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San Antonio: IDEA Charter School Vice Proncipal Arrested for Punching 5-Year-Old

By dianeravitch
April 30, 2022 //
18

The vice principal of an IDEA charter school in San Antonio was arrested for punching a 5-year-old child.

Betsy DeVos, when U.S .Secretary of Education, gave the IDEA chain more than $200 million from the federal Charter Schools Program to expand.

SAN ANTONIO – An area elementary school vice principal is in custody and charged with assault after she “lost control” and attacked a 5-year-old student in her office, according to Sheriff Javier Salazar.

The incident happened April 22 at an IDEA elementary school in the 10100 block of Kriewald Road, but the sheriff’s office wasn’t made aware of the situation until Wednesday, April 27.

According to Salazar, a mother told deputies that her five-year-old son, who attends the school, was assaulted by the school’s vice principal, 53-year-old Tara Coleman Hunter in her office..

The child admitted that he became “unruly” while in Hunter’s office and struck her. However, the situation escalated further when Hunter “lost control” and attacked the child, Salazar said.

“This was handled way inappropriately,” the sheriff said during a news conference Thursday.

Hunter punched the child in the face or head and pushed him into a file cabinet, according to the sheriff. This caused the child to develop a bump on his head and bruising.

The child was out of control, but the adult should know how to deal with an unruly child without resorting to physical assault.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Childhood, Discipline, Education Industry, San Antonio, Students, Texas

Ted Cruz: “School Choice is the Most Important Issue” of Our Time

By dianeravitch
April 26, 2022 //
35

The two most outspoken conservatives in Texas—Senator Ted Cruz and Governor Greg Abbott—are at odds in two races for the state legislature. Abbott is supporting the Republican incumbents. Cruz is supporting their challengers in the Republican primary.

The two grinches of the right are diverging because of one issue: school choice. Texas is already overrun with charter schools (mostly low-performing), but the legislature has opposed vouchers for private and religious schools for years.

“Sen. Cruz believes that school choice is the most important domestic issue in the country,” Cruz spokesperson Steve Guest said in a statement. “He doesn’t hesitate to endorse and support candidates in primaries that will fight for school choice across Texas.”

Some might think that climate change or the high cost of prescription drugs or high rates of child poverty was “the most important domestic issue in the country,” but not Senator Cruz.

His own children are enrolled at the elite St. John’s School in Houston, where tuition is about $30,000 annually. If Texas were to endorse vouchers, you can be sure that they wouldn’t be large enough for any student to attend St. John’s.

The broad concept of school choice is popular among Texas Republicans. In the March primary, 88% of voters approved of a ballot proposition that asked voters whether they agreed with the statement, “Texas parents and guardians should have the right to select schools, whether public or private, for their children, and the funding should follow the student.”

But the issue divides Republican lawmakers when it comes to school voucher programs, which would let parents use public money for private school education. Rural Republicans are often the most outspoken opponents, voicing concerns that such initiatives would hurt the public schools that are the lifeblood of their tightly knit communities.

The Texas House has long been a firewall against voucher proposals. During the last regular legislative session, the chamber voted 115-29 on a budget amendment to ban school vouchers, with a majority of Republicans siding with Democrats.

Our friends, Pastors for Texas Children, has led the fight against school choice, knowing that the vast majority of students in Texas are enrolled in underfunded public schools. PTC believes in separation of church and state, and they support public schools.

Categories Charter Schools, Education Industry, Texas, Vouchers

Dr. Charles Luke: Will Texas Politicians Keep Promoting Vouchers Despite Years of Failure?

By dianeravitch
April 19, 2022 //
10

The subject of vouchers—public money for religious and private schools—has been proposed in every legislative session since 1995. Vouchers have gone down to defeat every time.

Dr. Charles Luke of Pastors for Texas Children wonders whether the voucher lobby—led by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick—wants another showdown. How many times do you have to fail before you get the message?

Dr. Luke writes:

Vouchers have never fared well in Texas, failing each legislative session since 1995. Conversations with a variety of state legislators and Austin-based politicos indicate that while, vouchers will likely pass the Senate in the next legislative session in 2023, it is still unlikely that they will pass the House. In the regular session of the 87th Texas Legislature, the Texas House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to prohibit state funds from being used on school voucher programs.

On top of vouchers consistently failing in the Texas Legislature, three other states have recently voted against vouchers. Oklahoma, Georgia, and Utah recently rejected private school vouchers aimed at providing state dollars to private schools.

