“LGBT” Teachers Conference in Boston – Part II: Pushing ‘Gay’ clubs in Middle Schools

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The latest push: “Gay” clubs for kids in middle schools. Here’s how they get them in — and what comes with them.

The homosexual-transgender movement is working hard to indoctrinate schoolchildren as young as possible. By far, the most effective way is to get them into school-based “gay” clubs that are run by activist, often radical, adults, but though otherwise unsupervised. They have been working at this for several years (see our 2008 report) but are now ramping up their efforts considerably.

We reported last week, on this year’s annual GLSEN Conference in Boston which brought together LGBT teachers, activists, and supportive administrators to discuss their latest tactics for the schools.

A prominent part covered strategies for setting up “gay-straight alliance” (GSA) clubs in as many middle schools as possible, given that most high schools now have them.

Getting kids to feel involved — especially middle school students — is a major tactic of the LGBT movement. These buttons were given out at the GLSEN Conference in Boston.

At that conference, there were kids as young as 11 and 12, and that younger age group was clearly the focus of much of the conference.

Middle school student gives speech at LGBT conference opening session

Middle school are such an important target that GLSEN recruited an activist “LGBT” middle school student to address the conference’s opening session. She said she’s bisexual (in middle school!) and that her sister is lesbian.

The girl spoke about how she helped organize the “Day of Silence” in her middle school. She said that one teacher was reluctant to put up the posters because of parent conferences that evening, saying that parents might not be comfortable seeing it. The girl labeled the teacher “ignorant” and said the teacher is “no longer working at the school” (which brought a cheer).

She added that “kids are figuring out who they are younger than ever” (i.e., being persuaded to self-identify as L, G, B, or T) and that “we need to create a safe environment for them in the lower grades.” This was a mantra that was repeated again and again in the conference. (“Safe environment” is the Orwellian term for a school that aggressively enforces pro-“LGBT” sexual ideology and suppresses all dissent.)

Given that middle school students would not have these ideas and talking points on their own, this shows how well the adult activists instruct them.

Helping kids be “safe” at school is the Orwellian term for aggressively enforcing pro-“LGBT” sexual ideology — and more importantly, suppressing all dissent. In particular, it’s used very effectively to confront any criticism by adults, including parents.

The workshop: “Starting a Middle School GSA”

The LGBT movement is getting serious about the lower grades. One of the prominent workshops at the GLSEN conference was “Starting a Middle School GSA.”

At first glance, a “gay” club for middle school students would seem beyond something even most liberals would buy into. But that’s simply another challenge for the movement to overcome. After all, it wasn’t too long ago that ANY “gay” club at all, even in high school, was beyond the pale.

Here is how the conference program listed it:

3.1 Starting a Middle School GSA: A Sustainable, Grassroots Approach
Practical advice and encouragement for students, staff, parents and community members who would like to establish a sustainable GSA in their local middle school.

Presenter(s): Anna Watson, Friends of the Ottoson Middle School [Arlington, MA] GSA

This workshop gave step-by-step instructions by a seasoned activist.

The presenter, Anna Watson, started out by saying that she believes that “coming out” is a “life-saving adventure” and that kids are coming out at younger and younger ages. Thus, they need support groups to help them do that.

She told the workshop attendees that she has been an “LGBTQ” activist and organizer for several years. In particular, she is interested in starting GSA-type groups for young people.

“Queering the ‘Burbs Since 1992.”  Anna Watson gave out this card at the workshop. She is no casual activist, obviously.

She said that in city schools there are lots of GSAs, but it’s different in the suburbs. This is likely because the parents are more attentive to what’s happening in the schools. She used the term “suburban gap” and said that just a few people with a lot of energy can make it happen.

The strategy: Build up incrementally then hit with petition!

Her goal at the Ottoson Middle School in Arlington, Mass., was to put in a GSA with “permanent club” status — with a line item in the school budget for financial support.

At first, the principal was resistant, even though Arlington is a very liberal town.

The homosexual movement has found that a very effective approach for overcoming resistant school officials is using a petition as a pressure tactic, along with other maneuvers.

Watson’s tactic was to do incremental, smaller things to set up an informal GSA and have it become active as much as possible in the school. They would get everything else in place so that there would be no procedural or other excuse not to allow it. Then they would go over the head of the principal and blitz the superintendent with a petition — with as large a force as necessary — to push it over the top with a demand it be given permanent “club” status in the school.

The Petition presented to the Superintendent (and Anna Watson’s timeline of events)

That strategy worked perfectly. Here’s the timeline of events that Watson described:

1. Starting in the fall of 2010, Watson began discussing it with the principal. Since the principal had an interest in anti-bullying, Watson positioned it as an anti-bullying group.
2. Spring 2011: Watson established an “informal” GSA group at the school that met every other week. She submitted a grant to the local “Arlington Education Fund” for funding.
3. Fall 2011: The grant was awarded from the local group. The GSA’s outside activities, including a stipend to the adult staff advisor, were now funded and it started meeting every week.
4. Spring 2012: The GSA began giving out “Human Rights” awards to students at the school. They also attended the GLSEN Conference that year, brought in “educational” groups, and established a “peer leader” program in the school.
5. Fall 2012: They persuaded the principal’s discretionary fund, the PTO, and the Parent Advisory Council to give the GSA funding. They also had volunteers raise money in the community.
6. Fall 2013: The petition was put together and formally presented to the Superintendent, accompanied by a lot of pressure.  The superintendent easily capitulated and granted the GSA permanent club status and a budget item in the school budget. They achieved their goals.

The principal and any other staff who might have been resistant were completely steamrolled. It’s a strategy that can be replicated at other schools where there is any significant resistance.

Other comments at the workshop

Many of the other people at the workshop were experienced GSA activists. Some of their remarks and ideas on starting a GSA were interesting:

  • Some schools have made it easier by having a less overt title, such as calling it an “affinity” group rather than a GSA.
  • One person said, “For school clubs, no permission slips are needed. Thus parents do not know. The same is true for GSAs. You don’t have to let your parents know. There is a sort of goodwill around it.”
  • They always say that GSA’s are about “school safety” and suicide prevention. They also remember to make a point to say that GSAs “are not about sex.”
  • One teacher recommended that the GSA follow the GLSEN “Ally week” program. (See more on that below.)

How to get kids to come to their first GSA meeting? Most middle school kids would not normally think of going to a “gay” club. So the LGBT activists use a variety of tricks and misleading tactics. Once the kids are there, it’s easier to persuade or pressure them to keep coming back.

Here are some of the ideas brought up by activists at the workshop:

  • Announcing a “cheese & food” party.
  • Getting the school football coach to come is a great draw for bringing kids to a GSA meeting.
  • One school put up posters with the message: “You don’t have to be gay to be in the GSA.”

For a larger view click on the flyer.

The LGBT movement will use any tactic they can to lure kids into their “gay” clubs for the first time. GLSEN passed out this information at the Conference.

What is Watson’s next project? Apparently, her next goal is to set up AGLY (“Arlington Gay and Lesbian Youth”) which would probably be a youth/adult “gay” club not connected with the school. There are several of those around the state, supported at least in part by taxpayers.

GSAs: A poisonous experience for vulnerable kids

In our experience going back nearly twenty years working with parents and kids, the GSAs in the schools are emotionally poisonous and physically dangerous to vulnerable kids, many of whom have serious psychological issues to deal with. And GSAs are often run by radical “gay” adults who themselves are psychologically dysfunctional.

GSAs persuade students that homosexuality, transgenderism, etc., is perfectly normal to engage in. They take troubled kids and tell them that if they feel “different” or that they “don’t fit in” then they’re probably really “gay” or “transgender.” This causes enormous trauma down the road. We’ve seen that these kinds of “clubs” lead kids into engaging in perverse sexual activities.

Also in GSAs: Indoctrinating kids in radical “queer theory” as “LGBT allies”

But additionally, a purpose of GSAs is to indoctrinate the kids (including those calling themselves “straight”) in the radical ideas of the LGBT movement, which they term “queer theory.” Most people are not aware just how extreme this is. Then the GSA leaders have the kids spread those ideas to the rest of the school through events like the “Day of Silence”, “Gay History Month”, and “Transgender Awareness Day.”

When getting this training, the kids are told that this helps them become “allies” of the LGBTs. The concept of being an “ally” pushed very hard throughout the schools. It becomes another identity for the kids in their fight for so-called social justice.

At the GLSEN Conference, this “training” pamphlet, titled “Ally Packet” was given out. It’s a pretty frightening example of what the LGBT movement teaches children, and what parents know almost nothing about.

“Ally Packet” given out at GLSEN Conference

Here are just a few examples and excerpts from the 8-page pamphlet. THIS is what the LGBT movement is teaching schoolchildren:

What is an Ally?
An ally is a member of the dominant social group who takes a stand against social injustice directed at target group(s) – for example .. . heterosexual individuals who speak out against heterosexism and homophobia. An ally works to be an agenda of social change rather than an agenda of oppression.

