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Trump Signs Executive Order Threatening to Punish Schools that Teach About Racism and Gender

By dianeravitch
January 30, 2025 //
15

Trump signed an Executive Order threatening to cut off federal funding from schools that “indoctrinate” students on issues related to race and gender. The order is titled “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling.”

Let’s start by acknowledging that this order is in direct violation of a law that was passed in 1970 to prevent the federal government from imposing any curriculum on the nation’s schools. This provision has been repeatedly renewed. Neither party wanted the other to impose its views on the schools, which is what Trump seeks to do.

The law says:

“No provision of any applicable program shall be construed to authorize any department, agency, officer, or employee of the United States to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum, program of instruction, [or] administration…of any educational institution…or over the selection of library resources, textbooks, or other printed or published instructional materials.” P.L. 103-33, General Education Provisions Act, Section 432.

What Trump ordered is illegal.

Trump is expressing the views of far-right extremist groups, like “Moms for Liberty,” who hate public schools for teaching honest accurate history about racism. They want teachers to say that there was racism long, long ago, but not any more. They vehemently oppose any discussion of systemic racism (they call such discussion “critical race theory,” which of course must never be mentioned).

Any discussion of the reality of racism is forbidden by this order.

Even more threatening to the extremists is what they call “radical gender ideology.” That would be any discussion that acknowledges that LGBT+ people exist. They believe that just talking about the existence of such people–widespread on television, movies, and the Internet–makes children turn gay or even transgender.

Trump’s executive order threatens to withhold federal funding from any school where yea gets “indoctrinate” their students to consider the existence of systemic racism or sexuality.

It is Trump’s hope that with the actions he take, non- binary people–that is, LGTB+–will cease to exist.

Trump’s friend Elon Musk posted yesterday a graphic showing that in the distant past, there were two genders; in the recent past there were “73 genders.” Starting in 2025, his post said, there will be only two genders. Musk is the father of a transgender daughter, who was originally named Xavier. With his gleeful tweet, he seems to be trying to erase his daughter.

Categories Academic Freedom, Accountability, Bigotry, Censorship, Civics, Civil Rights, Curriculum, Democracy, Disruption, Extremism, Freedom of Speech, Freedom to Learn, Freedom to Read, Gender, History, Lies, Race, Racism, Republicans, Trump

Ann Telnaes: It’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Day!

By dianeravitch
January 20, 2025 //
1

Today is a day to celebrate a great man: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. No one spoke about the relevance of our founding ideals more eloquently than Dr. King. He called to account to live up to those ideals. Dr. King called on us to be the very best possible Americans.

We are not there yet but we must never stop trying.

Ann Telnaes created this editorial cartoon for the Washington Post in 2018. She resigned from the Post a few weeks ago after one of her cartoons was spiked. It showed the billionaires bringing bags of cash to Trump. One of them was Jeff Bezos, owner of the newspaper. We now know that it is not a good idea to criticize the guy who owns your newspaper. I described to Ann’s blog to express my support for her courage and integrity.
Categories Billionaires, Civil Rights, Democracy, Ethics, Trump

Heather Cox Richardson: Remembering a Hero, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

By dianeravitch
January 20, 2025 //
14

I am always grateful to read Heather Cox Richardon’s voice of reason, putting events into perspective, tying together past and present.

In this post, she reflects on the heroes among us.

You hear sometimes, now that we know the sordid details of the lives of some of our leading figures, that America has no heroes left.

When I was writing a book about the Wounded Knee Massacre, where heroism was pretty thin on the ground, I gave that a lot of thought. And I came to believe that heroism is neither being perfect, nor doing something spectacular. In fact, it’s just the opposite: it’s regular, flawed human beings choosing to put others before themselves, even at great cost, even if no one will ever know, even as they realize the walls might be closing in around them.

It means sitting down the night before D-Day and writing a letter praising the troops and taking all the blame for the next day’s failure upon yourself in case things went wrong, as General Dwight D. Eisenhower did.

It means writing in your diary that you “still believe that people are really good at heart,” even while you are hiding in an attic from the men who are soon going to kill you, as Anne Frank did.

It means signing your name to the bottom of the Declaration of Independence in bold print, even though you know you are signing your own death warrant should the British capture you, as John Hancock did.

It means defending your people’s right to practice a religion you don’t share, even though you know you are becoming a dangerously visible target, as Sitting Bull did.

Sometimes it just means sitting down, even when you are told to stand up, as Rosa Parks did.

None of those people woke up one morning and said to themselves that they were about to do something heroic. It’s just that when they had to, they did what was right.

On April 3, 1968, the night before the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated by a white supremacist, he gave a speech in support of sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee. Since 1966, King had tried to broaden the Civil Rights Movement for racial equality into a larger movement for economic justice. He joined the sanitation workers in Memphis, who were on strike after years of bad pay and such dangerous conditions that two men had been crushed to death in garbage compactors.