In Oklahoma, a voucher bill that would have provided $128.5 million taxpayer dollars for private schools failed in the Senate by a narrow margin in March of this year. Senate Bill 1647, called the Oklahoma Empowerment Act, was defeated by a 24-22 vote against the bill. The bill, authored by Senate Pro Tem Greg Treat was also supported by Governor Kevin Stitt who pledged to sign the bill if it passed. Had the bill passed the Senate, it likely would have failed in the House as Speaker Charles McCall had said he would not give the bill a hearing.

Opponents of the bill cited multiple problems. Rev. Clark Frailey, the Lead Pastor of Coffee Creek Church in Edmond and the Executive Director of Pastors for Oklahoma Kids said, “In Oklahoma, there are many reasons to oppose private school vouchers that are funded by taking resources away from public schools. There are religious liberty problems, constitutional issues, and practical implications for parents. In this session, it was made quite clear by parents in rural, urban, and suburban Oklahoma communities that they want well-resourced schools in their own communities. They are not interested in being forced to transit hours a day just to have access to good schools.”

Likewise, Georgia Senators refused to pass a voucher bill supported by their Senate Pro Tem, Butch Miller. Senate Bill 601, which would have given private schools up to $6,000 per student, failed by a vote of 29-20. While supporters of the bill argued that it would give some parents more educational options, opponents pointed out that the voucher would likely be used by wealthier parents that are able to supplement tuition from their disposable income. “If you were really going to try to allow lower income families to exercise school choice, this bill would be means-tested,” said Sen. Elena Parent, an Atlanta Democrat. “Instead, it’s going to be used a lot more by individuals who already have the means.”

In February, Utah lawmakers overwhelmingly rejected a $36 million voucher bill which would have provided leveled funding for private schools based on the parents’ income. House Bill 331 was struck down by a vote of 22-53. Critics noted that, even at the highest funding level, the amount of the voucher would not have covered private school tuition for many schools in Utah. Others questioned the accountability of private schools’ use of public taxpayer dollars, pointing out that private schools are not held to the same transparency standards as public schools. “I don’t see strong accountability measures here,” said Rep. Joel Briscoe of Salt Lake City. “There’s very minimal accountability measures here and then with an opportunity to opt out.”

All the issues cited in these cases have been raised in Texas for nearly 30 years since vouchers were first proposed in the Texas Legislature.

Vouchers do not typically provide enough money to cover private school tuition, so they are often used by parents wealthy enough to send their children to private schools already. They normally do not cover transportation costs so poor parents who are often working more than one job may not be able to get their kids to a private school, even if they could afford to supplement the voucher. Many private schools are religious in nature. Should taxpayer funds be used to provide a religious education in violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment?

Finally, vouchers are a redistribution of taxpayer funds to private citizens that divert funds from the common good of public education. Is it even right or just that such a thing occurs?

While some state leaders and voucher proponents claim that Texas citizens want vouchers, a recent poll has shown that parents overwhelmingly approve of Texas public schools and that 80% of them would keep their kids in their current school even if other options were available.

Categories Accountability, Education Industry, Religion, Texas

Texas Requires K-3 Teachers to Take a 60-120 Hour Reading Course at Their Own Expense or Leave

By dianeravitch
April 2, 2022 //
38

Texas has a teacher shortage, but that doesn’t stop the state from piling new requirements on teachers.

Brian Lopez of The Texas Tribune reports:

It was one thing to ask Texas teachers — during an ongoing teacher’s shortage — to make extra room in their busy home routines for online classroom teaching for months, then to monitor the latest in vaccine and mask mandates while waiting and adjusting yet again for a return to the classroom.

But now, as teachers attempt to restore all the learning lost by their students during the pandemic, the Texas Legislature has insisted those who teach grades K-3 need to jump another hurdle: they need to complete a 60-to-120 hour course on reading, known as Reading Academies, if they want to keep their jobs in 2023.

And they must do it on their own time, unpaid.

For many like 38-year-old Christina Guerra, a special education teacher in the Rio Grande Valley, the course requirement is the final straw and it is sending teachers like her and others out the door.

“I don’t want to do it,” she said. “I refuse to, and if they fire me, they fire me.”

Course adds to teacher workload

In 2019, the Legislature wanted to improve student reading scores and came up with a requirement that teachers complete this reading skills course. Every teacher working in early elementary grades — kindergarten through third — along with principals, had until the end of the 2022-23 school year to complete it.

