It is the most difficult thing I’ve ever done. In my case, it’s been as a firearms instructor in Southern California teaching the broad range of people one encounters in this very diverse part of the country. They can come from any background and all viewpoints. They may be young. They could be very old. You can find them from anywhere in the world. Their personal beliefs can span all political, cultural, and sexual perspectives. Each of them comes to class to acquire the basics of their desired skill, which is marksmanship. At the core of it, as a teacher, it’s my job to be able to find a way to constructively interact with all of them.
Every teacher that I’ve ever discussed this with shares the same outlook on what they owe the students that crossed their paths. It is a dedication to service that I admire. This profession is often overlooked and is much more valuable to ordinary Americans than it is acknowledged. So, when I see instances where the institutions within which these honorable people must do their jobs become muddled by the politics of activism, I move to take a closer look to see what’s really going on; how is this really affecting the quality of the lives of these teachers?
RedState discovered this course for teachers at Los Angeles Unified Schools District that encourages them to confront other teachers and push for a militant agenda.
This particular course is called “Identity Working Terms”, a contracted course purchased by LAUSD from the California Conference for Equality and Justice, a 501(c3) non-profit activist organization. The course claims authority to train teachers to comply with a formal policy by the LAUSD known as Bulletin 6224 “Gender Identity and Students – Ensuring Equity and Nondiscrimination”. If you read the official bulletin, it basically goes over the rules for complying with regulations having to do with recognizing gender preference in the district’s record-keeping system, what the rules are for engaging with students in their chosen identities – which can be male, female, or other — and goes over infrastructural accommodations like restroom and locker room protocols.
However, the CCEJ course content itself isn’t the official bulletin policies but additional material that emphasizes teachers facing off. Additional course materials are also available from Seed the Way (whose website states that).
“Seed the Way LLC seeks to enable teachers and educational leaders to cultivate and sustain actively anti-bias, antiracist pedagogies, curricula, practices, and learning spaces, and to disrupt patterns that continue to oppress people of the global majority.”
There is also a sheet from LGBTQ activist organization WelcomingSchools.org. This sheet is from WelcomingSchools.org, which is a private LLC. It contains points that are similar to the LAUSD policy bulletin. The organization’s website goes on to promote alternative textbooks and teaching materials to replace legacy curriculum materials. According to their website,
“Welcoming Schools is the most comprehensive bias-based bullying prevention program in the nation to provide LGBTQ+ and gender inclusive professional development training, lesson plans, booklists and resources specifically designed for educators and youth-serving professionals. We use an inter-sectional anti-racist approach to identifying and implementing actionable strategies. We uplift school communities with critical tools to embrace family diversity, create LGBTQ+ and gender inclusive schools, prevent bias-based bullying, and support transgender and non-binary students.”
And finally, CCEJ added handout materials including something called the “Gender Unicorn,” which comes from an organization named the Trans Student Educational Resource (TSER). The website states that the hand-drawn graphic motif material comes from CCEJ.
“Trans Student Educational Resources is a youth-led organization dedicated to transforming the educational environment for trans and gender non-conforming students through advocacy and empowerment.”
The most confrontational of these materials being given to LAUSD staff is the Seed the Way materials. This is a list of possible ways teachers could call in or invite other teachers so they can confront them peer-to-peer. The LAUSD policy bulletin does not mandate such activities. The bulletin only instructs teachers and staff that they should be attentive individually.
If LAUSD allows staff to use non-policy advocacy material in their training, it seems that LAUSD is open to hostile workplace complaints. Encouragement of an activist teacher to bully another staff member is exactly what every employee conduct and corporate responsibility program states you should not tolerate. It can lead to lawsuits. Look at these “conversation starters” and notice how the activist organization promoting them is encouraging workplace confrontation.
I could easily see a teacher reacting to another teacher with a very legally costly statement: “Your comment to me is deliberately hurtful. You are creating a hostile workplace situation and I am going to file a formal complaint about it with human resources.”
And that doesn’t even begin to deal with the issue that the LAUSD policy is about accommodating and blending in students with different views, not turning the many other issues of teaching the remainder of the self-identified male and female teenager into second class considerations. Where the LAUSD official policy pays homage to this reality, the advocate contractor’s materials are presented without balance. In fact, out of the entire handout set, there’s only one page that deals with LAUSD policy, everything else is an add-on.
That doesn’t seem right to me. The school board needs to investigate and tell the contractor they need to limit their training only on the approved slides and stop embellishing the program.
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