More than 30,000 teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District are voting this week whether to authorize a strike. We examine the possibility of the first teachers strike in LAUSD since 1989. We also discuss a class action lawsuit against Stanford accusing the university of discriminating against students with mental health problems; look into Education Secretary Betsy DeVos' new policies for campus sexual misconduct; and more.
Department of Education is readying new policies on campus sexual assaults, what are the implications?
The University of Southern California is facing serious allegations over sexual misconduct. Other institutions as well like Ohio State and Michigan State universities are facing similar charges accusing members of their faculty and staff of various misconduct allegations.
In the midst of such claims, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos is proposing new policies for campus sexual misconduct.
The rules, reports The New York Times, would “narrow the definition of sexual harassment, holding schools accountable only for formal complaints filed through proper authorities and for conduct said to have occurred on their campuses.” The proposed policies would reduce liability for institutions of higher education. At the same time, according to The Times, the new rules would encourage schools to provide more support for victims.
We look into the proposed revisions and discuss the implications.
We have reached out to the U.S. Department of Education, they sent us this statement: “We are in the midst of a deliberative process. Any information the New York Times claims to have is premature and speculative and therefore we have no comment.”
Guests:
Michele Landis Dauber, professor of law and sociology at Stanford University; helped revise Stanford’s policy on sexual assault and is an advocate for improving college and university policies on sexual assault
Mark Hathaway, private defense attorney in Los Angeles, who has represented students and others accused of sexual misconduct
The DoJ has weighed in on admissions discrimination lawsuit against Harvard. How would that impact the trial?
The Department of Justice on Thursday sided with Asian-American students suing Harvard University over affirmative action policies.
The Department said in a court filing that the school has failed to demonstrate that it does not discriminate on the basis of race.
The lawsuit was filed back in 2014 when a group called Students for Fair Admissions alleged that the ivy league is “employing racially and ethnically discriminatory policies and procedures in administering the undergraduate admissions program.”
The Department argued that the university hasn’t explained how it uses race in admissions and has not adopted meaningful criteria to limit the use of race.
Attorney General Jeff Session also said in statement that the school’s use of a “personal rating,” which includes highly subjective factors such as being a “good person” or “likeability,” may be biased against Asian-Americans. The Attorney General called such attempts to ‘racially balance’ the makeup of a student body ‘patently unconstitutional.”
The Justice Department’s court filing opposes Harvard’s request to dismiss the lawsuit before trial. The department is separately investigating Harvard’s admissions policies, a probe that could also result in a lawsuit.
With files from the Associated Press
Guests:
Melissa Korn, reporter at the Wall Street Journal who covers high education; she’s been following the lawsuit; she tweets
Hans A. von Spakovsky, former counsel to the assistant attorney general for civil rights at the Department of Justice in the George W Bush White House; senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation; he tweets
Brenda Shum, director of the Educational Opportunities Project at the nonprofit, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law; the group filed an amicus curiae brief in this case to support the defendant’s motion for summary judgment in the lawsuit challenging Harvard’s race-conscious holistic admissions policy
Can a university require that a student take a leave of absence for mental health reasons?
A class action lawsuit against Stanford is accusing the university of discriminating against students with mental health problems by forcing them into taking leaves of absence.
According to the New York Times, this is part of a larger pushback from students against leave of absence policies, which they can jeopardize a student’s academic career, further damage their mental health and might prevent a student from seeking help in the first place.
A university can ask a student to leave if they present a harm to others, but it’s less clear what a university can or should do if the student might harm themselves. In some cases, a leave of absence is an opportunity for a student to get away from the stressors of school and might be the best option. But how does a university or a counselor make that call? Should it ever be mandatory? In what ways should a school accommodate and help students with mental health issues on campus?
If you are in need of support, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, 1-800-273-8255, for free and confidential help 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Guests:
Connie Horton, licensed psychologist and vice president for student affairs at Pepperdine University; former director of the Counseling Center at Pepperdine and Illinois Wesleyan universities
Daniel Kolodziej, partner with Trygstad, Schwab & Trygstad, an education and employment law firm in Los Angeles; Daniel has experience representing college students in suits involving universities
LAUSD, teachers' union negotiations reach a deadlock, will 30,000 teachers go on strike?