Characteristics of an ally
Recognizing that unlearning oppressive beliefs is a lifelong process.

Appropriate Group Terminology
Genderqueer: A term used by individuals, especially transgender youth, who identify as neither male nor female, or as both, and who often seek to blur gender lines.

Appropriate Social Justice Terminology
Gender-Normative Privilege: The benefits and advantages that gender-normative people receive in genderist culture.

Inappropriate Terminology
Homosexual: A clinical term for gay men and sometimes lesbians.
Transvestite: An outdated clinical term for crossdressers.

What are Biphobia, Homophobia, and Transphobia?
Example of Biphobia: Believing that bisexuals are confused or indecisive about their sexuality. Example of Transphobia: Believing that cross-dressing is a sexual perversion or that people who cross-dress do so for sexual gratification.

How to Be an Ally to LGBT People
Validate people’s gender expression. For example, if a person assigned male at birth identifies as female, refer to that person as “she” and use her chosen name.
Educate yourself about LGBT histories, cultures, and concerns.
Support and involve yourself in LGBT organizations and causes.

What is Heterosexual Privilege?
You can belong to the religious denomination of your choice and know that your sexuality will not be denounced by its religious leaders.
You can expect to see people of your sexuality positively presented on nearly every television show and in nearly every movie.

Myths and Realities of LGBT Life
Myth: The majority of child molesters are gay men. Reality: Very few gay men molest children. Myth: Bisexual men are largely responsible for the spread of HIV/AIDS to heterosexual women. Reality: This stereotyping of bisexual men ignores the realities of AIDS. It is unsafe sexual practices and needle-sharing behavior, not membership in a particular group, that spreads HIV.

Lots of help from your tax dollars

In Massachusetts, once these “clubs” are set up, they get substantial organizational and financial help from the state. This will likely become more prevalent in other states.

Among other things, the Mass. State Department of Elementary and Secondary Education maintains a staff to make sure that the GSA clubs across the state are properly organized and that the school is cooperating with them. The Department also provides training for GSA adult leaders.

In addition, the state-funded Mass LGBTQ Youth Commission goes into the schools and works directly with students and pushes LGBT programs statewide.

Just the beginning

The GSAs and the “training” are, unfortunately, just the foundation of what the LGBT movement is doing in the nation’s high schools and now, the middle schools.

In upcoming posts we will reveal more from the 2014 GLSEN Conference. As we’ve said, most people are completely uninformed of what the LGBT movement does with schoolchildren . . . and where this leads beyond the school doors.

National Council on Teacher Quality Gets Caught in a Data Collecting Lie

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NCTQ-300x240The National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) will be “grading” university-level, traditional teacher training programs again soon.

Last year, 2013, they released this report on June 18. They “grade” in a superficial manner, relying upon program artifacts to form skewed judgments– judgments that they publish in US News and World Report and that are meant to damage the credibility of traditional teacher training in favor of the privatization of American public education. Just consider who ends up on their advisory board. (For example, in a profound irony, NCTQ’s board even includes five-weeks-of-training, temporary-teacher organization Teach for America founder Wendy Kopp.)

Georgia State University Professor Emeritus of Science Education Jack Hassard had this to note about reading NCTQ’s “report” on traditional teacher training programs:

When you read the NCTQ report it seems as if teacher prep institutions are the enemy. …All of the data come from paper or online documents. None involved interviews or discussions with people at the teacher prep institutions. As hard as this is believe, it is the pattern that the NCTQ has followed since it was formed by the Thomas Fordham Institute. [Emphasis added.]

Passing maligned judgment is what NCTQ does. And because their reporting is done with much fanfare and is backed by reformer cash (Gates alone has paid NCTQ $11 million since 2005), the public views NCTQ as a credible source for information on teacher education.

NCTQ is the creation of the Fordham Institute, a pro-privatization organization that is pushing hard for the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), having itself taken over $6 million from Gates, $2 million of which is earmarked for the CCSS push. Fordham Institute’s VP Mike Petrilli is even willing to tell states with comparable or better standards that they should retain CCSS.

Back to NCTQ’s shallow “reviews” of teacher training:

The beauty of NCTQ’s grading teacher training programs based upon artifacts (as opposed to on-site observations and in-person, open communication with the evaluated programs) is that NCTQ is still able to complete its “evaluations” even when programs do not wish to participate.

As far as non-accredited, self-appointed traditional-teacher-training policeman NCTQ is concerned, programs are not allowed to refuse the NCTQ intrusion.

NCTQ insists upon gathering teacher training program artifacts, and it will resort to deceptive tactics to get those artifacts.

Consider this email sent to a Fordham University teacher education professor even today (May 23, 2014). The entire account was forwarded to me by Fordham University Associate Professor John Craven. (Note: Fordham University is not affiliated with the Fordham Institute):

Dear Professor **,

I was informed you would be able to assist me.  My daughter is currently looking at different grad programs.  Being a teacher myself, I have a question about the student teaching aspect of the program.  I was on the school website and couldn’t find how many formal observations are conducted by the university supervisor during the student teaching semester.  Could you please elaborate on this?

Thank you.

Emilie Baker [Emphasis added.]

An odd email: A teacher “parent” writing on behalf of a college-age “student” and singling out the number of formal observations??

The Fordham professor to whom this email was addressed wrote the following to Craven and others:

I’m pretty sure this would be an attempt to get information from us for NCTQ (or similar) purposes.  Have any of you received something similar?

Teacher training faculty are apparently alert to NCTQ’s tactics.

Craven responded to “Emilie Baker” on behalf of the initial Fordham faculty member:

Dear Ms. Baker,

As coordinator, I’ve been forwarded a request you recently made regarding our program.  Firstly, let me thank you for your interest in our programs at Fordham.  Secondly, I understand you are seeking to better understand our clinically rich programs (funded by NYSED) and scholarship opportunities for initial certification.  It would be my pleasure to mail you a copy of our scholarship program, student handbook, and requirements for field experiences.  Following internal policies, I need to send hard copies of these materials  to interested prospects and potential applicants.  Accordingly, can you please indicate where you would like these materials sent?  I’ll have my graduate assistant send out the information immediately upon our response to this email.  Again, thank you for your interest in the programs at Fordham.

JC

“Emilie Baker” offers the following response– including an address:

Great, thanks so much!  I’d like it all sent to the following address:

Andrew McCorry 

1823 W. Henderson St, #3

Chicago, IL 60657

Well, now. Who is Andrew McCorry in Chicago?

Craven investigated and uncovered the following Linkedin bio:

Andrew McCorryAndrew McCorry
Research Analyst at National Council on Teacher Quality

Greater Chicago Area 
Nonprofit Organization Management

Uh oh. Looks like NCTQ has been found out.

As for “Emilie Baker”: No information that clearly connects her to NCTQ is available. However, NCTQ is known for hiring students to collect teacher training program artifacts (as noted in these Central Washington University October 2011 meeting minutes).

In his review of the 2013 NCTQ “report,” Hassard notes the unorthodox “student solicitation” role:

…I’ve never read a study in which researchers demanded cooperation from the research participants. The NCTQ policy is very clear. If you don’t give us what we want we’ll use legal means to get it. They also “reached out” to a few students to supply materials that were requested from the administration.

The so-called NCTQ researchers not only resort to coercive strategies to get data (syllabi, curriculum, etc.), but you get the feeling that they snoop around universities, trying to find what texts are used by bookstore shopping.

The NCTQ “snooping” apparently incorporates direct-yet-deceptive solicitation of information from university departments of education.

NCTQ should really better “train” its information gatherers in their would-be-deceptive practices.

Otherwise, they might reveal more information about NCTQ than they manage to gather– and that NCTQ “research analyst” Andrew McCorry might prefer.

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New Florida School District Policy: Spy on Students’ Behavior when Off Campus

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Sarasota County School Board Members

Sarasota County School Board members: Back row – Dr. Todd (resigned), Goodwin, Kovach. Front row – Zucker and Chair Brown.

The School Board of Sarasota County, Florida will vote to adopt a revised bullying and harassment policy at the June 17, 2014 board meeting. According to Scott Ferguson, Communications Specialist Sarasota County Schools, “The changes to the bullying and harassment policy were recommended by staff based on a state Department of Education requirement that Florida School Board bullying/harassment policies include staff members in addition to students. Staff also recommended clarification about cyber-bullying.” [Emphasis added]

Paragraph I-B-5 is new and covers cyber-bullying. The Bullying and Harassment 2.70 revised policy states:

B. The District upholds that bullying or harassment of any student or school employee is prohibited

1. During any education program or activity conducted by a public K-12 educational institution;
2. During any school-related or school-sponsored program or activity;
3. On a school bus of a public K-12 educational institution; or
4. Through the use of data or computer software that is accessed through a computer, computer system, or computer network of a public K- 12 education institution; or
5. Through the use of data or computer software that is accessed at a non-school–related location, activity, function, or program or through the use of technology or an electronic device that is not owned, leased, or used by a school district or school, if the bullying substantially interferes with or limits the victim’s ability to participate in or benefit from the services, activities, or opportunities offered by a school or substantially disrupts the education process or orderly operation of a school or department. This paragraph does not require a school to staff or monitor any non-school-related activity, function, or program.

