Guest post by Jan
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As I work with parents and community members in our area to fight CRT, SEL, Sexual and Political Indoctrination in the classroom, I’m told over and over by a parent or citizen, “That’s terrible, but it’s not happening in my child’s school.”
They may be right.
But I don’t think so. And all you need to see is the video from Project Veritas included in this post.
You see, the Tik Tok videos and crazy stories I post on “Education Emergency” are happening. They are the obvious examples of how our schools and many “educators” have gone off the rails. But, if you think that you will walk into your local school and see glaring abominations happening, it’s likely you won’t.
To me, that is a truth that may be more insidious than some swastika wearing blue haired they/them teacher explaining how he/they/them is “creating little Commies.”That person is easy to fight. He can quickly be fired for his extreme positions and stupidity. Or, if your child is in his class, you remove your child from the class.
What is harder is what was exposed on the Project Veritas video, educators who know they can’t be up front with what they are doing. They have to be much smarter, sneakier. They have to quietly hire teachers who will do what they want, who have the same beliefs as the leftist administrator, and who will quickly and quietly become a member of the leftist cult.
I know. I have seen it first-hand.
We have indoctrinators in our local schools. I don’t believe they are the majority of the staff, but they are there. They are hidden in plain sight.
A good example of how one of these teachers operated was a Social Studies teacher I observed in the late 90’s. She was a nice woman in her twenties who had just started teaching. She was teaching a government class and the discussion in her class was about an upcoming election. As the discussion progressed, the teacher discussed the one candidate with glowing accolades while dismissing his opponent with disparaging language. She highlighted how one candidate was more interested in helping people while the other was more interested in helping big business. It was clear who she did and didn’t support. No facts were shared, just her opinion.
During our observation conference I mentioned to the teacher that she needed to be neutral in the discussion and not reveal who she would vote for. She seemed surprised and a bit vexed. I gave her the examples to which she replied, “But that’s what I think and the kids need to know that.” I explained to her that the role of a teacher was to allow kids to look at objective facts and make their own decisions. She finally admitted that she felt compelled to influence her students into her own views. I reiterated it was not.
If that observation conference had any impact, I’ll never know since she only lasted a few years in the system before she moved elsewhere. Even if she had, once she got tenure, no observation would have been able to stop her from sharing her opinions and foisting them on her students. And I certainly couldn’t sit in her class every day.
There are other examples of the daily indoctrination of students in plain sight. A graphic arts teacher made this poster hung on the walls of the high school:
It has been present on the walls of that high school for at least 12 years. Do I know how it was created? No. However, the “Agreements” and “Conditions” for “Equity” are the same as those defined in staff training in “diversity” provided by the Pacific Education Group in the system. One could conclude that a teacher made this to drive home th0se ideas.
Look at the belief system it promotes. Students are told to “minimize the presence and role of whiteness” in the classroom and school. “Whiteness” is a condition, a disease, to be removed. Thousands of students in classrooms read this message every day. Hidden in plain sight in a school parents trust. And parents will never see it unless they go into the schools.
Local Middle and Elementary schools are no better. In fact, since the younger the student the less likely parents are to see the indoctrination, it is probably more prevalent. Remember the student who came home and told his grandma that she lied when she told him men can’t have babies? That’s an elementary student who learned that somewhere and it probably wasn’t on the Little League field.
A middle school student was told by her principal who proudly displays a Gay Pride flag in her office that the discussion of that child’s sexuality would be something the principal would keep from the child’s family. This was after the parent had expressed to that principal that her daughter’s sexuality was a family issue which they wanted to handle at home.
No crazy Tik Tok videos. Just average employees who were hired via a process that might be as the one portrayed in the Project Veritas video. Just as much harm to children and families.
These stealth employees don’t put up their views on the internet. But, if you engage in honest conversation with them, they will tell you they believe in it all, the CRT, the SEL, and even the sexual indoctrination. They will say that it’s to protect those kids who are disadvantaged, who are different, who need affirmation. They will also express the idea that all children need to be “parented” once they set foot in school.
