; and so forth. Some parents and administrations — fearful that if their school is not IB it will be somehow be “left behind” — risk great compromise of conscience in order to win the IB stamp of approval. Teachers and students might be coached by administration to speak only glowingly of IB pedagogy and lingo. Teachers may feel coerced to lie about their happiness with the IB in order to keep their jobs. The IB authorization visit is similar to a restaurant franchise’s visit by district or national managers, who are there to ensure sameness, predictability, and control of the product.

Is this the direction independent schools should go? Can independent schools really not teach students to think globally on their own? I find the success of multicultural studies, sensitivity training, overseas trips, the presence of exchange students, and the quality of enlightened teachers and administrators in independent schools has already been extremely global. In fact, the IB can seem downright provincial in comparison.

As the IB slowly takes root in the American educational landscape (about a third of schools now offer it, according to the College Board) it peddles something dangerous to democracy: suppression of free speech.

The U.S. Constitution mandates that you are free to petition the government, express yourself, and air your thoughts. The IB teaches teachers and students alike that you are free to conform. Its methodologies are the “best” methods; its ideas of educational units are the “best” units; its canned (and corny) IB lingo is the “best” lingo. Teachers, school boards, parents, and students are not competent enough to create a list of good values on their own; they must post the IB language all over the school. The IB lingo creeps into a campus like a cancer. It takes over the body and chokes it — until it alone exists.

I deliberately taught the memoir Red Scarf Girl about the Cultural Revolution in China to one of my classes this past school year because the book features students being inculcated into Mao’s China and being forced to write dae-ze-bo — propaganda posters — and plaster them all of their school. A good student in Revolutionary China was brainwashed to believe in the dogma. I wanted my students to see the dark irony. Here in 21st-century America, the same thing exists. In many classrooms of an IB school, there are canned phrases about “the ten traits of the IB learner profile” — so that they are the same adjectives in any classroom, be it Malibu or Mali. It’s no different than finding the same Outback Steakhouse or Walgreens across the country, except we are talking about human beings, not steaks or Rolaids. (In the IB’s top ten list of “the best learner profile,” neither “creative” nor “individualistic” is included. I wonder why.)

The once sacred classroom, if it becomes IB, might have a little bit of the teacher’s own stamp — but that “stamp” must always show how the teacher conforms and buys into IB philosophy. You are supposed to be as enthusiastic about it as someone who sells used cars, particularly when talking to parents or students. You are trained to be a believer. The whole business is all too redolent of a dogmatic ideology — if not a cult. This past academic year, I offered to teach “The Importance of Being Ernest,” for the sheer joy of it, and to kindle a love of Oscar Wilde in my students. To know and quote Wilde is, as every English major knows, part of one’s joie de vivre. It is a pleasant diversion from the often tragic literature that is hurled at students. My idea was immediately shot down by the coordinator. There was no way to get it to conform to one of the four pre-slated IB “areas of interaction,” which are the “correct paradigms” of human thought. The canned areas of interaction overlook joy and fun as objectives, which is too bad, because students who have joy and fun probably go on to read more in life.

I am hardly an isolationist or an alarmist. I considered myself to be a “citizen of the world” long before I encountered the IB. There are certainly many good intentions of the IB program, but the implementation of its ideals fosters an environment that suppresses creativity, streamlines thinking to established paradigms, creates use of an artificial language and value system among children, and rewards conformity. It downplays American exceptionalism, and gainsays some of our most cherished values as a unique civilization producing original thinkers.

This is a follow up of the information on Bill Gates massive database filled with our kids’ information. This additional article below titled “Education Department Leaks Student Data” matters because they admit in it they are invading the privacy of millions of students for a study on the MIND.