Parents and concerned citizens are questioning the Sarasota County School Boards authority to prohibit or be involved in the “monitoring” of  student activities while off campus. Many find this a clear over reach in authority and can place students, and others, in a position to “monitor” (spy on) fellow students. The broad language, while “not requiring” it, can allow schools and staff to monitor students’ non-related activities, functions and programs.

Paragraph II-B defines cyber-bullying as:

Cyberbullying means bullying through the use of technology or any electronic communication, which includes, but is not limited to, any transfer of signs, signals, writing, images, sounds, data or intelligence of any nature transmitted in whole or in part by a wire, radio, electromagnetic system, photoelectronic system, or photooptical system, including, but not limited to, electronic mail, Internet communications, instant messages, or facsimile communications. Cyberbullying includes the creation of a webpage or webblog in which the creator assumes the identity of another person, or the knowing impersonation of another person as the author of posted content or messages, if the creation or impersonation creates any of the conditions enumerated in the definition of bullying. Cyberbullying also includes the distribution by electronic means of a communication to more than one person or the posting of material on an electronic medium that may be accessed by one or more persons, if the distribution or posting creates any of the conditions enumerated in the definition of bullying. [My emphasis]

Is this a fix to a problem that does not exist? There are approximately 40,000 students in Sarasota County district schools. According to Ferguson:

Regarding data on bullying, here are the responses to questions posed to high school students in our district in a recent survey:

During the past 12 months, have you ever been bullied on school property?

(3,408 respondents)
a. Yes

22.3
b. No

77.7
During the past 12 months, have you ever been electronically bullied, such as through e-mail, chat rooms, instant messaging, Web sites, or text messaging?

(3409 respondents)
a. Yes

18.9
b. No

81.1

From the start of the current school year through May 7, there have been 16 expulsions for bullying and 34 expulsions for threats/intimidation.

According to the districts 2014 data .0004 percent of students have been expelled for bullying. The number is so small, yet the policy revisions are so broad. Is the intent to stop bullying or something more nefarious?

Is the Sarasota County School Board using cyber-bullying to infringe on the First Amendment rights of students to freely express themselves on and off campus? Is this school board becoming the NSA of education monitoring of all digital communications? Is this policy a bridge too far in trying to control the behavior of children beyond the school grounds? Is this policy an attempt to stifle students from speaking out based on their beliefs?

Is this policy using a sledge hammer to pound down a ten penny nail?

Children will be children. Peer pressure is both part of growing up and part of life.  It is not the role of this or any other school board to decide what is proper behavior and what is not in the cyber world. That is best left up to parents.

Peter Baklinski writes on a different twist to anti-bulling campaigns, like that in Sarasota County:

While much of the past 15 years has left the goals of the gay ant-bullying scheme carefully unspoken, a recent article in an online homosexual publication let the cat out of the bag.

“Why would we push anti-bullying programs or social studies classes that teach kids about the historical contributions of famous queers unless we wanted to deliberately educate children to accept queer sexuality as normal?,” wrote Daniel Villarreal on Queerty.com, a website that promotes the gay agenda.

“We want educators to teach future generations of children to accept queer sexuality. In fact, our very future depends on it. Recruiting children? You bet we are,” he added.

“I for one,” continued Villarreal, “certainly want tons of school children to learn that it’s OK to be gay, that people of the same sex should be allowed to legally marry each other, and that anyone can kiss a person of the same sex without feeling like a freak. And I would very much like for many of these young boys to grow up and start f**ing men.”

For a fuller description please see the special report on Jennings by Mass Resistance.

For those who wish to contact the Sarasota County School Board and District staff about the new policy:

To email all School Board members:
boardmembers@sarasotacountyschools.net

Jane Goodwin Chair
jane.goodwin@sarasotacountyschools.net

Frank Kovach Vice Chair 
frank.kovach@sarasotacountyschools.net

Shirley Brown
shirley.brown@sarasotacountyschools.net

Caroline Zucker 
caroline.zucker@sarasotacountyschools.net

District 1: To be announced

Zoe Marshall,
Administrative Assistant
zoe.marshall@sarasotacountyschools.net

Phone: (941) 927-9000 ext. 31147

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“LGBT” Teachers Conference in Boston – Part II: Pushing ‘Gay’ clubs in middle schools

Leftists Cancel School Honors Night — Too “Exclusive”

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It’s increasingly the case in America that the nail that sticks up gets hammered down. A case in point is Archie R. Cole Middle School in East Greenwich, Rhode Island. Writes East Greenwich Patch:

Citing concerns about the “exclusive nature” of the annual honors night at Archie R. Cole Middle School, school officials have decided to scrap the tradition.

Instead, students who would normally be recognized at the annual spring tradition will be honored during team-based recognition ceremonies and graduation.

The notice was sent to parents over the weekend in an e-mail signed by School Principal Alexis Meyer and Assistant Principal Dan Seger.

Certainly, we must battle feelings-bruising exclusivity. Thus do I have a question: Will Principal Meyer and Assistant Principal Seger now also lobby to eliminate the position of “principal” or at least for the elimination of the term? After all, as Dictionary.com informs, the word means, “1.first or highest in rank, importance, value, etc.; chief; foremost.” And the Online Etymology Dictionary states, “c.1300, ‘main, principal, chief, dominant, most important;’ also ‘great, large,’ from Old French principal ‘main, most important,’ of persons, ‘princely, high-ranking’ (11c.), from Latin principalis ‘first in importance; original, primitive,’ from princeps (see prince).”

That sounds awfully excusive to me. Note that “Princeps” was an official title of Roman Emperors that translated into “First Citizen.” And I can’t imagine that these egalitarian educators could tolerate such anti-egalitarian positions and titles. Or do I have it wrong?

Is it that refusal to recognize achievement is only to be applied to other people’s achievement?

This much reminds me of Elizabeth “Fauxcahontas” Warren, now senator from Taxachusetts. She not only supported affirmative action while saying nothing about the remarkably un-diverse faculty she was part of at Harvard Law School, but then — despite being white enough for two people — claimed Cherokee heritage, presumably to benefit from the Affirmative Action Daily Double: being female and minority. (Give her credit, though, as she could have gone for the Trifecta and claimed lesbian status, too.)

So I guess it’s poor blue-collar guys, such as the firemen in New Haven, Connecticut, who have to maintain Warren’s principles. Meanwhile, education’s other elitists will maintain their principals and whatever other exclusiveness benefits them. As with the Marxists in the former USSR, North Korea and elsewhere — who had/ have the best residences, cars, vacations and other free-market fruits — leftist policies are for the little people.

Contact Selwyn Duke, follow him on Twitter or log on to SelwynDuke.com.

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RELATED VIDEO: Teacher admits he helped write Common Core to end “white privilege”:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/LQ8Nr3_2724[/youtube]

Common Core Assignment is Virulent anti-Semitic Propaganda

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Photo: While on an inspection tour of the newly liberated Ohrdruf concentration camp, General Dwight Eisenhower and a party of high ranking U.S. Army officers, including Generals Bradley, Patton, and Eddy, view the charred remains of prisoners that were burned upon a section of railroad track during the evacuation of the camp. Also pictured is Jules Grad (third from the left taking notes), correspondent for the “Stars and Stripes” U.S. Army newspaper.

In April of 2014, two thousand eighth graders in a California Common Core school system were given an 18-page group project assignment requiring them to “read and discuss multiple, credible articles” on the issue of whether or not the Holocaust “was an actual event in history, or merely a political scheme created to influence public emotion and gain wealth.”   The project, consuming seven full days of class time, included a multi-page required-reading “credible source” article from a website containing hundreds of pages of anti-Semitic propaganda, that begins with the declaration, “Within five minutes, any intelligent, open-minded person can be convinced that the Holocaust gassings of World War II are a profitable hoax.”

Ohrdruf_Eisenhower_04650The “credible” article, which the thousands of students were mandated to read, next cites the findings of Fred A. Leuchter, described in the article as America’s leading specialist on execution equipment, finding no evidence of homicidal gas chambers in Auschwitz and other death camps.  In fact, Mr. Leuchter, named “Mr. Death” in a documentary film about his life, had no formal training or education in methods of execution.  He claimed that he was asked by the defense team in a foreign Holocaust denial trial to take residue samples from gas chambers and that he found no evidence of the gassings.

