Biden and Critical Race Theory—How To Fight Back Amid Admin’s Confusing Mixed Signals
District of Columbia | August 23, 2021
Judging from the flurry of headlines about racial discrimination and teaching history in schools, you could easily forget that school was out for the summer. But some students have already returned, and the rest will be back at their desks before you know it. So will the grownups settle the issue before all of them are back in class?
Not likely.
Consider what White House press secretary Jen Psaki said when asked what President Biden thinks about educators using critical race theory—a philosophy that, ironically, pushes racially discriminatory ideas—is appropriate in K-12 lessons: “There is not just racism and slavery in our history … children should learn not just the good, but also the challenging in our history.”
Psaki’s response is confusing because just weeks earlier, the U.S. Department of Education recommended that teachers use reading material from the New York Times’ 1619 Project—which, the Times says, “aims to reframe the country’s history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of Black Americans at the very center of our national narrative.”
So after the Education Department told teachers that racism and slavery should be “at the very center of our national narrative,” the White House press secretary said there is more than “racism and slavery in our history.” (After the agency received some 35,000 comments to its announcement recommending the 1619 Project, the office retreated from this position. We can safely assume not all the comments were positive.)… (Excerpts from the Heritage Foundation)