PA: District Settles BLM Lawsuit For 45K

Here's a story from Pennsylvania showing that you don't even need to have a state gag law to cause expense and headaches for a school district. It also has plenty to say about what is motivating some of the protestors.

Maureen and Christopher Brophy filed a lawsuit in June of 2021 on behalf of their son and daughter, two students in the East Penn School District (Emmaus, Lehigh Valley). This lawsuit is epic-- they sued the district and five district employees (admins and teachers) in both individual and official capacities. The lawsuit charged "severe and pervasive harassment" along with violations of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, violations of Constitutional rights under the 1st and 14th Amendments, plus violations of the Rehabilitation Act of 1974 and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act. 

The reasoning for the Title VI violation was that federal courts have said that it covers religious discrimination when the harassment is based on "shared ancestry or ethnic characteristic" rather than religious practices. You'll want to remember that one. 

The "statement of facts" portion of the complaint takes up almost 100 paragraphs, but we'll try to catch the highlights.

The trouble started in September of 2020 when the plaintiffs (the son and daughter) were introduced to the book White Fragility in courses they were taking. Mrs. Brophy emailed the principal of an elementary school (it's not clear why, because the son and daughter were 15 and 16 at the time) and the Humanities Supervisor to explain her "non-acceptance" of the book, as well as the discussion of white privilege and Black Lives Matter. She also wanted to complain about Facebook posts from a teacher at the elementary school that she viewed as "anti-Christian, anti-Conservative, and therefore, offensive, derogatory and discriminating against Plaintiff's religious beliefs."

The Humanities Director responded in four days, saying the objected-to items were not part of the school's core curriculum. She didn't address the Facebook posts. Mrs. Brophy fired back more complaints about the teacher's posts, with attachments. The superintendent replied that teachers have First Amendment rights and she wasn't going to do anything about the posts. 

Mrs. Brophy gave that issue one more try, then moved on to complaints about a video of police brutality and the Breonna Taylor case shown in an art class. Also, more complaints about systemic racism, white privilege, Black Lives Matter, and other unacceptable topics. And now they offered an explanation:

Plaintiff Parents explained that these topics are anti-Christian and therefore, discriminate directly against their religion.

How, you may ask, are white privilege and Black Lives Matter anti-Christian? The complaint goes on to explain:

Christians and Catholics are a majority white religion, self-identifying white Catholics comprising 60% of the followers. This religion is heavily tied to Italy, whose population is 80% Catholic and home to the Vatican.

So white privilege and Black Lives Matter and all the rest are anti-Christian, because Christians are white.

And if you're think "That can't be right," well, it isn't. According to PEW, roughly 50% of the world's Christian population is located in South America and Africa. They're right about the 6 in 10 Catholics being white--if they talk about the US. Globally, not so much. Maybe the Brophy's are just that uninformedly racist as to imagine that Christianity is a white religion. Or maybe their lawyers told them that this argument would let them throw a Title IV violation in there. 

Also, in case you're wondering, East Penn's student body is about 80% white. 

By mid-October, the Brophys had opted their children out of all these topics that they found "anti-Christian and anti-Conservative." At this point, they allege that the school started discriminating against the two students, "withholding crucial educational benefits on account of their disabilities." Both children had IEPs, with the son having health issues including hypersomnolence (excessive daytime sleepiness), Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, and Amplified Musculoskeletal Pain Syndrome. His IEP included an exemption from masking.

Now, that fall East Penn was distance learning, but the son needed reduced screen time because of his vision impairment, so the school was supposed to print out some of his work to do. Plaintiff Parents allege the school did not do so, nor did they provide a "reasonable alternative," and the Brophys claim it was because of "religious discrimination." This is one of several points where I feel we're missing some information. We know the Brophys had email--did they not have a printer? 

The IEP also called for home tutoring, but there was no tutor available for AP Physics. And the AP teacher, also named in the lawsuit, would not do instruction with an unmasked student. Parents sent a letter to the school saying it's in his IEP, and if she "is not comfortable with that, then she should not be teaching any students in person whatsoever."

So by the end of October, Mrs. Brophy is filing an Educator Misconduct complaint with the Pennsylvania Department of Education and the Office for Civil Rights. Let me recap--because the teacher in the fall of 2020 would not work one on one with an unmasked student, Mom turned that teacher in to the state. 

