Sometimes when we focus on one particular aspect of our society, we miss the bigger picture. For example, on this blog, education is our main topic. But one cannot discuss education right now without noticing that everything that is going on in education is connected to something much bigger, much more malevolent.

I attended a Board of Education meeting Wednesday night. I attend every meeting I can because it’s important to listen to what is said and presented. Generally, this may seem harmless and of little consequence, but it rarely is.

I walked in the meeting while the principal of a local elementary school was talking about her school and all the great things going on there. But it was one statement that really struck me. She said that her school now had 41% of the student population that qualified for free and reduced meals. This means that her school will now qualify as a Title One school. She was very excited about this.

You might not understand what that means, because most people outside education don’t know what Title One means. To put it simply, if you are a Title One student, your family is considered by the Federal Government to be too poor to pay for school meals partially or in total. For school systems, Title One means big bucks.

Historically, Title One is a government program that has been around since 1965 when it was passed by Congress and signed into law by Lyndon Johnson. You remember President Johnson as the President who started “The Great Society” and the welfare program. Here is the text of the original description:

As you can see, the program was designated to help the children of low-income families. The premise was that poor children were subject to the worst schools and were at a disadvantage educationally.

It was a noble cause and was based on truth. The poorer the neighborhood, the worse the school. But, as we know, despite intent, most government programs never stay focused on their original intent or population. They expand exponentially.

In 2001, the government created two different programs, the targeted assistance program and the school wide program. Approximately 35% of Title One schools operate as targeted assistance schools which means aid is given to a specific group of students in the school. The rest of the Title One schools are school wide programs, meaning the entire school is involved. Consider these two levels as Title One Lite and regular strength.

In a targeted assistance school, students who need services are identified by staff. Schools can provide academic assistance, can hire extra staff, offer one on one tutoring, etc. only for those students. These are schools that do not hit the 40% poverty threshold.

In a school wide program, money can be spent for extra teachers, staff, etc. to help all students based on need and not necessarily financial status. These are schools that hit the poverty level of at least 40% of their students from poor families. An extensive plan must have been created in consultation with the LEA and the school support personnel for upgrading the overall school academic program. Parents and other community fellows, teachers, principals, administrators, technical assistance staff, school staff, and students must be included in planning.* Just so you know, academic planning doesn’t just include reading, writing, math, etc. It includes all the “woke” agenda woven into classrooms.

Although the Title One program is federal, money is dispersed to districts to use as they see fit as long as they operate within the Title One guidelines.

In 2022, Title One takes on a special significance because the level of poverty in a school can make a school a “Community School” with many extra bells and whistles. For example, a school will have medical services, more staff, adult education options, job training got parents, expanded pre-K, higher pay for staff, and basically one stop shopping for services. A system that has more Title One schools gets a higher percentage of other federal funds as well.

This is why a principal might be happy to have more poor kids in her school. It’s estimated that by 2027, one third of schools in Maryland will be community schools because of Title One designation. That’s a lot of extra money to spend.

Currently, the United States spends $14 billion federal dollars annually on Title One schools. The Biden Administration and Congress have increased that by $20 billion. That’s huge money and a great payoff for schools and of course, the Unions. This is why National Education Association President Becky Pringle said that President Biden and his administration are fulfilling their promise to improve the lives of the country’s most vulnerable households by providing funding that genuinely prioritizes them. Indeed, Title One investment is a continued devotion to creating a better nation for everyone through education (National Education Association, 2021). Regardless of the concentration of poverty in American schools, the fund brings kids at least a step closer to a bright future.

And it gives more money to the Unions and Ms. Pringle. Apparently, their current assets of over a half billion are just not enough to pay the bills and assure their power in government.

In 2017, Maryland schools received $2048.00 per Title One Child. Talbot County received $1621.00 per Title One child. This was five years ago. This is ON TOP of State funding.

In the meeting the other night, the Superintendent noted that every elementary school in our county was now designated as a Title One school. This seems odd in a district where the median income is $73,000 and is considered one of the wealthiest counties in our state. Just a few short years ago, only ONE elementary school was considered a Title One school. Now it is all of them. How did each elementary school suddenly have 40% of students that come from households that are considered poor?

According to Federal Guidelines, the threshold for reduced meals has gone from $37000 annual income for a family of four in 2006, to $49,025 in 21/22 to $51,000 in 22/23, a $14,000 increase. For free meals it has gone from $26,000 for a family of four in 2006, to $34,450 in 21/22 to $36,000 in 22/23, a $10,000 increase. As a comparison, the median income in Talbot County in 2016 – 2021 was approximately $73,000 and the per capita income during the same time was $49,193. The percent of the population classified as “in poverty” was 9.6%. However, the calculation for the percent of students in the poverty level is not calculated by the number of poor households whose kids attend a school, but by what percentage of children in the that school come from poor homes. So, one poor household can account for multiple children counted as poor. It’s an interesting way to calculate the percentage.

While much of the free and reduced income threshold could be tied to inflation rate, the lowering of the threshold does not directly connect to higher inflation until this year. Of course the very agencies lowering the poverty threshold are part of the administration causing the inflation.

The bottom line is if you are in the public education business, the more poor students in your school the better. It used to be educators celebrated the academic achievement of their students, and they still do to the extent they can since scores are abysmal, but now they have a bigger celebration of the poverty of their students and the money those students can bring with them.

More poor students are a big win for school systems, giving them more money, more services, and more control over people. It’s an interesting concept that feeds into the creation of “Community Schools.” Here is a description of “Community Schools.”

Edit Post ‹ Radio Free Oxford — WordPress.com

As you can see, Community Schools will allow more free services to people, and the more free stuff we give to people via the schools, the more we lock them into government control. This is all happening while public schools are losing students to private schools and homeschooling over indoctrination and vaccine/ mask mandates. With over 28,000 (3%) of Maryland students leaving the public schools since the Pandemic, the education establishment wants to “stop the bleeding” of students leaving. They also don’t want to lose funding that comes with them. As any government establishment, educators and teachers’ unions work hard to assure there is a certain population who can’t or won’t leave, poor kids and special education students. That’s another reason why schools love Title One.

The CDC vote last week to approve the addition of the untested Covid 19 vaccine to the childhood immunization schedule will cause some states to mandate the shot for any child attending public schools. Since Community Schools will be in place, they will not just mandate it, but have a mechanism to deliver it, with or without parental permission, to students. This could prompt another large exodus especially with new information coming out each day about the vaccine’s dangerous effects on kids and the fact that kids are not in danger from Covid.

Families who are hooked on the freebies in their community schools via Title One will not be able to leave, nor will they have anywhere to go. Poor families will be held hostage by the public schools to keep districts from losing federal and state funds.

I believe the average teacher, principal, administrator in the school system has good intent when discussing Title One. After all, they are tasked with educating children, rich or poor. In some ways, I see them as a victim of the system as much as the students. They are stuck in a vicious cycle of Title One funding that does very little or nothing to help students academically as proven by weak test scores. Without strong academics, their students will not have good jobs when adults and will force their children into the same system.

If you think about it, it’s the same vicious cycle created by the “Great Society” welfare state created in the 60’s. It keeps poor people poor and creates more poor people.

References:

What Is a Title 1 School? A Guide to Funding Benefits & Requirements | Research.com

U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts: Talbot County, Maryland

U.S. Public Education Spending Statistics for 2022 | Research.com

Title I funding for schools: Interactive maps show your state’s stakes (journalistsresource.org)

Test Score Release in Maryland: Edit Post ‹ Radio Free Oxford — WordPress.com

Teachers Unions: Edit Post ‹ Radio Free Oxford — WordPress.com

Title I | Talbot County Public Schools (tcps.k12.md.us) * The list of Title One schools does not include the school mentioned at the BOE meeting on October 19. This school was just added.

Info on the CDC vote to add Covid to the Childhood Immunization Schedule: LIVESTREAM REPLAY: CDC Covid Vax Mandate For Children, Dr. Meryl Nass, David Bell – CD Media (creativedestructionmedia.com)

I attended a candidates’ forum on Sunday, October 9th at the Avalon Theater in Easton. It was sponsored by the TALBOT SPY. I thought I knew everything I needed to know about the County Council race, but I learned interesting things at the Forum.

1. It is vitally important to get experienced moderators at political forums. Even though the moderator, who was a former member of the Reagan and H.W. Bush administrations, was obviously a well-connected, well-spoken man, he was not a good moderator. He seemed totally clueless or indifferent to the many topics that needed to be covered in the forum. He only asked about one or two issues. He said in the beginning that he had chosen the questions and the order. That would be fine if he actually covered a variety of topics and limited candidates to their time constraints, but he didn’t. This led to long rambling responses from some candidates that didn’t answer anything.
2. If you tell the audience NOT to do something, then you must make sure they follow your directions. The moderator told people not to respond after each candidate’s response, but they did anyway. In a highly partisan crowd, this led to some very disruptive and ugly responses from members of the audience. All while the moderator and sponsor gave lip service to civility. Not a good look.
3. If you claim to be non-partisan, then make sure you are actually non-partisan. Quite honestly, knowing the Talbot Spy and its political leanings I predicted that the forum would be highly partisan, and it was.
4. Require candidates follow the time constraints on answers. This was clearly not done as some candidates repeatedly when beyond their time limits despite having a clock in the back of the theater.