Governor Greg Abbott is not satisfied with the performance of Texas students on NAEP. But Texas has a growing crisis of teacher shortages.

But the pressures of the pandemic have forced many teachers to reconsider whether to remain in the profession. From 2010 to 2019, the number of teachers certified in Texas fell by about 20%, according to a University of Houston report.

After recent reports of more teacher departures, Gov. Greg Abbott formed a task force to address teacher shortages.

But teachers and public education advocates alike believe the state should hold itself accountable for the teacher departures, especially when adding requirements that add to teacher workload.

“I just feel like a lemon just squeezing, squeezing, squeezing,” said Guerra, a special education teacher in La Joya Independent School District. “But there’s no more, there’s nothing that you squeeze out anymore. There’s no more juice.”

Guerra plans to leave the profession at the end of the school year.

One way to increase the teacher shortage is to crack down on teachers, demanding more while paying less.

Categories Education Industry, Literacy, Teachers and Teaching, Texas

Texas: How Stupid Is Lt. Governor Dan Patrick?

By dianeravitch
March 15, 2022 //
17

Lt. Governor Dan Patrick of Texas explains in this video why he wants to eliminate tenure in the colleges and universities of Texas. He believes in “academic freedom,” he says, but he thinks the legislature should govern what is taught in universities. He lashed out at professors who want to teach “critical race theory.” He believes that there is no academic freedom for those who want to teach the Constitution (!), but only for those who teach controversial topics.

Apparently he thinks that academic freedom and tenure should protect only those who share his views.

Just how dangerous is Dan Patrick’s proposal?

Seth Masket, director of the Center on American Politics at the University of Denver, understands that Patrick threatens one of our nation’s greatest treasures: its public institutions of higher education.

He writes, at NBC’s website:

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick announced last month a plan to phase out all tenure in Texas’ public colleges and universities, and to revoke tenure for those who teach critical race theory. These changes would have dramatic effects on public education in Texas and, ultimately, across the United States, undermining academic freedom and compromising a higher education system that is the envy of the world.

If you were to make a list of the United States’ most significant contributions to the world, our public university systems would have to be somewhere near the top. According to U.S. News’ rankings, of the top 20 universities around the world, 15 are American, and five of those are public. Thanks to these and other universities, the U.S. dominates Nobel Prizes and other scholarly achievements, while it educates tens of millions of students annually. Typically, about a million students per year come from other countries to attend American colleges and universities. Those on student visas largely return to their home countries, spreading the knowledge and values they learn here.

Rather remarkably, this is not widely celebrated. Worse, America’s public universities are currently being attacked from multiple sources, threatening both our educational integrity and global reputation, to say nothing of the way such attacks could impact student opportunities.

The first of these attacks stems from a rather long-term historical force — declining state budgets. States are simply subsidizing public education far less than they used to do. Outside just a handful of states, per-student funding from state governments dropped substantially over the past few decades. Students and their families increasingly have to make up that difference.

But there’s a more immediate threat going on, of which Patrick is only the latest instigator. Patrick is hardly the first state leader to go after tenure for university professors. Former Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker worked to weaken tenure protections at his state’s university system. A current bill in South Carolina would end tenure in that state. Georgia made it easier last year for administrators in public universities to fire tenured professors. Tenure has long been a target of Republican state officials seeking to reduce the status of the professors they see as elitist liberals.

Tenure, of course, is complicated, involving complicated and school-specific standards. Some schools have suspiciously biased tenure patterns. But at its best, tenure serves two important purposes. First, it protects researchers from reprisals. Academics may produce findings that make state leaders uncomfortable or defensive — tenure helps assure that findings are not suppressed and altered. Think, for example, of recent academic debates over whether voter ID and other voting restrictions disproportionately affect people of color and actually reduce turnout. This is an important discussion that quite legitimately makes people on all sides of it uncomfortable. But researchers must be able to pursue the truth without fear of losing their jobs…

Second, tenure is a valuable perk for professors who could typically make more money in another line of work. In both these senses, tenure helps keep top scholarly talent at universities producing important and occasionally critical and politically unpopular research.