They might give lip service to parents’ rights, but only acknowledge parents’ rights when they need help from parents. Otherwise, they think parents should leave their children’s development solely to them.
Even outside the classroom the indoctrination is evident. In the Project Veritas video, the Assistant Principal speaks about how he hires. He not only discriminates based on religion and political leanings of the candidates, but by age. He says that older candidates are “set in their ways.” Funny, back in the day, we used to call that experienced!
But this Assistant Principal is just one person. Imagine if an entire state of school districts was implementing hiring, funding, and service delivery based on race and gender as well as political biases. You need to look no further than Maryland’s Blueprint for Excellence in Education, formerly known as the Kirwan Plan, to see how this will happen.
The Blueprint requires systems to hire “highly qualified and diverse teachers.” This is a lovely phrase. Unfortunately, the descriptions “highly qualified” and “diverse” are explained nowhere in the document. In trying to find a description, I found several different definitions:
Here is the definition of “Highly Qualified Teacher” prior to 2016:
“Highly Qualified Teacher” Provisions under NCLB (2001‐2015). NCLB significantly expanded the role of the federal government in prescribing teacher qualifications. As a matter of fact, a major objective of NCLB was to ensure that all students had “highly qualified teachers” in core content areas. Federal law defined a “highly qualified teacher” (HQT) as one who met three criteria:
1.holds at least a bachelor’s degree from a four‐year institution; 2) holds full state certification; and
3) demonstrates competence in each core academic subject in which a teacher teaches. These
HQT requirements applied to every teacher who provided direct instruction in core content areas,
including elementary certified teachers working at the middle level, special educators, alternative
educators, and teachers of English as a second language (ESL). These requirements had significant
impacts on State education policies
Sounds pretty specific with an emphasis on content. But, in 2016 NCLB was ended and the ESSA (Every Student Succeeds Act) was signed by Obama. It changed “highly qualified” to something more amorphous:
“Highly Qualified Teacher” Provisions under ESSA (2016). ESSA rolls back all of the prescriptive HQT requirements that were established under NCLB. Now, any teacher who meets state certification requirements automatically is “highly qualified.” Under ESSA, states have sole authority to determine all teacher certification requirements including which teachers are
qualified to deliver core content instruction
The ESSA was funded until 2021. While I believe in local and state control, removing the more rigorous definition of a “highly qualified teacher” left decisions open to many different biases.
And now in Maryland, we have The Blueprint for Excellence.
There is plenty of information in the Blueprint about how teachers can move up once in the system and there is a current description on how pre-service teachers should be trained and how they can get a teaching certificate:
Teacher preparation programs must:
– include specified components of instruction, including
basic research skills, differentiation of instruction, cultural
competency, restorative practices, and effective classroom
management
But nothing about how a teacher is considered “highly qualified” once in service. (By the way, did you notice that the idea of content knowledge is NOWHERE in teacher preparation?)
One group called “Strong Schools Maryland” has taken on the task of defining both high quality AND diverse:
The foundation of a world-class education in Maryland under The Blueprint for Maryland’s Future for education will require high-quality diverse teachers and school leaders in every school; elevation of the teaching profession with career ladders that allow the advancement of teachers and principals based on knowledge, skills, performance, and responsibilities; rigorous preparation, state exit, and certification standards that require demonstration of competencies to successfully teach all students, regardless of their backgrounds.
This group, which appears to be a non-profit, is fully on board with the Blueprint. But, even in their description and the document below, “high-quality” is not defined nor is “diverse.” You could point out the “rigorous preparation” phrase but what does that mean? It still all boils down to the fact that the teacher must be certified. That’s it.
Document from Strong Schools Maryland:
HIGH-QUALITY-DIVERSE-teachers-school-leadersDOWNLOAD
Is it important that “highly qualified” and “diverse” are defined?
I guess not unless you want to avoid the hiring practices employed by the Assistant Principal in the Project Veritas video. When a “pie in the sky” generic definition is used to guide hiring, it leads to the injection of many personal opinions and biases in the hiring process.