Those were organizational issues. Here’s what I learned about candidates:

1. Scott Kane has no business running for Talbot County Council. From his first answer to his last, it was clear that Scott, former Mayor of Chevy Chase and the owner of the Solar Lane Company since 2012, has no clue or connection to the realities facing people of the Eastern Shore. He has not lived here that long. I’m sure his green energy agenda with his proposal to have ” a solar panel on every roof” and everyone in Talbot County driving an electric car might play well in deep blue Montgomery County, but it doesn’t here. It also seems to be a huge conflict of interest. That along with the many incorrect statements regarding books that have been banned and who is in charge of our schools shows him to be out of touch with our community. This makes sense since he feels the County Council has “no place in the public schools.” I guess he doesn’t know they approve the public-school budget.
2. Michelle Dappert I’ve met and talked to Michelle. She graduated with my daughter. She seems like a nice girl. But her disdain for people who disagree with her would not be productive on a council that represents everyone in Talbot County, not just the people she agrees with. She was dismissive and snarky about many of the people in the room and several running for office. Michelle’s status is as a self-proclaimed “activist.” It’s clear by her comments and expressions that if you don’t agree with her, she doesn’t respect you. I chalk this up to her being in her 30’s and lacking life experience and humility. From her postering over DEI and planning to hire companies that fit her “DEI” agenda to her claim that she was instrumental in bringing computers to Talbot County Public Schools classrooms, it’s clear that she has a far-left agenda that she will promote regardless of what is best for the county. Especially when it comes to budgeting. While I am all for youth in government, it needs to be someone who doesn’t think she knows it all. Based on her giggling and scoffing at the opinions of others, Michelle not only thinks she knows it all, but she also thinks others know nothing.
3. On the other side of the age spectrum are David Montgomery and Lynn Mielke. David, who is a lifetime D.C. bureaucrat, is obsessed with one issue, the Talbot Boys Monument that he visits in Virginia. He focuses on this while ignoring the problems that impact the lives of real people here in Talbot County; people who live outside his exclusive elite self-proclaimed intellectual followers. Interesting that as soon as he was endorsed by the Talbot Integrity Project, he began pandering to them claiming that despite their Democrat leanings, he would use them because ” the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” David has no vision for the county beyond a hunk of metal in Virginia. Lynn Mielke, who is a former defense attorney, offers solutions for the county such as creating various cumbersome committees to oversee the schools and almost everything else. This is something we already have in the Talbot Board of Education, County Council, and Town Governments. It’s also the philosophy that has grown out of control National, State and Local governments. Her opposition for big box stores was clear, but her only answer for that was generic economic support for local businesses and distance work. As another TIP endorsed candidate, she closed with a statement to appease them. Both are token Republicans put forth by the TIP because they are extremely weak and will only pull votes from strong Republicans and Conservative Democrats. And they, like the TIP, don’t seem to understand that towns have control over development in their town limits, not the county. Neither should be anywhere near our County Council.
4. Phil Jackson is clearly appealing to the Teachers’ Union and the schools. Of course, his wife is running for re-election to the school board so that could be part of the reason he said his kids all come home “well educated and well fed” each day. Well gee, Phil, do you think that might be because no one in the system wants to upset their mother who is on the school board. Or maybe because of what you claimed at a recent environmental forum, your “privilege”? Another statement that his mom was a teacher and he would never dare to question what she taught in her classroom is a clear swipe at parents who believe they have a right to question what their children learn in the PUBLIC, taxpayer supported schools. As a teacher of thirty years, I always felt like parents had that right and responsibility to ask questions and it wasn’t an insult to me or any other teacher. Unlike Phil, I knew I was an expert at teaching, but I also knew that parents were experts on their own children. They know their own children better than any teacher ever could. He said the county schools are doing “an excellent job” which indicates he hasn’t paid attention to recent test data or what MANY teachers and parents are saying. If Phil wants to be on the County Council, he should take off his union-colored glasses. Of course, he is fully on board with Dan Watson and his TIP friends.
5. Keisha Haythe was one of the candidates who actually connected with people in the audience. Her answers were focused and stayed on point. In fact, it seems to me that she has much more to offer than she was allowed to share. A candidate who has lived in Talbot County her entire lives, Haythe has experience in both the private small business and the non-profit arenas. Her non-profit organization HOPE helps young women prepare to compete in the workforce successfully. While some of the candidates were focused on splinter issues, Keisha was very clear about the point of economic development as job creation so our young people will be able to compete after High School and stay here to develop careers and establish families. That’s why she is focused on retaining existing businesses, farms, and watermen in our county. One comment she made that hit home was, “When my home caught on fire, the firemen and police that came didn’t ask me what party I was in. People are the fabric of Talbot County.” She is a refreshing, non-elitist voice who pledged to be partners with citizens.
6. Dave Stepp was a candidate that the organizers of this forum obviously wanted to muzzle. Not only was he placed on the end of the stage in a corner, but he was also virtually ignored by the moderator. Nonetheless, he did his best to get out his message of supporting and promoting small businesses, supporting law enforcement, monitoring safety and strengthening academics in our schools rather than curricula that support division. He spoke about listening to parents and to teachers. Dave’s summary comment was that God gave him one mouth and two ears so he could listen more than speak. He promised to listen to the community, something a few of the other candidates might want to try. He spoke well in a difficult situation.

Incumbents:

I separated the incumbents in the forum because both of them, Chuck Callahan and Pete Lesher, were the only participants who could address what has happened in this county since they have both been on the Council. Chuck talked about all of the issues that must be decided that are not publicized. He did emphasize, correctly, that development in various towns in the county are under the jurisdiction of those towns. This clearly shows that the Lakeside issue is not one that should decide the makeup of the Council, regardless of any groups saying otherwise. This is not a single issue despite the efforts of the TIP. To say it so is dangerous. If we elect council members who are only focused on the Lakeside Development, other issues will be ignored.

Chuck talked about the new Sheriff’s office and Health Department approved by the current council as well as the $60 million dollars given to the public schools in the past year and the upcoming renovation of a county school.

Lesher focused on broadband access, clean water, and infrastructure to prevent flooding. He also talked about the effect of inflation on the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future spending, and possible tax increases that may occur because of it.

Based on the forum, the citizens of Talbot County have a huge decision in front of them. While the development in Trappe is of consequence to the citizens of Trappe, to base an election for a County Council on that issue is foolish. It’s also important that citizens look at whether or not the candidate they choose will represent all of the citizens or just special interest groups such as the Teachers’ Union and the TIP. It’s also important to make sure that we have members who will listen to all citizens with respect and not just those they agree with. We need experience, for sure, but not experience in the rarified air of the social and economic elite, but experience as small business owners and average community members. And a little humility would help too.

Note: Wade Strickland did not participate in the forum since he had a previous commitment.

*I have not included all the comments of all the candidates, only the ones I thought were indicative of how they would work on the County Council. If you want exact quotes, the video of the forum is posted online.

I remember a quote from a military general after Katrina, “Don’t get stuck on stupid.” That general portrayed a public persona of action and solutions to problems. While his real character was much less than desirable, his quote stuck with me because so many times people do get stuck on “stupid” and never solve problems, they just wallow in the problem without moving forward. Throughout my thirty years in education, I’ve seen plenty of that! In my opinion, most of them are politicians and a majority are Democrats. There are plenty of Republicans like that also.

However, I see a new trend with Conservatives. They are becoming stuck on angry. While I agree there’s much to be angry about, we can’t let ourselves stay in anger 24/7.

I understand the feelings. I get angry at so many things, particularly about the indoctrination and sexualization of children in the public schools. I’m furious when our elected officials refuse to listen. But if I stay in that emotion, I’ve noticed that I don’t get any change accomplished. There are many reasons.

Folks don’t like angry people. I don’t know if you noticed, but someone who is angry all the time doesn’t motivate people to join their cause. It might work for a bit, but after a while people get tired of the negativity and move on to someone who is focused on good solutions to problems. I’ve had people tell me that the reason Trump won in 2016 was because he was angry about what is going on in our country and stated that anger. That’s partially true. But if you look at Trump, you’ll see that he spent more time providing solutions than being angry. Most of the time he was focused on pointing out which actions were need, even if you look at his “mean Tweets.” Quite frankly, most of his Tweets were funny!

The angry candidate in 2016 was not Trump, it was Hillary. We see where that got her.

Anger is disorienting. I don’t know about you, but when I am angry, I don’t accomplish much. My mind becomes scattered, and I spin my mental wheels on things that don’t make a difference. Imagine what you feel like when you get road rage. When you get road rage, you throw common sense and control out the window. All of a sudden, you are following that guy who cut you off and violating all speed limits and traffic laws. This is why so many road rage incidents end up in violent confrontations. Certainly, no one is going to deal with you when you are angry. In fact, they will probably run in the other direction.

Angry people wear themselves out. When you get angry your body reacts chemically with adrenaline. Adrenaline is great at the beginning of a life-threatening event because it is the substance that allows you to focus and escape danger. But, if you keep that same level of anger going all the time, you will eventually run out of energy to do anything, much less work to correct a bad situation. It’s why athletes can’t play angry and last the entire game!

Anger is an emotion that needs to be displayed judiciously and at the correct time. It’s like managing a class of students. If you yell at them all the time, they tune you out. In fact, strategic silences and a lowered voice are much more effective. Timing is everything. When someone is just angry to be angry, it turns people off to their message.

And while we are talking about strategy, anger doesn’t help one be strategic. Imagine if Eisenhower, in his anger over fighting against Hitler in WWII, was unable to calm his mind and be strategic. Imagine if Patton, who was the decoy for D-Day, just got angry and blew the whole operation. We’d be speaking German.

When you’re angry all the time, everyone starts to look like the enemy, even your friends. Suddenly, no one is trustworthy. When that happens, you turn on friends and allies and start making them the brunt of your anger. You not only lose friends, but you lose credibility. During the last two years, I have seen so many people get stuck in angry and all of a sudden, they dislike and distrust everyone. They isolate themselves and insulate themselves. When someone is in that mode, no one wants to be around them much less work with them. And, just so you know, there have been times that applied to me.

