Because Republicans nationally are targeting school boards, and Republican governors are urging schools to teach that slavery had its good points for enslaved folks, please don’t ignore our local school board races.
I support Ed Frank and incumbents Tenorio and Patrick Nolan.
Education should not only teach facts but develop critical thinkers who can handle facts sensibly. That means teaching accurate history and being open to kids’ questions. Kids learn better when they feel welcomed, by teachers who believe they can succeed, whatever their ethnicity or background. Making kids feel that way, even non-white kids, pays off big-time.
I also believe this is a wonderful country. It’s not, as I was taught all through public schools, perfect. Trying to whitewash history, as in Florida and Texas, (a) doesn’t work, (b) seriously undermines schools’ credibility, ( c) can be unwelcoming to “minority” students, and (d) ain’t education. It’s propaganda. We – and our patriotism – should be strong enough to face our warts. (If they’re cancerous, ignoring them can be dangerous) We have some big ones.
Because the education of our youth is so important, we should vote, to keep our schools honest and productive, whether or not we have kids in LCPS schools.
That’s doubly so because of some unsavory tactics used here.
Jack of Hearts and Other Parts is an award-winning YA novel which features unconventional sexuality, and also some sexual situations that most all of us would try to prevent if we could. It’s in one high school library here. One person has checked it out. Rightwingers criticized it in Tennessee, where the Wilson County School board voted to remove it, because members disagreed with it. That probably violated the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Island School District v.Pico.
Coalition of Conservatives in Action, which seeks generally to change our schools, complained. Not because any kid or parent read or saw it and was offended; but because the book is unappetizing and, they say, dangerous reading for kids, It’s also a convenient weapon against the school board. LCPS appointed a committee to consider whether the book should be removed. The committee heard evidence, including the complainants, then voted 6-1 not to ban the book.
The complainants had every right to share that public information and opine.
But one complainant posted on Facebook something I believe no decent person would have posted: she included names of teachers on the committee and a photo with teachers who voted “the wrong way” circled in red. Like targets. The entire post communicated that these teachers supported pedophilia.
These teachers were put on this committee. Jack shocked some. But they heard New Mexico’s education officials, and that Jack had helped one student, and that parents have power to keep their kids from obtaining a book. No one should publicly attack these teachers in such a vile, misleading, and personal for voting their consciences. Teachers’ names being public information is no excuse. To me, helping one troubled kid outweighs officious intermeddlers’ fears.
Please help save freedom of thought by voting.
And consider voting for Cassie McClure, Johana Bencomo, and Tessa Abeyta for City Council. Cassie, a columnist and writer, is the best of five candidates for the District 1 seat Kassandra Gandara is vacating; incumbent Bencomo (Dist. 4) deserves re-election, but put Gabe Duran 2nd ; and incumbent Abeyta (2), smart and hard-working, is a better choice for 2023 then long-time-ago Mayor Bill Mattiace in District 2.
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[The above column appeared Sunday, 29 October, in the Las Cruces Sun-News and on the newspaper’s website, as well as on the KRWG website under Local Viewpoints. A shortened and sharpened radio commentary version will air during the week on KRWG (90.1 FM) and on KTAL-LP (101.5 FM / http://www.lccommunityradio.org/). ]
[ When I mentioned all this to friends at coffee, one friend told me that (for some more innocuous purpose) he’d tried with some AI gizmo to put red circles around someone’s face, the gizmo wouldn’t allow it and told him it couldn’t be published on-line. Obviously it can on Facebook. ]
[ This morning, as I started on the radio commentary version of the column, I thought about how sad it is that everything is so polarized, and that instead of merely looking for good-hearted folks who care about kids and know something about education, we’re in this long-running war.
I find myself in a tough spot. I abhor censorship. I feel for the teachers these folks attacked. But I talk to these folks, I like them, perhaps they like me, even though we obviously disagree. I hate to attack them. Actually, I’m not: I’m attacking tactics they adopted on this occasion. I hate to impugn their motives. On the other hand, that they don’t have kids in these schools (nor do I), and that they took this in such an unnecessarily nasty direction, warrants asking the question: are they motivated by their expressed concern for young folks who might be led astray, or are weaponizing Jack as a spear to throw in their long-running battle against progressive school boards and city councils? I won’t purport to answer that. I hope they’re sincere. And, as a famous victim once said, “Can’t we all get along?”
That reminds me of another point I couldn’t fit into my radio commentary. Some of us believe that extra steps to welcome nonwhite kids are not distractions from teaching substantive courses, but a preparatory step that, by making the kids feel more at home, can enhance their learning to a degree that far outweighs the time taken. (That’s particularly true in a town in which “minority” kids probably outnumber “Whites!”)
Critics of that view say racism is no longer a factor in our society. They’re flat wrong, or holding hands over eyes and ears like those monkeys. This week furnished, perhaps, one more little example. My wife walks the dog around our neighborhood. One thing we both do (she and I – the dog doesn’t) is pick up mail that somehow ends up on the street, and try to put it where it belongs. She, doing that quite often, has never had a problem. But recently while a friend of ours picked up mail off the street to put it in someone’s box, a woman cursed him out and tried to hit him with her car. (Fortunately, his only injuries, I think, were mental or emotional.) I’ll bet I don’t even have to articulate what was different about him. (Even walking a pedigreed dog, being his color on a public street proved dangerous.) But, no, Black kids don’t see racism anymore. ]
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