After his friend Ralph Abernathy introduced him to the crowd, King had something to say about heroes: “As I listened to Ralph Abernathy and his eloquent and generous introduction and then thought about myself, I wondered who he was talking about.”

Dr. King told the audience that if God had let him choose any era in which to live, he would have chosen the one in which he had landed. “Now, that’s a strange statement to make,” King went on, “because the world is all messed up. The nation is sick. Trouble is in the land; confusion all around…. But I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough, can you see the stars.” Dr. King said that he felt blessed to live in an era when people had finally woken up and were working together for freedom and economic justice.

He knew he was in danger as he worked for a racially and economically just America. “I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn’t matter…because I’ve been to the mountaintop…. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life…. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!”

People are wrong to say that we have no heroes left.

Just as they have always been, they are all around us, choosing to do the right thing, no matter what.

Wishing you all a day of peace for Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2025.

Categories Character, Civil Rights, Courage, Democracy, Ethics, Goodness, Hope

Sherrilyn Ifill: The Truth

By dianeravitch
January 17, 2025 //
8

Sherrilyn Ifill is a law professor who holds an endowed chair at Howard University. She is a former president and director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.

In this post, she offers sage advice about how to recharge your batteries and re-engage in the struggle for a better society. She wrote this piece soon after the 2024 election. It’s good advice.

….But ours is a subtle strength
Potent with centuries of yearning,

Of being kegged and shut away
In dark forgotten places.
We shall endure
To steal your senses
In that lonely twilight
Of your winter’s grief.


-Pauli Murray, To the Oppressors (1939)            

The truth is that things are going to get very bad. America has gone over the cliff’s edge. How hard we land in the ravine below remains to be seen. But we are one week in, and things are already quite dire. Trump’s first round of cabinet nominees, and his insistence that his picks be installed without a vote of Congress is a defining moment. It demonstrates that there will be no bottom with this Administration.

Donald Trump and his coterie of supporters are firmly in control of the most powerful and wealthy country in the world. And because they are in charge of this country – which perhaps undeservedly,  has stood as an example throughout much of the world as a symbol of freedom, equality, ethics, the rule of law and democracy – other countries will fall in our wake.

I am saying this now because I have always tried to be honest in my writings and analysis about this country. I say all of this because I have been able over the years to encourage my clients, my colleagues, my staff, my family and community to believe that we can fight and win. I have infected other people with my unshakeable optimism about what we can accomplish to transform this country.

I am going to keep fighting. It’s what I do. But I do not want to lead you astray. Because I do think that many of us – especially those of us in communities likely to be targeted by this Administration – need to see this moment as one in which we are focused on surviving this difficult time. I have faced the fact that we will not be able to move much forward in the next few years. In fact, I expect things to become so dire over the next two years, that we will scarcely recognize the country we live in. I expect that fear and cruelty will become part of our daily diet. We will hear the frightening sound of silence, as those who speak out most boldly against the excesses of the incoming administration, against its policies, against Musk and against Russia, find themselves at cross-purposes with a vindictive and cruel administration with almost unimaginable power to control communications, law, and the sense of reality itself.

Perhaps it won’t be that bad. But we are here in some measure, because far too many failed to imagine that the worst could happen. I have written already about “the nadir,” and I believe we must face it.

And so, our goal now must be first and foremost to survive this dark period with as much of our values, dignity, integrity, work, financial stability and physical and mental health intact as possible. We must also work to protect our families and communities, and to hold in place our most trusted and needed institutions, a modicum of the rule of law, our constitutional commitment to equality and to free expression.
As I have said in earlier pieces, this is “planting time.” Planting is work. That work must be aimed at building ideas, theories, paradigms, institutions, skills, practices, and alliances that we can seed now for a future harvest – a fulsome and lush democracy that will reflect the very best of us.

We are not “watching the Trump show” this time. We’ve seen it already. We can dip in every now and then, but we must not become paralyzed watching the train wreck. We will, of course, push back against injustice, and defend our rights and citizenship when necessary in the courts. We will demand that congressional representatives, our Governors and our Mayors, act to protect our democratic rights. Even when we know they will not stand up for what is right, we must not be silent. We must not make it easy for them to be cowards or to take our rights. We must still call, write and email our representatives and show up at town halls and meetings. Remember that those who have fought for us over these past years are tired too. Let them see us in these spaces and hear from us.

But our primary work must be first and foremost to work in our communities – both physical and ideological. To build them up and to share time and ideas with those committed to democracy and justice. We each need a curriculum of local service.