Eerily, Mr. Death spent his honeymoon in Auschwitz; yet he is the scholarly, scientific source of “credible” evidence presented to a captive audience of students required, in order to pass a course, to read an article that touts a man who proudly honeymooned at the Auschwitz Hotel, which had served as the German officers’ quarters during the Holocaust.

In order to testify in favor of a Holocaust denier, Mr. Leuchter surreptitiously sneaked into crematoria in various death camps and illegally chiseled chunks of their walls as “samples” for chemical testing, using his bride as his “look-out.”  Needless to say, she divorced this man, who testified in a courtroom on Hitler’s birthday that the Holocaust gassings were a hoax, based upon his report which was later translated into dozens of languages and featured in a special edition of the Aryan Nations Newsletter.

As a popular speaker at Neo-Nazi rallies, Mr. Leuchter denied the mass gas murders of Jews, saying:

It’s a tough job to execute several hundred people at once ….  I think it would be easier to shoot them or hang them ….  Why didn’t they just shoot them [the Jews]?  Bullets would have been cheaper than doing this.

The Rialto group project’s “credible article” citing Mr. Leuchter’s scientific evidence of the Holocaust as a hoax also purveys every conceivable anti-Semitic claim – that the “Diary of Anne Frank is a hoax” and that Israel receives $35 billion per year from the United States, such that “every family in America could afford a brand new Mercedes Benz” were it not for “the irrepressible Zionist influence and control of our country.”

Mohammad Z Islam

Mohammad Z. Islam, Superintendent Rialto School District

While the Rialto School District, with a city population that is 68% Hispanic and 16% Black, admitted under pressure that the assignment was “a mistake,” the evidence shows that the group project had been reviewed at multiple levels for at least many months and distributed to middle schools in February, when teachers were asked for comments prior to compelling students to read the insidious hate materials against Jews.  Importantly, according to the Superintendent, Mohammad Z. Islam, who initially defended the lengthy and weighty Common Core group project, there were never any complaints received from parents, teachers, or administrators about the project, until it was widely exposed by the media.  Thus, the virulent anti-Semitic theme of and materials included in the project were not “a mistake” until the public outcry forced an apology under duress. [You may reach Superintendent Islam at mislam@rialto.k12.ca.us]

Since when is it educationally sound or morally decent to subject captive students to hate propaganda, repeatedly described by their school as “credible”?  As an educator for 36 years, with a doctorate in education and child psychology, I consider the assignment to be abusive to students and a gross violation of their inherent right to receive school materials that uplift their minds rather than thrust them into the depths of delusional hatred.

The actual question before the thousands of students infected with the pernicious materials they were required to read should be simply, “Is this assignment a hoax?”  Assuredly, of the 2,000 children directly affected by the forced reading of hate literature and thousands more indirectly impacted, many have been irreparably poisoned against Jews.  Forced resignations of the Superintendent and other defenders of the project should follow from the forced readings.  The core of the project within Common Core should be thoroughly cleansed from the curriculum, although the young affected minds can never be cleansed of the filthy, fallacious thoughts planted in them by well-educated educators.

What is the cost of a hoax?  This hoax has cost human minds.  Sadly, the mind damage was done before the hoax was exposed, and the great-grandchildren of the Greatest Generation are left to question not only the Holocaust but also the enormous loss of American lives and limbs in defeating “a hoax.”

Did our veterans fight for “a hoax”?  That part of the curriculum materials was “mistakenly” omitted – the testimonies, written records, films, and photographs of death camp liberators and Holocaust Survivors, the real eyewitnesses to history’s most hideous acts of human inhumanity.

RELATED STORY: Less than half under age 35 are aware of Holocaust: International Poll

‘Gay’ teachers conference reveals latest plans for school children

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“GLBT” teachers conference in Boston reveals latest plans to push homosexuality even further into schools. Well organized, fueled with taxpayer dollars.

Exclusive report from MassResistance. Coming to your school soon.

What are the latest homosexual and transgender tactics targeting your schools? In the school “culture wars” nothing happens by accident. It is usually the result of careful planning and execution. Here is a look behind the scenes.

Homosexual teachers, school officials, and education activists (and their “allies”) — along with children as young as fifth grade — converged at GLSEN’s 2014 Annual Conference in Boston last month. At this “hands-on” event they to introduced and discussed their latest strategies for thoroughly pushing homosexuality and transgender issues and behaviors into the minds of kids.

The conference program.

Powerful national group heavily connected to state education system

GLSEN (Gay Lesbian and Straight Education Network) is the nation’s largest homosexual and transgender activist organization working inside schools in all 50 states. It has set up “gay straight alliance” student clubs (GSAs) inside thousands of high schools (and even some middle schools) across the country. GLSEN pushes a wide range of psychologically penetrating homosexual and transgender programs activities into the schools, such as the controversial “Day of Silence”. It also directly organizes and trains teachers to integrate their techniques throughout the curriculum. Founded in the early 1990s by super-activist Kevin Jennings, it has a multi-million dollar budget, lavishly funded by corporate America and private foundations. The conference program.

This just one of the things GLSEN is implementing in high schools and middle schools across America.

In 2000, the Boston-area GLSEN Conference gained national outrage when MassResistance (then known as Parents’ Rights Coalition) exposed the sickening “Fistgate” workshop which involved adults teaching young kids explicit sex acts. Nevertheless, the Massachusetts Legislature (and corporate America) has continued to support GLSEN.

In Massachusetts, much of GLSEN’s activities in the schools are funded with taxpayer dollars though the Massachusetts Commission for GLBT Youth. They are also closely coordinated through the State Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

All-day conference in Boston

The all-day conference was held on Saturday, April 5, 2014, at Madison Park Vocational High School in Boston. It included keynote addresses outlining their overall plans and direction, and 21 workshops dedicated to specific topics and strategies, by both national and local experts.

Madison Park Vocational High School in Boston.

It was attended by approximately 325 people. About two-thirds were students who were brought in from across the state — from middle schools, high schools, and (according to the conference organizers) some from elementary schools.

MassResistance was also there that day. We attended the keynote sessions, workshop sessions, and just about everything else.

The other objective: Using kids as the vanguard in schools

The GLSEN Conference is run by adults and is meant to train adults. But they go to great lengths to bring in as many students as possible, no matter how young. They come from schools across the state, and usually seem part of a “gay club” or affiliated with a homosexual activist on the school’s staff, such as a teacher or guidance counselor.

That’s because there are big roles for kids in the GLSEN strategies. Part of that is to be the “hands on” teaching of the new techniques. In the workshops, there is a fair amount of role-playing, for instance.

But even more important, the students are seen as the vanguard within the schools, to bring these ideas into the schools and interact with other kids and with authority figures in a way that other staff members can’t. For example, kids are trained to help form the gay clubs and other activities, how to talk about “coming out” to their friends, and how to deal with stubborn school administrators who resist these programs.

Students at the conference taking in the latest propaganda and marching orders.

The Conference’s keynote speeches: Setting the tone for the kids

The opening session that morning included two keynote speeches, both directed at the students. In many ways, these set the tone for the rest of the day. A general message we got from both speeches was that there is no sense of truth, or reality, or of right and wrong. Any way you want to express yourself in life is fine.

The first keynote speaker was Eliza Byard, Executive Director of GLSEN, from their New York office. She told the kids about the necessity of being “out and proud.” She goes to a lot of schools, both here and overseas, and makes it a point to counsel kids and teachers to publicly “come out of the closet” and declare their homosexuality. And GLSEN will support you, she said. She’s also pushing the radical “pronoun” issue — taken from so-called Queer Theory and coming into schools — that people can decide for themselves whether they’re “he” or “she” or something else, and everyone else needs to adjust to that.

Eliza Byard, Executive Director of GLSEN, from New York, giving her keynote speech to the attendees.

The second speaker was a student from western Massachusetts. who talked about her experiences as a GLSEN activist in her high school. She talked about “creating change” in the school, and how she does that, working with both students and adults. Small groups can make change, she said. But she said that “space must be available” for that to happen – i.e., accommodating teachers and school officials and “guidance by adults who allow youth to express themselves and not stifle themselves.”

Then, a middle school student spoke about how she helped organize the “Day of Silence” in her school. One teacher balked at having posters put up because of parent conferences that evening, saying that parents might not be comfortable that. The girl labeled the teacher “ignorant” and “no longer working at the school” (which caused a cheer). She said she’s a bisexual (in middle school!) and that her sister is a lesbian.

These stickers were given out.

The workshops

Below are some of the workshops from this year’s conference. This is what they’re training teachers and administrators to do, as well as the activist students. In one way or another, this is what you can expect to see coming up in your schools. A few of the topics had been introduced in past GLSEN conferences and are being refined. But all of them are about changing the schools and the minds of children in some way.

1.1 The Trevor Project: Empowering Youth to Save Lives!

Wondering how you can make an impact? Learn about The Trevor Project! We’ll discuss language, stereotypes and how to respond to signs of suicide. [Note: The “Trevor Project” steers kids to books portraying “gay” sex. See our MassResistance report.]

