VA: More Youngkin Snitch Line Fiasco Unspools

Glenn Youngkin figured he had been elected as the Parental Rights governor, so it must have made sense to keep attacking public education and the teachers who work there. 

He started right in with an edict that schools should not teach anything "inherently divisive," one more anti-CRT law so fuzzy, subjective, and poorly-conceived that it will chill teaching of any subjects that anybody might object to. The text is spectacularly vague, and though it contains a list of some "divisive concepts" that are specifically naughty, its reliance on that "divisive concept" language guarantees that schools across the state will have no clear idea what exactly is forbidden, and so administrations not in the mood for a fight will simply instruct teachers not to talk about race, gender, or pretty much anything that might upset anybody. Is evolution divisive? History of the Civil War (particularly in Virginia)? My students were pretty divided on whether Lady MacBeth is a redeemable character or not. In fact, we used to stage debates, but I suppose those are inherently divisive, too.

To insure that the decree carries maximum power to intimidate and silence teachers, the governor has followed the lead of states like Texas and Florida and instituted a means for parents and community members to turn in any teachers for being naughty. As he explained in one interview:

For parents to send us any instances where they feel that their fundamental rights are being violated, where their children are not being respected, where there are inherently divisive practices in their schools. We’re asking for input right from parents to make sure we can go right to the source as we continue to work to make sure that Virginia’s education system is on the path to reestablish excellence.

Brown shirts and cultural revolution posters are optional.

James Fedderman, the head of the Virginia Education Association called the tip line "poorly conceived" and "designed to intimidate educators simply trying to do their jobs," which sounds about right.

But the fails have just kept on coming. By February, the tip line had been a spoof on SNL ("You know you're racist when you call the cops about a Black character in a book.") and was being flooded with fake tips. Virtually every education group in the state was calling on Youngkin to take back his executive order and shut down his snitch line. It was failing hard enough that Youngkin was using half-baked legal arguments to keep people from seeing just how bad it was, because Freedom of Information is a pain when you have information that makes your big snitch line idea look dumb.

Last week the wrangling over the freedom of information requests was finally settled and the snitch line turned out to be just about as useful as anyone could have imagined. 

One woman used it to send a compliment every day about individual teachers while she spent 34 days recovering from hip and back surgery. One parent complained about district-offered tutoring because it was "a potential path for unknown perverts." One complained that gender identity concepts were in some family life classes. There were book ban requests and masking complaints.

There were also some complaints about teaching "Arabic numbers." A high school senior complained about how his teacher was teaching Beowulf. Many were complaints about violations of special ed laws, including those from Kandise Lucas, an advocate for students with special needs. Lucas sent roughly 160 emails. Another parent sent 23 emails to argue for reinstate accelerated math options in his district. 

The total number of emails released was 350. Virtually every email writer noted that they never got a response from the Governor's office. And it appears that many not-very-serious submissions were not released. 

Youngkin was still touting the tip line last week, despite the fact that it was actually shut down back in September as tips just kind of "dried up." It's almost as if this attempt to root out Critical Race Theory throughout Virginia turned up nothing. Kind of like the whole thing was just a political stunt.

American Oversight still has a lawsuit in progress to unveil the rest of the snitch line's submissions.

Youngkin is not the first to try this stunt, or to get this result. North Carolina's Lieutenant Governor gave it a shot and turned up mostly nothing serious, though they tried hard to make a meal out of their nothingburger, 

Let's hope that tomorrow's elections bring enough defeat to this kind of baloney that we see fewer elected officials staging attacks on teachers as political stuntery.