That is exactly how the IB operates. As it sits, ALL schools continue to go way TOO far into PERSONAL information that they have NO right to ask of our kids. But the IB Program is the finely tuned master of this deception and manipulation of a child’s mind. If our kids are NOT taught what they should NOT do in school they will be handing critical data over during CLASS for this psychological profile filled database because this is when they hit them up for it. Of course they are NOT telling parents about this because they know parents would object. The only way I have found these things out is when my kid has come home to tell me what they tried to get her to “share” about very personal parts of her life that they had NO business to even be asking her about. See how they are using state testing to gather even more data for these psychological PROFILES. Remember they were busted for doing this with the SAT testing as well and I have seen it nonstop in a majority of applications for scholarships.

This severe invasion into our child’s mindset by the use of psychological manipulations and “testing” is why there is NO time for the focus to be on academics because this entire system is being transformed into one massive clinical trial for child psychiatry.

You bet it is a CRIME to do this to our children. But when your own government has made it their JOB to spy on us, and strip our freedoms, instead of butting out of our lives and protecting our freedoms, it should come as no surprise to see the equally unconstitutional “federal” department of education doing the same exact thing to our kids. Where do we think they are getting their marching orders from? It sure as heck isn’t coming from the parents who pay taxes that pay their salaries!

Indeed, see how they use the excuse that they are doing this for researcher who hope to glean secrets of the human MIND? Do they really want to know a SECRET about the MIND? How about this one… NO two minds ever think or react the same exact way unless those two minds are under total control due to severe psychological manipulation. Ironically this is the exact goal of using psychiatry to indoctrinate our kids and it is the exact reason why we see these psychological tests everywhere we look today.

After fighting the incessant invasion into my child’s mindset by the UN’s treasonous IB school I can tell you all about the future our kids are facing because this is the exact path Obama is going to try to take the entire country down. It is a path in which each child will be given a series of psychological reviews instead of academic reviews. They will place the results in a file and they will call this psychological file a “Learner Profile”. They will make parents think this is a GREAT tool and they want them to believe this will help the child learn. It’s all LIES because what those test and assignments consist of is delving deep into the mindset of that kid with the sole intent to destroy whatever beliefs they have that are NOT beliefs that coincide with the UN agendas. They have perfected this diabolical IB program down to a perfected art of deception in which they are able to indoctrinate a majority of the parents first. Therefore if you find yourself objecting to this insanity of replacing an education with an indoctrination those other parents become the henchmen who will try to force you into silence. Indeed, I was in those trenches WAY too long and I saw what I believed to be very intelligent parents fight for the IB to the bitter end of the destruction of their own kids. I also saw the truth in how hardcore they can get when you tell them to back OFF and you make them stick with academics and get the heck out of your child’s mindset and out of your personal life.

They never managed to get the “Learner” profile they wanted on my kid but I am sure those nuts have a very long dossier on her mother because I refused to back down every time they dared to try to go into areas they had no business in. It caused me problems in my marriage too because my husband is one who does not like to make waves and he just tries to get along. When it comes to the mindset of your kid and you see they are using very dangerous and deceptive psychological tools of manipulation you do not step back and just hope for the best. My daughters close friends who are still in the IB are now avowed atheists, they eat up ALL of the UN agendas that attack our real freedoms, and they hate THIS country… several are fragmented from their own mothers and fathers because the IB made sure to make them think their parents were idiots too. THAT IS the path they wanted to also take my kid. That is the path they want to take all our kids. It is a path that leads to divided families and a greatly damaged country. I’ll tell you this right now…I do not care what unconstitutional laws they pass, I do not care what unconstitutional acts they pass, my kids are MY kids. Instead of hoping they will not be harmed by this system of using psychiatry as a weapon against their innocent minds I taught them how to protect themselves from it.

Indeed, nothing good has EVER come out of psychiatry. They have now built this entire country around this quite dangerous but provable system of FRAUD. Psychiatry is all based upon collectivizing entire groups of society with preconceived notions of how they expect these people will behave and then inserting controls in order to change their behavior to their desired end results. Of course when they are doing all they can to control the mindset and the behavior they leave out free will and that is their Achilles heel.