Presenter(s): Kate McGravey, Manchester Essex Regional School District; Jaclyn Kinsman, North Reading Public Schools

1.5 When a Teacher Makes a Gender Transition

We will share the successful experience of a faculty member’s gender transition at Milton Academy, K-12, as well as communications strategies, documents and lessons learned.

Presenter(s): Marshall Carter & Sam Landau, Milton Academy

1.6 Strengthening Youth/Adult Collaboration

This workshop will provide participants with helpful tips for achieving healthy, successful collaborations between youth and adults in school and community based settings. [Note: The “youth and adult” connection in the homosexual movement is particularly disturbing.]

Presenter(s): Jessica Flaherty & Giftson Joseph, BAGLY, Inc.

1. 7 Teaching “Out”

This workshop is a space for LGBTQ people to discuss the personal, professional, and political impact of being an LGBTQ teacher, particularly in a K-12 setting.[Note that this starts in Kindergarten!]

Presenter(s): Ryan Ambuter, Paulo Freire Social Justice Charter School

2.1 Supporting Transgender Youth in Schools

This workshop will serve as both a Trans* 101 and a resource for those looking for more knowledge about the rights of transgender students in schools.

Presenter(s): Ryan Ambuter, Paulo Freire Social Justice Charter School

2.2 When They Jump to Conclusions: Education on LGBTQ Topics

LGBTQ youth are often approached as “experts” on LGBTQ topics, by their parents and peers. Join QSA students in this engaging discussion on this multi-layered issue.

Presenter(s): Boston Area Homeschoolers’ QSA

2.5 Reversing the Erasure of LGBT History

Using Los Angeles Unified School District and Lowell School District as case studies, this workshop examines strategies for introducing vital LGBT inclusive history curriculum into schools. [Note: The concept of “LGBT History” is an important psychological tool for legitimizing it to kids. It also introduces deviant figures such as Harvey Milk and NAMBLA activist Harry Hay as worthy of admiration.]

Presenter(s): Debra Fowler, Debbie Costello & Erin Kehoe, Lowell High School

3.1 Starting a Middle School GSA: A Sustainable, Grassroots Approach

Practical advice and encouragement for students, staff, parents and community members who would like to establish a sustainable GSA in their local middle school.

Presenter(s): Anna Watson, Friends of the Ottoson Middle School GSA

3.2 Queering the Classroom: Providing a Safe Learning Environment for All

Providing a safe environment for GLBTQ youth promotes a more comfortable, creative environment for all students. Resources and discussion will address your classroom needs.

Presenter(s): Marie Caradonna, WAGLY (West Suburban Alliance of GLBTQ Youth)

3.3 Coming out to Parents

Coming out to parents as LGBTQ is a big decision. Learn what to expect and get support. Interactive workshop and resources for participants.

Presenter(s): Pam Garramone, Greater Boston PFLAG

3.4 Responding to LGBTQ Partner Abuse In Black & Latin@ Communities

This workshop will define partner abuse, the tactics of abuse, and discuss overcoming challenges for seeking support. The workshop will focus on Black/Latin@ LGBTQ communities. [Note: Abuse and violence in homosexual relationships has become such a problem in Massachusetts that it’s even discussed in “gay club” settings for kids and at “Youth Pride” activities.]

Presenter(s): Ricky Granderson & Corey Yarbrough, Hispanic Black Gay Coalition

3.6 Changing the Game: The GLSEN Sports Project

Participation in sports and Physical Education has positive effects health, self-esteem, sense of school belonging and academics. Unfortunately, some research suggests that LGBT students may not have access to these and they may be less likely than their non-LGBT peers to attend Physical Education classes or play sports teams. This session focuses on developing strategies to create inclusive conditions where all students can benefit from participation and learning. Note: This is the national homosexual movement introducing strategies for “queering” high school sports.]

Presenter(s): Jenny Betz, GLSEN National

Coming up

Unfortunately, most people – and especially most parents – have no idea the extent of the radical homosexual and transgender psychological propaganda being pushed at children in their schools, much less what’s going on behind the scenes. We hope to begin to remedy that.

We’ve just scratched the surface on this Conference. In upcoming emails, we will be reporting in greater detail what took place in some of the workshops, as well as posting some of the handouts.

Pamphlet handed out to kids at the Conference reveals the new “upgraded” name for state-funded radical group:Massachusetts Commission on Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender and Queer/Questioning (not well defined yet) Youth. They keep adding letters.

RELATED STORIES:

Hundreds contact FBI about pedophile teacher case – New York News
Janesville superintendent issues apology for ‘Kids React to Gay Marriage’ video : WSJ
State Department Sacrifices Children for ‘Gay’ Imperialism
Chuck Hagel: Transgender ban in military should be reviewed

Behind the Scenes on the Chicago Teachers Union Anti-Common Core Resolution

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On May 7, 2014, the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) passed a resolution against the Common Core State Standards (CCSS).

That evening, I wrote this post and included my own experience and conversations on Lewis’ position on CCSS. In the post, I figuratively note that this is now a battle between Lewis and American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President Randi Weingarten, who has stated that if it comes down to AFT constituency rejection of CCSS and keeping CCSS at the AFT convention in July 2014, she plans to keep CCSS.

Though I metaphorically describe the battle as being between Weingarten and Lewis, I know from my interactions with Lewis that she is a union president who serves her constituency. Unlike Weingarten’s dealings with AFT members, Lewis does not try to force CTU membership into the mold of her top down choice.

On May 10, 2014, fellow blogger Anthony Cody posted a guest article by CTU member Michelle Gunderson. In it, Gunderson describes the process by which CTU arrived at and crafted CTU’s anti-CCSS resolution.

Include below is Gunderson’s post in part:

By Michelle Gunderson.

Wednesday evening I stood before my brothers and sisters at the Chicago Teachers Union to speak in favor of our resolution opposing the Common Core State Standards. When I finished speaking, there was a call for the vote. It was unanimous. It was resounding – not a single voice raised in opposition.

There are times when the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) seems like an engine; that we are able to accomplish great and difficult work seemingly overnight. I would like to pull back the curtain for a moment, and help others understand the purposeful and deliberate process we take in order to form our decisions and actions at CTU.

There are those in the media who contend we are being reckless and blindly following Karen Lewis, the president of our local. Nothing could be further from the actual case.Michelle.jpg

As much as we admire Karen Lewis and are grateful for her talents, this work was not generated from her. In fact, characterizing this event in such simplistic terms denigrates the social justice transformation of the Chicago Teachers Union, a long and hard-won struggle that involves many. We do not act on Karen Lewis’ behalf or her wishes. She acts on ours, with our guidance, and we love her for it.

It is hard to imagine a union in existence where a full democratic process is expected by everyone involved – leadership, rank and file, and union staff. Yet, in Chicago, we hold this ideal in such high regard we cannot imagine a union working any other way.

Several months prior to the passing of the resolution, the Caucus of Rank and File Educators began discussing and debating the Common Core in our open meetings. We read Diane Ravitch’s bookThe Reign of Error in small study groups. And many of us followed Anthony Cody’s work on this blog. Through conversations and study we came to a strong conclusion. The authors of the Common Core view the purpose of education as college and career readiness. We view the purpose of public education as a means for educating a populace of critical thinkers who are capable of shaping a just and equitable society in order to lead good and purpose-filled lives.

With our philosophical underpinning so drastically divergent from that of the Common Core we did not see any room for common ground.

That is why we say no to Common Core.

My hat is off to CTU.

To read the rest of Gunderson’s piece on Anthony Cody’s blog, click here.

EDITORS NOTE: The featured photo was taken by firedoglakedotcom. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.

inBloom, BloomBoard, and the Undeniable, Corporate Reform “Need” for Student Data

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On April 21, 2014, the Gates-funded data warehouse inBloom publicized that it was shutting down.

The New York Times called it a “setback for the nearly $8 billion prekindergarten through 12th-grade education technology software market.”

InBloom CEO Iwan Streichenberger calls it “a real missed opportunity for teachers and school districts seeking to improve student learning.”

I’m sorry, but making my classroom part of “the nearly $8 billion… technology software market” does little to convince me that Iwan Streichenberger can do anything substantial toward “improving student learning” in my classroom.

I wonder just how dead inBloom actually is.

One of the sponsors of inBloom is a company called BloomBoard, a company started by Jason Lange and Eric Dunn in 2o1o. The two entities complemented one another: inBloom was to collect student data; BloomBoard is to collect teacher data for “professional development” and teacher evaluation– and embedded in teacher evaluation is student data.

BloomBoard needs student data. InBloom was to provide student data.

In true corporate reformer fashion, Jason Lange is a “CEO” who is now making a go at profiting from public education dollars after establishing his professional background in mergers and acquisitions and private equity.

