From the Editor
Fred Barton
Editor, SLATE Newsletter, and Region 4 Representative to the NCTE/SLATE Steering Committee

Gentle Readers:

Well, another year looms up before us like a squall line on the horizon. The wind freshens, the sea wrinkles, and the shaky ship of public education sails gamely on into what we all hope isn’t the perfect storm.

While the wind is still favoring, I thought it would be good to take a step back and look at our roles as crew on this ship. In that effort, Benjamin Barber, author of A Place For Us: How To Make Society Civil and Democracy Strong, sounds the lookout call and asks that we direct our glass abaft in time to his piece on the fundamental relationship between public education and a democratic society.

Next Marilyn Wilson, Professor of English at Michigan State University, charts a course through the shoals and reefs of teacher deskilling attempts and fathoms the depths that those who would turn teachers into message technicians will go. There is hope, Dr. Wilson explains, but we will have to tack into a strong wind to get there.

“Highly Qualified Teachers” is our next port of call. Jessie Rummins, who teaches at the secondary level in a rural Michigan district, gives us a personal view of her voyage of discovery on the way to becoming  “Highly Qualified” and points out that it is a journey, like all journeys, full of hope and danger.

Even though we fix our sights on potential troubles ahead, we can’t afford to forget that the waters around us contain dangers of their own. In that regard Deborah Will and Jeffery Burd, both teachers at Zion-Benton Township High School, Zion, Illinois, lay out a course for us through the rough seas of censorship by putting the emphasis on being proactive and inclusive when dealing with texts that have the potential of being challenged.

I use my watch to tell the tale of “Science” and the plaintive call of objectivity in the brig of ideology. Scylla and Charybdis had nothing on these boys.

Before you ship out, I’d like just a moment more of your time to tell you about a big change here at SLATE. Charles Suhor has retired. Many of you knew Charlie and many more knew of him. He was our General, our Field Marshall, our cavalry charging over the hill to the aid of teachers facing book challenges. His tireless work to protect students’ right to read and teachers’ right to teach was one of the first things that attracted me to SLATE. He will be missed.

The reading lamp is lit.