These theories of how they think all people who fit their contrived “profiles” will behave are just as asinine as gun control advocates are when they are inane enough to think criminals will follow the laws of this land…these psychiatrist believe psychopaths will be HONEST on their bogus psychological reviews. Think again, if an individual is one who never follows the rules and they are set on committing a crime they are not going to be honest about it on some psychological test to get a job, to get a gun, to work in a school, or to babysit our kids. That is the truth about the so-called “mystery” of the human mind that these sell outs are working so hard to make sure the public never contemplates.

We see it everywhere don’t we? Psychiatry has infested this entire country. From bogus police profiles of how a serial killer is supposed to act, to bogus profiles of what a patriot or veteran is supposed to act like, to bogus profiles of what kids from parents who drink are supposed to act like, to bogus profiles on how much a child can achieve in academics based upon a test that is evaluating them with psychiatry…on down the line they have inserted psychiatry in our lives to the point that jobs are on the line, careers are on the line, custody of kids are on the line, gun ownership is on the line, …our very freedoms are on the line which was the real goal all along. Free thinking “individuals” cannot be controlled in large groups. That is why psychiatry is taking front and center stage in “education.”

I suggest all American who care about this country take the time to learn about the IB because all of the progress we have made to kick them out is about to be reversed by our own Anti-American president. The Truth About IB is the best site there is to get everyone fully abreast of what this really means for our country. These “Learner profiles” are exactly what these nuts are trying to pull off in this database filled up with all our kids personal information. That information will be a GOLD MINE for the nuts of the UN. See where it leads to and understand why it has got to stop. Remember The Wood Foundation is the exact organization that is pushing for vaccine clinics to be in ALL schools. All of these treasonous nuts are working together to destroy our kids instead of helping them. To add salt to the injury they are using our own tax dollars to get away with it.

Obama/Duncan/IB

Arne Duncan’s Plan to use IB for Systemic Reform – 2007
Using the IB for Systemic Reform in North America
ARNE DUNCAN, DENNIS COCHRANE
Arne Duncan, Superintendent of Chicago Public Schools, and Dennis Cochrane, Deputy Minister of Education for the Province of Nova Scotia, will expand on their panel discussion of the introduction of the IB throughout each of their school districts.

So how did Arne Duncan help IBO to “enact” this plan?　

THE AMERICAN RECOVERY AND REINVESTMENT ACT (ARRA): CAPITALIZE ON FEDERAL EDUCATION FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES WITH THE INTERNATIONAL BACCALAUREATE (IB) – ANNENBERG CHALLENGE FUNDS – IB MYP IN CHICAGO

Like something out of a bad Kafka novel, it may seem hard to believe, but Truth About IB is going to report it here first – due to the courageous and diligent efforts of Stanley Kurtz, the release of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge expenditure file reveals that money was allocated to the Beverly/Morgan Park IB MYP in 1997-1999, the years when Barry Obama and Bill Ayers served on the CAC Board. (Box 5,6)

In the linked article, Mr. Kurtz describes the “type” of educational reforms Obama and Ayers funded for Chicago’s public school children:

This irrefutable evidence of funding of the IB program by an unrepentant domestic terrorist and IBO’s willingness to accept the money, speaks volumes about the organization’s integrity and ideology. If you look further into the Annenberg disbursements, you will find the South Side Community Network. This caught TAIB’s attention because IBO seems to have a thing for U.S. schools with South Side in the name. A quick search of this “network” turns up the Woods Foundation:

Please form your own opinion as to the legitimacy and goals of this “charitable fund”. The lines and paper trails become extremely blurred at this point when trying to differentiate between what constitutes a “community organizer”, an “educational non-profit” a “network”, a “Challenge” or a “Fund”. The ONE thing that binds them is a radical left-wing philosophy.

Even the left-leaning CNN released a segment on the Obama/Ayers/Annenberg collaboration.
Note the reference to the Peace School with the United Nations curriculum.

OBAMA/BIDEN SUPPORT DISSOLVING
LOCAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS IN FAVOR OF
IB CHARTER SCHOOLS:

“…the school district and teachers worked together to close down a large, low-performing high school and open 6 new small schools to let parents and students choose between schools that focus on the arts or on technology, offer an International Baccalaureate (IB) program, or focus on workplace internships or world languages.”