We also need a personal curriculum that will allow us to contribute to the building of the future we dream of for ourselves and our families. That means that our core work must be to commit during this time to do less watching, and more learning and more growing. We need to become better citizens for the democracy we want. That means we must dedicate time to expanding our thinking and our knowledge, and to building up our democratic imagination. That means our work is to imagine, to ally, to experiment, restore, befriend, study, read, write, serve, and create. Every one of us. Even as chaos swirls around us.

I encourage you to show your children and grandchildren real things – nature, animals, how things are built, how to cook from scratch. Teach them cursive writing, so that they have a signature all their own. Take them to live concerts and theater. Go on field trips. Infuse their lives with memories of things that are true and concrete.

If you teach, use primary documents in your teaching, take your students to historic sites, listen to audio of oral arguments and speeches so that they will feel confident in their understanding of history, and know that history was made by human beings not machines.

If you litigate, do it with the expectation that you will win. And act like it. Show out. Be excellent and remain confident. Those who can still feel shame – whether those at your opponents table or those on the bench – will feel it when you hold the standard high. And your clients will never forget it.

If you organize, never stop. Plant those seeds deep in our communities.

If you hold office. Hold it. Do not give up your power. Use your voice. Master every rule. Make a record. I repeat. Make a record–so that the truth might be known.

To protect ourselves and our loved ones, there are also pragmatic things we must do. I’ve thought of a few:

  • Save some cash. And keep enough in the house for gas and food for a week.
  • Let yourself imagine what you would do if you lost your job in terms of finding new employment, paying rent/mortgage for several months, and start building what you need to be able to meet that moment if it comes.
  • Get needed vaccinations in case new HHS policies result in changes or delays in their development or availability. Stock up on COVID tests, and get the most recent COVID booster. Purchase Plan B if it’s available in your area.
  • Think about tightening security on your electronic devices. Be more thoughtful about social media, and even return to making phone calls and writing letters in some instances. I know it’s old school, but actually memorize the phone numbers of at least two loved ones.
  • Gird yourself spiritually, through your faith or other meditative practices, as we are all likely to hear or confront many disturbing and ugly interactions. Experience art, go on walks, dance, play Spades, Dominoes, Scrabble. We need resilience.
  • Walk away when you need to walk away. Challenge when you need to. Try to always have back up.
  • Take the bystander training offered by groups https://righttobe.org/ so that when you see outrages committed against members of your community or against strangers, you will have practice in how you might intervene or respond.
  • Get an online subscription to a news service from another country so that you have a reliable sense of what’s going on in the world, and how this country is being perceived.  
  • Are your taxes paid, or more importantly, filed?
  • Is your passport up-to-date?
  • If you have money to give – then give to your local library, the food pantry, homelessness services. But also give to cultural institutions. Get a library card and a membership to a museum. Give to organizations working to hold back the worst that this administration may dish out – the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, the ACLU, the National Women’s Law Center, and so many others.
  • I am going to write more in this space. I hope you’ll subscribe and even pay a nominal fee to sustain the writing. I’m right here, going through this with all of you. And for me there is beauty in our shared walk. Let’s do this together.

Categories Bigotry, Billionaires, Budget Cuts, Censorship, Civil Rights, Courage, Creativity, Democracy, Elections, Equity, Ethics, Evil, Extremism, Fascism, For-Profit, Freedom of Speech, Freedom of the Press, Freedom to Read, Trump

Just Published: My Review of the Trump Education Agenda

By dianeravitch
January 11, 2025 //
5

This article just appeared on the website of The New York Review of Books.

https://www.nybooks.com/online/2025/01/11/their-kind-of-indoctrination/

It is my review of Trump’s plans for K-12 education.

NYRB is the most distinguished literary-political journal in the nation. It has a huge readership. It reaches a different audience than education journals.

If you subscribe to NYRB, you can open it in full. If you don’t, it costs $10 for 10 issues. Or, if you wait, I will post it in full in a few weeks.

Categories Accountability, Arizona, Budget Cuts, Censorship, Charter Schools, Civil Rights, Cruelty, Curriculum, Democracy, Deregulation, Disruption, Education Industry, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, For-Profit, Freedom to Read, Funding, Gender, History, Ignorance, Inequality, Lies, Privatization, Racism, Religion, Segregation, Separation of church and state, Trump, U.S. Department of Education

Chris Tomlinson: Jimmy Carter Was a Model for All of Us

By dianeravitch
January 9, 2025 //
6

Chris Tomlinson is a star opinion writer for The Houston Chronicle. His reflections on Jimmy Carter are worth reading. He knew President Carter well.

My first big assignment as a journalist was covering President Jimmy Carter’s 1995 visit to Rwanda, a doomed mission that brought him little acclaim.

Carter didn’t fight disease, promote democracy or negotiate peace to make headlines. He did the work quietly and diligently to make the world a better place. His life was a master class in a leadership style firmly out of fashion but will hopefully return.

