How a School District Got Caught in Virginia's Political Maelstrom

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Last edited Mon Nov 15, 2021, 09:55 AM - Edit history (1)

I'll see if I can post this without getting a "403 Forbidden." I'm off to a bad start this morning.

A Virginia school district tried to address racism and promote diversity, but it landed in a maelstrom of angry parents and politics.

Link to tweet

How a School District Got Caught in Virginia’s Political Maelstrom

Loudoun County tried to address racism and promote diversity within its schools. Then it found itself on Fox News.



A Loudoun County school board meeting, which became the epicenter of conservative outrage.Credit...Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters

By Stephanie Saul
Nov. 14, 2021

LEESBURG, Va. — Long before the father was tackled by sheriff’s deputies at the school board meeting, before there was shouting to reopen classrooms and before “parents matter” became the central slogan of the most closely watched campaign in the post-Trump era, Loudoun County was just another American suburbia taking a hard look at its schools.

The county, at the edge of the Virginia sprawl outside Washington, had grown much more diverse. White students were no longer in the majority, and educators were trying to be more aware of how racism could affect their students’ education.

The district hired a consulting firm to help train teachers about bias. It tried to hire more teachers of color. And a high school changed its mascot from the Raiders, named for a Confederate battalion, to the Captains.

But there were rumblings of resistance.

Vocal parents protested the district’s antiracism efforts as Marxism.

Some teachers disliked the trainings, which they found ham-handed and over the top.

And evangelical Christians objected to a proposal to give transgender students access to the restrooms of their choice — complaints that were magnified when a male student wearing a skirt was arrested in an assault in a girl’s bathroom.

{snip}

The media also jumped in, feeding the frenzy. The story rebounded from one outlet to another, with conservative media leading the way, from The New York Post to The Daily Wire to Fox News, which aired 78 segments on the racial issues at Loudoun schools from March to June this year, according to Media Matters, a left-leaning group that scrutinizes media coverage.

{snip}

[FBaggins]

1. Seemed like it happened the other way around

The school board had problems and republicans made the conflict a central issue in their campaign - while our candidate could only pretend that it wasn't happening or wasn't real.

On edit - The story seems to read in the correct order. It's the title that gets it backwards.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. I urge DUers to find a way around the paywall and read this article.

{snip}

Later, {in a late June school board meeting,} at the back of the room, Scott Smith was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct after getting into a scuffle. He had been upset because his 15-year-old daughter had been sexually assaulted in a high school restroom by a 14-year-old student, identified by Mr. Smith as a “boy wearing a skirt.”

The incident played into the fears of some parents about the new transgender bathroom policy. ... Conservative media outlets zeroed in on the transgender angle; Fox News aired 88 segments in just over three weeks, according to an analysis by Media Matters.

The events turned out to be different than originally cast. ... At a juvenile court hearing, it was revealed that the two students had an ongoing sexual relationship and had arranged to meet in the bathroom. The crime, which took place before the transgender policy went into effect, was not a random assault. ... But the narrative had been set.

By September, with the governor’s election in the final stretch, Mr. Prior’s group had raised nearly $300,000 from around the country. Among the major donations was $10,000 from 1776 Action, an anti-critical race theory organization formed in March.

In September, at a Save Our Schools rally in Loudoun County, Mr. Youngkin repeated his vow to abolish critical race theory in Virginia. The phrase, which originated decades ago as an academic concept, has become a conservative rallying cry, used to broadly criticize educational and social efforts to address racial inequalities in education.

{snip}

A debate in September further inflamed many parents, when Mr. McAuliffe, the Democratic candidate for governor, said, “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”

That same month, {Beth Barts, a former board member}, was surprised to see her photograph in a television ad attacking Loudoun schools and broadcast during the Washington Football Team’s season opener.

It was paid for by the “Free to Learn Coalition,” which is tied to Leonard Leo, a prolific fund-raiser and confidant of President Trump. Mr. Leo serves as co-chairman of the conservative Federalist Society.

{snip}

Sophie Kasakove contributed reporting from New York. Kitty Bennett contributed research.

Stephanie Saul
Stephanie Saul covers national politics. Since joining The New York Times in 2005, she has also written about the pharmaceutical industry, education and the illicit foreign money fueling Manhattan’s real estate boom. Previously she worked at Newsday, where she won a Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

3. "How the CRT outrage was completely manufactured by right wing pols and media as a backlash to ..."

Kevin M. Kruse Retweeted

Such clear data about how the CRT outrage was completely manufactured by right wing pols and media as a backlash to 2020s BLM uprisings. A literal non-issue until then.

Link to tweet