Anger forces you to “other” people. This means that you start making assumptions about people based on surface issues. This is the “secret sauce” of every authoritarian tyrannical government. They get their population to start judging each other by labels and not by who the people are and all of a sudden, tyranny takes over. It’s called stereotyping and I’ve seen quite a bit of it lately. On both sides of the ideological fence.

When you “other” people, you never talk with them, listen to them, and they don’t do the same for you. When we can’t do that, we lose, tyrannical government wins. To be clear, you may talk with people, listen to them and still end up on opposite ends of issues. But when that happens, at least you tried. And you probably learned something valuable about them that you can use later.

So, why is this important this year?

It’s important because we not only have mid-terms coming up, but a long marathon stretch to 2024. The Biden regime is going to hit the accelerator after the November elections, regardless of results. If we think the first two years were bad, the next two years could be worse, even if there is a Red Wave. In Maryland, we could have a Governor who is an avowed Communist as shown by the policies in his campaign literature.

It’s important because we don’t want to become what the radical left is in the fight to overcome them. Notice that every time you see one of these Marxists, they look angry. They never talk to people; they shout and name call. They have a permanent case of “road rage” and “cancel” people they disagree with. The other night, I witnessed it first-hand in a “candidates forum.” Despite being asked not to, the Progressives in the crowd shouted down every viewpoint they didn’t like. It was disgusting. Add to that the utter disdain candidates showed regarding at least half of their constituents, and you have a recipe for tyranny. One who was particularly troubling was the youngest candidate on the dais, who seemed to think she knew it all and those who didn’t accept her views were stupid. She needed more humility and less snark. Can you imagine how she will treat people if she has power?

Problem is, I am seeing more Conservatives take this same tactic. I agree that we have to be aware of what is going on, be engaged and be ready to fight. But we have to start from a place of common sense, of stating facts, of fighting with solutions. It’s the only way that we can win long term. Constant anger won’t work. We have to show ourselves as strong, humble AND civil.

So, what can we do if we are angry and want change?

Dan Andros of FAITHWIRE gave some suggestions. Here are some of his ideas and mine:

1. Let your anger be the spark for your action, but not the total plan.
2. Stay away from people who live in anger. Ally yourself with action-oriented people who want to positively solve problems.
3. Don’t sink to the tactics of the left. Remain calm when they goad you, call you names, or accuse you of wrongdoing. Use facts and reason.
4. Allow people to have different opinions. Listen. You don’t have to give up your beliefs just because you listen.
5. Don’t dismiss and stereotype people on surface characteristics.
6. Pray each and every day for the strength to do what is right.
7. Be a role model for others in how to act and react.
8. Be kind to yourself and your friends. Period.
9. Don’t be afraid to let toxic people out of your life. It’s not easy, but sometimes it is what’s best for everyone.
10. Use your anger judiciously. It’s like salt, if you use it too much it ruins the dish. Be strategic.

People say to me all the time,” Jesus was angry at the cheating money changers at the temple and overturned tables and cleared the temple with a whip.” It was definitely righteous anger and He displayed it. But He spent most of his life trying to convince people through his kindness and forgiveness. He didn’t live in anger.

We have to try to do the same. It’s hard. It’s a challenge for me every day.

I’ll get there.

James 1:19-20 says, “My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.” God’s way of dealing with anger is to be slow to anger.

” In your anger do not sin.” -Ephesians 4:26

NOTE: This is an article that highlights an item in Maryland’s Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, a huge bill impacting the funding of Maryland’s public schools. It is a series of articles about the Blueprint. Even though this is about Maryland, the Community School initiative is in EVERY STATE. When you read this, replace Maryland’s programs with those in YOUR state.

Community School. It sounds so quaint, so nice, so comforting.

If you ask most people to describe a “community school” they would probably create a picture of a local school in a town, a school that served the children of that community, that was paid for by local taxes, and was a matter of local pride. Parents had access to the school, volunteered there, knew the teachers, etc.

The town I live in once had such a school, The Oxford School. It has long been closed because it was too small and too expensive to keep open. But it was a true community school where kids walked to school in the morning, went home for lunch, walked back, and walked home after dismissal. My husband attended that school when he was a child. It was a community school in the truest sense.

The community schools I am going to describe for you are not that community school. They are something much more invasive and insidious. And they will cost state taxpayers millions.

The new definition of “community schools” is posted on many websites, but let’s start here in Maryland. From MSDE:

“Community schools are schools that develop and utilize partnerships that connect the school, students, families, and the surrounding community to the resources needed to thrive. They highlight the assets in traditionally underserved communities and leverage partnerships, ultimately providing students, families, and communities with essential services and support. Through strategic partnerships, community schools work to provide access to high quality academics, health services, mental health support, academic enrichment, out of school time programming, crisis support, adult education classes, leadership development and more. “

State educators like to call this “full-service schools” with “wraparound services.” Sounds great, huh?

Community Schools (marylandpublicschools.org)

But let’s break this down. The same school systems that cannot account for all their Covid relief funds, cannot find all their students (Baltimore City can’t find 1300 students), don’t have enough teachers and auxiliary staff for schools, can’t get state testing scores out in a useful and timely fashion because they are SO bad, locked down and cost our children up to two years of learning, now want to provide “one stop shopping” community schools. Even worse, these are the schools that are so focused on social justice, CRT, and SEL that they don’t adequately teach basic academic content. Yet they promise they will provide all these other services efficiently and expertly while teaching content. It’s a scam and they know it.

Who is pushing this and why?

THE UNIONS: Both Teachers Unions are working very hard to promote the community school concept. In fact, the NEA wants community schools so badly that that union head Becky Pringle allocates $3 million dollars of union funds per year to 100 community schools in the country. While the Union hides their motives with statements about doing what is best for poor children, it’s important to remember that the NEA has rabidly supported abortion rights and sexual indoctrination of children at young ages. On the abortion front, the union has called its members to protest and march in favor of these rights. When it comes to sexual indoctrination, they oppose Florida’s law to prohibit sexual content in early childhood classrooms. They actively promote drag queen events and gender reassignment treatments. The union spends $100,000 a year to “investigate” organizations who oppose sexual indoctrination of young children in schools. And one of the links on their national website goes directly to a site for kids that promotes sexual activity of all kinds.

NEA Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer+ Caucus | nea-lgbtqc.org (archive.ph)

But now we are supposed to believe they are all about what’s best for kids. I don’t think so.

Just in case you’re wondering, the American Federation of Teachers has similar connections.

If you are going to promote this kind of agenda, what better way to do it than a “community school” that not only has the children for six hours or more a day, but also controls their meals, medical and psychological care, as well as those services for their parents and families and more. Controlling every aspect of a person’s life is an easy way to control what they think. Just ask the Chinese.

It’s also about money. Community schools mean more staff. Those staff can be brought into the unions which means more members, more dues, more political clout. Even if everyone doesn’t join the Teachers Union, there will be other unions focused on the staffs of these schools who will join with the Teachers Unions to form affiliations. Each of the Teachers Unions already has hundreds of millions of assets, can you imagine what they will have with community schools?

THE BIDEN REGIME: On July 12, the U.S. Department of Education announced $68 million in grants for Full-Service Community Schools. President Biden has already requested $468 million for the 2023 fiscal year for community schools and has made it clear that an expansion of community schools falls within his socialist policy agenda. (Credit: Keri D. Ingraham and Arina O. Grossu, Washington Times, July 2022)

Biden and his administration have proven over the past two years that they have total disregard for parental rights and are “owned” by not only the Teachers Unions but also Planned Parenthood, Big Pharma, LGBTQ+ Organizations, and other radical left groups. All will have a place in community schools. Remember, it was his DOJ that called parents “dangerous extremists.” When these schools become more prominent, the rights of parents will be eradicated.

The CDC, who recently bungled Covid, are also on board:

Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) | Healthy Schools | CDC

It’s not hard to imagine how the big Pharmaceutical Companies will use that connection to find their way into your “community” school. If you read the CDC’s list of 10 components of the Community School involvement, #6 is “Health Services.” Imagine the vaccine and drug coercion that could exist in this environment. (Maybe Dr. Fauci will visit before he retires!) “Family” is tenth in a list of 10.

Think of what a Planned Parenthood office will be able to accomplish in local school.

The parent’s responsibility and rights to provide for and take care of their child will be superseded by a full-service school, making it so easy to perpetrate physical, mental, and social damage without parents’ knowledge. Ultimately, the Communist dream of the child belonging to the state will be true.

And let’s not forget the illegal immigrant voting block that Biden and Dems want to court.

Look at what is going on in Arizona:

Arizona Legislators Propose Communist-Style ‘Community Schools’ (dailysignal.com)

Local Management Boards/Agencies: In Maryland, each county has a local management board that controls the planning and implementation of service programs that support youth and families in that community. At its inception these were good agencies that supported all county citizens. Now they have morphed into something quite different, promoting the concept of “systemic racism” and doling out aid on a racial hierarchy. In fact, most of their focus lately has been workshops about race and gender that bash certain races and create victims of others.

Look at number two on this list from a local management board organization:

And they get huge funding to do it. All spent without transparency as dictated by State law:

Here’s the state’s description of local management boards:

The local management board system is already a great cash cow for the counties at the expense of the taxpayers. Imagine what it will be like when those groups officially become part of the local community schools. Like the unions, they will force their agenda on children and families full time and out of view of the parents and community.

And how much will these community schools cost? In FY 2020 there were 219 schools in Maryland designated as “community schools,” meaning they had an 80% concentration of poverty so were provided expanded services. That number increased to 289 in 21-22. It is promised that by 2027 there will be 557 schools that will become community schools. For 2022, the cost will be $116.90 million, a $52.5 million dollar increase over FY21. This money goes toward personnel and contracts for services. If the budget increases by 228 schools by 2027, it will be over $300 million dollars. Don’t let the term “grant” fool you, this is taxpayer money. Remember also who gets to define poverty; the people who create the grants.

