by Laurel Duggan
American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten shared an article that claimed parents do not have a right to shape what their children learn in school.
“Great piece on parents’ rights and #publicschools,” Weingarten commented on the article by The Washington Post. The piece describes movements by parents to influence what schools teach their children as “paranoid” and a “frenzy,” and it characterizes parental involvement as an obstacle of sorts to children “[thinking] for themselves.”
The piece calls resistance to critical race theory a “white racial grievance.” It also suggests that parents unhappy with public schools should simply opt their children out of public schools and pay to send them to private school.
Ten minutes earlier, Weingarten tweeted that “parents are our partners.”
Parental involvement in education improves grades and test scores, according to Tina Descovich, Brevard school board member and co-founder of Moms for Liberty. Descovich said that parents “have the fundamental right and the responsibility to direct the upbringing, education and care of our children.” She said that “there is no school board policy or union leader that can change that.”
The American Federation of Teachers (AFT), one of the largest teachers unions in the U.S., did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
Schools boards have become a political battleground over the last two years as schools responded to the COVID-19 pandemic, created policies for transgender students, and proposed curricula related gender, sexuality and race.
Former President Barack Obama waded into the Virginia gubernatorial race Saturday, calling parental concerns about education “phony, trumped-up culture wars.” The Loudoun County Public Schools board in Virginia was recently accusedof covering up an alleged rape of a female student in a girls’ bathroom before passing a district-wide policy allowing students to use bathrooms based on gender identity.
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Laurel Duggan is a reporter at Daily Caller News Foundation.
Photo “Randi Weingarten” by AFGE. CC BY 2.0.
Homeschooling is a legal instructional option in all 50 states and national homeschooling rates grew rapidly from 1999 to 2012 but had since remained steady at around 3.3%. However, the global COVID-19 pandemic has sparked new interest in homeschooling and the appeal of alternative school arrangements has suddenly exploded.