Reading the complaint, one gets the impression that these parents are not trying very hard to build a partnership with the school. 

The school offered some alternatives for the AP Physics--take it next year or take a college-level course. Mrs. Brophy rejected those. The school offered a zoom class with the AP Physics teacher and another non-physics teacher in the room with the son. Also not okay. Mrs. Brophy told the district to stick the teacher in a big room with some filtration and an N95 mask. 

By January of 2021, the whole mess had moved to Facilitated Resolution Between the Parties. First meeting set for February 3. After receiving a document from the district that they didn't agree with, the parents chose not to attend. After the son was absent five days, the school sent a letter, noting that such a series of unexcused absences is a summary offense. "Harassment," say the parents.

In February, the school district (which has not always covered itself with glory in this tale) finally denied the Brophy's request for exemption from all race stuff. At the same time, the district told the Brophy's that they were banned from communicating with their children's teachers. The Brophy's replied to reiterate that they "are simply seeking religious exemption from the topics that are anti-Christian and anti-Conservative." Is Conservatism a religion?

Well, you get the gist. I go through all this detail so that we can get a feel for how this whole business just kept dragging on, and there is still more, but I'll skim. Son misses homework assignments and it's hurting his grades. More discrimination, and if you'd just let us talk to his teachers, we'd be on top of this, say the parents. It's all just retaliation for expressing the religious and disability discrimination. More attendance issues as the son "would choose to attend school from home on certain days he was scheduled to be in person." New IEP meeting scheduled in April but parents don't like that so many people at the IEP and "they would be more comfortable" if just the special ed director attended (as experienced IEP parents, surely they know that PA IEP meetings require, by law, a full team). 

There are plenty of unknowns here--for instance, there doesn't seem enough here to explain a ban on communicating with school staff, and one suspects that perhaps the Brophys haven't reported the full extent of their communications with the school. And as always, the public school district cannot breach confidentiality to defend itself. Also, for what it's worth, there's a perfectly fine Lehigh Valley Catholic high school nearby in Allentown.

The suit was taken on by Derek Smith Law Group, a big legal firm that specializes in discrimination and sexual harassment lawsuits; their lawyer is Catherine W. Smith, who used to be a sex crimes prosecutor in Philly. The Brophys demanded a jury trial. The district's lawyer doubted the success of the suit, saying “Anybody can file a lawsuit by paying the filing fee. Being successful is something completely different.”.

Well, I guess that depends on how one defines success. The Brophys sued for unspecified damages. What they got, earlier this month, was a settlement of $45,000. The district was represented by its insurance company, and this statement was read at the board meeting:

There was no admission of liability on the part of the school district or its employees and there was no finding of liability on the part of the school district or its employees. The insurance carrier agreed to make the payment to avoid any additional expenses and the uncertainty of litigation.

So it turns out that actual gag laws aren't needed to harass a school district--just some white fragility, religious paranoia, and a good law firm. We live in interesting times.

Classroom Proposals (Don't Be Gay)

Just last week there was another one. You know--one of those heartwarming stories about somebody proposing marriage to a teacher in her classroom. This time it was in Dover, New York. A third grade teacher's boyfriend not only proposed in the classroom, but enlisted the students to help out by holding the proposal signage. 

These crop up regularly; sometimes there's touching video and the whole school is in on it. And then there are really good ones where both halves of the couple are teachers (this one made it all the way to US magazine and ABC News). And here's one that involved a video, a kindergarten class, and a whole school assembly:

I have always had thoughts about these things. For one, a public proposal is only for people who are already 100% certain of the answer. For another, as someone on Marriage #2, I wonder about the weird factor for young students who remember being part of the proposal for a marriage that later crashed and burned. 

But mostly I think this can be part of the general category of Living Your Teacher Life In Public. I think it's generally useful for students to see adults-other-than-their-parents navigating life stuff. As with everything in education, there's the matter of balance; if every Monday class period starts with an account of the weekend's dating, or your every rough day at home turns into a rough day for your students, that's too much. But family photos on the desk, brief mentions of Cool Things That Happened (like the baby walked yesterday)--things that are the classroom equivalent of having students discover that you actually buy groceries at the store--these not only help you relate to students human to human, but also help them see more examples of how normal adult humans cope with life. Put another way, the first step of a relationship is to show up, and you can't show up if your own life is a deep secret. I didn't propose in front of my students, but I told them I was engaged, because if you have any kind of real human relationship with other humans, even a professional relationship, then you share major events that require them to shift their picture of normal you.