We just saw the great culling of the educational system is continuing in Chicago.

Obama’s Education Reform Fact Sheet

Chicago To Shut Down 54 Schools

Citing budget concerns and falling enrollment, Chicago Public Schools officials announced Thursday they plan to close 54 schools next year and shut down 61 school buildings — the largest single wave of school closures in U.S. history. To soften the blow for students at closing schools, the district said it is adding 13 new special science programs, five International Baccalaureate programs, air conditioning and fine arts classes in 19 of the schools where these students will be sent.

Just remember the way the IB operates is always under the radar. When they admit they have 5 IB schools for those kids that means 5 operational IB schools that are already under the UN control, it does not include all the schools where they are trying to shove in the IB application before the public gets wind of what this really means for their kids and their wallets. Nor does it include all the militarized schools Obama and his cohorts in crime already ushered into Chicago. This matters because they have indeed created the crisis and now they have to sell the public on why these IB schools are so much “better” for their kids.

It’s heartbreaking but it is NOT unstoppable. Parents have to get truly informed to understand what we are up against. No matter what… please remember to teach your kid about their rights to refuse to answer ANY personal questions. I always taught my daughter to tell them this… “You need to ask my Mom about that because it is personal information and she would want to talk to you about it first.” You’d be surprised at how that stops these teachers in their tracks because they know that kid is 1.) Going to go home to tell their parent how the teacher was going where they had no business going, and 2.) It makes them stop and think they can be held accountable for what they were trying to do with that kid behind the parents back. I would call them or come to the school the next day and personally confront them about getting out of line with NON-academic related invasions into my child’s life. They did not want to see me again so they had no problems giving her alternative assignments and skipping the psychological reviews. That is what they want the whole country to face…tell me how many parents even know what is going on IN our schools today? Further, how many parent will see the threats of these psychological reviews? I can attest from my own personal experience a very slim margin of parents will even question it much less stand up and make them back off.

That is why this information needs to be shared because I have faith that IF more parents knew what was going on far more WILL stand up and kick these nuts out of our schools while also preventing new IB schools to have the opportunity to even get started. We have to look at this in terms of stopping it now or facing a huge army of indoctrinated civilians (former IB students) who will be battle ready for the UN against our own people. Obama’s use of his brown shirt cadets from his Chicago indoctrination centers (that he used for his first campaign) were just a glimpse of what they are doing TO kids IN these schools and how they plan to use them across the country for the UN against the US.
–

Related: Annenberg is in NH – This article was written by a teacher who founded an national educational research group. Further, it contains links to a story by another NH education researcher who tells of actually attending the session with the “Annenberg Change Agent”.

In the article a teacher is quoted:

“The organization “not only teaches its own worldview, it simultaneously undermines the beliefs and values of the United States (also called the ‘American creed’),” the report said. It cites an International Baccalaureate teaching page, which says, “Both Democrats and the Republicans supported a more or less unrestrained capitalist system. They believed that it offered unique incentives to hard work and opportunities for all even though there was plenty of evidence that it left many people very poor and a few grotesquely rich.”

[The] teacher who asked not to be identified believes the standards in Massachusetts, one of the states where the International Baccalaureate has been expanding, are fine the way they are.

“One thing that greatly troubles me is we have an excellent curriculum in Massachusetts public schools. Our frameworks are second to none. Our [standard] is the envy of the nation,” the teacher said.

Read more at: WND

Critics of the International Baccalaureate (IB) program often say that IB is “un-American.” IB supporters, on the other hand, say that participating schools can write their own curriculum, so the content of the curriculum is really up the schools—not the International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO). In this ongoing debate over IB, who is right? (The IBO website says that IB is now in 680 American schools.)