I was in my third month as the Associated Press and Voice of America stringer in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital. A civil war between an ethno-fascist Hutu government and rebels from the Tutsi minority had culminated in the 1994 genocide that slaughtered 1 million people, most of them Tutsi civilians, in 100 days.

The Tutsi-led rebels drove the Hutu leadership and 1.2 million of their followers into neighboring Zaire, rnow known as Democratic Republic of the Congo. Insurgents from the Zairian refugee camps were still killing 300 people a week in Rwanda more than a year later.

I trailed Carter through Rwanda and the Zairian refugee camps. His Secret Service detail was minimal, yet he moved through these dangerous places with a confidence, kindness and humility that only comes from tremendous inner strength.

He spoke to political leaders, genocide victims, refugees and me with the same courtesy and respect. He knew Mobutu would probably never agree to a peace deal, but unlike most famous people, he didn’t allow the likelihood of failure to stop him from trying.

Carter wanted to negotiate a deal between the new Tutsi-led Rwandan government and Zaire’s dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, whose murderous misrule had made him a pariah.

“These leaders know that I’m their last chance to rejoin the international community,” Carter told me while driving to a church where the skeletons of the dead were displayed as a genocide memorial. He laughed and added, “If Jimmy Carter gives up on you, there’s no one else coming.”

Carter met with Mobutu, and he agreed to a summit with the Rwanda foreign minister. Diplomats knew Mobutu had cancer and hoped he might cut a deal to boost his legacy.

Carter’s staff asked me to join the trip to Mobutu’s palace in Gbadolite, Zaire. I watched Mobutu turn the summit into a farce. Eighteen months later, Rwanda overthrew him, installed a new president and forced the refugees home. The old dictator died in exile. Carter kept lobbying for world peace.

I saw the former president many more times over my 11 years in Africa. His foundation, the Carter Center, monitored elections and fought preventable diseases like river blindness, guinea worm and other neglected tropical diseases. Carter’s work saved tens of millions of people from suffering, but he never made a big deal out of it.

No one can accomplish so much without steely determination. Too often, I hear people describe Carter as the weak and bumbling caricature that President Ronald Reagan created to win the 1980 election. Folks should stop confusing courtesy for weakness.

After the Watergate scandal and the Vietnam debacle, Carter, in 1976, offered an alternative to Richard Nixon’s imperial presidency. He practiced what has become known as servant leadership, the theory that a leader’s primary duty is ensuring subordinates have the tools they need to accomplish their mission.

In the Army, my brigade commander instilled servant leadership in me when I joined his staff as a newly minted sergeant in 1986. He explained that junior enlisted members did not serve me because I outranked them; my rank meant I was responsible for their success, and the colonel promised to hold me accountable if they failed.

The term servant leadership is hackneyed, but it captures valuable techniques that have caught on in the business world. It emphasizes listening, empathy, persuasion, stewardship and community building while discouraging egotism and authoritarianism.

The greater good comes first, not any individual.

While president, Carter rejected much of the pomp at the White House. His speeches focused on addressing problems, not promoting himself. Despite attending the U.S. Naval Academy and serving in the nuclear navy, he was never a warrior-king style leader, which American voters tend to favor.

Humility does not do well in the current culture, where conspicuousness is valued. Politicians must constantly self-promote while denigrating their rivals. Compromise is considered a failure, and vulgarity is considered clever.

The strongest people I’ve encountered in the most difficult places don’t puff up their chests. They don’t need others to bow before them. People with inner strength don’t use cruelty to prove their power.

Here’s hoping kindness makes a comeback, courtesy becomes cool, and strength is demonstrated by lifting people up, not knocking them down.

Categories Character, Civil Rights, Courage, Democracy, Ethics, History, Joy, Justice

Jan Resseger: Project 2025 and the Demise of Civil Rights Protections

By dianeravitch
January 2, 2025 //
3

Jan Resseger is a social justice warrior in Ohio who writes deeply researched observations on national and Ohio issues. She reviews here the Trump administration’s plans to roll back the civil rights protections for vulnerable students.

She writes:

It is disgusting that Donald Trump’s election campaign set out to create the myth that the nation’s public schools are widespread settings for “woke” indoctrination. Good educators seek to make all students welcome and engaged. They are not pushing critical race theory to make school kids to feel guilty about our nation’s history, despite that our society has not always lived up to its proclaimed ideals. Neither are teachers and school counselors pushing kids to become gay or transgender. In fact Trump’s plea for reducing “woke” policy covers a more cynical plan to reduce the protection of the civil rights of racial minority and gay, lesbian and transgender students. Racism and homophobia seem to be at the center of both President-elect Trump’s re-election campaign and also the policies prescribed in Project 2025, which many believe has served as the handbook to Donald Trump’s educational priorities.

