Contact Scholastic. Tell ‘em what you think about The Path to 9/11.

[BuyingThyme]

General Information
212-343-6100
www.scholastic.com

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1-800-SCHOLASTIC
[e-mail]

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212-343-6741
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212-343-4563
[e-mail]

http://www.scholastic.com/medialiteracy/


You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson, as he is asking America’s students, “What are the matters of dispute in the docudrama?”

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson, as he is asking America’s students, “In your view, is this an appropriate way to treat an event such as this?"

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson why he refers to the fact that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 as a belief.

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson why he awkwardly tied the following two sentences/ideas together in his latest “study guide” thus creating a false and deadly choice for America’s students:

Many people believe that there is no connection between Iraq and the events of 9/11. Others believe that the broadly defined “War on Terror” justified the invasion of Iraq.

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson why he is asking what the difference is between fact and drama as if fact and drama are somehow mutually exclusive concepts.

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson why he is using the victims of 9/11 to promote a movie which he knows to be factually flawed.

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson in what other ways he has profited off of the 9/11 dead.

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson why he is continuing to insist that The Path to 9/11 is “largely based on the 9/11 Commission Report.”

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson what “largely based” means.

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson if he is acting in the best interests of Scholastic’s investors.

You may want to ask Chairman Richard Robinson how much money ABC offered before he caved. Twice.

With over $2 billion in revenues, Scholastic's nearly 10,000 employees operate globally in education, media and publishing businesses reaching children, parents and teachers. A highly trusted brand name with many businesses centered around education and learning, Scholastic creates quality educational and entertaining materials and products including children's books, magazines, educational technology, teacher materials, television programming, film, videos, web sites and toys for use in school and at home.

Scholastic is a publicly held company that trades on NASDAQ under the ticker symbol SCHL.

http://scholastic.com/aboutscholastic/

[Kurovski]

1. K&R.

On my "to do" list.

[AnotherMother4Peace]

2. Scholastic is on my "Do not patronize stupidity list" Thanks for the links

[Tahkcalb]

3. Bravo!

:applause: :beer: :beer:

[EFerrari]

4. Didn't they already pull out of that deal? Did I miss something? nt

[BuyingThyme]

5. No, they had a seamless contingency plan which made it seem like

they were doing the right thing. But, in reality, they never had any intention of doing the right thing, no matter what happened.

[EFerrari]

6. Are you KIDDING? DU doesn't know this.

If Scholastic goes with distributing this propaganda, we are so f$cked.

[bliss_eternal]

21. May I ask how you found this out?

I'm going to send this to dailykos and other blogospheres, they are going to want confirmation before letting their readers know.

:) Thanks for the head's up. This is disturbing.

[EFerrari]

7. Kick! Lying sacks of #@$%

[tnlefty]

8. When exactly is this supposed to be in schools?

K&R, BTW, but I have asked may junior and a high school English teacher that I know and the teacher wasn't even aware of any of this at all, and my junior in high school keeps telling me that nothing has been mentioned about it at his school, so is this supposed to be coming out now?, in time for the book fairs? Or could I possibly have hope that for once my red area has smelled the shit that this is and refused to participate?

[mmonk]

13. That's what I'd like to know.

Parents have a right to request teachers not teach lies to their children.

[BuyingThyme]

16. I'm not sure how they do things, but somewhere along the line

I got the impression that they send out a lot of email. It may have been a dream.

[LWolf]

44. It's not supposed to be in schools.

It's a study guide on their website, available for teachers to download, or not, as they see fit.

[bleever]

9. To hell with this "on the one hand, on the other hand" approach

to truth.

Not in my school. No way. Unh uh.

[Dinger]

10. Whoa Nellie! You Got It! Thanks For Posting! K & R!

[Dinger]

11. Hmmmmmmm, What Would You Do?

I know of a book fair cokming to a certain school next week, let's say- What would you do?

[hfojvt]

48. book fairs are evil anyway

and usually do not involve Scholastic. Scholastic is sold right from class by teachers. Just another way that bookstores have competition which is sponsored by their own tax dollars. As a former bookstore owner I say boycott all such activities and vote and speak out against having them. Support your local independent bookstore.

[EFerrari]

12. Kick

These muthas have no business in our schools if THIS is an example of their ethics.

