In Collier County, Florida, parents are pushing back on the purchasing of new textbooks for the district, claiming they're pushing liberal ideology and Marxist views onto the students.
The School Board meeting was opened for public comment after three people filed official objections. There were speakers both for and against the new textbooks.
Some people became so aggressive they needed to be removed.
You can see news coverage here:
One of the largest bones of contention was the latest conservative "boogeyman"—Critical Race Theory (CRT).
Critical Race Theory is defined by EducationWeek as:
"The core idea is that racism is a social construct, and that it is not merely the product of individual bias or prejudice, but also something embedded in legal systems and policies."
It explains the various ways our systems have oppressed marginalized groups with things like redlining, single-family zoning and race-blind policy making.
It takes a sociological approach to examine our political and social systems that are designed to hinder growth of Black, Indigenous and other people of color. However this field of study is rarely tackled in graduate level education, let alone elementary, middle or high school curriculum.
Instead, the thing mostly White Republicans are railing against is an end to White supremacist and White nationalist versions of history. An accurate depiction of history will include times when the United States, the U.S. government or the racial majority were not always right or the hero of every story.
For people unused to anything but a distorted heroic view of their history, truth can feel like an attack. For people whose status is a birthright, marginalized people achieving equality can feel like persecution.
Many parents and taxpayers in Collier County believed Critical Race Theory—which is not actually part of the curriculum—would cause division or cause an "us versus them" mentality.
One speaker said:
"I'll be damned if I will allow a Marxist revolution to take place in this country, and we need to reject our children even being taught it."
Another added:
" Politics cannot be in the schools unless it's a political class, and then it needs to be true politics and not someone's opinion of how something is being treated; we have to be super careful."
There is a Twitter account pushing to keep Critical Race Theory out of schools called FL Citizens' Alliance. It state's they're a "501C3 non-profit dedicated to equipping citizens with resources to improve K-12 education in their communities."
On Monday June 7th, Collier County Public Schools will be holding a special hearing to adopt K-5 English Language Arts textbooks that are full of Critical Race Theory (CRT) and its many tentacles (ex. "equity", "diversity", BLM, 1619 project, social emotional learning, etc.)pic.twitter.com/gxGaLQs0eN— FL Citizens\u2019 Alliance (@FL Citizens\u2019 Alliance) 1622748612
Big win for Florida students! DeSantis\u2019 team comments regarding this recently banned curriculum\u2019s prevalence in textbooks. @GovRonDeSantis @richardcorcoranpic.twitter.com/M7X2IgegxD— FL Citizens\u2019 Alliance (@FL Citizens\u2019 Alliance) 1623257918
However, a district official pushed back against the misinformation:
"There is no evidence of critical race theory in this resource or any of the [Houghton Mifflin Harcourt] Florida inter-reading student materials, teacher materials or any ancillary materials."
School board member Stephanie Lucarelli agreed. They had gone through textbooks along with four students in their entirety.
Lucarelli said:
"Anything in these texts was not, you know, a problem for me."
Another speaker said this about Critical Race Theory:
"[Critical race theory] focuses on mainly on teaching cultural differences, instead of commonalities. It's cultural differences, racial differences, ethnic differences, and the keyword is differences."
This statement is actually closer to culturally relevant teaching.
Culturally relevant teaching focuses on the students individual background to assure students have fair, equitable and accessible education. It affirms their differences to better serve their needs as they're learning.
EducationWeek said the two concepts are similar only in one area:
"It's related [to Critical Race Theory] in that one of its aims is to help students identify and critique the causes of social inequality in their own lives."
According to WINK News, some people are uncomfortable with the HMH website speaking on Black Lives Matter and other political issues.
Joshua Mckie of the Collier Youth for Black Lives Organization said to Fox4:
"You know it's all about solidarity, but you know we see people who are for the Black Lives Matter movement, and we see people who are against the [Collier County Sheriffs Program] 287g."
"So it's like different groups coming together to support the same cause which is equality and equal treatment."