Education Week‘s Alyson Klein describes the public school policies in Trump’s recent campaign: “For months on the campaign trail, President-elect Donald Trump pledged to take money from school districts that teach critical race theory, champion a version of American history he sees as unpatriotic, or promote supportive policies and instructional practices for transgender students. In fact, Trump said he would sign an executive order on his very first day back in office to that effect. ‘We are going to cut federal funding for any school pushing critical race theory, transgender insanity, and other inappropriate racial, sexual or political content onto the shoulders of our children,’ Trump said at a July campaign event in Minnesota.”

In fact President-elect Trump’s policies go much deeper than merely cleansing the schools of policies he believes offend his supporters. By proposing to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education, to remove some of the civil rights protections for vulnerable students, and to move responsibilities of its Office for Civil Rights to the Department of Justice, the President-elect has proposed turning back our nation’s progress in protecting the educational opportunity and safety of extremely vulnerable groups of children.  Klein explains that Trump’s policies are based on a  false understanding what the Office for Civil Rights does, why its work is important, and how today’s civil rights investigations of schools usually work. The Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) receives complaints, processes them, and then works with school districts to reform policy:

“OCR doesn’t just yank money from school districts. Instead, the loss of federal funding is just one—very rare—possible conclusion of a lengthy, detailed process that typically unfolds over the course of years. The office receives complaints from students, staff members, parents, or other community members alleging that a school or district has violated a key civil rights law—commonly Title VI of the Civil rights Act, Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). The department then investigates the claim and decides whether the school has indeed run afoul of the law. If so, the school or district could technically risk losing a portion of federal funding. But school districts seldom see their money revoked. Instead, OCR works to help them comply with civil rights laws… For instance, in 2010, OCR concluded that instruction of English learners in the Los Angeles Unified School District was grossly inadequate, prompting a reimagining of district practice.”

The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights adds: “Project 2025 proposes that the Departments of Education and Justice… should enforce civil rights laws only in the courts, eliminating important administrative tools to address discrimination. The overwhelming majority of complaints of discrimination in schools are handled through administrative enforcement by… (the Department of Education’s) Office for Civil Rights… Without this process, fewer students would see schools and districts change their policies to prevent further discrimination, and fewer schools would have examples of how to comply with the law.” The Leadership Conference also reminds us that Project 2025 has also proposed to eliminate “disparate impact” as a standard.  This means that it wouldn’t constitute a violation if, for example, a school district has engaged in a pattern of disparate school discipline policies for children of different races.

The National Education Policy Center has released a series of short, accessible interviews with academic researchers who explore the history and implications of education proposals in this year’s Trump campaign and Project 2025. Two of these short briefs explore the civil rights issues in Trump’s proposals relating to, first, preventing homophobia at school, and second confronting racism.

In the first, Protections against Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Discrimination in Schools: The Federal Role, University of Colorado, Boulder professor, Elizabeth Meyer explains the history of the federal government’s role in protecting students’ civil rights around sexual orientation and gender identity: “The Federal Government got officially involved in this issue… in 2010 when the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) issued Title IX guidance… that explicitly included LGBT students as entitled to protection from discrimination. The guidance prohibited forms of bullying and harassment that are ‘gender-based’ or related to ‘stereotypical notions of masculinity and femininity’… The goal has been primarily to address anti-LGBTQ+ violence in schools and ensure sexual and gender minority youth are able to access educational opportunities… Starting in 2017, under the Trump administration that approach changed, as the guidance documents mentioned above were rescinded and official statements were issued refusing to hear complaints about anti-transgender discrimination in schools…  This backslide in legal protections for LGBTQ+ people ended in 2021 whcn President Biden issued his Executive Order…. Yet these protections are currently only symbolic in much of the country, since their implementation is being halted by injunctions affecting students in 26 states.”

Meyer concludes: “The ways the RNC and Project 2025 frame their approach to gender and sexuality diversity goes against what has been well-established in the research literature… Under the (previous) Trump administration, school climate declined for LGBTQ+ youth, and this is likely to recur during a second Trump presidency.”

In the second short civil rights brief, The Elections and Issues Around Racial and Ethnic Diversity, Kevin Lawrence Henry, Jr., an associate professor in the Department of Educational Leadership & Policy Analysis at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, examines the Trump campaign and Project 2025 proposals from the point of view of racial justice: “(F)ederal educational provisions and regulations that are concerned with the enforcement of civil rights protections can positively impact the educational lives of students. For instance, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights enforces a variety of consent decrees, ranging from ensuring desegregation within school districts, to improving multilingual learner instruction, to addressing racial discrimination in student discipline… (Federal initiatives such as President Obama’s efforts to address discipline disparities that disproportionately impact Black and Latinx students is noteworthy. Federal guidance, interventions, and oversight that address racial inequity attends to institutional and organizational realities that stymie and limit educational opportunity, and in doing so gives meaning to educational equity and the unreached promises of a multiracial democracy.”