[ocd liberal]

14. Do you happen to have a link

to the original pdf files Scholastic put out? The ones before they rewrote the questions teachers are supposed to be asking? I would love to share this with the principal of my son's school, he seemed to not know about this atrocity.

[BuyingThyme]

15. I don't have a link, but if you search DU subjects for "Scholastic,"

you may be able to find what you're looking for.

[LA lady]

17. They're still available online in Google cache

The originals were sent to schools earlier. Our High schools printed them up last week and used them yesterday and today. I have a copy. The history and social studies class were encouraged to watch and discuss in class.

[BuyingThyme]

18. Do they distribute this stuff by regular mail or electronically or both?

[LA lady]

19. The schools here received them electronically , I believe.

I printed the copy I have last week when I heard about it.

[ancient_nomad]

20. Kick and Recommend!

:kick:

[bliss_eternal]

22. I'm all for rallying the troops, but we need proof

or at least to have a better idea of how it was revealed there was a contingency plan? Who was tipped off that Scholastic did not (or won't) comply to the statement they released last week?

They would have to answer to the press they released these statements to as well as the public at large for lying.

But again, could we please have some sources so we can proceed?

Thanks! :hi:

[BuyingThyme]

23. What did they lie about?

As far as I know they only said they were changing their study guide or whatever. Did they ever say anything about disaffiliating themselves from the project?

[bliss_eternal]

24. I'm sorry--

I thought you were posting this because they went back on their word to change the study guides. I'm apparently confused. lol.

Let's try to clarify.:) May I ask what reason you wanted us to give attention to Scholastic again?

I found this thread that you created:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=2107526

but I didn't find any reason we should think they've gone back on their word? Again, I apologize I mean no disrespect, but am I missing something?

[BuyingThyme]

25. I only want people to pay attention to Scholastic because they are

going to great lengths to promote propaganda while pretending to educate.

[bliss_eternal]

26. Ok. But you are aware that they said this, right?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=2081204#2092303

You must be. You posted in the thread, did you not?

Why are you trying to lead others to believe that they are going back on their word? Because YOU don't believe Scholastic?

[BuyingThyme]

27. Again, you are the one saying they went back on their word.

I'm saying they never denounced the propaganda. They simply changed gears to make for a smooth ride.

[bliss_eternal]

28. Please don't twist my words.

I'm saying no such thing. I'm asking if that is what you are saying.

While they "didn't denounce the propaganda" they did offer something quite a few here on DU seemed to be satisfied with. Apparently you were not?

You seem to be purposely misleading people on this thread, and the other thread that you started in hopes of getting people to carry out your agenda.

[BuyingThyme]

30. Look, I responded to what you wrote. You twice intimated that

I said that Scholastic was going back on their word. I have never said anything similar to that. Only you have said that. You are projecting.

[bliss_eternal]

31. I'm not going to argue with you.

My words are there. I know what I said and I know what I asked. You're the one that's been evasive and indirect in this thread. When people have asked you specifically what you're referring to you sent them to search. That's not specific and it's not fair to send others on wild goose chases.

You could have said specifically what your issues were. Why have you not?

[BuyingThyme]

32. How can I be any more specific?

And why are you making up this stuff about people asking me what I'm referring to? I referred to the original PDF? What are you doing?

[bliss_eternal]

33. See post #14 (among others)

If you refered to the original pdf, then why is it that you didn't have it referenced in your op? Or when the member in post #14 asked about it?

Generally when I create posts here, calling others to action--asking them to call, e-mail and/or write someone in the name of Democracy I can cite a source as my reason why.

:shrug: Just thought that was customary on these boards. If you refered to them as you say in your response to me, why don't you have them readily available--the pdf?

:eyes:

[BuyingThyme]

34. I didn't refer to the original pdf. Once again, you did.

But, I must give you credit. This is one of the most fascinating sentences I've ever seen:

If you refereed to the original pdf, then why is it that you didn't have it referenced in your op?

Again I ask, what are you doing?

[bliss_eternal]

35. This seems unnecessary.

I didn't refer to the original pdf. I was merely trying to determine what your source was, or if you had one.

In my last response to you, I misunderstood what you had written here:
And why are you making up this stuff about people asking me what I'm referring to? I referred to the original PDF? What are you doing?

