If you saw the 2004 Pixar hit The Incredibles, you might remember that Mr. Incredible, a.k.a. Bob, captures in one line the reason our schools are failing. Resisting his wife’s plea that Bob attend his son’s “graduation” from fourth grade, Bob growls, “We keep creating new ways to celebrate mediocrity!”
Today’s remake of that film would have Bob growl, “We keep creating new ways to celebrate illiteracy!” because the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) is pressuring teachers and professors to drop the requirement that students learn to speak and write Standard American English.
Unfortunately, the NCTE is having some success.
That directive is a byproduct of the NCTE’s 2020 Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC), whose delegates demanded that
Teachers stop using academic language and standard English as the accepted communicative norm, which reflects White Mainstream English!
and that
Teachers develop and teach Black Linguistic Consciousness that works to decolonize the mind (and/or) language, unlearn white supremacy, and unravel anti-Black linguistic racism!
In short, delegates to that conference “DEMAND[ed] Black Linguistic Justice.”