More than 30,000 teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District are voting this week whether to authorize a strike.
If enough LAUSD teachers vote "yes," the leaders of their union, United Teachers Los Angeles, would have the power to launch the first teachers strike in LAUSD since 1989. The voting ends Thursday. Roughly a year and a half of contract talks stalled in July. Almost every day since, the already-tattered relationship between UTLA and LAUSD leadership frays a little more.
The first mediation date is still one month away, and in recent days, both the
NOW: @UTLAnow has filed a formal complaint with a state labor board against @LASchools. The triggering event for filing that complaint appears to be a request for public records filed by, um… me.https://t.co/aLsbHHP7ZE #lausd @KPCC @LAist
— Kyle Stokes (@kystokes) August 28, 2018
and the
This is getting bad.
— Kyle Stokes (@kystokes) August 28, 2018
JUST IN: #LAUSD and @UTLAnow are now trading "unfair labor practice" complaints. After the union filed one last night, @LASchools filed one today, all but saying union has never been interested in a resolution. pic.twitter.com/fHwGVodYEz
filed formal complaints against each other.
Read the full report on LAist.
Guest:
Kyle Stokes, K-12 education reporter for KPCC; he tweets
As Trump accuses Google of rigging search results, we look into how search engines work
President Donald Trump is accusing Google and other U.S. tech companies of rigging search results about him “so that almost all stories & news is BAD” — and though he is offering no evidence, a top adviser says the White House is “taking a look” at whether Google should face federal regulation.
Google is pushing back sharply, saying Trump’s claim simply wasn’t true: “We never rank search results to manipulate political sentiment.”
The president’s tweets Tuesday echoed his familiar attacks on the news media — and a conservative talking point that California-based tech companies run by CEOs with liberal leanings don’t give equal weight to opposing political viewpoints.
Trump followed that up his accusation with vague threats: “I think Google has really taken advantage of a lot of people, and I think that’s a very serious thing. That’s a very serious charge,” Trump said, adding that Google, Twitter, Facebook and others “better be careful, because you can’t do that to people.”
Experts suggested that Trump’s comments showed a misunderstanding of how search engines work. Many factors help decide the initial results, including how much time people spend on a page, how many other pages link to it, how well it’s designed and more.
We have reached out to Google and they did not get back to us in time for the program.
With files from the Associated Press.
Guests:
Joe Balestrino, consultant and independent search-engine-optimization expert; author of the book, "The Definitive Guide to Local Search" (Joe Balestrino, 2011); he tweets
Steven Andres, lecturer in management information systems at San Diego State University; founder of Special Ops Security, an Orange County-based firm specialized in cyber security; he is a Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH) and a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA)
What’s in a name? Beneath the anglicized names people of color adopt
Last week, “Star Wars” actress Kelly Marie Tran wrote a piece in the New York Times about how racist comments directed at her on Instagram led her to delete her old posts and leave the platform.
She quoted being called “Ching Chong,” and other racially demeaning names. In addition to writing about the hurt of being ridiculed for being Vietnamese-American, Tran shared her challenges over how best to express her identity.
Tran wrote that her real first name is Loan, and that using an anglicized name left her “aching to the core.” She described it as a “literal erasure of culture.”
The choice of a name is one many immigrants to America have dealt with for more than a century. Parents struggle with whether it’s better to choose a child’s name from one’s country of origin, despite potential mispronunciations or ethnic stereotyping, or whether it’s in the child’s interest to use a name more common in the US.
If you were given, or chose for yourself, an anglicized name, have your feelings about your name changed over time? If you have a name from your family’s country of origin, do you ever wish you would’ve anglicized it so people don’t mispronounce it or keep asking you how to pronounce it? Did you change your name to one that’s traditional in your ancestral culture as a way of better connecting to your family’s culture? What consideration did you give to this in choosing your child’s name?