It might be prudent to remind ourselves here that school systems and other groups are not very good at management of budgets of this size. During the pandemic, the U.S. Department of Education couldn’t accurately track over $190 billion of Covid support funds sent to schools.

The Federal Government Gave Billions to America’s Schools for COVID-19 Relief. Where Did the Money Go? — ProPublica

This program won’t be monitored any better, especially with the involvement of Local Management Boards and their networks. There will be plenty of opportunities to award contracts to certain contractors based on social justice objectives and political favor. Fraud will be rampant unless strict audits of budgets are conducted. Can we really count on that happening? If we have learned nothing else during Covid, we have learned that millions of dollars can go missing without accountability

Global Interests: There are international groups who support this concept. The “Global Partnership for Education,” in alliance with the World Economic Forum, United Nations, and UNESCO, fully supports the community school concept. Again, the sooner they get the children, the better for those groups. Here is the Global Partnership list of “health interventions” for kids aged 5-20 in community schools:

The interventions include mental health education and counseling and “comprehensive sexuality education.” Not “sex” education but “sexuality” education. The words are not chosen by accident.

Marxist Authoritarians: This is a rather broad group of people who support community schools. It includes all groups who wish to splinter us by race, gender, economic status, political views, sexual preference, etc. These groups hate this country and try to make some members of the population feel as though they have been victimized by America. For them, the Community School is an excellent way for them to force their lies and beliefs on our children as well as to give some less than desirable people access to kids. In that kind of environment with the wrong people you have a breeding ground for sexual predation and sex trafficking.

As Kimberly Ells exposes in her book, The Invincible Family: Why the Global Campaign to Crush Motherhood and the Family Can’t Win, these forces are joining together to nullify the influence of the family.

Part of the problem with this and many more of these programs is that part of it sounds so good. Who can be against helping hungry kids eat, sick kids get medical care, the unemployed get job training? How can we complain about helping poor kids to achieve? And that’s how they always rope people in and shut people up, with the promised benefits of initiatives. Protest the “community school” concept and you will be called a racist and many other horrible names.

The problem is that this, like all the other “do good” school programs, will not do what they claim because they will have muddied the waters of education and schools with jobs they were never intended to do. Once the waters get muddied, it’s an open door for every grifter, abuser, and opportunist. When things go wrong those in power won’t be accountable or even try to fix the real problems. They’ll say, “If only we had more money, more community schools, more agencies involved, more committees to study issues, we could fix the problem.” It will never be enough because they don’t want to solve the problem. They have other motives. The goal line will always move.

This quote from the Daily Signal article by Ells reminds us why we can’t be lured in:

A 20th-century Russian communist said: “Children, like soft wax, are very malleable. …We must rescue children from the harmful influence of the family. … From the earliest days of their little lives, they must find themselves under the beneficent influence of communist schools. … To oblige the mother to give her child to the Soviet state—that is our task.”

It’s how Hitler did it. How Stalin did it. How Mao did it.

We can’t let them do it here.

MORE RESOURCES:

U.S. Department of Education Emphasizes Importance of Full-Service Community Schools Through Competitive Grant Program | U.S. Department of Education

Community schools’ ‘woke’ indoctrination agenda – Washington Times

The Invincible Family – Why the Global Campaign to Crush Motherhood and Fatherhood Can’t Win – Regnery Publishing

Updated 12 noon 9/28/22

Recently, the Maryland State Department of Education notified the public that they would not be releasing the Spring 2022 Maryland Comprehensive Assessment Program scores in Reading and Math until January of 2023. Here is the official statement or rationale for this delay:

Here’s a response to a Public Information Act requesting these scores:

In the past, state testing was in the Spring of the year and then those scores would be released to the systems in the late Summer/ Early Fall to help guide instruction for the current school year. The thought was that this would allow systems to change curriculum, groupings, remediation, etc. to shore up weak areas or to help populations who did not do well.

But not this year. For some strange reason (and the excuses listed above), the scores had to be held until January. This means that locals will get the data in January, will spend weeks analyzing it for group performance and then weeks identifying and analyzing individual results for strengths and weaknesses. Now we will be up to the end of January before a plan can be created and implemented. This will leave one to two months for locals to implement the plan before the next round of testing must start.

It’s also strange that all the standard setting, item evaluation, cut scores, etc. could not be completed by the end of summer. Was that because of incompetence or by design to avoid releasing terrible scores? Even when the Maryland School Performance Assessment Program was in place. scoring didn’t take that long. And those were tests that had a heavy essay and short answer component.

Some school systems, including Talbot, will be filling the gap by conducting local norm referenced tests throughout the year to assess where the kids are since state test scores are not available.

If that’s the case why should anyone care if state scores aren’t released?

There are a couple of reasons.

One is because school standardized and state testing is BIG business and a huge expense for taxpayers both in dollars and staff/student time away from academics.

There are several main testing companies that control the school assessment market in the United States and other parts of the world. These companies are raking in the dollars for testing provided in all grade levels throughout this country and the world.

One of the biggest moneymakers is Pearson who made $762 million in profits in 2018. Their revenues were $5.511 billion. Add to that the $89 million dollars revenue from Pearson’s ownership of Penguin Random House Publishers, a major world textbook publishing company and you have a sweet deal. If a company owns the testing and the textbook, they have both ends of the educate/assess process sewn up.

And their CEO has a ten million dollar pay package, an apartment in New York City, and Pearson stock valued at around $9.3 million. He has no education background.

Pearson’s main competitor, Educational Testing Services, or ETS, had revenues of $2.1 billion in 2018. They are a non-profit. As is College Board that had $1.068 billion in revenue in 2017. Both of their CEO’s make almost a million dollars a year.

There’s a lot of money in school testing. None of it goes to teachers or to help children learn. It’s a big ATM called the “educational testing complex.” The staff hired to coordinate testing, train staff in testing, monitor testing in districts is an expense that takes away from classroom funds. Not only does testing take away from funds, but hours of teacher, administrator, and student time as well. Time that could be spent on instruction. (Credit: Now’s the Time to Get Rid of Standardized Tests | Eclectablog by Mitchell Robinson)

And Forbes predicts that these test publishers will profit big from the pandemic “learning loss.” https://www.forbes.com/sites/akilbello/2021/04/07/how-test-publishers-are-poised-to-profit-from-pandemic-learning-loss/?sh=bf25ce050c4b

Imagine if they make money off a test that accomplished nothing? This is a huge waste of taxpayer funds. Yet, citizens are told that these tests are vital to the improvement of our schools. Apparently not that vital.

Take the money out of the equation and consider this; we are coming off what has been called the biggest disruption to our children’s education, the pandemic. In fact, recent National Assessment of Education Progress scores show that student scores in reading had the biggest drop in thirty years. Math scores fell for the first time ever. And for those concerned about minority achievement, minority students suffered the most drastic losses. Whatever gains might have been made in two decades have been wiped out.

‘Nation’s Report Card’: Two Decades of Growth Wiped Out by Two Years of Pandemic – The 74 (the74million.org)

Certainly, this should be a time when educators should be on a fast track to analyze and address student achievement. Tom Kane, an economist at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, agreed that NAEP scores definitively affirmed what prior studies have already demonstrated. He compared classroom learning to an industrial process – the conveyor belt slowed in 2020 and 2021. “What we learned …is the conveyor belt is back on, but at the same old speed. Somehow, we’ve got to figure out how to help students learn even more per year in the next few years or these losses will become permanent. And that will be a tragedy.”

It seems that the Maryland State Department of Education isn’t in any hurry.

Why is that?

Maryland is currently staring at what one Superintendent called “a big rock to lift.” That rock is the Maryland Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, legislation that has been delayed for two years and that will cost Maryland taxpayers $3.8 billion dollars a year for the next ten years. (Source: MSDE). This is ABOVE current education formulas and projections. The legislation will expand state control over local education systems and will force taxpayers in various jurisdictions to fund all the expensive bells and whistles of the Blueprint, even if those additions don’t work, fit what the local taxpayer wants or what children need. Many counties will struggle to meet these demands and will have to raise local taxes by an average of approximately 30%. Some counties will suffer even more devastating increases:

If the State can’t get test scores out in a timely fashion, can we trust them with BILLIONS more in funding?

With all of this money wrapped up in the Blueprint, one would think that MSDE, the State Board, and Superintendent Mohammed Choudhury would want these scores out there to set a baseline, even if it is low. Choudhury has already been quoted as saying these scores are dismal. We have only one way to go and that is up. So why the big deal?

The big deal is that an election is coming up. A set of bad test scores would not bode well for politicians up for election in this Democrat controlled state. Democrat candidates like Wes Moore, running for Governor, who has released positions on education that support the current system and the Blueprint will look foolish:

These scores discount his idea that the Blueprint has “set Maryland on a path to future success.” People may wonder if Moore has a clear picture of what is really going on in the schools. The scores put him in direct opposition to Dan Cox, Republican Gubernatorial Candidate who advocates for more choices for parents outside the public school system as well as parental rights. Cox knows what many parents know, our schools are failing. Bad scores will only highlight Cox’s plan for real educational reform as a better way to go.

Let’s not forget that other politicians in this State, including current Governor Larry Hogan, have been in charge of this educational system throughout the last two years at a minimum. Hogan has been in charge for almost 8. In his case, it was his lockdown order that took kids out of school for at least one year if not more. Hogan envisions a run for President, so this kind of bad test data will stick with him. It could drive his low support levels even lower.

The people who shoulder the biggest blames are the Democrats of Maryland who threw more money at failing school systems like Baltimore City which just today announced they are “missing” 1300 students:

Baltimore City schools working to track down 1,300 ‘missing’ students | WBFF (foxbaltimore.com)

This is a system that scores in single digits on test scores during good years. Is the State concealing scores below those levels?

