Though critical race theory’s introduction to the public school system has only recently become a well-known issue, a recent report from the Heritage Foundation suggests it has been a problem in education for quite a while.
A sample of 554 different public school districts with more than 15,000 students found that 39% of them currently employ a chief diversity officer, or a high-ranking school official whose responsibility it is to implement various diversity, equity, and inclusion goals. The purpose of this position is to reduce achievement gaps, level the playing field, and make sure that less-privileged students are able to achieve just as much as others. But in reality, CDOs exist to push a toxic narrative about disparity, in which every single unequal outcome is the result of systemic racism, income inequality, or both.
They are pushing this narrative all over the country. In Virginia, for example, a diversity chief in Fairfax County said his goal is to make sure “that equity is at the forefront of every decision that we have to make.” In Austin, Texas, the chief equity officer said she wanted to create a comprehensive equity plan that would address systemic racism in the district.
Heritage’s study found that 79% of large school districts with more than 15,000 students have someone in a CDO position. Democratic states, those where at least two institutions (including chambers of congress and governorships) are controlled by Democrats, are more likely to have school districts that employ CDOs than Republican states. About 47% of school districts in blue states have CDOs, while just 32% of school districts in red states can say the same. Overall, just six of the 31 Republican states employ CDOs in more than half of their school districts.
And, yes, the political affiliation of the state is a vital factor, Heritage says.
From the report:
Even after controlling statistically for … other factors, the size of a school district and whether it is in a blue or red state remain strongly associated with whether school districts have CDOs. The influence of which political party controls the state actually grows larger when other factors are controlled. Blue states are 17 percentage points more likely than red states to have CDOs, after adjusting for other observable characteristics. This supports the conclusion that CDOs are designed, at least in part, to promote ideological goals.Heritage concludes: “Given the rate at which CDO positions are being created for K–12 districts, it may not be long before the vast majority of all districts have this kind of position.”
In other words, parents should assume, if they do not already, that their public school district has begun to implement critical race theory in some form, whether by hiring a CDO, introducing “equity” goals, or encouraging students to think about our systems as unjust. If they can’t pull their students out of the public school system, they should find out exactly how critical race theory is represented in the district. And then they should act. Parents must make their concerns known to local school boards and elect officials who share those concerns.
The Left thought it would be able to turn the public school system into its own indoctrination camp without anyone noticing, but not anymore. The backlash against critical race theory has been swift and organic, and if the momentum holds, parents will be able to reverse all of the gains leftists have made over the past several years. But they have to keep that momentum going.