(There is a whole other chapter that goes with teaching in a small town, where people will already Know Things and fill in the blanks, so it's in your own best interests to provide accurate information yourself. That also saves you moments like the time I noted a tv actress was attractive and a student said, "Ha ha--what would Mrs. Greene say about that" and another student said, "He's divorced, you dummy.")

These are all the thoughts I used to have when I came across one of these stories. Now I have other thoughts.

Thoughts like, if this we a same-gender couple, in some states the teacher would lose their job and be subject to being sued by parents. If bills like the one proposed in Tennessee were passed, a same-gender couple that was legally married and legally had a child could not even put a family picture on their desk for fear of violating the ban of any materials that “promote, normalize, support, or address lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender issues or lifestyles." 

Don't Say Gay laws like those being supported in Kansas and Florida and Tennessee and South Carolina and heaven knows where else since the last time I looked-- these are, for teachers, Don't Be Gay laws. To simply be in the room while being both LGBTQ and normal would qualify as "normalizing" and therefore illegal behavior.

It's important to remember that these kinds of laws are not about having some sort of vague philosophical impact-- they are about requiring LGBTQ teachers and students to keep their lives in a sealed box, requiring them to keep part of themselves hidden and to keep unexpressed parts of the lives that we straights get to blurt out anytime we feel like it. Simple stuff like referring to a partner by a pronoun would have the potential to disrupt your entire career. 

These are dumb, dehumanizing laws that would threaten the lives of students and teachers, and while it's not the worst thing about them, they would also throw a serious obstacle in the way of teachers being able to do their jobs. 

The next time you see a touching story about a teacher classroom marriage proposal, or even just notice a nice family picture on a teacher's desk, ask yourself if you think that should be illegal for certain people. 

Charters Can't Escape Gag Laws

One of the big selling points of charter schools is supposed to be that they can escape and avoid all sorts of bureaucratic meddling and red tape that plague public schools. But it turns out that some conservatives are perfectly happy to extend red tape to charter schools if it's their preferred red tape.

Essence Preparatory was all set to launch in San Antonio, a school with a mission for high quality and culturally sensitive teaching. The school's founder, Akeem Brown, has been a busy guy in local government and community organizations. He mentions starting out as a teacher, though he has no education degree. But further down the line, he became a BES fellow, a group that has a twenty-year history of trying to grow charter school leaders (BES stands for Building Excellent Schools). So Brown's charter pedigree is flawless, and yet, when he was just about to open the doors of Essence Prep (did I mention this is in Texas) he hit a snag. See if you can spot the potential problem. In an interview, Brown explained some of the thinking behind Essence:

Essence Prep competencies and teaching practices will be culturally responsive. Our pedagogy and tailored curriculum is purposely multicultural, and not white-centered.

Our school will connect students to the culture of literacy, which we believe is their birthright and civil right. We will engage students in critical reflection on their lives and racial identities in relation to power and justice. Research has consistently shown that positive racial identity matters for both Black boys and Black girls to be able to achieve academically and have the best shot at success in life.

This wasn't just noise. One parent who spoke to Brown said, "He spoke about empowering people through knowing their race and their lineage." In his application, Brown noted "The opposite of racist isn't 'not racist.' It is antiracist."

The Texas Education Agency approved the charter 11-3. But the next a chief of staff for Rep. Steve Toth reached out to TEA commissioner Mike Morath. Toth spearheaded the Texas gag law (HB 3979) forbidding critical race theory and dictating how racial issues would be taught in Texas, and he wrote an op-ed about Essence Prep. It was never published, but Chalkbeat got their hands on a copy which said in part

Unlike other charter schools who focus solely on academics, Essence Prep’s goal is to promote critical race theory and community activism. Promoting ‘antiracism’ in the classroom would mean teaching that the system of government in Texas, designed to protect economic freedom, is racist. Instead of stopping critical race theory, the Texas Education Agency furthered it.

Well, if you want to teach creationism or religion or bad, racist history in a charter school, that's one thing. But if you're going to bring up the dreaded CRT--well, then. Essence was informed that before they could open, certain "statements, authors, or written works in violation of HB 3979" would have to be scrubbed. The school's mission would also require "additional clarification of the plan for teaching students to be advocates for public policy change" to be clear that it wasn't going to violate the law." And the list continues to cover all the ways that they must clarify how they wouldn't break the gag law.

