Education
Related: About this forumMoms for Liberty meets its match: Parents in this swing suburban district are fighting back
Source: Salon
Moms for Liberty meets its match: Parents in this swing suburban district are fighting back
Amanda Marcotte
Tue, October 10, 2023 at 6:00 AM EDT·25 min read
"Monster Liberty": That's how the otherwise excellent closed-captioning service in the auditorium at Pennridge High School interpreted "Moms for Liberty," while one of several dozen citizens who had waited in line to lambast the group spoke at the podium. A chuckle rose up among the parents in the crowded school board meeting, held on a late August evening after the first day of classes for the Pennridge School District in suburban Bucks County, Pennsylvania. "Fair enough," one mother whispered to another.
That wasn't the only moment of levity that evening, which saw a robust crowd of largely irate parents speak out against the adoption of a social studies curriculum linked to far-right organizations like Moms for Liberty and Hillsdale College. Before the meeting, people exchanged wisecracks about "talented clappers" an inside-joke reference to an email circulated among local conservatives that appealed for sympathetic outsiders to turn out and applaud the right-wing agenda: "You do not need to be a resident to attend and clap," it advised, for "policies that bless and protect our children."
Link to tweet
Most of the attendees saw that appeal as a minor victory, or at least as evidence that they were gaining ground in the battle for control over the school district one of hundreds of similar battles unfolding all over the country. Yes, the Pennridge school board was dominated by far-right members, one of whom had been present in Washington for Donald Trump's "Stop the Steal" rally-turned-riot on Jan. 6, 2021. Yes, at least five of the nine board members were linked to Moms for Liberty, a right-wing "astroturf" organization that has orchestrated a national campaign to remake public education along arch-conservative and anti-intellectual lines. But Pennridge board meetings for months had been dominated by outraged parents speaking out against the Moms for Liberty incursion and the board majority's apparent agenda. Conservative forces were sufficiently worried about the optics, it appeared, that they were eager to pull in "talented clappers" from outside the community.
A tightly packed group of Moms for Liberty supporters did indeed show up, huddled together in a few rows of seats. ...
-snip-
Read more: https://news.yahoo.com/moms-liberty-meets-match-parents-100001256.html
RandySF
(70,636 posts)Central Bucks School Board Democratic Slate - https://www.cbsdneighborsunited.com
Individual Candidates:
1. Karen Smith - https://www.karensmithforcbschoolboard.com
2. Heather Reynolds - https://www.electheatherreynolds.com
3. Dana Foley - https://www.electdanafoley.com/
4. Rick Haring - https://www.voterickharing.com/
5. Susan Gibson - https://www.electsusangibson4cbsd8.com
FalloutShelter
(12,749 posts)Granddaughters in the Central Bucks system.
Cant wait to vote for our Democratic candidates. thanks for posting the slate.
Lonestarblue
(11,827 posts)This group is just one more nationally funded organization trying to take local control of schools away from parents and force their white supremacy evangelical curriculum on public education. The New York Times has an article today about the superior performance of students in Department of Defense schools. Some of the key points made are that parents have housing and food security, teachers are paid competitive salaries and classrooms are well equipped, and all DoD schools follow the same challenging curriculum. Their students scores on national and international tests surpass those of most public schools.
What is obvious to me is that the DoD schools probably have better disciplined kids and they focus on education instead of working right-wing politics and religion into their schools. We need to get politicians and religion out of our schools.
Gift link
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/10/us/schools-pandemic-defense-department.html?unlocked_article_code=seJBOefnOEuYS0Q4a6D1BPjiWcmgla0lLQnbplCHVLlB9nH2jesn5m_V92ELVtV6Iop24zBJ5HZ13L3uRtMHGEvp2V5QGBMc02z6ERyc3Pd69G9FzCLBt3oG1ePxgmev60nLwRxwgdJWNcMFgmzM0CqW7Ancc4qatBd6M4JC12haT4tJ5lsaxTUeY_ErqJ-7f4lWqVAxUAny20saE63ric0a0-HISyo08m8u__Qx_B7pH_35Lq8ma8_XhKY-Yu9iAEUOnvooSp-99uzKF0qnhHwr8puOVJlwlcL8k7EE45dIO1GZQChu8yvsrvHrRBzJ4IpeFubMPeKbx3XO_HihaFF9_YPDrH4t&smid=url-share
AllaN01Bear
(23,047 posts)Joinfortmill
(16,406 posts)NNadir
(34,664 posts)He was powerful, particularly when he held up Toni Morrison's Beloved as a banned book.
The ignorant fascist book burners need to be stopped.
LisaM
(28,601 posts)(not to mention a misleading name). We can get rid of them by paying attention to school board elections.
Happened in my small town. One of them, who didn't have kids in the district AFAIK, ran for school board the last cycle and tried to campaign on the town's local Facebook page, where - to the credit of people in my home town - she was immediately exposed for who she was, was flustered when confronted with direct questions, and did not win the election.
calimary
(84,331 posts)Not everybody is taken in by this Moms for Liberty BS.
Thank Heaven.
Goddessartist
(2,067 posts)One of my sisters lives in Sparks, NV, and is going to go to the School Board meetings as she found out that a 'Monster' Liberty mom is on the board. So she's going to show up! Her children, now grown, went through the school system there. She's now retired, so she has time to do this!