September 13, 2021 – West Bend, WI – Parents in the West Bend School District turned out in large numbers to speak at a West Bend School Board meeting about their displeasure with Critical Race Theory in West Bend schools.
Parent Corine Freund is a concerned mother with two children in the district. She spoke during the August 23, 2021 meeting. Click HERE to view the full meeting.
Freund quoted sources and presented printed material to the school board. “If you’re not familiar with CRT, it is a system rooted in Marxism,” said Freund, “We do know educators in the district have issued white privilege tests to students. We know teachers have, through open records requests, in the classroom within our district, found that the school district has spent roughly six figures through many types of funding on training…regarding topics like diversity, inclusion and equity.”
Freund quoted, “Dr. Wyatt T. Walker, a friend of Dr. Martin Luther King, stated “CRT chooses race-consciousness over the Enlightenment view of colorblindness as a societal norm.”
Parents came armed with information and questioned subject matter in the curriculum as well as the CRT training for teachers and staff. One parent said she found “87 references to equity and socio-political ideology that is a rebranding of Marxist ideas.”
“Why is such a radical and controversial curriculum being taught to any children?” said one parent. “Why are adult culture wars being brought to their learning table?”
Another parent said, “Scratching the surface of this socio-political ideology reveals it is a rebranding and repackaging of ideas and theories pulled straight from Marxism—just replace class with race. Why would we ever in America instill doctrine of equity over equality. Why would we choose to instill a theory birthed in Marxism over the declaration all men are created equal and that America is an equal opportunity land that we are all free to strive in this land after life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
“We shouldn’t even have to be here discussing something this biased and controversial being put into our public schools.”
No parent spoke in favor of Critical Race Theory.
The school board did not respond to any of the comments, as is policy.
“[A website] called casel.org was sent to parents to use as a resource to learn more about SEL,” said a parent, “Within five minutes of exploring the website I stumbled across what also is, let me read you some quotes ‘We are committed to highlighting the potential and urgency of leveraging SEL to promote educational equity and excellence.’
“These terms are subjective and often disagreed upon. From my perspective equity means everyone gets the same outcome no matter the effort put in. Equality means you earn the outcome based on the effort you put in. And another quote ‘transformative SEL represents an as-yet underutilized approach that SEL researchers and practitioners can use if they seek to effectively address issues such as power, privilege, prejudice, discrimination, social justice, empowerment, and self-determination.’
“I’m here to inform you of this disparity and to gain your partnership and participation in identifying and eliminating the elements of critical race theory that exist in the current SEL curriculum. Today we are requesting that the board add the SEL curriculum to the agenda for the next meeting for discussion and possible action.”
The Districts Curriculum Committee met Tuesday, Sept. 7, 2021, to discuss social and emotional learning.
The West Bend School Board meets Monday evening, September 13, 2021 starting at 5:30 p.m. at the Silver Lining Amphitheatre at the West Bend High School.
So not a single expert spoke, just a bunch of poorly educated white people that think they know everything because they have Google?
Jay A Kanta, I don’t know who you are, but for you to make the comment, “just a bunch of poorly educated white people that think they know everything because they have Google.” Just who do you think you are? They are concerned for their children’s welfare and education, our children are not going to school to be brain washed but to learn. There is far too much going on in the school district that should not be being taught. School’s need to get back to the basic, reading, math, history, science, & writing I have grandchildren that don’t even know how to sign their name. So if you have something better to say, say it now or keep you opinion to your self, as to someone else’s education. Our schools don’t need CRT.
FYI- schools across the nation stopped teaching cursive writing before I retired back in 2016. It was deemed unnecessary due to the use of computers. They started using the time to teach keyboarding in its place. If you want your grandkids to sign in cursive you will need to teach them yourself. Check online or @ a place that sells teacher supplies. It is sad that they don’t teach it anymore, but you can.
Jay A Kanta are you an expert? Are you a teacher using crt? Or, are you a highly educated person of color? Any color will do, even white. Please expound on your great knowledge of crt and how you believe it is in the best interest of our children
I’m not an expert on CRT but I am an expert on many other topics.
You are NGMI.
Supporters of Biden’s (((chi-com))) revolution are enemy combatants and do not have constitutional protections.
You have to cut the folks who spoke at the meeting some slack here, since it sounds like none of them have been exposed to what CRT really says… all the points they were most concerned about came directly from a made-up version of CRT put together, primarily, by Christopher Rufo — who worked for the Heritage Foundation and is on the record on Twitter bragging about how he’d weaponized a pretty dry, 40 year old, set of academic theories. If you google his website you’ll find all of this stuff.
But apparently our county board members and state reps have found this a great new way to scare voters into giving up their votes. I guess we should be used to politicians lying to stay in office… but this is a shame.
I have to admit that those of us who teach material from CRT (at the University level, btw… nobody in the K-12s is teaching CRT) have been amazed by the political traction of this scarecrow version. But it’s understandable. You can’t blame these parents for being worried since, if *any* of what Rufo says is in CRT were true, I’d be fighting it tooth and nail too…. but it’s not
Essentially all of the stuff these parents were worried about are NOT in CRT, but were photoshopped into CRT to make it a scary and effective political tool, that’s all.
Like all communist shills, Mr. Mark Peterson is lying. Just do your research on John Dewy, the father of public education, who’s whole agenda was to make children statist subjects. This is not disputable unless you do what Mr. Peterson and the collective tools have been doing for the last century. Wake up all of Washington County and pull your kids from the “public brainwashing institutions.” Vote with your feet. And by the way don’t send your kids to the University either!