Students at Roberts Middle School in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio were recently handed this assignment, which has drawn a great deal of controversy:
"Whom to Leave Behind
Instructions: The twelve persons listed below have been selected as passengers on a space ship for a flight to another planet because tomorrow the planet Earth is doomed for destruction. Due to changes in space limitations, it has now been determined that only eight persons may go. Any eight qualify.
Your task is to select the Eight (8) passengers who will make the trip. On your own, take approximately 5 minutes and rank order of the passengers from one to twelve based on those who you feel are most deserving to make the trip with one being most deserving and twelve being least deserving. Next, the entire group will come together and decides as a group the eight (8) passengers who will make the trip. PLEASE NOTE: when you make your decision as a group EVERYONE must agree on the final eight passengers and come to a consensus. You are NOT allowed to vote or take a 'majority rules' decision.
Original passenger list:
- an accountant with a substance abuse problem
- a militant African-American medical student
- a 33 year old female Native American manager who does not speak English
- the accountant's pregnant wife
- a famous novelist with a physical disability
- a 21-year old, female, Muslim international student
- a Hispanic clergyman who is against homosexuality
- a female move star who was recently the victim of sexual assault
- a racist armed police officer who has been accused of using excessive force
- a homosexual male, professional athlete
- an Asian, orphaned 12-year old boy
- a 60-year old Jewish university administrator"
(yes, the typos were present in the original copy)
After posting this article on my Twitter page, I received several comments pertaining to it. I'd say roughly 3/5 of the commenters reacted negatively and 2/5 reacted either positively or neutrally to the controversial assignment. Many in the former camp asked what year we were in and how this assignment could be useful in any manner. The latter camp tended to note the potential for constructive discourse amongst the group members and the class overall due to the project, with at least one individual saying, "Kids need to be challenged!"
If the assignment had listed just the professions, I may have been more understanding of it being used in a classroom as a medium for the purpose of thought-provoking discourse. If the paper's list had read something like: Teacher, lawyer, doctor, athlete, movie star, journalist, politician, police officer, fireperson, construction worker, mailperson, and pharmacist, while I might not have loved the idea of deeming certain jobs as unimportant, I also wouldn't have cringed upon seeing it. I cringed upon seeing the list on this assignment. How could this have truly "challenged" students? Challenged the prejudices of 11- to 14-year old kids? Really? Of what relevance is a person's race, religion, or sexual orientation in the hypothetical scenario presented to the class? How could debating about whether a Jew, Muslim, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, homosexual, or African-American is more deserving of being saved be of any good use to these students? Intentional or not, the assignment isn't asking students to challenge their own prejudices; it's asking them to develop and rationalize prejudices. What we should be doing is teaching our kids to love and respect all, not to pick and choose who's superior and inferior to others.
https://www.cleveland.com/akron/index.ssf/2018/08/controversial_assignment_asks.html
"Whom to Leave Behind
Instructions: The twelve persons listed below have been selected as passengers on a space ship for a flight to another planet because tomorrow the planet Earth is doomed for destruction. Due to changes in space limitations, it has now been determined that only eight persons may go. Any eight qualify.
Your task is to select the Eight (8) passengers who will make the trip. On your own, take approximately 5 minutes and rank order of the passengers from one to twelve based on those who you feel are most deserving to make the trip with one being most deserving and twelve being least deserving. Next, the entire group will come together and decides as a group the eight (8) passengers who will make the trip. PLEASE NOTE: when you make your decision as a group EVERYONE must agree on the final eight passengers and come to a consensus. You are NOT allowed to vote or take a 'majority rules' decision.
Original passenger list:
- an accountant with a substance abuse problem
- a militant African-American medical student
- a 33 year old female Native American manager who does not speak English
- the accountant's pregnant wife
- a famous novelist with a physical disability
- a 21-year old, female, Muslim international student
- a Hispanic clergyman who is against homosexuality
- a female move star who was recently the victim of sexual assault
- a racist armed police officer who has been accused of using excessive force
- a homosexual male, professional athlete
- an Asian, orphaned 12-year old boy
- a 60-year old Jewish university administrator"
(yes, the typos were present in the original copy)
After posting this article on my Twitter page, I received several comments pertaining to it. I'd say roughly 3/5 of the commenters reacted negatively and 2/5 reacted either positively or neutrally to the controversial assignment. Many in the former camp asked what year we were in and how this assignment could be useful in any manner. The latter camp tended to note the potential for constructive discourse amongst the group members and the class overall due to the project, with at least one individual saying, "Kids need to be challenged!"
If the assignment had listed just the professions, I may have been more understanding of it being used in a classroom as a medium for the purpose of thought-provoking discourse. If the paper's list had read something like: Teacher, lawyer, doctor, athlete, movie star, journalist, politician, police officer, fireperson, construction worker, mailperson, and pharmacist, while I might not have loved the idea of deeming certain jobs as unimportant, I also wouldn't have cringed upon seeing it. I cringed upon seeing the list on this assignment. How could this have truly "challenged" students? Challenged the prejudices of 11- to 14-year old kids? Really? Of what relevance is a person's race, religion, or sexual orientation in the hypothetical scenario presented to the class? How could debating about whether a Jew, Muslim, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, homosexual, or African-American is more deserving of being saved be of any good use to these students? Intentional or not, the assignment isn't asking students to challenge their own prejudices; it's asking them to develop and rationalize prejudices. What we should be doing is teaching our kids to love and respect all, not to pick and choose who's superior and inferior to others.
https://www.cleveland.com/akron/index.ssf/2018/08/controversial_assignment_asks.html
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