Brown told Chalkbeat that getting into compliance required three months of work taking away from "prepping and setting the stage" for the new school. That included removing specific references to Ibram X. Kendi and quotes from How To Be An Antiracist. 

So this particular tale shows how the gag laws can be used to ban a particular book or author. They also show that conservative dedication to school choice takes a back seat to enforcing gag laws intended to squelch unapproved discussions of race, and that when push comes to shove, some people's belief in free market dynamic doesn't go quite so far as they like to claim it does. You can have choice--just not that choice. 

John Oliver on Critical Race Theory

 I could not have done this any better myself. I don't really have anjything to add, but I don't want you to miss this.

FL: How To Make "Don't Say Gay" Bill Worse

Florida's HB 1557 is a truly terrible bill that clamps down on any mention or discussion of LGBTQ topics though Kansas actually has a worse bill which would forbid any mention of LGBTQ topics of any sort at all. Perhaps that is what inspired the sponsor of the Florida bill to make matters worse.

Last week the bill picked up 15 proposed amendments, most of which were attempts to mitigate the damage that the Don't Say Gay act would inflict. But Joe Harding, a co-sponsor of the original bill wanted to go in a different direction.

The bill originally tempered its requirement that the school must inform parents of anything going on with the student's mental health or well-being by including the note that the bill wouldn't 

prohibit the school district from adopting procedures to withhold such information from a parent if a reasonably prudent person would believe the disclosure would result in abuse, abandonment or neglect as those terms are defined in s. 39.01

Harding's amendment would add to that--

abuse, abandonment or neglect, as defined in s. 39.01, based solely on child-specific information personally known to the school personnel and as documented and approved by the school principal or his or her designees. The school principal or his or her designees shall develop a plan, using all available government resources, to disclose such information within 6 weeks after the decision to withhold such information from the parent. The plan must facilitate disclosure between the student and parent through an open dialogue in a safe, supportive, and judgment-free environment that respects the parent-child relationship and protects the mental, emotional, and physical well-being of the student.

So. The reasonably prudent person's judgment isn't good enough--there must be documentation specific to this particular child, and the administration has to go on record essentially declaring the parents abuse risks.

Then-- even if they've done all that--the school still has to out the child to their parents within six weeks. But there will be counseling--well, counseling that prioritizes the parents' right. 

In other words, Florida LGBTQ students with difficult family situations would understand that school would also not be a safe place for them to speak up.

This is a truly horrifying awful idea. As others have pointed out, if this becomes a law, LGBTQ children will die because of it. If you're in Florida, for heavens sake, call your elected representative.

Privatization Costs

 We've talked before about Donald Cohen and Alen Mikaelian's book The Privatization of Everything, but it's worth returning to in order to underline yet another point.

One of the arguments often pushed to promote the idea of privatizing, of having government farm out a function to private operators, is that it will be a money saver. But time after time, that turns out not to be true.

The challenge with public services is that there aren't that many ways to get money out of them. Privatizers like the word "efficiency," but that too often translates into either pay less or get less. Schools are a fine example; if you want to make money running a school, there are only so many ways to do it. Pay people less. Reduce the number of people you pay. Reduce the services you offer. 

We see those idea reflected in plenty of school "reform" ideas. We can replace teachers with "coaches" or "mentors," which would cut personnel costs. We can reduce staff by having really super-duper teachers teach thousands of students. We can replace teachers with software. We could get rid of all materials, practices and services that don't contribute to some narrow-but-numerical measure of "success." We can set up schools that don't offer services to (or accept for admission) high cost students. 

Not one of these ideas is about providing a better education for students; they are all about finding "efficiencies," about finding ways to cut the cost of providing the service so that a company can get more money out of it.

I'll say, as I always do, that there is nothing wrong with a business trying to make money. That's part of its basic function. But that basic function makes business incompatible with the running of public services.

There is another related problem, most visible in education-- the amateurism problem. Companies look at a sector like education, and because they don't know the sector well at all (except that, of course, everyone went to school, so everyone is an expert) so they look at it and go "Surely there are inefficiencies we can squeeze to get profit." They assume that there must be a lot of change under the couch cushions, but they've never been in the living room and they don't even know if there IS a couch. I have no doubt that many folks singing this refrain really believe it--but they simply don't know what they're talking about.