Just recently, Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis pushed the Florida Board of Education to amend their rule on how History is taught in the state's schools.
The rule now specifically bans Florida from teaching Critical Race Theory along with anything that would "indoctrinate or persuade students to a particular point of view."
Ron DeSantis touts education to fight antisemitism as Florida seeks to ban critical race theoryhttps://www.newsweek.com/ron-desantis-touts-education-fight-antisemitism-florida-seeks-ban-critical-race-theory-1598808?utm_term=Autofeed&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1623200255\u00a0\u2026— Newsweek (@Newsweek) 1623206421
CRT is a legal field of study that isn't being taught in non-collegiate schools. STOP using CRT in the twisted, ignorant GOP context! DeSantis is seeking to ban the teaching of actual history b/c it disputes the faux patriotism narrative his party uses to prop up white supremacy.— DiDi (@DiDi) 1623206845
Banning subjects in schools is not the way you educate people, it is the way you indoctrinate people. Parts of our history are uncomfortable for many people but that is exactly why it must be taught.— TampaNole850 (@TampaNole850) 1623338675
As a teacher, this is deeply concerning to me. Honestly, it scares me a bit. I taught about systemic racism as it relates to housing discrimination for pre-reading for A Raisin in the Sun, a required text at our high school. So...am I now, according to these folks, teaching CRT?— Jennifer Collard (@Jennifer Collard) 1623247291
Someone needs to ask these parents to actually define the concept because I guarantee more than half of them have no idea what it actually is.\nAnd they need to emphasize that it's not actually being taught. These people are informed by Fox News and Facebook, and it shows.— Sunshine Daydream\ud83c\udf0e (@Sunshine Daydream\ud83c\udf0e) 1623187071
They\u2019re confusing CRT (which is taught in some college graduate programs), with teaching an accurate version of American history that includes ugly truths about our country. If you think teaching students about the Tulsa Race Massacre is CRT, you got it wrong. Theory \u2260 History— TekKwene, PhD (@TekKwene, PhD) 1623246467
nothing, literally NOTHING, makes a better case for the validity of Critical Race Theory than the reaction of white suburban conservatives to even the suggestion of learning Critical Race Theory— All I'm Saying Is Open The Borders (@All I'm Saying Is Open The Borders) 1623246064
They say Republicans are incapable of feeling shame. But it appears to me that these people are all motivated to oppose learning about real sad and wrong incidents in our history because they\u2019re ashamed....— The Tall Sister (@The Tall Sister) 1623243654
These people are not interested in a productive dialogue. Their goal is to perform outrage; to recite shibboleths, emote strength, and intimidate. None of them even understand what they're purportedly against, they're just answering the call of their television/internet gods.— Michael Plitt (@Michael Plitt) 1623243177
This is so disturbing. When all tchrs have to do is teach the facts, literally the FACTS. We are a nation divided precisely because we won't teach historical FACTS. Opposers want to censor bec the truth for WPs is too hard to swallow. We've lied for too long. Now we're stuck.— Tanji Reed Marshall, PhD (@Tanji Reed Marshall, PhD) 1623270524
I learned my history on my own. I feel cheated at what was passed off as \u2018history\u2019. I was lied to & mislead, yet I\u2019m not supposed to want better for future generations. If white parents don\u2019t like it, they can homeschool & continue the ignorance/hate.— Kat Ferguson (@Kat Ferguson) 1623284583
When I was in high school, my history teacher kept insisting that the civil war was about states rights. She got mad when I said \u201cto own slaves\u201d every time she said \u201cstates rights\u201d. Schools have been pushing a white political agenda for generations. Time to fix that— Keri McCauley, MPT (@Keri McCauley, MPT) 1623331599
It's important for folks to know that this has been a strategic campaign that started in media to conjure up a bogeyman not based in reality.pic.twitter.com/WfDn2bPsq4— Susan Bordson (@Susan Bordson) 1623331494
The Collier County School Board postponed the vote on the budget for the textbooks because of the backlash, but there definitely is not Critical Race Theory being taught in their school.