Henry continues: “Nevertheless, these initiatives are fragile…. During Donald Trump’s administration, movement away from race-conscious remedies for racism-caused harms intensified. For instance, the Trump administration rescinded Obama-era guidance on the reduction of suspensions and expulsions. Additionally, the Trump administration reduced the federal emphasis on enforcing Title VI protections for English Language Learners… and decreased Office of Civil Rights investigations into systemic discrimination… We need policies that explicitly aim to redress and counteract institutional and structural racism.”

Henry concludes: “Project 2025 and the RNC platform completely abandon a vision of a pluralistic, multicultural democracy. Focused on deregulation and the expansion of privatized education (which has historically been used to evade civil rights efforts and currently reproduces systemic racial inequity), these policy statements would significantly curtail and constrain regulatory civil rights enforcement in K-12 and higher education settings. Moreover, Project 2025 calls for the elimination of Head Start…  (and) calls for rescinding the equity provision within the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which specially aims to evaluate and address racial disproportionality in special education. Project 2025 calls for the redistribution of Title I funds (over $18 billion) as deregulated block grants to states, and then for the phasing out of these funds.. over a 10-year period… Project 2025 calls for the prosecution of entities committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). This would be a fundamental disavowing of educational justice.”

The attack on public education embodied in the President-elect’s education plans is directed at federal policies, programs, and regulations designed to protect the most vulnerable among the roughly 50 million students served by public schools. Trump’s campaign and other politicians, however, have  turned discussion of these complex policies that shape public education across the nation’s 13,318 public school districts into an attack on the public schools themselves and the teachers who work with our students. I believe that teachers’ work with students is not political. The goal is to make students feel authentically welcome so that they are able to learn.

Kids bring who they are to school, and it is responsibility of school staff to make each student feel included.  Schools must also ensure that all students are physically safe, and safe from meanness and bullying. The late Mike Rose, a fine writer and a teacher of future teachers, reflected on what shapes a student’s experience of school: “We need to pay attention to the experience of school.” (Why School?, p. 34)  “I’m especially interested in what opportunity feels like… What is the experience of opportunity? Certainly one feels a sense of possibility, of hope. But it is hope made concrete, specific, hope embedded in tools, or practices, or sequences of things to do—pathways to a goal. And all this takes place with people who interact with you in ways that affirm your hope.” (Why School?, p. 14)

Categories Civil Rights, Elections, Trump

Scott Maxwell: Where I Stand, What I Believe

By dianeravitch
December 31, 2024 //
6

Scott Maxwell is an opinion writer for The Orlando Sentinel. I consistently enjoy his writings. Here he explains what he believes. I agree with him, although I am not a Presbyterian.

He writes:

Every new year, I follow a tradition started by former Orlando Sentinel columnist Charley Reese who believed that, if a newspaper columnist is going to tell you what he thinks all year long, he should first tell you who he is and where he stands.

I am a married father with two grown kids, both of whom picked up their best attributes from their mother.

I’m not a Republican nor a Democrat. I’m a lifelong unaffiliated voter who has seen too many people defend indefensible deed-doers simply because they share a party affiliation.

That said, I lean left of center. I believe in public education, free speech, equal rights, balanced budgets and the U.S. Constitution.

I believe most of the politicians who lead this state and claim to be constitutionalists are full of it. We have the court rulings to prove it.

I believe censorship is favored by those with weak minds. If you crave government censorship, you’re an authoritarian’s dream disciple.

I think the world has two kinds of people: Those who hear an idea and immediately think: How will this affect me? And those who hear a new idea and also wonder: How will this affect society? I have a lot more respect for the latter.

One of my favorite quotes involves the definition of privilege — when something doesn’t strike you as a problem because it’s not a problem to you. I believe that explains why families with disabilities are on seven-year-waiting lists for basic services in this state.

Another one of my favorite quotes is: Fifty percent of the enjoyment you get from a vacation comes from the anticipation beforehand. My wife and I always have several vacations planned.

We love our children. I’d throw myself in front of a bus for either one. That said, now that they’re both grown, I’m glad that any buses they might take nowadays will drop them off at their own respective homes. My wife and I have fully embraced being empty-nesters.

Our daughter works with children in the arts. Our son writes and also substitute teaches. Both of our kids are good with kids. We take great pride in that.

I believe teachers are underappreciated. So are social workers, public defenders and full-time caregivers.

I believe arts and culture are an essential part of any community. So are nonprofit organizations. If cultural groups are the heart of a community, nonprofits represent the backbone.

My wife and I have two main sources of income — my salary at the newspaper and hers with the Department of Veterans Affairs. We’ve worked at both jobs for the past quarter century. Her job is a lot more stable.