Bad test scores before election day will not be good news for Democrats. It will not be good news for the Teachers Unions who support everything but teaching academics. People are waking up to the fact that schools are not doing their job, and these groups want to hide that for as long as they can.

What they hope is that when the scores eventually come out and the election is over, everyone will forget the scores and wait for the next set. The State will soften the fact that students are failing with four new levels for test scores: “Distinguished Learner, Proficient Learner, Developing Learner, and Beginning Learner.” Talk about putting lipstick on a pig! If you are in the lowest quartile, you’re sweetly called a “Beginning Learner.” In other words, you have no academic skill. Wow. If you are in the lower half, you are “Developing.” It’s the same theory as redefining the word “recession” to something more palatable. “Don’t worry Ms. Jones, your child is just “beginning.”

What they don’t realize is that everyone sees through their slow walking of the scores to the public. We see their lies about why. And we aren’t going to excuse them from shirking their duties and facing the realities of what they have done to our children.

As Thomas Kane says: “A friend of mine sent me a political ad for one of the gubernatorial candidates in Rhode Island, Helena Foulkes. She says, ‘I’m running for governor, and my top priority is restoring students’ achievement, and if I fail to restore achievement, I’m not going to run for reelection. Hold me accountable for whether we catch kids up.’ “

” I would hope more politicians take that pledge, and that the way to judge mayors and school board members and governors over the next couple of years is on whether they succeed in restoring students to their pre-pandemic levels of achievement. It would be that kind of accountability that would wake people up to the need for more aggressive action now. It’s one thing to read these reports about achievement losses nationally, but it’s another thing to see that your own schools, locally, followed exactly the pattern of this report. “

In Maryland, it appears our school leaders don’t want to see and share the report. You can’t defeat what you don’t acknowledge.

But it appears that is not the point.

**** Since writing this blog, I found out that Maryland, like many other states, switched test vendors a few years ago. Pearson became the company adopted by most. Pearson is heavily involved in global education and is a partner with the World Economic Forum. They are based out of England.

Pearson’s Project Literacy Davos VR Experience (businessinsider.com)

Social Innovation – Reports – World Economic Forum (weforum.org)

Additional info: Harvard Economist Offers Gloomy Forecast on Reversing Pandemic Learning Loss – The 74 (the74million.org)

This may seem like a weird question since school counselors seem like the nicest, most kid centered staff members in a school. And, many of them are. After all, they got into counseling to help kids solve problems, improve their grades and go to college.

But, while that might have been the majority thirty years ago it started to change about 20 years ago. I know, I watched it happen during my last ten years of teaching.

I’m not sure why it started, but I know that some of the counselors I worked with started spending inordinate amounts of time rewarding students not for good behavior or strong academics, but for acting out in class. As an example, in one school they had hired a new staff member whose main job was to follow ten to fifteen kids deemed “at risk” through their school years. She was called a “counselor/social worker.” The kids she worked with were consistently truant, failing, in trouble with the law or in constant trouble at school. One I knew was a renowned community drug dealer.

It was a noble idea, I guess. Except that this counselor didn’t really attack the problems these kids had. Most of the time she took them out of class, gave them pizza or snacks, talked with them and then sent them on to the next class. They avoided doing work in class and weren’t pushed to strive academically. They actually got a big “attaboy” for ANY tiny example of good behavior they exhibited throughout the day but were never held accountable for the bad. Several of the students told me that they understood if they just “did their time” in school, they would graduate without doing one single thing. But they sure did like the pizza and talking to the counselor!

I don’t blame the counselor. She had her directives to follow. Honestly, with 15 to 20 kids on her workload of a 30-hour work week, there was no way she was going to accomplish anything other than delivering a “feel good” program that could check a box on some central office administrator’s to do list.

An example of the “new” version of school counselor.

How did this happen?

Like most of education, the goals shifted somewhere in the late 90’s early 2000’s. During this time, we started to see the educational establishment shift its focus away from academics and into educating “the whole child” via something called Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Maslow was a famous psychologist who believed in “Humanism” which focused more on WHY people did what they did rather than WHAT they did. In other words, he thought any act was motivated by some need all humans had. In 1943, he published his first book and Maslow’s Hierarchy was created. It put human needs in priority order. The idea was that unless each need was met in order, a person could not move forward in their lives and certainly not in learning. The responsibility for someone’s behavior and accomplishment was taken away from the individual and handed over to others. It created victimhood.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs (verywellmind.com)

This idea was the initiation of the “self-esteem” movement in schools. I remember it well as we were told that all children needed to feel self-esteem for anything they did. It was the beginning of the “everyone gets a trophy” movement in youth sports as well. It’s why schools eliminated Valedictorians, class rankings, and even grades. No one wanted kids to have low self-esteem. In Maslow’s hierarchy, happiness is king, and accomplishment is not crucial, “self-actualization” is.

Did I mention that Maslow was one of the first to coin the phrases, “social and economic justice”? Are you seeing how the pieces are coming together?

As the years progressed, this movement morphed its way into all the social fragility among many of our young people. Add the claims of systemic racism, white privilege, fluid gender, safe spaces, speech as hurtful, identity politics etc. and you have the foundation of a new kind of counseling based on anything but academics or actual self-improvement.

You think your child is getting advice about college in the counselor’s office, but he/she might be getting something more.

Alvin Liu, a self-described political refugee from California and President of “Courage is a Habit” (courageisahabit.org) put together the document below:

If you read nothing else on this blog today, you have to read this document. I will include separate links further down in the blog. The American School Counselor Association is the association that a majority of school guidance counselors belong to. Much like both the NEA and AFT for teachers, they started out as a way to help teachers/counselors into the promoter of progressive, Marxist ideas in the classroom.

This document which is an inside look at the national conference of the American School Counselor Association, details the main themes school counselors are trained in. While ASCA promotes a generic mission and vision about supporting membership and helping them be more professional and ethical, if one digs deeper and looks at topics covered in their national convention and online training, this mission is quite different.

Remember, the indoctrination of our children begins with the training given to the people who work with them.

For example, their Standards in Practice pages have many interesting topics and statements that make it clear that their mission goes beyond professionalism and ethics. For example, this is their document on “Eliminating Racism and Bias in Schools: The School Counselor’s Role:”

Notice a couple of things here. First off, we get that blanket “systemic racism” charge but in the case of the ASCA, the racism is only against Asian Americans and Black Americans. And only people of color suffer poverty. I guess counselors should only deal with those groups.

Even more disturbing are some of the breakout sessions that were recorded by Liu’s staff. Here are some short clips:

This speaker describes Counselors as “manipulators:”

ASCA Conference 2022: Master Manipulators – YouTube

Counselors promoting CRT Lens:

ASCA Conference 2022: CRT Lens – YouTube

Counselor hiding birth control from parent:

ASCA Conference 2022: Hiding Birth Control From Mother – YouTube

And listen to the utter disdain for parents in this speaker:

ASCA Conference 2022: Parental Rights Erasing Children – YouTube

Did I mention this is training for school guidance counselors?

More from this conference:

It’s interesting that counselors should be in favor of telling students who are uncomfortable with transgender students to “deal with it.” Not very compassionate to the normal kid, is it?

So, what do parents do? This is Liu’s advice:

As anything else in the government schools, parents have to take control of what is going on with their children in schools. There are plenty of great professional counselors in our schools and most of them would never ascribe to what is being promoted at the national conference.

Parents are the guardrails for the lives of their children. We need to take that responsibility in every aspect of the government school programs.

These aren’t your parents’ or even your counselors anymore.

Today is Constitution Day, the day when we celebrate the document that created this nation and acknowledged and defended our God given freedoms.

And that really bothers some leftists in this country. So much so that when various groups attempt to donate pocket sized Constitutions to each 8th grade student to school districts, the districts either stonewall them or turn them down.

In fact, it is easier to get books that are considered inappropriate or even pornographic approved for these districts than it is to get a copy of the Constitution in the hands of 8th graders.

I’m sure you are wondering how that can be true in a country that values its freedom and history.

Sadly, it’s true.

See that? It’s a box of Constitutions from the 917.org group. They were sent to a chapter of a Moms for Liberty for donation to their local schools in honor of Constitution Day. Here’s the response the attempted donation got:

Good Morning (Name removed),

Harford County Public Schools would like to thank Moms for Liberty for their offer to provide students with Pocket Constitutions. However, students in 8th grade already have access to the U.S. Constitution in its entirety through the textbook, the text embedded in the curriculum, and via online resources linked in the curriculum.

The Pocket Constitution has not been approved for distribution to students in the Harford County Public Schools.

Our recommendation would be to donate the Pocket Constitutions to either the Harford County Public Library branches or to the Harford County Education Foundation to make it accessible to students and to the public at large.

Best regards,

Administrative Support Specialist
Office of Family and Community Partnerships 

You may not know that there is a law that says all schools that receive Federal money are required to teach the Constitution on Constitution Day, or if it falls on a weekend, during Constitution Week, September 17 to 23. So, accepting free pocket Constitutions for 8th graders would be a no brainer.

You might think this is no big deal. After all, the school district said the Constitution was available to students online, text embedded in the curriculum and in textbooks. I think they missed the point. Allowing each child to have his/her own copy is completely different. Maybe schools have a larger agenda.

To provide a contrast, let’s look at some of the books that are in the hands of students in different states/counties:

While it’s not clear which approval process each district may use for books in media centers and classrooms, the books themselves contain not only inappropriate but sometimes pornographic content that describes sexual acts and pedophilia in great detail.

In Texas, parents complained to their school board about this:

Parents Continue Testifying Against Pornographic Books in School Libraries – Texas Scorecard

Here is one of the comments from a parent:

 “In the last few weeks, parents across the district have discovered multiple books such as ‘Lawn Boy,’ ‘Gender Queer,’ and ‘Out of Darkness’ on the shelves of our school libraries. These books and others include X-rated pornographic pictures and illustrations and/or text descriptions of sex acts, with one book graphically describing two 10-year-old boys performing oral sex on each other and another describing in detail an adult molesting a child.”