IB’s Core Curriculum Requirement

Can IB schools write their own curriculum? IB schools can write their own curriculum so long as the “beliefs and values” of the curriculum agree with the beliefs and values of IB. The philosophy of IB must be incorporated into the school’s core classes.
When schools adopt the IB program, they agree to the following stipulations:

Program Standards and Practices:

Section A: philosophy

Standard A1: There is close alignment between the educational beliefs and values of the school and those of the [IB] program.

Practices:

1.The school is committed to the principles defined in the IBO mission statement.

2.The school is committed to developing in students the qualities, attitudes and characteristics described in the IB learner profile.

3.There are clear and close connections between the school’s published statements of mission and philosophy, and the beliefs and values of the [IB] program.

4.The beliefs and values that drive the [IB] program are shared by all sections of the school community (including students, teachers, administrators, members of the governing body and others, as appropriate). [Program standards and practices, International Baccalaureate Organization, Geneva, CH-1218, Switzerland, Published September 2005 by the International Baccalaureate Organization.]

Notice that in the IB “Standards and Practices” quoted above, the words “beliefs and values” are used three times. One has to be impressed by this extraordinary emphasis IBO places on requiring that member schools teach its beliefs and values. IBO leaves no doubt about requiring its schools to teach the guiding philosophy of IB. This heavy emphasis additionally raises the question: Is IB primarily about education? Or is it more about indoctrination?

What are the “beliefs and values” of IB?

IBO insists that its beliefs and values form the core of the IB curriculum. IBO calls its curriculum “the best possible curriculum to be enjoyed by all who participate.” What is this curriculum? The same paragraph in which IBO claims to have the “best possible curriculum” also clarifies that the essence of the IB curriculum is teaching students “those human values which are recognized as universal; these are embodied in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, [as stated in Article 26] adopted and proclaimed by the General assembly of the United Nations in 1948″ ["A CONTINUUM OF INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION," published by IBO, p. 10, all emphasis in the original].

That is, IBO says its curriculum is “the best possible” for two interrelated reasons: (1) The IBO curriculum focuses on the beliefs and values it says are universal. These beliefs and values are seen by IBO, therefore, as being superior to the parochial beliefs and values of mere nations that are less than universal. That is, IB believes that it teaches the universal beliefs and values which are superior to the limited beliefs and values of the United States.

And (2) IBO says its curriculum is “the best possible” because IB teaches the beliefs and values of the UN as defined in the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights [UDHR]. This UN document specifically requires supporting nations to promote all the activities of the UN in its education program [UDHR, Article 26.]. This means that IBO is committed to teaching the beliefs and values contained in numerous UN treaties and accords the United States does not support such as Kyoto, the UN Treaty on the Rights of the Child, the Earth Charter, Agenda 21, the Biodiversity Treaty and many others. (IBO formed a partnership with UNESCO in 1996.)

Teaching the Beliefs and Values of IBO

As mentioned above, IBO requires member school to teach its courses from the IB point of view. This requirement is clearly stated in the Minnesota School District # 6078 federal grant application, which says: “Units will … integrate IB philosophy and concepts into core content curriculum.” [p. 70]

The IB curriculum in A.C. Flora High School in South Carolina illustrates how the IB values are incorporated into math and language classes. A.C. Flora describes its IB curriculum as follows:

At A. C. Flora the French classes have continuously integrated global concerns, such as pollution, endangered species, health issues (obesity, aging, AIDS, cloning), space research, human rights, and the death penalty…

One wonders how much French IB students are learning when they are studying AIDS and the death penalty. A. C. Flora describes its math curriculum as follows:

Math Studies curriculum explores problems concerning the weather, environmental protection, conservation, and energy. . . The statistics unit will examine a variety of problems from a global perspective, such as the disparity of wealth distribution between first and third world countries.

How much math are students learning as they study “wealth distribution”? (They are actually learning Marxist ideology in math class.)IB Latin looks like this:

In Latin, [at A. C. Flora] an ancient language, students will examine the ancient world as a sounding board to measure and compare the global issues in a modern world. Students will discuss the impact on the Roman world, as well as their own, of such topics as women’s rights, slavery, and national imperialism.