But Patrick’s second announcement, that he is seeking to revoke tenure protections for professors who teach critical race theory, is even more sinister. It’s important to note first that very few professors outside of law school actually teach critical race theory. Rather, the term “critical race theory” for public officials like Patrick has come to mean any lessons involving race, identity and/or history that conservatives do not like. For some, critical race theory now just means any history lesson that might make white students feel bad. It’s not hard to guess who will be blamed for teaching these sorts of lessons, and who will more readily be fired or silenced as a result…

Great public university systems with top scholars educating millions of students at (relatively) low cost are legitimately one of the U.S.’ greatest accomplishments. We are watching that accomplishment being dismantled before our eyes

Categories Academic Freedom, Funding, Higher Education, Ignorance, Stupid, Texas

Texas: Republicans Who Support Public Schools Win Big Victories

By dianeravitch
March 2, 2022 //
11

Pastors for Texas Children have worked with a bipartisan coalition to support public schools and stop privatization. Rural Republicans have been an important part of the coalition that has repeatedly stopped voucher legislation and slowed charters.

Big Night for Pro-Texas Public School Legislative Candidates

GOP Candidates Again Rebuke Extremist Insurgents Financed By Ultra-Right-Wing Billionaires

Candidates that support Texas public schools celebrated significant victories in the Republican primary last night. On the eve of Texas Independence Day, these incumbents declared their independence from the deep pockets of right-wing extremists that are trying to destroy your neighborhood schools. We congratulate those candidates: Stan Lambert, Ken King, David Spiller, Gary VanDeaver, Travis Clardy, Reggie Smith, Ernest Bailes, Giovanni Capriglione.

“Yesterday’s primary elections proved decisively, in the reelection of pro-public education incumbents, that Texans overwhelmingly support their neighborhood and community public schools – and oppose the privatization of them through vouchers and charters,” said Reverend Charles Foster Johnson, founder and Executive Director of Pastors for Children. “These House seats cannot be bought by a couple of right-wing billionaires, no matter how many millions they put up.”

Pastors For Children will continue the fight in the upcoming May runoffs and launch an unprecedented pro-public education campaign for the November General Election.

Pastors For Children stands firm for the belief that there is a moral obligation before God to educate every school kid in Texas. We are also strong proponents of Article 7 in the Texas Constitution, which mandates the State Legislature to support and maintain a free public school system. It is the only way for the Texas economy to continue to outpace the rest of the country.

Pastors For Children is a 501c4 that engages parents, teachers, and all Texans to fight for Texas neighborhood public schools through their votes in the ballot box.

PO Box 471155, Fort Worth, Texas, 76147

Categories Charter Schools, Democracy, Education Industry, Resistance, Separation of church and state, Support for public schools, Supporting public schools, Texas, Vouchers

Texas: Charter $$$ Flood Race for State Board of Education

By dianeravitch
February 25, 2022 //
20

The charter industry has set its sights on Texas, since the state has a rightwing Governor and Lieutenant Governor and Republicans control the state legislature.

So charter money is flowing to candidates for State Board of Education. In El Paso, board member Georgina Perez decided not to run again, so the charter industry is backing a charter school leader to take her place. Perez is a charter critic who recently joined the board of the Network for Public Education.

The charter industry has donated more than $200,000 to Omar Yanar. Yanar leads a small charter called the El Paso Leadership Academy.

The money behind the money: billionaires Reed Hastings and Jim Walton.

Charter Schools Now reported spending more than $1 million on various primary candidates throughout the state from Jan. 21-Feb. 19. That includes a $1,000 donation to state Sen. César Blanco, D-El Paso, who is unopposed in the March 1 primary, according to the PAC’s Feb. 22 filing.

The PAC gave to three Republican incumbent SBOE members’ reelection campaigns in addition to three Republican primary candidates and five Democratic primary candidates.

Charter Schools Now is heavily funded by two well-known charter advocates: Netflix co-founder and CEO Reed Hastings and Jim Walton, a member of the Walmart family.

Hastings is on the board of directors of KIPP Public Schools, a national charter school chain with campuses in Austin, San Antonio, Houston and the Dallas-Fort Worth area. He was previously on the national board of Rocketship Public Schools, which is opening its first Texas campus in August in Fort Worth.

Hastings gave $1.5 million to Virginia-based Educational Equity PAC on Feb. 15, the same day that PAC gave $570,000 to Charter Schools Now. Days earlier, Educational Equity gave Charter Schools Now $70,000.

Walton gave Charter Schools Now $450,000 in December 2021. The Walton Family Foundation has invested millions over the years to support public charter schools across the country.

One way to win elections is to buy them.

Reed Hastings lives in California.

Jim Walton lives in Arkansas.

Neither lives in Texas but they arrogantly assume that their money gives them the power to buy seats on the Texas Board of Education.