When these books were pointed out, the Superintendent said they were removed. This was a lie: “Teachers were told to stop hiding those books that were said to be removed and place them where students could find them.”

Even when books were approved, the approval process was skewed in favor of pornography:

“The [Community Curriculum Advisory Committee] reviewing the books was packed with activist teachers who were pushing pornographic books,” the citizen continued. “The books were filled with inappropriate materials and content that provided materials for us to investigate. All this information came from teachers.”

This was all lost on one school board trustee:

“However, Leander ISD board trustee Gloria Gonzalez-Dholakia said removing those sexually graphic materials from children’s school libraries was stealing an opportunity from them.”

“It was less about the books and more about creating a political movement for something else,” she said. “What was lost in this political movement was the ability of our students to enjoy reading and to see somebody that looks like them or sounds like them in a book. That opportunity was stolen from them.”

Apparently, being able to see and read pornography is an opportunity for children this woman promotes. Not to be outdone, Montgomery County in Maryland isn’t just making sexually charged books available, they are making them required reading for all students entering 6th grade:

Not only is this one of the most insipid, poorly written books I’ve ever read, it’s a book that portrays all white heterosexuals as villians. In fact if you read this book, everyone is gay or transgender. A child reading this book would probably want to join in the “fun.”

IT’S REQUIRED READING FOR ALL SIXTH GRADERS IN MONTGOMERY COUNTY, MARYLAND.

Back to the Constitution. In a different state, Pennsylvania there is something more troubling. Forty-eight hours after Moms for Liberty donated over 1,000 pocket Constitutions to North Penn School District’s 8th graders, they were told:

“I regret to inform you that I was informed by our Superintendent that while he is thankful for the donation, unfortunately they cannot distribute them due to a board policy that restricts the distribution of content that is not part of the curriculum.“

Wow. Not only do they not want the pocket Constitutions, they don’t even teach the Constitution in their schools. Looks like they are in violation of Federal law and should lose Federal funds! Here’s the law:

“Each educational institution that receives Federal funds for a fiscal year is required to hold an educational program about the U.S. Constitution for its students on September 17 (if it falls on a weekend; it should be held in the previous or next week).”

More info is available here:

Constitution Day and Citizenship Day (ed.gov)

What would keep districts from following Federal law and teach the Constitution? Why the push to keep donated pocket copies out of the hands of public-school 8th graders? Why do they find inappropriate books about sexual activity more acceptable for students?

For some school systems, approval is merely a matter of control over EVERYTHING that is distributed in the schools. In my career, it came up all the time. Every flier, note, etc. had to be cleared by administration in order to assure nothing given out could get the district in political or legal trouble. One person was usually given the authority to approve items and it usually didn’t take but a day or two, but hours.

Some districts want everything cleared through committees and boards, making approval cumbersome and slow. Again, control. That’s understandable in this lawsuit happy society.

This is different. All it takes is one glance at the pocket Constitutions to see that they are fine and merely copies of our fundamental documents. It should be a straightforward almost instantaneous decision.

If all people in the government schools believed in this document, it would be. But we need to face facts. There are groups both in and out of the education bureaucracy who don’t believe in this document and don’t want kids to know about it. They want it replaced by a twisted version of woke ideology that portrays our country as evil and bad. Because they hate the “old White men” who wrote the Constitution, they think it is a flawed oppressive document that students shouldn’t study. Remember, these are the same people who think that a book that shows all heterosexual White men as bad should be read by all sixth graders in their district or that students should read and see graphic depictions of sexual activity.

Interesting, especially since the Constitution protects the rights of all the advocacy groups to exist, have free speech, and live their lives. In other countries, most of them would be in jail or dead.

In fact, they will hide behind this Constitution next week when they celebrate “Banned Books Week.” The point will be made that the banishment of any book, pornographic or not is a VIOLATION OF FREE SPEECH. Forget what is best and healthy for the children, the agenda and indoctrination supersede all.

Unfortunatey because of bitterness, ignorance or outright hatred, they won’t see their hypocrisy.

They prefer to teach our kids about sexual practices that should be reserved for adults, how to question their gender, and that dividing people by religion, race or sexual preference is okay. They want to choose good and bad based on outward appearance or political affiliation. They want kids to question the love of parents and families so government becomes the family.

And if government is the family, the religion, the god, our Constitution gets in the way of total compliance. And they definitely don’t want that.

My headline is wrong. Districts don’t give the Constitution the SAME treatment as porn. They actually treat it as more dangerous.

On this Constitution Day, they need to know we won’t give in to that. Ever.

HOW SCHOOL CHOICE PROMOTES THE MYTH OF ACTUAL CHOICE. IT”S LIKE THE LIE,” IF YOU LIKE YOUR DOCTOR, YOU CAN KEEP YOUR DOCTOR.”

Hypothetical Situation: You need a new car. Your old car is broken down, barely runs, and is dangerous. So, the dealer who sold you the car in the first place comes to you and says, “Hey, we know you aren’t satisfied with your current car. So, we are going to give you a choice of any car on our lot for free.” You’re excited as you walk out onto the dealer lot.

Your excitement fades as you look around you. All the cars on the lot are identical to yours except for minor differences like color. They are the same year, same model, same make. But, you decide that free is free so you take test drives of every car offered. Your “new” care is subsidized after all!

As you drive each car, you realize that all the cars on the lot have major problems that are either the same or similar to the problems with your current car. You have a choice that is a choice between terrible options. That choice won’t make your situation any different. You’ve been grossly misled. And did the dealer tell you that HE would decide where and how fast you’ll drive?

How does this relate to school choice?

Let’s take a look at school choice in 2022 and how it has made a resurgence in our country.

There’s little doubt that the pandemic of 2020 created an earthquake in public education. When schools were closed and students started virtual instruction at home, parents had a window into what was happening in their child’s classroom and much of it was not good. Parents challenged what schools were teaching their children and demanding more say in district and school curriculums. When school and district officials resisted giving parents the right to control or even see what the children were taught, parents sought alternatives.

While private schools seemed the best option, parents questioned why their tax dollars should support public schools. This was especially important to middle class parents who couldn’t afford private school tuitions and still pay everyday bills. They felt trapped.

Even those who considered homeschooling were doubtful that they could have one parent stay home and educate their children while supporting their families. The assumption was that homeschooling was as expensive as sending their child to private school. And again, families were still supporting public schools with their taxes.

Lawmakers across the country picked up on the frustration of parents with the public schools and started to promote school choice in their states.

One of the problems with the school choice movement in the United States is that there are so many ways to define it. School choice can be everything from picking which public school in your district that you want your child to attend to funding private school or homeschool programs.

Just the FAQs—School Choice – The Center for Education Reform (edreform.com)

There are nine options listed in the article. However, it’s interesting that homeschooling is not listed as an option, although “micro schools” and “learning pods” closely resemble homeschooling. The difference is that the above are still considered schools while homeschooling is defined as something totally different. It appears that government still wants to give preference to groups of children being taught in a school format, just smaller. Why? It usually boils down to control.

When we examine the initiatives passed in many states regarding school choice it’s clear to see that legislatures are not really addressing the core issues with education in the U.S. or trying to reform it. Like the car dealer at the beginning of this blog, they are presenting parents with options that are just more of the same poorly delivered educational model provided in a different and sometimes smaller venue. Again, homeschooling is very seldom, if ever, presented as an option.

Even if homeschooling is part of the option like in The Right to Learn bill presented by Jeff Ghrist in Maryland (Caroline, R) which would have given parents scholarships to move their children from a failing public school to a suitable alternative which could have included homeschooling, the bills don’t make it to a vote.

School Choice Legislation in 2022 (reason.org)

What states passed school choice policies in 2022? | State Policy Network (spn.org)

A rational person would ask themselves why homeschooling is excluded and why there is no actual educational reform being offered in our country. There are several reasons.

1. The myth of the “good school.” While the public school system as it currently exists has only been around for a little over 100 years, most people assume that the model of large groups of children being taught the same content in the same building by trained teachers is the best delivery system for what our children need. It allows “experts” to decide what kids need to know and how they need to learn it. We’ve been told that before this model, children were uneducated and ignorant and that the poor whites, blacks and women were left out. As the former Superintendent of the Talbot County Public Schools Kelly Griffith put it, “Schools in America were designed by white men for white men.” The truth is that schooling in America was created by families and communities to teach children to read the Bible and to complete farming and economic transactions. Blacks and women had schools as early as the 1700’s. Free “public” education was clearly established in the 1800’s. However, education didn’t move to the current factory model until the 1900’s when children were viewed as “products” and standardized tests were created as quality control of that product. The unfortunate truth is that as government created larger schools, education became group oriented and somewhat toxic to individual learning. And actual learning declined. From 1967 through the present, student achievement in the public schools has declined steadily or, in “good” years, stagnated. So, while members of the public may believe the myth of the “good school” they have been almost nonexistent for years. the recent slide to CRT, SEL, and departure from content has accelerated the fall into nationwide, institutional rot.
2. Teachers Unions – In previous blogs we have exposed the hundred-million-dollar industry of politically partisan unions whose main concerns are power and making money. They long ago abandoned the facade that they care anything about teachers, education, or children. All one needs to do is visit their web pages to see their priorities: Our Issues | NEA, What Kids and Communities Need | American Federation of Teachers (aft.org) While they sprinkle in comments about children and what’s best for children, most of their issues are political issues that have no bearing on student learning or achievement, but mainly on political clout and indoctrination of their members. The unions hate the mere thought of “school choice” and transparency. They promote the message that choice would ruin the government schools. It’s somewhat like complaining that relief efforts after a hurricane would ruin the homes and cities that have been flattened by winds and torn apart by flood waters. However, if “school choice” can be tamed down to just moving money from different public entities and still tied to public control, unions can probably live with it. That is why those who get school choice will see their chosen schools suddenly inundated with state mandated rules and programs. And the unions will make sure teachers in these “choice” venues will be good, card holding, union members. But homeschooling will never accomplish the Unions’ goals.
3. Government, despite all the talk about rights, freedom, and choice, only gives lip service to those ideas, especially when it comes to education. Democrat or Republican, both sides can’t seem to fathom that parents have the right, the obligation, to determine what and how their children will be taught. Remember that it was the Bush Administration that created the disastrous testing of ” No Child Left Behind” and the Obama Administration which implemented the horrifying “Race to the Top” initiative which included restorative justice and quota systems that have brought our education system to its knees. In fact, it is easier to choose to kill your unborn child or get damaging hormone treatments to change its gender than it is to gain control over his/her schooling. So, when they create school choice, it comes with strings and price tags regarding curriculum, medical mandates, and other government intrusions.