(A.C. Flora High School described these classes in the 2002 IB Introductory Seminar given in Danvers, MA. These classes were said to be “designed for schools from around the world interested in becoming part of the IB Program.” That is, IB held up this A. C. Flora curriculum as a model IB curriculum.)

When students are studying “wealth distribution” and “national imperialism,” they are not learning much math and Latin. The United States is treated as an “imperialist” country by IB, of course, and is compared to Japan during World War II. The main concern about IB, however, is this: When the beliefs and values of IB are even taught in math, French and Latin classes, as well as in every other class, it becomes abundantly clear that IB is more about indoctrination than about education. Indeed, at numerous points IBO says that its purpose is teaching the beliefs and values that create students who are “world citizens.” IB leaves no room for doubt about the nature of its curriculum.

To ensure that that the IBO-UN beliefs and values are adequately indoctrinated into its students, IBO and the UN are now writing their own textbooks and other materials. The IBO website states:

The Global Teaching and Learning Project of the UN in New York accepted an IBO tender to produce two teaching booklets about UN global issues. … The project has been undertaken by the International Baccalaureate Curriculum and Assessment Centre in Cardiff using experienced curriculum writers from around the world, principally in IB World Schools, and having UN input and approval of the 20 units completed. They will be copyrighted by the UN, with acknowledgement to the IBO for its work, and disseminated to the governments of all member states for use in schools. The content of the booklets reflects the structure and philosophy of the IB programs …

Undermining the Beliefs and Values of the United States

IBO not only teaches its own worldview, it simultaneously undermines the beliefs and values of the United States (also called the “American creed”). And what are the beliefs and values of the United States? They are stated in our Declaration of Independence and Constitution. The American creed includes national sovereignty; universal truth; the equality of all persons; God-given, inalienable rights of life, liberty and property; limited government; free enterprise; natural law; rule by the people; constitutional government and other related values and principles.

It is important to understand that the American creed says its principles are true not only for Americans, but are also true and right for all people. The principles are universal.

It is this universal nature of the American creed that is consistently undermined by IB. That is, IB teaches that our creed may be acceptable to some Americans, but it does not contain universal truths and values that are good for all Americans and certainly not good for other nations. The IB curriculum, for example, makes the following accusation against free enterprise:

“Both Democrats and the Republicans supported a more or less unrestrained capitalist system. They believed that it offered unique incentives to hard work and opportunities for all—even though there was plenty of evidence that it left many people very poor and a few grotesquely rich.” [IB "History of the America: Politics Old and New"]

This IB description means that Americans may think of free enterprise as being good for all people and nations, but it is actually only good for some people and nations while it is bad for others. Free enterprise is not a universal value according to IB. In contrast, IB says that it teaches values that are universal. This theme—that our beliefs and values may be good for some people but not for everyone, while IB provides the universal beliefs and values—is the unifying theme around which the IB beliefs and values are constructed.

The American Creed versus the IBO-UNESCO Creed:

How different are the American creed and the IBO-UNESCO creed? The following table describes some of the differences:

Right to bear arms ——– UN-IBO-No / U.S.A.-Yes
No double jeopardy ——– UN-IBO-No / U.S.A.-Yes
Church & state separation ——– UN-IBO-No / U.S.A.-Yes
Limited government ——– UN-IBO-No / U.S.A.-Yes
Reserved powers ——– UN-IBO-No / U.S.A.-Yes
Natural law recognition ——– UN-IBO-No / U.S.A.-Yes

There are other significant differences between the American creed and that of IBO-UNESCO. For example, our Constitution guarantees that a person’s property cannot be taken by government without just compensation. IBO-UNESCO has no such guarantee.

The biggest difference between the American Creed and that of IB-UNESCO, however, is this: Our Declaration of Independence states that government exists to protect the God-given, inalienable rights of all persons. The Tenth Amendment to our Constitution restates the same doctrine as follows: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution … are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.” That is, human rights belong to the people, and government has only those rights given it by the people. Our rights have higher standing than government.

