USC: Museum of Education

The Bill Ayers Problem

A reflective statement by a Museum of Education patron describing a “personal reconciliation” with “the Bill Ayers Problem.”

by Sheri C. Hardee
(August 25, 2008)

The first time I ever heard of William Ayers was when I read the book Teaching toward Freedom: Moral Commitment and Ethical Action in the Classroom, and I was touched by the beauty of his ideas and his prose. Eager to learn more about the man who captured what I thought was the essence of teaching, I picked up his memoir Fugitive Days from the local library, and suddenly I was swept away in a different kind of world, a conflicted and chaotic world of violence from all sides—not just on his part.

This memoir, however, didn’t mar the feelings I had when I was reading Teaching toward Freedom. If anything they heightened my emotions concerning the importance of being both a moral and ethical educator and standing on the side of my students. After reading his memoir and watching The Weather Underground, Ayers became more human to me than before, not just a name linked to an idea or gracing the cover of a few books. He was a man with a past, a man who suffered and caused grief, but he was real and he learned from his experiences and changed from them.

My husband, who watched The Weather Underground with me, had a different reaction, as did many of my students. Once when Bill Ayers was speaking at our College of Education, I asked my students to read an article that he had written, and many of them were profoundly touched by his words. After doing further research on him, though, several came into the classroom visibly upset, one student even asking me, “How can I sit through his talk knowing he’s a terrorist?” Often, several will point out that they wouldn’t want him teaching their children. Yet when they hear him speak, they’re riveted at the same time that they don’t want to listen. They’re torn between hating his past and feeling drawn in by his compassion and knowledge of what it means to be an educator today.

I deal with this tension by engaging students in a conversation about what it means to be an educator and what it requires to be a good educator, and part of that journey involves learning from ourselves, learning about how our past clashes with or melds with our present. We cannot move toward the future if we don’t understand the past. The other part involves learning from our students and the people in our lives, to always being open to what others have to say, even if you don’t agree, and then being open to discussion.

So many of us view life and identity as static and unchangeable, even when we proclaim the opposite. We’re scared to leave what we know and move outside the box. What is important for us to realize, though, is that identity and life are fluid, whether we think we’re moving with it or not. Once we quit learning, changing, and developing in relation to our occupations, our hobbies, our beliefs, then it’s time to move on and expand. We can and do change and learn from every experience we have, be it a negative, positive, or middle-of-the-road occurrence.

In his blog on the Ayers-Obama relationship, which veers off course quite a bit, Steve Diamond writes, “Because the political views, as well as the past criminal behavior, of Professor Ayers represent, in my view, an authoritarian approach to education and society as a whole, I believe that it is important for the public to have as complete an understanding of the Ayers-Obama relationship as possible.” If he believes Ayers approaches education as an “authoritarian,” however, then he is mistaken. Ayers is not a proponent of blind submission and he doesn’t favor educational practices geared toward the elite, dominant culture. If Diamond had done his homework, he would know that Ayers is a proponent of free thinking, of education that encourages students to question and probe and to think for themselves with the help of history, literature, and their own daily experiences.

And this is something that doesn’t happen often in our educational system. If Diamond believes that “educational apartheid” is a stretch, then it’s obvious that he is far removed from the education system, that or he most likely didn’t attend schools in rural or urban areas of poverty. Diamond is right, fifty years ago the Supreme Court did indeed hold “separate but equal” to be unconstitutional, but our actions did not follow the law. Diamond chooses to believe that agency is in the hands of the people and he fails to realize the links between race and class. In noting that resources “are not likely to overcome other deficits such as those linked to parental involvement, cultural support for learning or the health of young students,” he also falls into the deficit fallacy, indicating that students of color are “culturally bereft.” In actuality, their culture is ignored while dominant culture (white, middle- to upper-class culture) is seen as the “normal” or “universally accepted” way of being. Students of color are expected to assimilate at the same time that they are never accepted or given the resources to succeed. It’s a way of displacing blame and then moving on without guilt. The problem is not with educators like Ayers, who realize these problems exist and seek to bring them to the public eye and address them, but the problem is with people like Diamond who continue to ignore these issues.

Ayers is in the hot seat for his past and Obama is in the hot seat for being linked to a man with such a past. As Stanley Fish notes, “Barack Obama ate dinner at William Ayer’s house, served with him on a board and was the honored guest at a reception he organized.” Thus, he must be a supporter of terrorist, people argue. Yet most of us know that logic doesn’t work this way.

Memory plays with our mind, sometimes evading us completely, at other times flickering in and out like a basement light. And yet again, memory plagues our every waking hour with thoughts of what we could have or should have done differently, with longing for things past, or fear of where we’re going in the future. He hasn’t forgotten or pushed his past to the side. It does indeed affect who he is, but it doesn’t mean that educators or anyone should cast him aside and fail to listen to his ideas about education and social change. Heck, for all that it’s worth, most of us have engaged in activities as teenagers and young adults that are less than notable, and while they may or may not be on the same caliber as Ayer’s, we wouldn’t want the way others view us now to be completely based upon our pasts. Our past does affect who we become, but we can let it hold us back or grow from it. From his writing and his ideas as an educator, Ayers grew from his and we have a lot to learn from him if we open our minds. There is absolutely nothing wrong in listening to a scholar who argues that we must stand on the side of our students—education would transform for the better if more teachers, administrators, and policy makers put students first for once and listened to what they have to say.

to return to The Bill Ayers Problem
to return to personal reconciliations

an affiliate of McKissick Museum, a financially-supported research unit of the College of Education,
and an institutional member of the International Coalition of Historic Site Museums of Conscience

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