Co-CEO Eric Dunn hails from the highly controversial Edison Learning, the reborn version of Edison Schools. (If managing schools leads to financial failure, just rename and change the game to education software focused on “achievement management solutions.”)

“Mergers and acquisitions” and “achievement management” are not terms on my resume. Then again, my entire professional career has been inside of the classroom. Imagine that.

According to this August 2013 BloomBoard Frequently Asked Questions file, inBloom and BloomBoard are not related:

7. inBloom, which collects student data to personalize learning pathways, recently faced controversy regarding user privacy concerns. What is BloomBoard’s relationship with inBloom?

The two companies are entirely separate entities with no connection. However, BloomBoard does work with inBloom in some districts and/or states that choose to utilize the inBloom platform data architecture. The sharing of the word ‘Bloom’ in our names is purely coincidence – and we actually called it first. [Emphasis added.]

The two “companies” (technically, inBloom became a nonprofit after its birth as the Shared Learning Collaborative [SLC]) might be “entirely separate entities”; however, to say that they have “no connection” is a stretch since not only did BloomBoard sponsor inBloom; BloomBoard expected to benefit financially from its association with inBloom.

Companies with access to the [inBloom] database will also be able to identify struggling teachers and pinpoint which concepts their students are failing to master. One startup that could benefit: BloomBoard, which sells schools professional development plans customized to each teacher.

The new database “is a godsend for us,” said Jason Lange, the chief executive of BloomBoard. “It allows us to collect more data faster, quicker and cheaper.” [Emphasis added.]

The “godsend” in inBloom for Lange’s BloomBoard would have been the “quicker, cheaper” student data required to fuel his teacher professional development product.

In 2012, BloomBoard CEO Jason Lange posted this press release (no longer available except via archive) concerning its “partnership” with SLC (precursor to inBloom):

Press Release: November 14, 2012

November 15th, 2012 by Jason

BloomBoard Partners With Shared Learning Collaborative To Accelerate Interoperability And Improved Use Of Data

Palo Alto, CA (November 14, 2012) — BloomBoard is proud to announce a partnership with the Shared Learning Collaborative to accelerate the standardization of data across our nations’ schools. Stephen Coller, Director of Developer Engagement for the Shared Learning Collaborative, praised the partnership stating “The SLC and BloomBoard share a passionate belief in the power of interoperability and data standardization to reduce the burden on teachers and spark innovation on a massive scale.”

 Through this partnership, BloomBoard will be able to leverage a common data architecture for SLC states and districts, resulting in automated account creation and maintenance, single sign-on, near-immediate implementation, and improved recommendation engine algorithms in the BloomBoard professional development marketplace.

BloomBoard provides school districts and states with user-friendly tools to collect educator effectiveness data — and then recommends personalized training for each teacher based on his or her particular professional development needs. In addition, BloomBoard customizes its tools so that schools can use processes and instructional frameworks that are already in place. And in an industry where comparable tools may cost thousands of dollars per school, BloomBoard offers its platform and desired customization to schools, districts and states at no charge. [Emphasis added.]

How is it that two non-educators are able to “recommend personalized training for each teacher”?

Based on “algorithms”– mathematical formulas– “value added” advice for “improvement.”

No human judgment required. Just plug in the data, and the BloomBoard “platform” tells the human teachers what they need.

And don’t let the “free” platform fool you, for it provides a means for districts to become dependent upon the products tailored to fit the “free” platform.

Of course, “cost effectiveness” is maximized if American education relies less on human professionals and more on computerized platforms, tools, and algorithms– all ultimately dependent upon student data.

Since student-data-related profits are the name of the game, is it naive to believe that inBloom is really a done deal?

Massive student data collection is part of the 2009 National Governors Association (NGA) Symposium spectrum of reforms approved by US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.

The federal government will continue this massive student data collection push, inBloom or no.

And do not overlook the USDOE trend toward standardization.

Standardization and consolidation are melded concepts.

On May 8, 2014, the US House of Representatives “quietly” pursued the USDOE student data collection goal:

If you blinked you might have missed it: The U.S. House of Representatives gave quick and quiet approval to a bipartisan bill that would reauthorize the Education Science Reform Act, with an eye toward making federal K-12 research more relevant and timely for those out in the field.

The legislation also calls for new or improved collection of data on areas such as high school graduation rates, school safety, discipline, and teacher preparation and evaluation. And it would add a new focus on examining the implementation of a particular policy or strategy, not just its impact.

It also makes changes to a federal program that helps states bolster their longitudinal data systems, a hot area of policy these days. It would shift the focus of grants away from just building data systems—since most already have robust systems in place—to actually using them to improve student outcomes. The measure would also beef up privacy protections for student data, a huge issue in state legislatures this year. [Emphasis added.]

“Improving student outcomes”– the nauseatingly familiar euphemism for teacher and school value as determined ultimately by student standardized test scores.

This federal “change” to “using” data systems over “building” data systems does not preclude the “need” for data warehouses as “godsends” for “faster, quicker, and cheaper” data collection.

Otherwise, there is no need for both the Gates-funded Data Quality Campaign (“implementing” and “using” data systems) and Gates-funded inBloom (unprecedented quantities of data collected).

Plus, I’m thinking that “the nearly $8 billion prekindergarten through 12th-grade education technology software market” that would “suffer” (tongue in cheek) from inBloom absence will surely continue to diligently search for its next outlet.

Why, that arrangement might already be part of the history of high-power boardroom handshakes.

Stay tuned, America.

America’s New Textbooks are Coming

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In just six months, the state of Texas will adopt new social studies textbooks and educational materials for its five million students.  Approximately 50 new textbooks and 100 workbooks, CDs, and other educational materials will be put before the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) for approval in November.  The committee’s determinations are not only essential in Texas, where the state purchases almost all educational materials for its school districts, but for the nation at large.  As a bulk purchaser of over 150 million textbooks, the Texas market is substantial enough to influence the textbook publishers themselves.  Major publishers align the content of textbooks offered nation-wide to comply with Texas’ requests in order to ensure their books have a place in this substantial market.

What happens in Texas does not stay in Texas, but impacts parents, teachers, and students around the nation.  The textbooks that the SBOE chooses in November could very easily be on the desks in middle schools and high schools around the country in 2015.  It behooves citizens across the country to pay attention to the choices Texas will make and to understand the content of the books.

So, how is Texas planning to decide which textbooks to adopt?

In January, the SBOE changed the rules for its review process to mostly exclude individuals who are not Texas teachers or professors from reviewing textbooks.  The selection process has become more opaque and the standards for review unknown to those outside the process.  The public only knows that reviewers will meet for a week in Austin over the summer and are instructed not to discuss the process with outsiders (including publishers).  According to a Star-Telegram article, we do know that the changes are specifically designed to prevent citizens from raising controversial issues at the November hearings.

The public does not know who will be chosen to review the textbooks, the degree of scrutiny the books will face, or if the review process will even examine factual accuracy, objectivity, and overall content responsibility.  Newer textbooks, especially the slew of new material now marketed under the aegis of “Common Core,” contain an alarming degree of inaccurate material and need to be scrutinized and analyzed by independent experts who are guided by honesty and objectivity.  An independent review of these educational materials is crucial for students, parents, the education system, and our civic society.

Residents of Texas and other states should be alarmed that such important decisions will be made essentially “under the radar” of the citizenry.  A group of citizens called “Truth in Texas Textbooks,” under the leadership of Lt. Col. Roy White is leading an effort to bring citizen input to the SBOE.  This group has been planning and organizing since the fall of 2013 and is committed to making citizens’ voices heard.

At Verity Educate, we are working hard to provide parents, communities, and schools with the information they need to know about the content of these new textbooks.  Our experts – independent, non-partisan scholars – review material in their specialized content areas.  Textbooks are examined line-by-line for factual inaccuracies and content objectivity.  The in-depth reports we compile note every error, explain biased material, and examine the impact of particular inaccuracies on students’ education.  We spend up to 60 hours reviewing each book, researching the facts, and compiling reports.  How can the SBOE complete a thorough review of all the textbooks in one week?

Because the state will be coming to the November hearings with reviews from its hand-picked expert panels, citizens must also arm themselves with credible, authoritative, and scholarly evidence.  Some of the textbooks up for adoption will be great – factual, objective, and honest.  However, other textbooks will be inaccurate, biased, and un-truthful.  It is important for citizens to be informed about the content of these books before their adoption by the state of Texas and before the books come home in students’ backpacks.  When parents, taxpayers, and citizens inform themselves about the content of these books they can have input with their schools boards, state boards of education, and elected representatives.

An education riddled with factual inaccuracies and biased content affects the heart of our civic society.  When factual accuracy is not accounted for, students will grow into citizens lacking the most basic historical knowledge.  When presented, over and over, with biased content and one-sided arguments students fail to develop critical thinking skills.  The effects of a poor history education are playing out as we speak.  Influential leaders bring their ignorance of key historical events like the Monroe Doctrine and the Crimean War to the attention of the world through their actions and their speech.  When history is taught incorrectly, the nation suffers.