The UN and IBO, in contrast, subscribe to the exact opposite view of human rights. The UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights [UDHR] says: “These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.”[UDHR, Paragraph 29, Article 3]

This means that under the UDHR, people have only those rights the UN says they have. But under the U.S. Bill of Rights, government has only those rights the people say it has. UN-IBO turn human rights on its head, and it takes the same view of human rights as, for example, the constitution of Cuba, which says that Cubans have freedom of speech—as long as their speech conforms to the wishes of the government of Cuba.

IBO and Multiculturalism

IBO frequently says that its curriculum is organized around multiculturalism. IBO defines “multiculturalism” when it says, “These programmes encourage students … [to] understand that other people, with their differences, can also be right.” IBO means that the American creed may be right for many Americans, and the Iranian creed may be right for many Iranians, but the IBO creed is the universal creed that is right for everyone.

Every subject in the IBO curriculum is taught from this same unifying perspective. Students are asked to “be familiar with” their own “traditions,” including their own history, government, religion and the like, but students are taught to view these subjects as merely their own cultural “traditions,” while other countries see and do things differently. No country’s traditions may be seen as superior to the traditions of any other nation. They are all equal and limited to their particular culture. IBO, in contrast, provides the beliefs and values that are universal and, are, therefore, good for everyone.

Following this theme, IBO defines its multicultural Theory of Knowledge (TOK), which it says is at the core of its curriculum, by asking: “Freedom Fighter or Terrorist?” and answering: “‘Honest disagreement is often a good sign of progress.’ [Mahatma Gandhi].” (The Learner Profile, Slide # 17) The point being that Americans may be right in calling some people “terrorists,” while Palestinians may be right in calling the same people “freedom fighters,” but both the American view and the Palestinian view are of little importance because they are limited to being right only in the postmodern sense of reflecting the traditions of their own cultures.IB, however, transcends particular cultures and believes it views such matters from the perspective of universal values.

The issue of the IB curriculum is not primarily a matter of the subjects being taught. The question is not, for example, whether the U.S. Constitution and U.S. history are taught—the question is how they are taught. Are the beliefs and values of American history and the Constitution taught as containing universal truths and values and being, therefore, good for everyone? Or are they taught as being good for some but not others? And, are the beliefs and values of IB-UNESCO promoted in the classes as superior to the beliefs and values of the American creed? These are the questions we must ask.

A Student’s Experience

Given the reality of the IB curriculum, one IB student described his literature class this way:

“…literary merit wasn’t in the mind of those who created the reading lists in my IB English classes; multiculturalism and gender concerns were. After reading some Shakespeare and Dickens’s classic Tale of Two Cities, our dead-white-guy quota was just about full. So, instead of Plato’s Republic we read Ngugi wa Thiong’s Weep Not, Child; instead of Catcher in the Rye we read Leslie Marmon Silko’s Ceremony; and instead of Dante and Cervantes we read Soseki and Rulfo.”

Western classics that form the foundation of our literary canon­ The Sun Also Rises, The Grapes of Wrath, The Scarlet Letter ­were absent. So, too, the poetry of Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman. Literature that had stood the test of time was sacrificed for contemporary works that addressed immediate cultural or feminist struggles. …

And it’s particularly disgraceful to forgo teaching such important works because of dubious diversity concerns. This was not the core knowledge I had been promised.

Undermining Christianity

IBO also attacks Christianity. “Christianity” is defined by the author in the usual sense as those organizations or persons who adhere to the Ecumenical Creeds of the Christian Church and who believe Christianity is true in the universal sense (not in a postmodern sense of being only true for Christians or Westerners). This definition is necessary because IBO lumps Christianity as defined above into the category of what it calls “fundamentalism”— along with the Taliban and various terrorist groups, saying that these “fundamentalist” groups are all “dangerous.” It would be difficult to imagine a more clear, and repugnant, attack on Christianity.

