Like’ the whitened ladies who helped sustain segregation and white power’
Democratic parents in Newton, Massachusetts got a real test in what happens when you question far-left propagandists in charge of your children ‘ training.
Several Newton Public Schools kids interviewed by The Boston Globe noted they began to voice concerns to things like pledges to “dismantle buildings rooted in prejudice” and “more equal benefits for all learners” beginning in 2022.
But … how could such noble aims be in any way inappropriate?
Because as happens much too often ( and allegedly was the case in Newton ), they lead to the dismantling of advanced courses, “equity” is defined not as “fairness” but “equal outcomes”, and antiracism programs “emphasize differences rather than commonalities”.
One concerned family, an refugee from Colombia, said Newton’s capital thoughts were “ideology surpassing student needs”. Ability-level ( tracked ) and advanced courses were abolished, and in their place came “multilevel” classes — the justification being” students at varying levels would learn together”.
After all, white and Asian students were overrepresented in honors classes, while blacks and Latinos were the majority in “less challenging” counterparts.
Three years ago, the parents started a petition to create a parental “advisory panel” to offer input on academic matters, but they faced “fierce opposition”.
The mothers and their allies found themselves portrayed online and in public as dog-whistling bigots doing the bidding of right-wing national groups.
Social media comments painted their side as “racism cloaked as academic excellence” and “right-wing activism cloaked as parental concern”.
PTO newsletters opposed them, as did the teachers ‘ union and the robust local group Families Organizing for Racial Justice, which claimed in an email that some petitioners” challenge the need for any activities related to microaggressions, inclusion, respect, or belonging”. …
At]a ] four-hour-plus meeting, one speaker— a professor — compared the petition’s backers to the white women who helped perpetuate segregation and white supremacy.
MORE: Newton teacher receives’ All Lives Matter ‘ sticker, cops called in
Indeed, the FORJ email stated “excellence for one of my kids can and should look different than academic excellence for the other. They are two different people and they have two different needs”. ( This actually seems like good argument for ability-level classes. )
But now, district teachers are balking at Newton’s “equity” changes. A math/physics teacher who wrote an op-ed acknowledged tracking students has its “problems”, but multi-level courses “are worse”.
” Classes may appear more diverse with all students mixed in one room”, the teacher said,” but no data have been presented to suggest these classes are actually helping Black, Latino, or low-income students. Instead, we have seen firsthand that the students who need the most support are those least served by multilevel”.
A member of the Newton School Committee added he had” not heard from a single parent who thought their child benefited from being in a multilevel class”.
The math teacher also pointed to something which I personally experienced: A foreign language teacher had noted that in the mixed-class scenario some students “are learning colors for the first time” while others are capable of “analyzing a Salvador Dali painting”.
In my waning years of teaching ( Spanish ), the state had mandated all students have at least two consecutive years of a foreign language in order to graduate. As a result, I had classes (typically 30+ students ) with kids who didn’t yet know the parts of speech in English… sitting alongside those who were easily conjugating irregular verbs in the target lingo.
As a result, in my final year I had gotten through barely half of what I had taught just 5-8 years prior.
One of the Newton parents summarized the situation thusly:” Our kids internalize helplessness, fear, shame, and guilt from the learning initiatives designed to increase DEI. This is not how we make social change and progress”.
MORE: Newton HS’s ‘ LGBTQ+ Awareness Day’ features ‘ Queer Jeopardy ‘
IMAGE: Rupert Lowe MP/X
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