Mere days after Republican State Senator Sandra O’Brien (R-Ashtabula) re-introduced the Parental Education Freedom Act to empower parents to be the primary decision-makers regarding where and what type of education their children receive. An undercover investigation has revealed that school administrators in Columbus, Ohio, are sneaking Critical Race Theory (CRT) into the classroom.
As part of Accuracy in Media‘s investigation, numerous school administrators admitted that teachers are sneakily and covertly introducing CRT to their students unbeknownst to their parents and that they don’t plan to stop even if lawmakers pass legislation prohibiting this.
According to Matthew Boaz, executive director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Upper Arlington, Ohio, they will teach what they want regardless of any potential legislation.
“There is more than one way to skin a cat. If you pass a bill banning Critical Race Theory, but if you don’t cover programming and extracurricular activities, the message will still get out there. Oops,” Boaz said.
Boaz continued to explain that when a parent comes up to him with concern regarding a controversial topic rather than laying out the details of what’s going on he only discusses one facet emphasizing the focus on supporting the students.
“They are not going to be supportive if I lay out everything we are going to do. But if I talk to them about doing one thing in the name of supporting students, they probably won’t have an issue with this thing. By the time we get that thing established, if I start talking to them about some other thing they don’t realize that it was two things. They just realize that we are moving from where we are to where we are going but we are not going here because that would be liberal. In five years they look back and are like what the hell happened,” Boaz said.
Boaz also noted that when a parent asks if CRT is part of the curriculum if they say “no” the problem goes away.
According to Ashley Staten, an administrative assistant in Groveport, Ohio, her district uses similar tactics to keep parents in the dark.
“We have some parents that you know they don’t fully understand, so we ‘trick them,'” Staten said.
She also noted that her school uses COVID bailout money that the government dedicated to reopening schools safely during the pandemic and instead spends it on CRT indoctrination by placing a social worker and guidance counselor in every building and incorporating a lot of materials that focus on Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) which is a common Trojan Horse for CRT.
Another form of indoctrination of critical race theory is through a classroom news service called Newsela. Newsela is a partner of the far-left Southern Poverty Law Center, the Zinn Education Project, and the debunked New York Times 1619 project.
According to Staten, they use Newsela in a couple of different capacities.
“We use it for not only some of our core content, our social studies use it, and we use it as a supplement for language arts also,” Staten said.
Ohioans are using their tax dollars to pay these radicals who are deceiving them. These public school administrators are outspokenly committed to advancing social justice in the classroom; they are committed to teaching kids that capitalism is inherently racist and that America is systemically racist. When parents speak out against these practices, the schools dismiss them as dramatic or committing a slippery slope fallacy. However, the comments by the school administrators validate Ohio parents’ concerns.
Republican lawmakers are pushing for the passage of Senate Bill (SB) 11 to allow parents to make educational decisions that are best for their children and to help end the political games played by the public education system.
Under SB 11, the current EdChoice Scholarship Program would expand to all Ohio students for either a $5,500 scholarship (for grades K-8) or a $7,500 scholarship (for grades 9-12) to attend a private school. Families choosing to home-school would be eligible for a non-refundable state tax credit of up to $2,000 for reimbursement of educational expenses for their children.
According to Ohio’s largest Christian public policy organization, the Center for Christian Virtue‘s President Aaron Baer, “Ohio must no longer allow any student to be trapped in underperforming and radically progressive schools that undermine parental rights and authority.”
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Hannah Poling is a lead reporter at The Ohio Star and The Star News Network. Follow Hannah on Twitter @HannahPoling1. Email tips to [email protected]