The charter industry wants to eliminate public schools or keep them as dumping grounds for students the charters don’t want.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Privatization, Texas

Texas: Pastors Fight for Public Schools Against Heartless Privatizers

By dianeravitch
February 23, 2022 //
8

The well-organized Pastors for Texas Children is engaged in rhetorical battles with the well-funded privatizers. Whether by Tweet, in the media, or on the lecture platform, Pastor Charles Foster Johnson and his colleagues lead the battle on behalf of public schools, taking on the rich and powerful and their political lackeys.

After Congressman Chip Roy attacked Pastors for Texas children and classroom teachers on Twitter, Pastor Johnson responded forcefully:

On Twitter, the group responded to Congressman Roy: “Congressman @chiproytx, your repeated lies about our [public school] teachers & the pastors who support them, are shameful, embarrassing, and shockingly immoral. You may mock them and us with your political lies against these servants. But you cannot mock God.”

Pastors For Texas Children, a Fort Worth-based organization, says it is an independent organization that advocates for public schools…

Last week, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, accused “left-wing educators” of showing children “explicit pornography” in schools.

Cruz would not cite specific examples, according to Business Insider, “but instead pointed to books that have made parents angry at school board meetings in general.”

“Take a look at some of the portions from books that parents are going to school boards and reading out loud; this is what my child is being taught,'” the senator told the on-line publication.

Rev. Johnson said it’s all a political smokescreen to create chaos.

“If CRT (critical race theory) is a problem, if pornography is a problem, you guys have been in charge in Texas for 27-years,” Johnson said. “Are you just now discovering it? Are you producing it? What if we were to go all over the state and say that you were pornographers? You’re more responsible than our public school teachers. Obviously, we’re not going to do that, but you get the point.”

“We’re in this program of sheer destructive chaos,” he added. “That’s their only agenda. The only agenda. And that is wrong.”

Teachers are an easy target, Johnson continued, because the far-right knows that educators are too busy in the classroom to push back. Many school districts also drew the ire of Texas Republican leaders during COVID-19 when some – even in conservative areas – refused to ban masks like the governor ordered.

In an op-ed last week for Baptist News Global, publisher Mark Wingfield argued that “it’s time to stop the insanity that is killing public education.”

“It is disgusting, dismaying and disheartening to see the continued attack on public education from conservative evangelical Christians and people who pretend to be evangelical Christians but couldn’t find John 3:16 in the Bible if you asked them,” Wingfield wrote. “It is time to stop being shocked at this behavior and stand up against it.”

You see why I admire, respect and love Pastors for Texas Children? They are fearless, wise, and animated by a sense of mission.

Categories Accountability, Courage, Democracy, Education Industry, Supporting public schools, Texas

Texas: Dan Patrick Threatens to Take Tenure Away from Professors Who Defy Anti-CRT Law

By dianeravitch
February 19, 2022 //
43

Kate McGee of the Texas Tribune writes that Lt. Governor Dan Patrick has threatened to kill tenure in Texas universities to compel compliance with his wish to stop any teaching about race or racism, which he calls “critical race theory.”

Dan Patrick is a phony Texan. He wears boots, but he was born and raised in Baltimore. His birth name was Dannie Scott Goeb. He was the little Rush Limbaugh of Texas until he entered politics. He has never abandoned the politics of hatred and division that have made him successful. He has advocated for teaching creationism in the schools and backed legislation last year to prevent public schools from requiring that students read writings by prominent civil rights figures, such as Susan B. Anthony, Cesar Chavez, and Martin Luther King Jr., when covering women’s suffrage and the civil rights movement in social studies classes.” He is a 21st century Know-Nothing.

McGee writes:

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said Friday that he will push to end professor tenure for all new hires at Texas public universities and colleges in an effort to combat faculty members who he says “indoctrinate” students with teachings about critical race theory.

“Go to a private school, let them raise their own funds to teach, but we’re not going to fund them,” said Patrick, who is running for reelection. “I’m not going to pay for that nonsense.”

Patrick, whose position overseeing the Senate allows him to drive the state’s legislative agenda, also proposed a change to state law that could make teaching critical race theory grounds for revoking tenure for professors who already have it. His announcement tees up the next major fight at the Texas Capitol over how college students learn about the history of race and racism in the United States.

Tenure is an indefinite appointment for university faculty that can only be terminated under extraordinary circumstances. Academics said Friday that tenure is intended to protect faculty and academic freedom from exactly the kind of politicization being waged by Patrick.