The results are chronicled in several privatizing stories in the book. There's the tale of Indiana toll road. Private companies said, "We can totally make a profit with those," and instead they tanked. Then-Governor Mike Pence decided, because reasons, that rather than take the road back, he'd resell it someone else who decided that rather than eat the costs that had given the previous company terminal indigestion, they would raise rates and pass the costs on to the traffic (creating a "shunpike"-- a road that people avoid-- we're trying a similar project in Pennsylvania).

That trick of passing on costs is a common feature of privatization. The book was my first encounter with the forces working to keep taxpayer-funded weather information away from the public. Instead of a weather service app for free, with have a variety of weather "services," all using the weather service data, but "giving" it to us via a commercial enterprise. The added value for users is zero, but the companies have to generate some income somehow. It's a model similar to the rules forbidding the IRS from letting us file income tax without working through some pricey "service" like TurboTax.

Privatization is never cheaper. Municipalities that have sold off their parking systems have screwed the public. Chicago sold off its parking for a $1.7 billion contract for 75 years; the buyers realized a $500 million profit in just 11 years. Imagine just how much cheaper parking could have been in Chicago. 

"Business can do the job cheaper," simply turns out to be wrong, time after time. Business either reduces the idea of what the job is supposed to be (in a privatized education world, the job is no longer to educate all children) or they simply throw out the "cheaper" part (note the shift in the school choice world from "we can do it cheaper" to "we need to be paid more"). 

ICYMI: Van Gogh Edition (2/20)

Yesterday, as our Valentine's Day outing, the CMO (Chief Marital Officer) and I went to see the Van Gogh immersive art thingy, Pittsburgh edition. Much of what I know about Impressionism I learned by reading my daughter's college papers, because she is the art whiz in the family. It was an unusual and beautiful experience. Very cool.

The reading list is a little short this week, but still worthwhile. Remember to share the pieces that speak to you.

This Guy Is Going To Take Over Georgia's High Ed System

Actually, this piece from Mother Jones calls Sonny Perdue a "know-nothing MAGA stalwart." A reminder that even though some politicsy stuff is boring, it matters a whole lot.

Florida pulling books off shelves

The 74 takes a look at the spreading book banning going on across the nation.

An Open Letter To Parents Who Wish To Ban My Books

Author Bill Konigsberg has been the subject of several book bannings; here he writes a response to one particular attack on his work. This is well done.

To Fight Attacks on “Critical Race Theory,” Look to Black History

The Nation takes a trip through history to show how Black educators have dealt with this kind of stuff in the past.

A Teacher's Wish

Steven Singer has a birthday wish, a wish to change just one thing that would lead to a host of positive changes in education (and I agree with his choice).

How Big Businesses Are Colonizing the Classroom

 

From Jeff Bryant and Velislava Hillman for The Progressive, a look at how some education programs are being co-opted by businesses to make more meat widgets.

Who gave $184 million to Hillsdale College

Schools Matter took a look at a Hillsdale Form 990, and boy does that raise some questions about the support for this uber-conservative school, soon to be a major player in Tennessee charter schools.

School Board Members Get Threats

Reuters put three reporters on this story which gives a broad and deep look at the kind of crap that school board members have to put up with these days. It's not pretty.

This 16-year-old wanted to get the COVID vaccine. He had to hide it from his parents

In the midst of all this noise about parental rights, it's important to remember stories like this one from NPR.

Why Pre-K does not have lasting effects

A researcher from Vanderbilt writes about a different way to view competencies in the littles. Posted by the good folks at Defending the Early Years. 

At this Portland school, what teachers want is for children to feel joy again in learning

Hey, it's an encouraging story about a school managing to hold true to its actual mission.

Honesty in the Time Of Covid

Nancy Flanagan looks around and sees stuff and then turns it into words; she has a real gift. She and her husband were positive for Covid last week, and she has some thoughts about that.

Finally, I'm going to plug two columns I wrote for Forbes, mostly because they took a chunk of time. But if you want to look at a state-by-state rundown of where teacher gag laws have been enacted and where they are currently pending (with links), I have that for you, as well as a look at what separates the bad from the worse.