It seems a moot point as we fight teacher shortages across Maryland and the United States, but it really isn’t. If we have people hiring by the criteria listed in the Project Veritas video, schools may turn away good teachers based on the skewed political demands of an administrator, leaving kids with crowded classes and biased teaching.
I’m sure you’re thinking that can’t happen here in our county. No one has ever been targeted for their political beliefs. But they have.
In 2007, A longtime Assistant Superintendent made a comment in a meeting with school board members regarding the make-up of the Board of Education. His comment was that it was “inadvisable” to have “right wing evangelical Christians” on the board. When a school board member objected to that comment because she was an evangelical Christian, she was then driven off the Board by then Superintendent Karen Salmon. (Star Democrat, August 20, 2007, Rick Kollinger)
This same Assistant Superintendent was very bold in sharing his political leanings, often carrying huge signs for Democrat candidates on the back of his truck. This while teachers were told NOT to have political bumper stickers on their cars.
If that Superintendent didn’t want right wing, evangelical Christians on the Board, what was his opinion about teaching candidates who fit that mold? How did his Democrat loyalty impact his hiring practices?
That was 15 years ago. That same Assistant Superintendent was not disciplined for those comments and biases. Safe to say he directed hiring processes via those biases for as long as he was in that position. How many current staff members were hired because they were good, card-carrying political leftists? Will we ever know? Add to that the direction of a Superintendent who believed in critical race theory, SEL and restorative discipline, a teacher’s union that has policies promoting political/social activism in the classroom, and you can bet there’s a whole lot of indoctrination going on.
The good news is that most of the people in the local scenario above are gone. The bad news is that they hired their replacements in each case except for the Superintendent. In the case of the outgoing Superintendent, many of the administrators in place in the county were hired under her watch.
That could be why certain schools are enacting radical agendas that corrode discipline and create an environment for racial divisiveness. It all started with the hiring of the wrong people for the wrong job even though they had a similar agenda with the Superintendent.
And that’s the insidious problem portrayed in the Project Veritas video. Even if your child’s teacher is not some crazy loon from a Tik Tok video, who’s to say that he/she isn’t teaching values contrary to yours right under your nose?
Think the motives of all of the leaders in your school or our system are pure and not political? Remember that the big players in the room are the ones that hold the purse strings, the State and Federal Governments and the funding they provide. Funding that leads to control. You are secondary.
Worse, the aforementioned Blueprint for Excellence is going to take some control of our local schools out of the hands of our elected Board of Education and place it in an Administrative and Implementation Board made up of people who don’t live in our area, don’t know our schools, don’t know our community, and only care about the political agenda of the State and Federal Governments.
Fortunately, we have a new Superintendent in our county. She went to school and graduated from a local high school. In her, we have the hope that there will be more openness to parental and community input. Having met her, I am optimistic.
This doesn’t mean that parents stop being aware of the biases of education professionals, it means we will have to be more vigilant, more aware of who is teaching our children and what they are teaching them. If we see something, we have to go to the source and question it.
This will involve getting into the school, meeting your child’s teacher, asking questions of both teachers and your kid, it means going to School Board meetings and paying attention to what they say, the words they use, and what they promote.
Think that having your kid in private school will protect your child? Look at this:
Trinity School staffer admits to sneaking political ‘agenda’ into NYC classroom (nypost.com)
James O’Keefe and Project Veritas exposed this Assistant Principal and his bias as well as the private school teacher in the previous link. Luckily for us, it opened many eyes and activated many parents and community members. Unfortunately, there are not enough James O’Keefe’s to watch every teacher, every classroom.
That means we have to be the investigative reporters. Talk to your kids about what happens in class. Look at the assignments and instructional materials they bring home. Ask questions!
As previously stated, the abuses are often subtle and stealthy. They are not on Tik Tok or Youtube videos. Hopefully, if some of this is exposed, something similar to what happened to this Assistant Principal will happen to educators with ulterior motives.
Don’t be afraid of what is happening, be informed and active to influence what should happen.
**This story involves a friend of mine. I didn’t know her well at the time, and my use of her story is to show how bias can influence who is in our school systems.
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