FAIR News

Parents Say "No" to CRT in Schools

And Other News

May 5th, 2021

A Local Election Speaks Volumes

Implicit bias training and racial affinity groups coming to K-12 schools have been making headlines across the country. Parents in Southlake, Texas saw what was being proposed in their community and said “no.”

A recent school board and city council election in Southlake, Texas garnered national attention. The Dallas suburb had a near-even split in the 2020 general election, with Joe Biden winning the county by less than one percent. However, the recent municipal election centered primarily on the Carroll Independent School District’s attempts to implement a “Cultural Competence Action Plan," which included hiring a director of equity and inclusion and embedding diversity training for all students at all grade levels as a requisite for graduation in order to “educate students about bias and advantages.” Like many other divisive racial training programs, the district’s plan was steeped in flowery language that ultimately suggested that the immutable characteristics of students and staff members were paramount. This is dangerous — not only because such training programs are regressive, but they oftentimes result in the opposite of the intended effect.

The community debate over implementing the proposed program in the Carroll Independent School District had been ongoing. With national attention focused on the matter, many anticipated a close race — so very few foresaw a landslide victory, with nearly seventy percent of voters opting for candidates who oppose the program.

FAIR Makes National News

“When we have a whole bunch of little kids who are told from a very young age that they are defined by their skin color... you are going to end up with a society where everybody is tribal, and everybody is racist,” said FAIR president Bion Bartning on ABC last night. Bartning's brief interview and ABC's mention of FAIR was part of an eight-minute segment on critical race theory in schools. While there is still much to overcome, FAIR being featured in a segment on CRT in schools is a meaningful step toward advancing a pro-human alternative to CRT's poisonous and pessimistic lens into mainstream discourse.

Watch FAIR's clip from ABC here.

Watch the full segment here.

Other News

Robby Soave of Reason magazine wrote an article detailing the motivation behind California’s plan to discourage students from enrolling in advanced math courses in K-12 schools. The California Department of Education explains that inequities in educational outcomes are the reason behind taking such a step.

“The essence of good schooling is choice. Individual kids benefit from a wide range of possible educational options. Permitting them to diversify, specialize, and chart their own paths—with helpful input from the adults in their lives—is the course of action that recognizes vast differences in interest and ability. Holding back kids who are gifted at math isn't equitable: On the contrary, it's extremely unfair to everyone.”

Read the full article here.

In an article for The Chronicle of Higher Education, Amna Khalid lays out how diversity, equity, and inclusion departments on campus serve to bolster universities’ bureaucracies and enrich many along the way. 

“By insisting on bureaucratic solutions to execute their vision, replete with bullet-pointed action items and measurable outcomes, student activists are only strengthening the neoliberal ‘all-administrative university’ — a model of higher education that privileges market relationships, treats students as consumers and faculty as service providers, all under the umbrella of an ever-expanding regime of bureaucratization. Fulfilling student DEI demands will weaken academe, including, ironically, undermining more meaningful diversity efforts.”

Read the full article here.

In a piece for Persuasion, Nadia Gill details the capabilities of filmmakers to tell the stories of people unlike themselves. In a time where it is becoming increasingly difficult to celebrate cultures outside of one’s own, the story behind the Oscar-winning director of Nomadland reminds us why pro-human values allow us to share what we all have in common. 

“Zhao’s meteoric rise shows that it is possible to portray the lives of those with different identities and experiences in a way that honors subjects and enlightens audiences. We should look to her as an example of how to do so effectively.”

Read the full article here.

FAIR Board of Advisors member Melissa Chen joined Reason for an interview discussing her fight against illiberal identity politics in the United States and authoritarianism in her birthplace of Singapore and elsewhere. The interview covers a range of topics from the mass shooting at a massage parlor in Georgia to politics in Hollywood, and how to counter radicalism. 

Watch the interview here.

FAIR Board of Advisors member John McWhorter also sat down for an interview with Reason. The interview delves into the seemingly religious fervor motivating those who push “anti-racism” and critical race theory, something McWhorter first noted as early as 2015. McWhorter discusses his upcoming book The Elect as well as his most recently published book, Nine Nasty Words.

“We're not allowed to admit how much better things have gotten. There's a certain kind of person... where if you point to the good news they don't want to accept it. It's unpleasant for them to hear how much better things have gotten and they're thinking that their job as moral actors is to find evidence to go against it.”

Watch the interview here.

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