We both read voraciously. She reads books — at least two a week. I read lengthy court rulings, drafted legislation and just about every piece of current-event info published about Florida.

We also diverge a bit when it comes to film. She likes Hallmark movies where a busy, big-city boss lady stumbles into a small town and discovers love on a Christmas tree farm. I like ridiculous, scary movies where the big-city boss lady stumbles into giant insects that have mutated in size thanks to toxic sludge dumped in that small town’s water reservoir.

My wife says her book and movie tastes are more normal. She’s usually right. About most things in life.

We own two houses — the one in which we live near downtown Orlando and our starter home that we still own and rent out in Seminole County.

I don’t have or accept any other streams of income. Mainly because I try to avoid financial conflicts of interest. But also because I find my one job pretty exhausting.

I start most days by 4 a.m. and work 60 to 80 hours a week, partly because our newsroom has only a fraction of the journalists and editors it used to have.

This newspaper business has changed a lot, in many ways for the worse when it comes to staffing and customer service. But I still believe in the mission and am honored to work alongside feisty, smart and curious  journalists who aren’t easily intimidated, virtually all of whom are still in local journalism because they care about this community.

I’m also honored to work for a paper with editors and publishers who have never — ever — told me what I can or can’t write.

I welcome dissenting opinions. In fact, I seek them out. When I’m writing a column, I usually spend as much time looking up arguments against my premise as I do ones that support it. I’d much rather hear the best arguments before I publish a piece.

I don’t worship any politician and am a bit puzzled by those who do. I’ve yet to meet one who was flawless. I respect elected officials who truly study the issues, question what they’re told and are willing to challenge the status quo.

I believe in checks and balances and that one-party control is a recipe for both extremism and corruption.

I’m a Presbyterian and church elder, a die-hard Tar Heel, a decent poker player, solid Worldler and much less-solid pickleball player.

I love laughter and plot twists and loathe bigotry and standing in lines.

I think Tesla Cybertrucks look ridiculous.

I feel privileged to have this job and honored to know so many of you read and share your own stories with me.

I hope you all have a happy, healthy new year.

smaxwell@orlandosentinel.com

Categories Censorship, Character, Civil Rights, Democracy, Ethics, Justice

Matt Gaetz Should Not Be Confirmed as Attorney General

By dianeravitch
November 15, 2024 //
33

When Trump announced that he intended to nominate Representative Matt Gaetz to be his Attorney General, a gasp went up in both political parties.

Gaetz has been a fierce Trump loyalist, which is why Trump chose him. He certainly didn’t choose him because he is an eminent member of the bar, because he has the respect of his peers, or because he is a pillar of integrity. Trump wants someone who is certain not to investigate him and certain to prosecute Trump’s “enemies.” Perhaps Trump thinks he has found his latter-day Roy Cohn, a man who can be counted on to twist the law to justify whatever Trump wants.

Gaetz was just reelected on November 5, yet resigned as soon as Trump announced that he had chosen him to be Attorney General, the very epitome of our justice system.

Candidates for the Cabinet usually wait to see if they are confirmed before resigning. Why did he rush to resign a seat he just won?

The House Ethics Committee was investigating serious charges against him and was about to issue its report. His resignation ends the investigation.

But, Politico writes, that’s not the end of the Gaetz story:

The lawyer representing a woman former Rep. Matt Gaetz allegedly had sex with when she was a minor called on the House Ethics Committee to “immediately” release its report into his alleged conduct.

“Mr. Gaetz’s likely nomination as Attorney General is a perverse development in a truly dark series of events,” attorney John Clune wrote Thursday on X. “We would support the House Ethics Committee immediately releasing their report. She was a high school student and there were witnesses.”

Gaetz, a conservative firebrand whom President-elect Donald Trump tapped Wednesday to serve as attorney general — and who pushed the effort to oust former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy —  resigned abruptlyfrom the House Wednesday, days before the chamber’s ethics panel was reportedly set to release a report of its investigation.

Gaetz has repeatedly denied the allegations. A spokesperson for Gaetz did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The former congressman was also the subject of a separate federal sex trafficking investigation by the Department of Justice — which he could soon lead — but was ultimately not prosecuted. That probe, started in 2020 during the Trump administration, was focused on whether Gaetz paid women for sex and traveled overseas to attend parties with teenagers under the age of 18.

In May, he was subpoenaed to sit for a deposition in a civil lawsuit brought against the woman with whom he allegedly had sex — who is represented by Clune — by a friend of Gaetz, ABC News reported.

House Ethics Chair Michael Guest (R-Miss.) told reporters Wednesday before Gaetz’s resignation that the probe would end if Gaetz was no longer a member of the House — and reiterated that position on Thursday.

But lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have said they hope to review the report ahead of Gaetz’s Senate confirmation. Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) demanded in a statement that the House Ethics Committee share its findings with the Senate Judiciary Community, saying “We cannot allow this valuable information from a bipartisan investigation to be hidden from the American people.”

Karen Tumulty of the Washington Post described the Gaetz nomination as “a middle finger to the Senate.” She hopes it never reaches a vote. Maybe Trump is testing the Senate to see how low they will go to please him.

The New York Times summed up Trump’s reasons to admire Gaetz:

Gaetz, a Florida Republican, says Trump’s ties to Russia should never have been investigated. He wants “the Biden crime family” to face justice. And he called nonpartisan D.O.J. officials whom he may soon oversee the “deep state.” He has introduced legislation that would limit sentences for people who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6 and suggested “abolishing every one of the three-letter agencies,” including the F.B.I.

The New Republic referred to stories about Gaetz’s drug-fueled sexual adventures:

Then-Representative Markwayne Mullin, now a senator, candidly told CNN last year that Gaetz bragged about having sex with young women to other members on the floor of the House of Representatives. 

“We had all seen videos … of the girls that he had slept with,” Mullin said. “He’d crush [erectile dysfunction] medicine and chase it with an energy drink so he could go all night.” Mullin, now a Senator, has done a total 180 on this, saying on Wednesday that he “completely” trusts Trump’s decision to nominate Gaetz.

Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville said that any Republican senator who voted against Gaetz should be ousted. Only four defections, and Gaetz is defeated.

Categories Character, Civil Rights, Corruption, Democracy, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, Injustice, Justice, Trump

Mercedes Schneider: Trump’s Plans for Education

By dianeravitch
November 12, 2024 //
24

If Trump follows through with his education proposals, if the Republican-controlled Congress lets him do it, America’s students and teachers are in for a world of hurt.

Mercedes Schneider writes here about what’s at stake. I did not copy and paste the article in full. It is excellent. I urge you to open the link.

I do not believe American education is a top concern for Donald Trump. I do believe that he could well turn it over to the likes of the Heritage Foundation and their Project 2025, so long as nobody outshines him in the press and puts anything (Constitution included) ahead of loyalty to him above all else.

So, when ABC News reports that Trump’s Agenda 47 as though the Heritage Foundation has not already done most of Trump’s homework for him, well, that fashions Trump’s interest in a number of issues as though it is something more than just letting those extreme-right-leaners who really care about that stuff have at.

Now that the election is over, Trump allies are openly admitting that Project 2025 was the Trump plan all along.

One featured Project 2025-Trump issue is the proposed dismantling of the US Department of Education (USDOE), which was created during the Carter administration. Talk of getting rid of USDOE began with the Reagan administration(in other words, soon after it was created). It should come as no surprise that in 1980, the “fledgling” Heritage Foundation was in Reagan’s ear and is proud to declare as much in the opening pages of its Project 2025:

page xiii

Several decades later, USDOE still exists, and several decades later, the Heritage Foundation is still trying to kill it. 

Heritage et al. has taken great pains to outline its 900+-page wish list of ultra conservatism, including nixing USDOE. However, it would take a lot to achieve the kind of legislative unity required to dissolve a federal department that supports numerous Americans in desired and positive ways, not the least of which is via the Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP).

Brookings offers a concise discussion of the Project 2025 plan for education, including this “sample list” of negative consequences:

No surprise that Heritage wants school vouchers for all, a notably unpopular concept at the 2024 ballot box:

Project 2025, page 319

Of course, the key is to have legislatures jump onto the choice bandwagon and force choice onto voters whether they want it or not. But some voters do benefit from having access to publicly-subsidized private schools: Those with money. Heritage alludes to Arizona’s “expanded program… available to all families. However, in Arizona, those accessing school voucher cash tend not to be the working class but more affluent families.

Speaking of the affluent and private school vouchers: Billionaire former US Ed secretary Betsy DeVos, who in 2023 could not get private school vouchers over the line in her home state of Michigan, apparently smells opportunity. 

On January 07, 2024, DeVos resigned as Trump’s US ed sec. In her resignation letter, DeVos placed the fault of January 06, 2024, chaos squarely on Trump:

In a November 07. 2024, interview with EdWeek about advice for Trump’s next Ed sec, , DeVos is fact checked as she tries to put lack of a school choice “big moment” at the feet of the Democrats. Not so, Betsy:

During Trump’s first term, DeVos’ inability to push private school choice to her liking has to be attributed in part to some Republican resistance to the idea. Heritage and any Heritage-sympathetic ed sec could well face similar issues in Trump’s second term.

I did not copy the entire article. Open the link to finish reading it.

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, Censorship, Civil Rights, Cruelty, Disruption, Education Industry, Elections, Equity, Ethics, Extremism, For-Profit, Freedom to Read, Funding, Trump, U.S. Department of Education
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