“This kind of attack is precisely why we have faculty tenure,” said Michael Harris, a professor at Southern Methodist University studying higher education, who likened tenure to lifetime appointments given to federal judges. “The political winds are going to blow at different times, and we want faculty to follow the best data and theory to try to understand what’s happening in our world.”

Patrick on Friday also proposed making tenure review an annual occurrence instead of something that takes place every six years. At the press conference, he said his proposals already have the support of state Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, who chairs the Senate Higher Education Committee…

Patrick’s plan drew swift condemnation from the American Association of University Professors, the body that helped develop the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure that has been adopted by universities and colleges nationwide.

“There’s always been attempts to interfere in higher education, but I have never seen anything as egregious as this attack,” said Irene Mulvey, president of the AAUP. “This is an attempt to have government control of scholarship and teaching. That is a complete disaster. I’ve never seen anything this bad…”

Patrick said his latest priority is in response to the UT-Austin Faculty Council after it passed a nonbinding resolution Monday to reaffirm instructors’ academic freedom to teach on issues of racial justice and critical race theory.

“Legislative proposals and enactments seek to prohibit academic discussions of racism and related issues if the discussion would be ‘divisive’ or suggest ‘blame’ or cause ‘psychological distress,’” the resolution stated. “But fail to recognize that these criteria … chill the capacity of educators to exercise their academic freedom and use their expertise to make determinations regarding content and discussions that will serve educational purposes.”

One day after the resolution passed, Patrick signaled on Twitter that he would continue the fight against teaching the discipline in the next legislative session.

“I will not stand by and let looney Marxist UT professors poison the minds of young students with Critical Race Theory,” Patrick wrote on Twitter. “We banned it in publicly funded K-12 and we will ban it in publicly funded higher ed. That’s why we created the Liberty Institute at UT.…”

The proposal to end tenure would fundamentally change the way Texas universities operate in terms of hiring, teaching and research. Faculty members warn it’s likely to impose major challenges for Texas universities to recruit and retain researchers and scholars from across the country…

Harris said even the headlines to propose ending tenure could hurt Texas universities that are hiring faculty members for next year who might think twice about whether to take a job at a public university.

A few strategic phone calls from public university presidents to their alumni in the state legislature could shut down Dan Patrick mighty quick. He is an embarrassment to the state of Texas.

Categories Censorship, Education Industry, Fascism, Higher Education, Race, Racism, Texas

Texas: Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick Wants to Ban “Critical Race Theory” in Universities

By dianeravitch
February 18, 2022 //
65

This is when 21st century McCarthyism gets serious.

Dan Patrick, the talk-show host who is now Lieutenant Governor of Texas, wants to ban the teaching of “critical race theory” in higher education. Critical race theory, the study of systemic and institutionalized racism, has been taught and debated in law schools and colleges since the mid-1980s.

Patrick wants to quash academic freedom in higher education. He thinks he can prevent professors who have devoted their academic careers to the study of racism from talking about it. Maybe, he believes, if they don’t talk about and study racism, no one will know it exists. Or maybe it will just go away.

Erica Grieder wrote in the Houston Chronicle about Patrick’s plans to restrict academic freedom and to have the state spend $6 million on a “think tank” called the “Liberty Institute” to prevent errant professors from exercising their freedom to teach and speak. Last year, the state passed a law to ban CRT in K-12 schools, where (he thinks) children are being stuffed with left wing propaganda and with the claim that racism is real.

“I will not stand by and let looney Marxist UT professors poison the minds of young students with critical race theory,” he announced in a tweet.

“We banned it in publicly funded K-12 and we will ban it in publicly funded higher ed,” he continued, adding: “That’s why we created the Liberty Institute at UT.”

This was in response to a report, in the Austin American-Statesman, that the Faculty Council of the University of Texas at Austin had passed a resolution defending academic freedom.

In other words, Patrick, hearing of an innocuous nonbinding resolution in support of freedom, responded by threatening to pursue even more aggressive restrictions on freedom, while also wrapping himself in the banner of “liberty.” Naturally. This is from the lieutenant governor, arguably the state’s most powerful elected official.

Patrick, a rabid supporter of vouchers, as well as limits on free speech, is a public nuisance who menaces the freedom of students, teachers, and professors in Texas.

Categories Academic Freedom, Censorship, Freedom of Speech, Racism, Stupid, Texas
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