The bottom line is that the clarion call to school choice is not really what it is purported to be. With that in mind, what should parents do?

The first step in achieving real school choice is to know what you are dealing with in your state. For example, here is a site that shows what choices there are in Maryland.

Maryland School Choice Roadmap – National School Choice Week

Once you know what is available, do your homework. For example,in some counties in Maryland there is a blended virtual program sponsored by the Eastern Shore of Maryland Consortium. Sounds great, right? It could be except that it is only available for grades 6-12. Not only that, but participants are still enrolled as public-school students in their local school. There is a long list of restrictions and rules as stated in this handbook:

And, in case you were wondering, the courses/curriculum offered are the same as in the public school. While the format might be better, the content and values taught will not be.

What about a voucher for a private school? When my children were in private school, I would have loved a voucher system. As a middle-class family, private school tuition was a strain. My husband and I carefully screened the school to find a school with great academics and no social clutter.

However, as evidenced by the articles and videos below, now many private schools no longer care about the wishes of the parents:

Diversity Admin: ‘BIPOC Students’ Must be Protected from ‘White Gaze’ (breitbart.com)

NYC Assistant Principal Becomes Second School Official to Reveal Discriminatory Hiring Practices, Child Indoctrination Strategy … If Candidates Answer ‘Diversity-Equity-Inclusion Question’ Incorrectly ‘They Are Just an Automatic Not Hire’ | Project Veritas

Imagine now that government money is given to parents to fund placement in private school. Whenever government money is given, government intrusion will be right behind it. Your private school will have all the woke bells and whistles and you will have people running it like the people in the videos above. There will be the same destructive programs and mandates our government schools deliver.

So, even though you may pay tens of thousands of dollars to find your child in a good private school, your child will still be indoctrinated. Remember, those unions who want to protect children? They hate that the truth has been uncovered:

American Federation of Teachers Union warns members about Project Veritas’ Secret Curriculum Series in letter accusing Veritas of “trying to paint” public schools as “places of indoctrination.”

“Dear AFT Leader,

Once again, the conservative activist group Project Veritas is targeting public education with out-of-context and deceptively edited videos.

The group is trying to churn up the culture wars in schools, announcing that they have videos about public education’s “secret” curriculum. They want to smear teachers and school staff, trying to paint them as nefarious and public schools as places of indoctrination.

In its first video of this series, a Project Veritas operative secretly recorded an assistant principal while going on dates with him. Using dating apps to find targets is the new preferred tactic of Project is the new preferred tactic of Project Veritas and its founder James O’Keefe, as was detailed in a recent lawsuit: “James O’Keefe instructed those doing the hiring that he wanted young, attractive female journalists to be hired to go on undercover dates-coming to headquarters dressed provocatively. O’Keefe openly referred to these employees as “PYTs” (pretty young things).”

In its second video, Project Veritas posts snippets of a conversation with a staffer at a private school in New York. We understand from its boasting that more videos may be forthcoming. A few years ago, Project Veritas hired someone to infiltrate AFT Michigan. That operative misrepresented herself in order to secure an internship and access to the union. We fought back and are still in litigation over this conduct.

Fortunately, major media outlets understand Project Veritas’ reputation. It has been banned from many platforms, including Twitter. So far, these videos are not gaining traction. We’re going to keep monitoring.

At this point there’s nothing for you to do, except remain watchful. But if you or a member encounter someone who could be secretly recording you, be careful. Keep in mind that this is O’Keefe’s new tactic, and remind yourself and your members to be aware. Trust but verify is my rule.

If you start to see a lot of people sharing Project Veritas videos or you get questions about it from local press, please flag them for us. Our team will help you with this. Finally, have a wonderful Labor Day.

In unity,

Randi Weingarten

AFT President”

In other words, the AFT not only wants to hide indoctrination from parents, they want government to demand it.

No government subsidies or vouchers will protect your child against that. In fact, they will make it harder to keep your child from brainwashing.

So, again, what do parents do?

I’ve been told that I lean too heavily on homeschooling as a solution. One teacher who comes to our monthly meetings told a relative that we don’t suggest any other solution BUT homeschooling.

Not true. While I believe homeschooling is a great solution, I understand it may not be right for everyone and that someday, if we don’t fix our education problem in this country, they will come after that as well. If the government starts giving money or credit for homeschooling, that won’t work either.

While it sounds good, there are so many issues with any government “subsidies” for homeschooling as a choice. Remember, government wants to intrude and control, which means they will start piling regulations and strings on homeschooling if money is involved. Some say, “well, don’t take the money.” But, as Nicki Truesdell (Nickitruesdell.com) author of “Anyone can Homeschool” says, it won’t matter. Perception is everything. Your neighbors will criticize you if you don’t do your teaching during traditional school hours, use materials they don’t approve of, etc. They will point to the money supposedly given to you and dispute how you used it without knowing if you took it or not.

The mere idea of government money given to homeschoolers will drive the price of instructional materials through the roof as well. Look to the college loan debacle. When the government started giving loans for college, tuition skyrocketed. And now we are stuck with another government program to illegally forgive those loans on the backs of the taxpayers. Does anyone think college tuitions will decrease in light of this action? If they do, they don’t know history or economics.

It’s not a pretty picture. Remember, people were willing to ostracize and report people who didn’t wear gauze pieces of paper across their face during the pandemic. Can you imagine how they will torture the homeschooler next door if they think that homeschooler got a voucher, stipend or tax refund to homeschool? Regulators and advisory committees will be on the doorstep at every turn.

In order for there to be real choices, the free market needs to work. Subsidies from the government for school choice of any kind won’t do the trick.

So, again, what do parents do? How do they stop this woke juggernaut that is destroying our children?

First. parents need to stop pretending that they know their school is a good school where no indoctrination occurs. There’s an old saying, “Trust, but verify.” Get in the school, get in the classroom, talk to teachers, principals. Ask tough questions. Get answers to those questions and if you don’t like what you hear, go up the ladder to administration. Be a pain in the neck every single day. You may be surprised that some school employees are actually on your side.

Ask your children questions. Search their backpacks for handouts, know what books they are reading, which internet sites they are visiting. It’s easier with younger children, but even teenagers will talk to parents who listen especially if it’s something you do about many topics.

Parents tell me their children will be targeted if they do this. My question to them is, aren’t your children already targeted? Just because they are a member of a targeted, indoctrinated group doesn’t mean they are NOT being targeted. Being one of the crowd isn’t better if you are still being fed poisonous content.

Share what you learn with other parents. Compare notes. Band together to provide your children with supplemental activities in history, reading, math and even science. Give your children alternatives that counter the progressive onslaught in the school.

Go to Board meetings and speak out about the things you see that you don’t agree with. If you must, get on the agenda every single meeting. Talk to system administrators and Board of Education members. Let them know you are not going away.

One of the ways for many of us will be to fight back, investigate, infiltrate, expose, and reform the system, not escape it.

And vote. Vote for people like Delegate Jeff Ghrist in Caroline County, Maryland, Dan Cox, Gubernatorial candidate in Maryland, and any other candidate who will support true reform and freedom in education. Ask Board of Education candidates how they will support transparency, strong content instruction, and parental rights and choice in education. Ask for specifics, not generalities.

Ayn Rand defined freedom, ” Freedom (n.): To ask nothing. To expect nothing. To depend on nothing.” Except for our children, they depend on US!

This is a great podcast on the topic:

Understanding School Choice – The Reason We Learn Podcast | Podcast on Spotify

You may think this is a ridiculous question. It’s not. You may be surprised at the answer.

I listened to an amazing podcast this morning. It was a teacher from California talking to Deb Fillman regarding what is going on in the schools. I highly recommend it to ALL parents and citizens interested in our public schools:

California Teacher Speaks Out – The Reason We Learn Podcast | Podcast on Spotify

While many topics were discussed and I learned so many things, there was one thing that struck me as something CRITICAL for parents.

Your school may be keeping two sets of records on your child, one you can see and one you can’t. In the podcast, the teacher Ray Raymond shares a story about an Assistant Principal who openly brags about having two sets of records on her students, one she keeps in her office and away from parents, and the other that parents are allowed to see.

Deb Fillman added that this is something that the State of New Jersey has now legalized. Then she described a training for administrators about keeping two sets of records on students. She was appalled that not ONE administrator questioned the practice. Read #2 in the “Guidance” at the link below:

Transgender Student Guidance for School Districts (nj.gov)

I did some research, and it was a bit shocking. I was always told that the schools and parents were a team and that we, as public employees with the best interest of children at heart, should work with parents, not against them. Apparently, this is has changed. Some public-school employees see parents and families as obstacles to be overcome.

One of the first resources I came across was genderinclusiveschools.org. They have an extensive summary of policies in fourteen states. For this blog, let’s look at those states which have explicitly stated that records of trans students, even minors, may or should not be shared with parents. This is not a complete list, but a good start.