For that I do apologize.

For everything else I stand by what I said. Frankly, I was trying to get a sense of why you posted what you did AFTER most seemed satisfied with what Scholastic has offered.

You are entitled to believe whatever you want about them.

[BuyingThyme]

37. Yes, promoting propaganda as educational material does not satisfy.

I believe propaganda should be identified as propaganda -- even if a corporation says otherwise.

Call me crazy.

[bliss_eternal]

38. Nothing wrong with that as I see it...

I don't think that's crazy at all. :) I totally understand how you would not be satisfied by that. But you did NOT SAY THAT, specifically. That is my point. You have not been direct in the course of this thread. Maybe this was not your intent, but that seems to have been the result.

Others on this thread seemed to think that Scholastic was no longer doing what they stated on Friday that they were going to, which was issue a different study guide than the one they originally agreed to with ABC/Disney. (I provided links to those threads above).

This is why I've asked specific questions and hoped for specific responses from you. Perhaps in your passion around this issue, and anger towards what Scholastic is doing you didn't realize this is what your post lead others to believe.

Perhaps the fact that others emotions are still high about what has just happened, makes it easier to make assumptions. I don't know. But again, you weren't this specific in your original post. It may have been helpful if you were. :)

[BuyingThyme]

39. I think the reason people are not caught up is because

it was announced on Thursday that Scholastic had pulled their study guide. People may have assumed that that was the end of it, that Scholastic had washed their hands of this. But, in reality, they were just getting started.

[bliss_eternal]

40. Yes, I recall the announcement of the pull of the study guide...

then I read that they had revised it, as it's now stated on their site.

What do you mean, just getting started? :) Just trying to understand the issues with them better...

[BuyingThyme]

41. People thought they were done with promoting The Path to 9/11 as

and educational tool, but in reality they were just getting started (at promoting The Path to 9/11 as an educational tool).

[bliss_eternal]

42. Maybe I'm dense--but wasn't it clear that they weren't

done promoting it as an educational tool, when they merely REVISED the study guide? They didn't say they weren't going to issue the study guide, they said they changed it, right?

Wasn't that already clear--or am I missing something? :)

[BuyingThyme]

43. It was clear to me that they weren't done promoting it.

Thus my three posts.

[LynneSin]

49. No they rewrote their study guide

to focus on accuracy in media

[Kurovski]

29. Did you read this?

http://www.scholastic.com/medialiteracy/

<Our mission is well-captured in our credo and editorial platform which includes the statement: “Good citizens may honestly differ on important public questions. We believe that all sides of the issues of our times should be fairly discussed—with deep respect for facts and logical thinking—in classroom magazines, books and other educational materials used in schools and homes.”>

-You can't "honestly" differ on outright lies and fabrications. It's impossible in a sane and rational venue. I suppose if the film were being used to openly discuss propaganda, we could find value in P2-9/11 being used as a "teaching" tool.

Perhaps some teachers will do so, but how many?

And then the study guide itself takes the flawed 9/11 commission report as the point of reference for students, which in itself gives the message that the report is far more thorough and trustworthy than reality would lead us to believe.:

<1.Have your students select a scene from The Path to 9/11 miniseries, such as the depiction of the USS Cole bombing in Yemen. Instruct your students to write a brief summary of the event as shown in the miniseries.
2.Then have students visit http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/index.htm to download a free copy of the 9/11 Commission Report. Students should search the report for information pertaining to the same event they selected in step 1.>

Again, any discrepancy between the actual report itself and the "docudrama" may well be in evidence, but we still are teaching students that lies-consciously promoted-are worthy of respect and discussion if they are considered an "opinion" or used in a "docudrama". There is plenty of room for a teacher to actually promote the propaganda itself in the classroom.

I think sfexpat2000 said something upthread about us not having time to be teaching bullshit like this.

Edit: here is sfexpat2000's quote, "These muthas have no business in our schools if THIS is an example of their ethics." I tend to agree. :-)

[Kurovski]

36. Kick.(nt)

[City Lights]

45. I emailed them last week asking for specifics on this.

Got a canned response promising a detailed answer later...I'm still waiting.

[myrna minx]

46. Excellent post.

K&R. :kick:

[Chimichurri]

47. I felt their press release describing the rewrite was garbage

This is reprehensible.