If you are interested in learning more about the content of new textbooks and efforts to ensure accuracy and objectivity, visit www.VerityEducate.org.  Follow us on twitter @VerityEducate and Facebook for regular updates.

George Will Demolishes Arguments for Common Core in Under Two Minutes

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“Conservative pundit George Will delivered a fierce attack on Common Core, characterizing the educational standards as a way for progressives to further promote their political views,” notes Katrina Trinko from The Foundry.

“This is a thin end of an enormous wedge of federal power that will be wielded for the constant progressive purpose of concentrating power in Washington so that it can impose continental solutions to problems nationwide,” Will said on Fox News’ “Special Report.” He also warned Americans that the federal standards posed a significant threat to local autonomy.

“The advocates of the Common Core say, if you like local control of your schools, you can keep it, period. If you like your local curriculum you can keep it, period, and people don’t believe them for very good reasons,” Will remarked.

[youtube]http://youtu.be/fmgadgKNz0I[/youtube]

A Valuable Research Tool: The “Way Back Machine”

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In exposing corporate reformers at their game, I have found that information sometimes “conveniently” disappears from websites once such information is publicized in a less-than-complimentary blog post.

There is a way to view web pages that have been removed or otherwise altered:

The “Way Back Machine”: https://archive.org/web/web.php

The “Way Back Machine” is a search engine of “snapshots” taken of web pages over time.

All one must do is enter the non-responsive or altered url into the search engine; the result will include the number of snapshots taken in a given period. For example, I just entered my blog address into the search engine, and the result was “Saved 24 times between January 31, 2013 and March 7, 2014.”

In the result, the dates “January 31, 2013″ and “March 7, 2014″ are links that I might click on. Clicking on the “January 31, 2014″ link produces my blog as it appeared on that date. At the top of my blog page are 24 boxes in the form of a number line. Clicking on any one of these boxes shows me my blog as it appeared on that date in the past.

The “Way Back Machine” does not save every change to a web page. However, navigating the snapshots often reveals sought-after information that has been altered or removed, yielding enlightening finds for those investigating corporate reformers.

For example, after I wrote about the Gates grant process– namely, that Gates solicits grantees whom he believes will advance his mission– the Gates link, How We Make Grants, went dead.

Thanks to the “Way Back Machine,” How We Make Grants lives on:

https://web.archive.org/web/20140209091533/http://www.gatesfoundation.org/How-We-Work/General-Information/How-We-Make-Grants

Thus, the resulting “Way Back Machine” url is an active url that allows access to the “snapshot from the past” at any time.  As a result, writers can include the snapshot url in posts so that readers might view the result for themselves at will.

And here is another invaluable usage:

The Way Back Machine could be used to recover information from damaged websites to aid in website reconstruction. Information one thinks has been lost might not be lost, after all.

My thanks to Suzette Lopez and Jack Hassard for reminding me of this tool.

PA Attorney General Charges and Arrests Test Cheaters — FL AG Bondi Missing in Action

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Taking a cue from former Georgia Attorney General Mike Bowers (R) and former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue (R), Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane (D) charged and arrested a principal and four teachers for cheating on standardized tests at Cayuga Elementary School in Philadelphia over a four year period (2008-2012).

Kane said the educators changed student answers, provided test answers to students and improperly reviewed Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) test questions before giving the tests. After the cheating stopped in 2012, the schools test scored dropped dramatically, Kane noted.

In 2008-09 state proficiency tests, Cayuga’s fourth graders excelled: 88.8% pass math and 83.9% pass reading. By 2012-13, the most recent numbers available, fourth graders at the school struggled with 31% passing math and 25% passing reading.

Those charged are:

  • Evelyn Cortez, 59, Dresher, Montgomery County;
  • Jennifer Hughes, 59, Jeffersonville, Montgomery County;
  • Lorraine Vicente, 41, Philadelphia;
  • Rita Wyszynski, 65,  Philadelphia; and
  • Ary Sloane, 56,  Philadelphia.

In Georgia, numerous teachers, and principals were convicted or took plea deals and are in prison. Superintendent Beverly Hall had her plea deal rejected and awaits trial in August 2014.

Unfortunately for Florida students and taxpayers, Attorney General Pam Bondy and Governor Rick Scott took a different course of action in response to test cheating: they did absolutely nothing.

Hard evidence was sent to both of these Constitutional officers and elected officials concerning various violations concerning professional development fraud, teacher certification fraud, teacher observation and evaluation fraud, and test cheating – all of which were documented in a state report issued by the Auditor General of Florida and the Miami-Dade OIG Final Report which concluded that, “Miami Norland has benefited in the form of attaining a higher school grade and may have received financial compensation or other benefit resulting from its high pass rate on the industry certification exams” (page 13).

Katherine-Fernandez Rundle, Miami-Dade State Attorney of the 11th Judicial Circuit, did not respond nor take action on these allegations, stating she can do nothing per “local control,” and that the responsibility for investigation and resolution rests with the employee of the perpetrators – Miami-Dade County Public Schools.

After appearing before investigators with the Office of the Auditor General for the State of Florida and the Miami-Dade Office of Inspector General in April and May 2012, in which sworn statements, evidence, and produced two witnesses (teachers who corroborated the test cheating) were given, to ensure that these investigations would be acted upon by the state, the findings were sent to Governor Rick Scott for action.

Governor Scott’s Inspector General emailed a written response declining assistance for lack of jurisdiction and deferred to the Miami-Dade OIG, who declined to investigate this particular matter as the Auditor General’s Office was investigating it.

On February 6, 2013, the FLDOE OIG, sent a written response claiming “lack of primary jurisdiction.” One would think they would have a secondary jurisdiction to investigate violations of state law pertaining to test cheating and any and all related frauds (money) to protect students, teachers, and taxpayers.

Worse yet, I emailed Florida’s and Miami-Dade’s chief law enforcement officers, Attorney General Pam Bondi and Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez-Rundle respectively, and the response was disappointing.

On March 8, 2013, Attorney General Bondi emailed the whistle-blower, Trevor Colestock, back basically citing lack of jurisdiction and passing the buck to the school district of all places and various local and federal agencies.

The Miami-Dade State Attorney did not respond whatsoever, though she did prosecute teachers and school administrators in the MOTET teacher certification scandal 8 years earlier.

These improprieties and related crimes (using computers to commit fraud, wire fraud, malfeasance, test cheating, and 20,000+ counts of record tampering and teacher certification fraud) were reported on by multiple media outlets. However, Governor Scott, Attorney General Bondi, FLDOE bureau chiefs and Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez-Rundle appear to have a “see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil” when it comes to stopping cheating and fraud in Florida’s public schools.

Though the state has inherent police and supervisory powers to enforce and regulate its laws, Florida (unlike the States of Georgia, Texas, and Pennsylvania) has been a passive spectator concerning school districts and test cheating to the detriment of Florida students, teachers, and taxpayers.

Perhaps it is time for Governor Scott and Attorney General Bondi to stop passing the buck and stand against cheating in Florida’s public schools?

The Commonizing of Common Core

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Patrick O’Donnell’s Cleveland Plain Dealer articles of April 17 and 20, regarding Common Core, stated that our educators were surprised that Common Core tests were tough. Why did these people in positions of trust accept the new curriculum before evaluating the complete package and its potential damage? The payoffs far outweighed all other considerations, including the children’s maturity levels and welfare.

Despite the Constitution’s Tenth Amendment that prohibits a federally controlled education system, President Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (stimulus package) bribed cash-strapped states with $4.35 Billion, Bill Gates Foundation added $200 million more, and states (Ohio: $10 million) will be heavily taxed to cover operational costs of this program that spells disaster.

Gates and “research company,” Achieve, Inc., selected non-academic people to design the standards, excluding educators, parents, and professionals in the disciplines. A 24-member team headed by David Coleman, who also lacks experience with English instruction, signed a non-disclosure agreement, keeping parents and school boards entirely in the dark. And the standards, although accepted, violated three federal laws – Elementary and Secondary Education Act (1965), General Education Provisions Act, and Department of Education Organization Act.

Common Core mandates prohibit teachers from lecturing for more than 15 minutes per day per subject! This “Type #2” agenda is student-centered learning, where the teacher is reduced to facilitator, unable to provide history, purpose, and background for comprehension. How does one grasp a Constitutional Amendment without its foundation and purpose – or find the essence of a speech without the events that inspired it? America’s founding, exceptionalism and achievements are de-emphasized; Islam is whitewashed and accentuated in great detail.

The program is designed to close the education gap by reducing expectations, and emphasizing skills over literary or cultural knowledge. Their perception of college readiness is not academic preparation but abundant test taking that take time from learning, creativity, and encouraging imagination. Great literature and fiction are sacrificed for new sexualized novels that emphasize social activism. Fifty percent of the reading material comprises informational texts and instructional manuals that discourage reading.