Keep in mind the source of this information, which could make it skewed and possibly not a correct interpretation of law. For example, the citing of law in the case of Maryland appears to be a ruling geared toward adults and not minor children. What is more important in each interpretation is the absolute belief that parents have no right to have important knowledge about their children.

CALIFORNIA:  To prevent accidental disclosure of a student’s transgender status, it is strongly recommended that schools keep records that reflect a transgender student’s birth name and assigned sex (e.g., copy of the birth certificate) apart from the student’s school records. Schools should consider placing physical documents in a locked file cabinet in the principal’s or nurse’s office. Alternatively, schools could indicate in the student’s records that the necessary identity documents have been reviewed and accepted without retaining the documents themselves. Furthermore, schools should implement similar safeguards to protect against disclosure of information contained in electronic records.

Pursuant to the above protections, schools must consult with a transgender student to determine who can or will be informed of the student’s transgender status, if anyone, including the student’s family. With rare exceptions, schools are required to respect the limitations that a student places on the disclosure of their transgender status, including not sharing that information with the student’s parents. 

MARYLAND: Note that while a balance between students’ rights to privacy and parents’ rights to information in the educational environment is vital, no provision of state or federal law requires schools to affirmatively disclose this sensitive information to parents. Courts have recognized a constitutional right to medical confidentiality concerning one’s status as a transsexual person, (See Powell v. Schriver, 175 F.3d 107, 111 (2nd Cir. 1999). Federal courts have concluded that schools should not disclose sensitive student information such as sexual orientation to parents without a legitimate stated interest to do so. See Nguon v. Wolf, 517 F. Supp. 2d 1177, (C.D. Cal. 2007) (finding a legitimate purpose for disclosure but stating school could not have ―gratuitously disclosed student’s sexual orientation to parents); Wyatt v. Kilgore Indep. Sch. Dist., 200 WL 601 6467 (E.D. Tex. Nov. 30, 2011), rev’d in part on other grounds, 718 F.3d 496 (5th Cir. 2013), (finding right to privacy regarding student’s sexual orientation and denying summary judgment to school district).

Implement training and practices that assist school staff and prevent accidental disclosure of information that may reveal a student’s transgender status to others, including parents and other school staff unless the student and/or the student’s parent has authorized school staff to make such disclosure or staff is legally required to do so. Consider that while information in official student records must be disclosed upon the request of parents, sensitive information related to gender identity generally need not be disclosed without the student’s consent.

MASSACHUSETTS: Transgender and gender nonconforming students may decide to discuss and express their gender identity openly and may decide when, with whom, and how much to share private information. A student who is 14 years of age or older, or who has entered the ninth grade, may consent to disclosure of information from his or her student record. If a student is under 14 and is not yet in the ninth grade, the student’s parent (alone) has the authority to decide on disclosures and other student record matters.

MICHIGAN: When students have not come out to their parent(s), a disclosure to parent(s) should be carefully considered on a case-by-case basis. School districts should consider the health, safety, and well-being of the student, as well as the responsibility to keep parents informed. Privacy considerations may vary with the age of the students.

NEW YORK: In some cases, transgender students do not want their parents to know about their transgender status. These situations must be addressed on a case-by-case basis and will require schools to balance the goal of supporting the student with the requirement that parents be kept informed about their children. The paramount consideration in those situations is the health and safety of the student and making sure that the student’s gender identity is affirmed in a manner in which the level of privacy and confidentiality is maintained necessary to protect the student’s safety.

OREGON: (See New York statement above)

VERMONT: Schools should work closely with the student and family, if appropriate, in devising an appropriate plan regarding the confidentiality of the student’s transgender or gender nonconforming status that works for both the student and the school. The support of the student’s family may vary. In adopting a student-centered approach, a school can best support a transgender student by involving the student regarding how and what information about the student is shared within the school and between the school and the student’s home. Some parents may be very supportive and advocate for the student with the school. Other students may not have a supportive home environment. In those cases, schools should develop a plan for information sharing which supports the student, while balancing a parent’s right to information. Any plan for sharing information must comply with all applicable laws, regulations, policies and guidelines. Privacy considerations may also vary with the age of the student.

WASHINGTON D.C. : Schools should work closely with the student and family, if appropriate, in devising an appropriate plan regarding the confidentiality of the student’s transgender or gender nonconforming status that works for both the student and the school. The support of the student’s family may vary. In adopting a student-centered approach, a school can best support a transgender student by involving the student regarding how and what information about the student is shared within the school and between the school and the student’s home. Some parents may be very supportive and advocate for the student with the school. Other students may not have a supportive home environment. In those cases, schools should develop a plan for information sharing which supports the student, while balancing a parent’s right to information. Any plan for sharing information must comply with all applicable laws, regulations, policies and guidelines. Privacy considerations may also vary with the age of the student.

There is one county in Maryland that has jumped the shark on parental rights in regard to transgender students, Montgomery County. It’s not surprising since Montgomery County is probably one of the most liberal counties in the country outside of California. They have passed a policy that not only actively hides a student’s transgender status from parents but allows school personnel to determine a child’s gender status:

School Districts Are Hiding Information About Children From Their Parents (dailysignal.com)

Remember that your child’s teacher and school personnel are NOT trained child psychologists. All it takes is a five-year-old saying she wants to be a boy and they will proclaim her ready for gender transition. Something that should be a rare and carefully considered decision that a family makes will be a casual notch on some school activist’s woke belt. And a child will be destroyed in the process.

If you followed the earlier link to New Jersey’s Department of Education, they have taken the same step of hiding information from parents. They frame this with the fallacy that they are protecting children. What they are doing is far from protecting children, it is manipulating and victimizing them by removing the most important influences in their lives, parents and families, and replacing them with government.

What is the motive? The agenda?

They want to grow an army of children willing to inform on parents who don’t buy into the woke policies of the tyrannical left. You must convince children that their parents are bad.

Remember that authoritarian governments want blindly loyal and obedient subjects. A caring parent will get in the way. It has happened in every single tyrannical government in history.

Or maybe they just want the human race plunged into a huge whirlwind of gender confusion:

The Left’s Goal of Creating a “New Generation of Drag Kids” | The Heritage Foundation

Remember, Marxism thrives on division whether it’s, economic, racial or now, sexual orientation. And if they have to destroy the mental health of children to achieve their goal of a Communist society, they see that as an acceptable price of success.

This article is an example of the destruction that adult actions with a young child can cause:

Transgender sex change regret: Transitioning won’t heal real issues (usatoday.com)

Imagine what our pre-school children will be like as adults if they are constantly bombarded by this sexual identity theology in thirty hours a week, ten months out of a year for almost twenty years? Sacrificed at the altar of gender ideology by a bunch of zealots on a mission.

No wonder schools want parents kept out of this part of their children’s lives. Read what happened to a parent when his 14-year-old daughter claimed to be a boy:

Transgender youth: My daughter needs mental health care — not hormones (usatoday.com)

This parent discovered that policies by the Obama Administration, the ACLU, and the Teachers’ Unions had obliterated his rights. This was in 2016. In the six years since then, it has definitely gotten worse.

So, as with all things, what do parents do? Here are some of my suggestions along with suggestions from the Arlington Parent Coalition.

1. Acknowledge that this agenda exists and that it exists in every school in every district. It also exists in private schools. One expensive private school in our area has succumbed to the transgender ideology with preferred pronouns listed by staff and faculty. Your school and district may be the exception but consider this. A friend of mine recently attended an event where the Maryland Superintendent of Schools had a booth about the State Department of Education. When the Superintendent’s aide was asked how things were going in school systems, he said that all the systems in Maryland comply with the MSDE (liberal) agenda save one, Carroll County. Still think your system isn’t on board. Think again.
2. Visit the school often. Don’t just ask about lessons but look at what is posted on the walls. Have uncomfortable but polite conversations with teachers and staff and be clear about your insistence that your child does not participate in transgender indoctrination.

Here’s more advice:

We Fought the Transgender Activists, and Lost. Here Are Five Lessons for Every Parent – Intellectual Takeout

The last point is the one I support the most. If you implement any one of the ideas, this is the one to implement:

5. There are no opt outs for our kids.

Parents must understand that we now exist in a “post-opt out” world. You are misled if you believe pulling your children out of certain course units will protect them.

Transgender ideology is coming from the “bottom up” through social media and massive cultural changes.

Public school children are being indoctrinated in transgender ideology by posters on the wall, speakers in the library, books on the shelves, after-school clubs, school-wide celebrations, and politicized teachers. Vigilance and consistent engagement with principals and classroom teachers are critical.

Concerned parents are, to borrow from the musical “Hamilton,” “out-gunned, out-manned, out-numbered, out-planned.” If you already are stretched in terms of time and attention, the situation can feel too big, too scary, and too inevitable.

At one point, I found myself looking for an exit from the fight when an activist from neighboring Fairfax County gave me a steely look and said, “It is far worse than you understand, and don’t you dare walk away.”

Only parents can demand accountability from school systems and set boundaries around their children. We can’t walk away.

Remember that.

END NOTE: As a former teacher and administrator in the public schools, I know there are good teachers, good administrators, out there. It is not my intent to paint all with the same brush. But, they are out there. BE AWARE.

The Stealth Indoctrination of Children via Hiring Practices and Classroom Biases.

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.

EXPOSED: Greenwich CT Assistant Principal’s Hiring Discrimination Ensures ‘Subtle’ Child Indoctrination; ‘You Don’t Hire’ Catholics Because They Are More ‘Conservative’ … ‘Progressive Teachers’ Are ‘Savvy About Delivering a Democratic Message’ | Project Veritas

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:

High-Quality & Diverse Teachers & School Leaders

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:

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.