The Religion of IBO

While IBO undermines Christianity, it also advocates its own religion. IBO promotes the worldview of New Age-Pantheism guru William Butler Yeats (see the link just above). Another New Age leader, Joseph Campbell, is often required reading for IBO students. Like Yeats, Campbell aggressively promotes “inclusive” New Age-Pantheistic doctrines while undermining Christianity.

Campbell argues that New Age religion provides the universal doctrines of the unifying world religion. He argues that no religion which claims exclusive truth should be followed—the position of IBO as noted above. Truth, says Campbell, can only be found in the common themes of all religions—which gives us a common world religion—exactly what IBO desires.

IBO also teaches the beliefs and values of the Earth Charter.* The Earth Charter requires schools to engage in what it calls “spiritual education”; and how is spiritual education defined? Spiritual education is explained by the numerous religious symbols on the “Ark of Hope” which houses the papyrus copy of Earth Charter and is promoted by the Earth Charter website. These religious symbols, without exception, are New Age-Pantheism symbols. The Ark of Hope website describes the Ark of Hope as being decorated with the symbols of “‘Spirit’ that honors the children and young animals of the world” (Pantheism).

The Ark of Hope is an antitype of the Ark of the Covenant. It is often carried about by priestesses in long flowing white gowns. When not on tour, it often resides in the Temple of Understanding in New York City, a temple the UN Chronicle headlines as being the “Spiritual United Nations” [Spring, 2000, edition].

IBO subverts Christianity while at the same time advocating New Age religion—a clear violation of the separation of church and state. This is not a problem for IBO, however, because it does not recognize the separation of Church and state. Both Christians and non-Christians need to be concerned about IBO religious indoctrination because IBO is inculcating New Age-Pantheism in all its students, not just Christians. (When IBO speaks of teaching “beliefs and values,” it clearly includes religious beliefs and values as part of the mix.)

So Does IBO allow schools to write their own curriculum?

IBO schools can write their own curriculum in the same sense that Cubans have freedom of speech—you can say anything you want so long as it agrees with the party line. This party line is really all that matters to IBO.

*For public relations reasons, IBO had itself removed as a signator of the Earth Charter in 2006. IBO still teaches the beliefs and values of the Earth Charter, however, and is committed to doing so by its subscription to UDHR, Article 26. The beliefs and values of IB have not changed.
Published March 21, 2007

MVSD IB Program Lacks Transparency

Addendum: In one of the comments under the article, a person named “Bruce Currie” insists that these complaints about IB were not coming from the teachers themselves. This is FALSE. The reason attention was brought to the program in the first place to local and national researchers was that the TEACHERS of MVSD approached them for help on how best to expose this while still remaining anonymous.

Further, when the Concord Monitor was asked to print the information that had been going back and forth between one of those activists that the teachers had contacted and Ms. Carey, they refused. It is too bad that those emails cannot be made public… perhaps in the future they might be.

Read more about that here: International Baccalaureate Scandal Continues

“According to a student in the class, the lesson was to teach about the life of women in Islam. The burqa exercise focused on fashion and did not include the fact that in many Muslim communities, women who appear in public without a burqa face being beaten, imprisoned or murdered by family members, vigilante groups or even the state.

At the end of class, the students were assigned to write a paper about Egypt. According to one student, they were instructed to discuss “how Egypt was a good country until democracy took over, and that things were finally corrected when the Muslim Brotherhood came into power.”

While it is true that not all Muslims are terrorists, the idea that they would portray the way women are treated in those countries as ‘liberated’ is laughable.

Read more…

In his Letter from New Zealand he states that IBers are becoming more judgemental, and that the word ‘rigorous’ is overly used to describe the program in marketing campaigns.He says that the range of requirements are designed to “indoctrinate us on the importance of “globalization”.”

The most disturbing comment gleaned from the letter was that IB really rams it into students heads “with the latest of wishy-washy religious propaganda, climate change propaganda, AIDS propaganda, propaganda against Christianity, propaganda against America, mother earth propaganda (somehow I deeply suspect it is related to New Age or Pantheism)”

Read more…