Guest guest Posted February 21, 2000 Report Share Posted February 21, 2000 Hi All: I am a third semester student at IICM's new campus in Denver. I've been getting this list for about a month in digest form and have found it to be quite informative. I can't contribute much in the way of herbal knowledge yet, but I do have some strong opinions on the state of TCM education in the US. IICM - Denver is currently in the process of getting accreditation by ACAOM. We were approved by the state for a masters degree program before ever opening our doors. > Message: 4 > Sun, 20 Feb 2000 10:18:04 +0000 > Ed Kasper <edkasper > RE: rumors .... > In the case of state regulated schools. The courses, and the library are > proposed to the state for acceptance. The state - with few exceptions - can > not (and should not) dictate contents. As that would be the greater evil. Higher education is regulated in very different ways in every state. There is usually also a difference depending on whether the school is a state run institution (e.g. U. of Colorado, Colorado State, etc.) or a public institution (e.g. community colleges, city colleges, etc.), or a private/non-profit/religious school. TCM schools in particular are much more regulated regarding accreditation by ACAOM in almost all states (CA is not one of them). In Colorado, the state does not regulate the library offerings of private/non-profit educational institutions. ACAOM, on the other hand does regulate this and can and will deny accreditation if a candidate school's library and or course content (among many other things) is not up to their expectations. > This debate has affected Chinese medicine in California (at least to me). > In order to be sanctioned and blessed to practice I had to pass the State > Test. My novice complaint was that the TEST didn't seem to reflect any > practical side of TCM. My teachers told me " First past the test, Then learn > TCM " . > The State position was the test, et al, was a composite of different > " schools of thought " each trying to influence what they believed crucial - > and therefore " had a right to be heard " and therefore was on the test. > The debate continues by different and competing acupuncture groups and > click's vying to be dominate. (all the while the AMA laughs). In almost all states (again, CA is not one of them), practitioners must pass the NCCA exam in order to practice. Only a handful of states also require a practitioner to pass their own state exam for licensing. I have not yet taken the NCCA exam, so I can't comment on the content or relevance of this test nor of any state exams (Colorado only requires practitioners to pass the NCCA for state licensing). Your experience may be applicable to CA only as I understand CA is the only state that does not recognize the NCCA exam at all. > Would the Blue Poppy Library really be crucial to a Five Element School ? As IICM -Denver's former librarian, I can say that Blue Poppy Press has a very wide variety of books and publications on TCM. Not all of them were written by Bob Flaws. > Is any library really reflecting of the vast collection of material > available? > Personally I believe that schools, organizations, individuals should seek a > foundation of their " unique " method. They should foster their ideas and > allow those ideas to stand or fall on the merits of a free and fair debate. A foundation of material, yes. However, a school's library should have a variety of information available to their students (including Chinese, Korean, Japanese, etc. as well as western medicine), regardless of the school's 'unique' method. Only by making this information available to students can those 'unique' ideas stand or fall on the merits of free and fair debate. To do otherwise would be unfair to the students trying to get a thorough education. -JC Saxe -- hey-jude Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 21, 2000 Report Share Posted February 21, 2000 -JC Saxe, So many books So little Time. One reads ten thousand books yet can't grasp the simplist idea. Ed Kasper L.Ac., A foundation of material, yes. However, a school's library should have a variety of information available to their students (including Chinese, Korean, Japanese, etc. as well as western medicine), regardless of the school's 'unique' method. Only by making this information available to students can those 'unique' ideas stand or fall on the merits of free and fair debate. To do otherwise would be unfair to the students trying to get a thorough education. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 22, 2000 Report Share Posted February 22, 2000 Anyone else on the list who is in favor of institutional censorship, please let me know. I will be glad to oblige you and require that all YOUR postings go through a moderation process. To the free speech advocates, I applaud your tenacity in supporting this crucial issue even in times where many apparent progressives have lined up on the side of censorship. P.S. This list should not stray too far from chinese herbs; I raised the censorship issue because it will severely impact the ability of students without acess to blue poppy books to practice effective herbology (unless they read chinese). Also, anyone who thinks that having access to the widest range of books possible is not important does not understand the textual basis of TCM. I have said this ad nauseum, the practice of TCM has never been based in mysticism or intuiton. Without books, we have nothing. Those of us on the list who have been in the field for a while and remember when their were only crappy books know exactly what I'm talking about. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 22, 2000 Report Share Posted February 22, 2000 In a message dated 2/22/00 9:25:43 AM, writes: >Anyone else on the list who is in favor of institutional censorship, >please let me know. I will be glad to oblige you and require that all >YOUR postings go through a moderation process. To the free speech >advocates, I applaud your tenacity in supporting this crucial issue even >in times where many apparent progressives have lined up on the side of >censorship. Which is what it comes down to. Actually, if they had had a meeting, even among the board of a single school for decisions within that school, and decided to do it thee would have been some review of the situation of perhaps more reasonable minds, but when one person makes the decision, without discussion with others, it smacks of totalitarianism. This of course might just show that the schools do indeed have owners and not boards of directors with the power. As non profit entities, policy decisions such as this should be made by boards and not individuals. I would be interested to see if any schools boards of directors actually voted to remove Flaws' books from thier libraries. Hopefully, the boards will rein in the loose cannons who may have made these decisions. If they are really non profits, the CEO or whatever has to present the reasoning to the board for a final decision. DAvid Molony Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 23, 2000 Report Share Posted February 23, 2000 Come on everyone, let's play nice... Mark Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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