I recently learned of a rightwing website collecting complaints about school boards, presumably to encourage dissension and hostility at school board meetings.
The School Board Watchlist (SBWL) is America’s only national grassroots initiative dedicated to protecting our children by exposing radical and false ideologies endorsed by school boards and pushed in the classroom. SBWL finds and exposes school board leadership that supports anti-American, radical, hateful, immoral, and racist teachings in their districts, such as Critical Race Theory, the 1619 Project, sexual/gender ideology, and more. SBWL also provides information on how parents and students can get involved in their local school board and put an end to the racialization of the classroom.
This group wants vigilantes to report their school board if students learn about sexism, racism, and other realities of our past and present. This is McCarthyism revisited.
On the “About Us” page, the group identifies itself as a project of the radical rightwing Turning Points USA. SourceWatch reports on the funders and ideology of Turning Points USA.
Evidently, these people don’t understand that state standards authorize the teaching that they find reprehensible.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“The School Board Watchlist (SBWL) is America’s only national artificial-grassroots initiative ”
Fixed
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“Evidently, these people don’t understand that state standards authorize the teaching that they find reprehensible.”
I assume that was tongue in cheek, since they understand it all too well. in fact, their sole purpose is to undermine state and local control.
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if only THIS was what we heard on the news — we only ever get the first part, that the upset citizens are just misinformed….
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Never attribute to ignorance what is more plausibly attributed to billionaires.
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now there’s a great bumper sticker
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Good article about public schools and covid that includes people who work in public schools and support public schools and isn’t limited to interviewing the same ed reform echo chamber members who promote the same anti-public school views, over and over again:
Much better than interviewing Arne Duncan or Jeb Bush or Betsy DeVos or any of the ed reform lobbying organizations. It’s also more interesting than the ed reform editorializing, where they push their narrow ideological vision for privatized school systems and everything is approached from the “public schools are the problem” ed reform frame.
Anyone who actually uses a public school will recognize the problems they’re having and the trade offs they have to make. I was pleased to see public schools represented in a discussion about public education. It’s the exception.
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“How Will America Recover. . .”
And in other headline news: The Sky is Falling, The Sky is Falling, The Sky is Falling, The Sky is Falling says Henny Penny, aka Chicken LIttle.
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Exactly, Duane!!!!
xoxoxox
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Around here the sky is falling. We got 17 inches of it in 24 hours
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PLease delete this duplicate post. Thanks!!
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“How will America recover from all the policies of the last 70 years?” Is a much more apt question
Or maybe “Will America recover?” is even more apt.
I don’t think most people appreciate just how bad things currently are.
Millions facing eviction (Eviction moratorium just ended puttong millions at risk for eviction). Homeless people everywhere. Families living paycheck to paycheck. Families without paychecks (unemployment just ran out for millions of Americans).
Seriously, just how long do people (including Congress and the President) think this can go on?
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Not to mention raging wildfires, hurricanes, and all the other natural calamities made progressively worse by climate change which we in the US are currently doing next to nothing to address.
The entire system is dysfunctional.
But by all means, let’s blame it on what happened or didn’t happen in schools over the past year.
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Look! Over there! A squirrel!
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As long as we peons continue to be so timid in confronting their audacious, avaricious actions.
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School Board Watchlist (SBWL): asstro-turfed Trojan hyena group handing out smallpox infested propaganda leaflets.
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Its actually very funny that all these AstroTurf orgs advertise themselves as “grassroots”.
In fact, you can use that as a sure indication that they are not.
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Nailed it, Joe
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Hurry up, close the barn doors, the horses have left.
When haven’t the so called “community based, locally controlled, democratic, transparent, non-profit,
traditional public school boards, failed to yeild
to the dictates of the unelected DOE, the testing
contractors, or B Gates whims ?
When haven’t the so called “community based, locally controlled, democratic, transparent, non-profit,
traditional public school boards, turned a blind eye,
or a deaf ear, to Educators advice (class size, staffing,
supplies, on and on)?
When have the so called “community based, locally
controlled, democratic, transparent, non-profit,
traditional public school boards, bargained a
contract that placed student needs in first place?
When haven’t the so called “community based, locally controlled, democratic, transparent, non-profit,
traditional public school boards, cut staff, reduce
programs, or supplies, to keep the “dust” flowing
to the upper “crust”?
Hurry, close the barn doors…
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You may not realize it but you repeat yourself a lot.
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Has anyone else read the info piece on FiveThirtyEight that SHOWS how authoritarian the Republican Party has become?
If you are interested, here’s the link.
“Which Senators And Representatives Vote in Favor of Democracy?”
“There is a growing strain of illiberalism both within the Republican Party and among Republican voters. But what does that illiberalism actually look like among elected members in Congress? …
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/which-senators-and-representatives-vote-in-favor-of-democracy/
To see the (dramatic) visual charts, you have to scroll down a bit. There’s more than one.
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The GOP has become a very radical, extreme anti-democratic, anti-science, anti-fact cult, especially with Trump as its de facto leader. When will it ever return to something approaching a normal political party as it was during the Eisenhower years? It’s not looking good. It seems to go deeper into the nutty conspiracy theory rat hole with every passing day.
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SBWL finds and exposes school board leadership that supports anti-American, radical, hateful, immoral, and racist teachings in their districts, such as Critical Race Theory, the 1619 Project, sexual/gender ideology, and more
Karen and Chad
Are so, so sad.
They’re scared, you see
Of those POC.
And by the way,
Chad is gay.
The self-hating lout
Should just come out.
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The problem with all this is that the perpetrators of it cannot stop. They know this is a step too far. Their followers already tried to march to Versailles and kill their Marie Antoinette on January 6. This will not end when the party gets what it wants. Rather, it will feed on itself until it explodes like the Wilmington riot of 1898. Just like then, those who caused the mayhem will be unable to stop its continuing.
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They are tough subjects. My husband and I were babysitting last night and helping our third grade grandson with his homework which consisted of reading a biography about Jesse Owens, The book did a good job on explaining the details (anti-semitism, slavery, racism, Nazis, Hitler, etc) and I filled in the details. At first my husband protested, “ He doesn’t need to hear that”, but then he joined in (he actually had seen a documentary about Jesse Owens so knew some of the background to the basics in the book).
Ultimately, the child will only retain the information they are ready to receive, the rest will go over their heads.
The best part was that we spent some quality time with our grandson and did what we always do – extend his knowledge base. Unfortunately, these individuals wearing the gold colored glasses don’t believe in expanding a child’s knowledge (after all, you can’t share what you don’t know – or pretend doesn’t exist).
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Posted on OEN https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/Beware-the-Insidious-Attac-in-General_News-Diane-Ravitch_McCarthyism_Racism_Teaching-210911-5.html#comment795947
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I am so grateful for the time you give to collect and publish information for all of us who work on the local level to protect our public schools.
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Mona, stay vigilant.
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