Note the test material given for Test I, Grade 3, deals with trickery, disappointment, feelings, social engineering – not resourcefulness, achievement, success. Test 3, Grade 11, deals with aloneness, divisiveness, social issues, and the errors in word usage and punctuation confirm the carelessness that also permeates the history books. Imagine being tested about the Declaration of Independence and speech by Patrick Henry before disambiguating, studying and analyzing them. A brief video would be valueless.

English and Math courses contain social concerns. Students are being taught what to think – that America is a nation of bigots, poverty-creating capitalists, intolerant war-mongering imperialists, anti-immigrants; and segregating, discriminating, disenfranchising racists; and that they should want big government that relies on redistribution of wealth, globalization, etc. Key concepts of America are negative or openly hostile.

The math places students more than two years behind their international peers by eighth grade. High school students will have to pass college exams on faulty information. Reform math is fracturing our society – teachers cannot help the parents who cannot help the children with homework, leading to frustration and anger, and the children are losing interest in school. Our Education Establishment is alienating them from learning.

Highly degreed and qualified professionals, Dr. Sandra Stotsky (developed one of the country’s strongest sets of academic standards for K-12 students and the strongest academic standards and licensure tests for prospective teachers), Stanford University professor Dr. James Milgram and New York University professor Jonathan Goodman refused to sign off on Common Core, citing the damage to education posed by its methods.

Microsoft and Achieve’s State Longitudinal Database System, will capture, analyze, and use students’ personal and confidential data from preschool through employment. Through “functional magnetic resonance imaging,” “skin-sensitive equipment” and “cameras that judge facial expressions and posture, data about student frustration, motivation, confidence, boredom and fatigue, plus private family statistics” will be available for workforce development in this German model system.

Pearson publishers are responsible for the textbooks and tests, apps, international media, business information, and more, although their books are shoddily assembled and written. Most notable are the history textbooks that present history out of time context, a smokescreen for what has intentionally been excluded. Our high school students are being brainwashed so that they will be intellectually incapable of dealing with the subversive threat to our country coming from the Muslim Brotherhood and its supporters in the American Islamic community.

Today’s students will be tomorrow’s teachers and leaders, obedient to the state, robbed of their freedom to thrive. Common Core is destructive and it is up to the parents to recapture our educational system from the grip of the current administration.

US Department of Education’s War On School Choice in Florida

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The Office of the Inspector General for the United States Department of Education, by their actions, seems to have a double standard for wrongdoing and impropriety concerning charter schools and public schools in Miami-Dade County, Florida.

Last month, The Miami Herald reported that South Miami-based Academica Corp., Florida’s largest charter school management company, is being investigated by the USDOE for “potential conflicts of interests in its business practices.”

Charter school critics said the Inspector General’s findings were a reason to push back on HB 7083, the bill that could weaken the power of school districts over new charter schools. HB 7083 died in the House K-12 Education Committee.

Critics of charter schools and school choice were quick to pounce on the USDOE audit that spotted “potential,” but not proven and definite, improprieties akin to those committed by the school district in terms of bogus teacher evaluation training, teacher certification fraud, and test cheating at Miami Norland Senior High School.

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Miami-Dade School Board member Raquel Regalado

“Obviously, there are some serious questions about the way the system works in Florida. The prudent thing for the Legislature to do would be to wait for the federal government to finish its work [on the audit] and then consider changes to the charter school law,” said Miami-Dade School Board member Raquel Regalado.

Jeff Wright, of the Florida Education Association, concurred: “If an audit like this is going on, the Legislature should not give charter schools more opportunities to game the system.”

But Rep. Manny Diaz, the Hialeah Republican sponsoring the bill, who left his job with the M-DCPS last year to become dean of a private college managed by Academica, said his proposal would not open the door to questionable business practices.

“This is not about opening up the Wild Wild West. We want there to be controls [over charter schools]. We just want to make sure the controls are uniform and transparent,” said Diaz.

It is interesting how Ms. Regalado and Mr. Wright come out on an unsubstantiated issue concerning charter schools, but where do they stand on substantiated wrongdoing by Miami-Dade County Public Schools on bogus teacher evaluation training, teacher certification fraud, and test cheating at Miami Norland Senior High School, and why have they not been vocal on those issues?

Furthermore, and more disturbing, the whistle-blower, Mr. Trevor Colestock, reported these issues to the USDOE OIG and they have done nothing to address them. Neither the USDOE or state officials have held anyone from Miami Norland Senior or M-DCPS to account.

Is it because charter schools and proponents of school choice espouse innovative teaching and offer students freedom from the Common Core and other federal government mandates and M-DCPS Superintendent Alberto Carvalho embraces Common Core, Race To the Top, and other federal initiatives?

Miami-Dade: Student, Not Teachers, Feels Heavy Hand of Justice

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In Miami-Dade County Public Schools (M-DCPS), there exists a double standard by the school system and its police department when dispensing justice between students and teachers.

For evidence of this, examine the circumstances between a student, Jose Bautista, an 18 year old senior at Dr. Michael Krop Senior High School, and Mr. Emmanuel Fleurantin and Mrs. Brenda Muchnick, two teachers at Miami Norland Senior High School. Each did something terribly wrong, each was treated very differently.

The question: Has justice been served?

According to a local news report, Mr. Bautista, was arrested and charged with eight felonies counts for allegedly obtaining the principal’s network password and offering to change grades for four students for an unknown sum of money. He was on track to graduate with his class at the end of May. On Friday, May 2nd, a judge set Bautista’s bond at $20,000 and ordered him to be placed under house arrest with a GPS monitor. He has since been released from jail.

Miami-Dade County Public Schools released a statement saying, “The school district takes incidents like this very seriously.  In addition to the arrest and ongoing criminal investigation, the Code of Student Conduct provides for corrective strategies up to and including recommendation for expulsion.”

It is unclear if Bautista will be allowed to graduate.

During the 2011-2012 school year, Mr. Fleurantin and Mrs. Muchnick gave the answers to standardized tests, industry certification exams, to a large number of students. Seventeen students confessed to this, some saying whole classes received the answers.

The Miami-Dade OIG Final Report concluded that, “Miami Norland has benefited in the form of attaining a higher school grade and may have received financial compensation or other benefit resulting from its high pass rate on the industry certification exams” (page 13).

With the assistance of cheating, undertaken by Mr. Emmanuel Fleurantin and Mrs. Brenda Muchnick, Miami Norland’s school grade went from a “C” for the 2010-11 school year to an “A” for the 2011-12 school year.

As a result, total federal funds (SIG, RTTT) given out due to a grade influenced by cheating was $100,560; the total state funds per FSRP was between $130,000- $140,000; the total overall combined federal and state incentive funds were $230,560- $240,560.

Each teacher at Miami Norland Senior High School received $1730.41 from all three payouts.

On October 16, 2013, the Miami-Dade School Board voted to terminate Mr. Emmanuel Fleurantin for his role in what has become known as Adobegate.

On November 19, 2013, the Miami-Dade School Board voted to suspend Mrs. Brenda Muchnick for 30 working days without pay for her role in Adobegate.

Mr. Fleurantin is still awaiting the results from his Department of Administrative Hearings case, and Mrs. Muchnick served her inconsequential 30 day suspension without pay and has been back to work at Norland Since January 8, 2014, whereas the whistle-blower, Trevor Colestock, was illegally removed from Norland and has yet to be returned.

Mr. Fleurantin and Mrs. Muchnick were both investigated by M-DCPS and Schools Police, but unlike the student Jose Bautista, both were not charged, handcuffed, or appeared before a judge.

How does Bautista, a student who did something juvenile yet serious, gets charged, cuffed, goes before a judge, has a $20,000 bond, confined to home with a GPS monitor, local media scrutiny, and now has a felony record for the rest of his days, but yet two teachers who should have known better were never charged, cuffed, appeared in court despite unduly influencing the school grade and caused, or attempted to cause, an erroneous $250,000 payout of state and federal incentive funds?

Fleurantin and Muchnick engaged in far more serious crimes than Bautista: multiple potential counts of using a computer to commit and perpetrate a fraud, wire fraud, defrauding (or attempting to defraud) an out of state corporation (Certiport, the test vendor), and defrauding (or attempting to defraud) the State of Florida and the federal government and the taxpayers thereof.

Perhaps Fleurantin and Muchnick got off easy because they were doing what they were told and/or their actions benefited the school district and school/district administrators across the board in terms of recognition, promotion, and pay, and Bautista gets the heavy hand of justice because his actions only benefited himself and not M-DCPS whatsoever.

RELATED STORY: Teacher caught on video manhandling kindergartner will make your blood boil

EDITORS NOTE: The featured photo is courtesy of the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s office.