This video of Tennessee state senator Raumesh Akbari caught my attention.
SEN. AKBARI: “I never thought I’d live long enough for diversity to become a dirty word.” @SenAkbari calls out Tennessee @tnsenategop Republicans ugly attacks on @UTKnoxville for valuing diversity efforts on campus.
— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) February 9, 2023
(From @TNSenateDems) pic.twitter.com/sCGARV1kEH
I too, never thought I'd live long enough to see diversity become a dirty word, along with values like equity and inclusion. But that is happening all over the country as we speak. It gets even worse.
A PA mother (with the help of Stephen Miller's legal group) is suing her child's school over a social skills curriculum, alleging it's emphasis on compassion violates her "Christian" beliefs because "not every human is deserving of my child's empathy."https://t.co/QDophKs4Df
— Gillian Branstetter (@GBBranstetter) February 11, 2023
The curriculum these people are objecting to is part of the national commitment to "social emotional learning" (SEL) that has recently come under attack by right wingers. At the West Shore School District in Pennsylvania, it's called "Character Strong." Here's a screenshot taken from their web site:
I taught in a public school system for 40 years. During this time, we participated in a number of 'character' programs designed to foster inclusion, valuing fellow students and families, and much of the same things that Nancy mentions in this article. This school system could best be described as mostly white, mostly mainstream Protestant & Catholic, and partly conservative/partly liberal. What matters most is that the administration, staff, and parents supported these efforts and consequently the students learned to do so also. At the same time, the district was one of the first to engage in a movement to bus minority students from a failing urban schools system to our suburban system, thus integrating the student body to a much greater degree than had happened before. We had our (small) share of antagonisms, but they were greatly offset by the many efforts of the system's population, students and staff to emulate these human values we were trying to teach. Did we always succeed? Frankly, we did, to a much greater degree than I had initially thought possible. I'm very bothered by the 'nativist Christian nationalism' that's now in evidence in some places. That is reprehensible.
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