Nikole Hannah-Jones: I Don’t Understand This Idea That Parents Should Decide What Is Taught

A special episode of Meet the Press on Sunday titled “Schools, America, and Race”, 1619 Project author Nikole Hannah-Jones said, “I don’t really understand this idea that parents should decide what’s being taught.” Perhaps believing that the Sunday after Christmas would be a slow news day, moderator Chuck Todd dedicated the entire episode to the topic of race and education in America, essentially to dismiss opposition to Critical Race Theory.

Todd conducted a series interview with educators and students about the continuing controversy around Critical Race Theory in schools. He decided that it was a good idea to invite Nikole Hannah Jones of. The New York Times, and author of the historically inaccurate 1619 Project, to talk with him about how to improve the teaching of American History.

Todd started by asking Nikole Hannah-Jones if she intended for “The 1619 Project” to be part of the curriculum in public schools or rather was her intention to simply start a national debate over how American history is taught. Hanna-Jones stated that she pitched the project as “a work of journalism” and that it is common for New York TimesProjects to be used in school curriculums. She claimed that she was now: “it’s only become controversial because people have decided to make The 1619 Project controversial.”

Later on in the interview, Todd asked Hannah-Jones about skepticism over the government’s involvement in deciding what was considered true history:

People will say that government history does not represent our history. I am aware of this. This seems to be a real challenge in an open society, is how do we get agreement on this, especially when, you know parents want to have — look, a Virginia governor’s race was arguably decided on the strength of how influential should parents be on curriculum. What can we do to achieve this?

Focusing on the Virginia governor’s race, Hannah-Jones chalked it up to “tThe success of right-wing propaganda campaigns that encouraged white parents to resist their children’s indoctrination, such as racism — but it was propaganda..”

Her argument was that many parents of Latino and black families in Texas want her inaccurate and radical writings to be taught in their schools. In reality, Governor-elect Glen Youngkin (R) won by gaining support among blacks compared to Trump and won the Latino vote by roughly 12 percent.

“That is why we must ask the right question. This idea that the parents decide what is being taught doesn’t make sense to me.” she scoffed. “My education is not professional. Although I do not have a degree or certificate in either science or social studies, we send our children school as we believe they should be taught by professionals who are experts in that subject..”

Virginia parents even got scolded for being angry at Terry McAuliffe’s failed Democratic presidential candidate.

Although the governor or the candidate stated that he doesn’t believe that parents shouldn’t have the final say on what school classes are taught, it was widely criticized. We send our kids to school, and not homeschool. They are professionals who can teach social studies and history. I believe we should let them teach literature.

Hannah-Jones claims she doesn’t understand the idea that parents should decide what’s taught in schools but isn’t she also a parent? Hannah-Jones also said that she isn’t a professional educator, if that’s the case, then why was she given a tenured professorship at Howard University? And she unironically claimed she felt schools “should teach us how to think, not what to think.”

This was made possible because of the elitist journalist who spits on concerned parents. FidelityAnd Google. This link will take you to their contact information so that they can be notified about biased news funding

To read the relevant transcript of this segment click “expand”:

NBC’sMeet the Press
12/26/2021
11:00:05 AM

CHUCK TODD – Did the 1619 Project become a public curriculum or was it intended to spark a discussion about how to teach American history better?

NIKOLE ANNAH-JONES The New York TimesI and, pitched a project as journalism. The New York Times. As we worked on the project for a few months, we started to think about how this might be an excellent learning tool. We were particularly thinking about the widesheet we produced in collaboration with the National Museum of African-American History and Culture. It talks about and teaches slavery using objects from that museum. It’s now. The New York TimesThe New York Times’ education division regularly transforms its journalism into curriculum. The Pulitzer Center, with whom we eventually partnered, also has a similar educational division. The Pulitzer Center, which we eventually partnered with, is constantly transforming journalism into curriculum. Because people decided to make The 1619 Project controversial, it has only been controversial.

TODD: It’s been two years since I feel that a lot more people are realizing that history education has been lacking. We talk about how we can gloss over the Tulsa Massacre, but many have claimed that I wasn’t taught about that. Although I grew-up in Miami Florida, Axe Handle Sunday was not something I learned about. If you take a look at public schools in America, 8/10 of their teachers are white and half the students attend public schools. Is there a way to increase this aspect of America’s education system?

HANNAH-JONES Our teacher education programs don’t equip educators with the necessary knowledge to better teach history.

According to Teaching Tolerance’s survey, about 50% of American teachers said they didn’t have the skills to educate about slavery. This is ironic because we are seeing anti-history bills passed. They make it harder to teach slavery, racism, and the long history of racism in our country. However, educators from other countries have been struggling.

Students are being asked to do essays on the pros and cons about slavery. Because we as a nation have never honestly confronted our historical truths. The history that we are taught is often one of nationalism or patriotism.

TODD: Right.

HANNAHJONES: It’s not all about the unverified truth.

TODD: From where should this come? You know, I’ve thought about this, and I, you know, I don’t think, I know that if government says this is our history, people are going to say, I’m not letting government historians decide what our history is. This seems to be a real challenge in an open society, is how do we get agreement on this, especially when, you know parents want to have — look, a Virginia Governor’s race was arguably decided on the strength of how influential should parents be on curriculum. What can we do to achieve this?

HANNAH-JONES There are many black parents in Virginia. And, of course, Virginia has a large number of Latino parents. But they weren’t being covered in the coverage. They wanted more information about race, history, and education for their children.

That being said, we must ask the right questions. It’s a concept that the parents have to decide about what is being taught. My education is not professional. Although I do not have a degree from social studies or science, we send our children school because we believe they should be taught by professionals who are experts in that subject. This is not what I do.

The Governor, or candidate, said that he did not believe parents should decide what is taught at school. He was mocked, but it’s the truth. We send our kids to school, and not homeschool. They are professionals who can teach history, social studies and literature. We should all be able to have our say, but schools are not just about affirming our worldview. Schools need to teach us to ask questions, and not just how to think.