You know, that now well-known unfair and biased teaching affair in Colorado brings up some quite unpleasant and not-too-far-away memories in my mind.

A year ago or so I had to suffer through a course that was part of my Social Science CEGEP program at the Cégep de Saint-Félicien, in nearby Saint-Félicien QC. The cause of me having to cope with this ordeal was that the course in question, normally supposed to be a 2nd-level Geography course in all respects, was much more of a far, far left-wing, anti-progress, extremely anti-capitalist, radically-environmentalist indoctrination scheme. And just like in the Jay Bennish case, it was the teacher who was at fault.

In fact, he was so biased and one-sided in his teaching that they could have called that course “The Left-wing Marxist-Communist Thought on the Economy, Politics, Society and the Environment” and they wouldn’t have had anything to change in what was taught to the students from beginning to end. But the actual name of the course was “State of our Planet”.

When the teacher went on to describe a phenomenon in front of the class, exploring causes and consequences, he would only present his opinion to the class, which always more or less equated to that of the radical left’s, and would never tell the students there were other ways of thinking. And when the exams came, he would ask us to either confirm or infirm a certain hypothesis on a subject (like something as volatile and barely known as global warming), knowing all too well that we had a lot more incentive to go with his opinions and his way of thinking since that was the only thing we readily had access to. Students who agreed with him could use his teachings to respond to questions. Students like me who wished to go against the teacher’s opinions and with their own and present some solid and credible points had to dig up their own information, find their own sources and present their own viewpoints which would then be rejected (as expected) by the teacher. In other words, write what I tell you to or you won’t get your grades. I didn’t, and I flunked the course, which is extremely unusual for a geography buff like me.

But like I said, this was just about the farthest thing from a geography course, so my skills were of no use here. Countless are the times when the whole course actually turned into the screening of a radically-leftist or environmentalist “documentary”, as he called them. The teacher also spent a lot of time throughout the semester reading far left-wing alternative media in front of the class, such as a magazine or a book. Unreal. I decided I had enough one time and I raised my hand and complained in class about the “lack of objectivity” in his course. He responded that newspapers that I often read (La Presse and Le Devoir just to name them) weren’t objective either from his point of view. Now, I’m really one of those people who always come up with the total killer rebuttal… an hour or so after the actual moment where it would have been needed has passed so at that time I just sat back down and didn’t reply anything.

But here’s what I should have said to him: Maybe those newspapers aren’t that objective, mister, but your course is biased to an even higher degree. And if I don’t like the paper, I can just quit buying it. Which is not the same for your course, which is, unfortunately, a requirement in my CEGEP field of study, and it is only because of this that I have to suffer through it every week!

Moreover, there was no substance in that course and it lead to a big giant NOTHING. Everything we did, every film we saw, every book or document we had to read was only required so the teacher could put together a “question bank” for the next pop quiz. EVERYTHING we did amounted to “question banks”. Learning anything useful was definitely out of the question. And the course syllabus had absolutely nothing to do with the course itself.

And then some mornings he would just stay home and not show up at school for his course. No explanations and that was that.

It was hell, hell I tell you! The teacher even declared himself a communist, without even realizing it. He actually said that he would like it if “the companies would hand back over their revenues to the State so they could be redistributed in the population“. At that point he totally lost the little credibility he had with me. And that was back at the beginning of the semester.

So, when the semester ended, at the beginning of Summer 2004, I sent an 11-page complaint to the CEGEP’s authorities. I hit VERY hard. (Can send you the original French Word documents if you want, e-mail me in private). 3 other people complained verbally. I also asked for a grade revision so I could pass the course (I really didn’t want to go through that TWICE!). In the end I had to do a book critic (positive or negative) on a book chosen by the teacher in question so I could pass. And the teacher had to reconduct his teaching style and had to go through some kind of teacher-rehabilitation process with a specialist. I was happy, let me tell you that.

And it pushed my personal viewpoint and ideology to the right like nothing else could. Yeah, I was a center-left person before. But he disgusted me of the Left beyond repair.

At least I can thank him for that.