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Biden Education Dept. Seeks to Prioritize Critical Race Theory and 1619 Project Grant Applications

Biden Education Dept. Seeks to Prioritize Critical Race Theory and 1619 Project Grant Applications

Proposed new rule prioritizes applications from school districts to implement critical race theory, the 1619 Project, and ‘anti-racism’ into civics curriculum.

https://twitter.com/KunkleFredrick/status/1298344285079838720?s=20

The federal Department of Education, on April 19, proposed a new rule to prioritize grant applications from school districts to implement critical race theory, the 1619 Project, and anti-racism into civics curriculum. This continues the Biden administration’s concerted effort to reverse Trump-era prohibitions on critical race theory in trainings throughout the federal government, and support for the advancement of critical race theory in federally funded programs.

The public comment period will remain open until May 19. The rule summary reads:

The Department of Education (Department) proposes two priorities for the American History and Civics Education programs, including the Presidential and Congressional Academies for American History and Civics(Academies) and National Activities programs, Assistance Listing Numbers 84.422A and 84.422B. We may use these priorities for competitions in fiscal year (FY) 2021 and later years. We propose these priorities to support the development of culturally responsive teaching and learning and the promotion of information literacy skills in grants under these programs. [emphasis added]

The proposed rule starts by noting that civics education in America could use a boost. It cites knowledge of the Bill of Rights as one goal. The Department of Education proposes to establish Presidential Academies to train teachers in American history and government, and Congressional Academies to provide enhanced education to high school students in these subjects.

Civics as a vehicle to inject critical race theory

Instead of strengthening the knowledge among students of our form of government, how it functions, and the intent of the Founders, the proposed rule immediately pivots to critical race theory. It would create two priorities: emphasising projects that incorporate “racially, ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse perspectives into teaching and learning,” and promoting information literacy skills. The DOE justifies the first priority by saying, “The Department recognizes that COVID-19—with its disproportionate impact on communities of color—and the ongoing national reckoning with systemic racism have highlighted the urgency of improving racial equity throughout our society, including in our education system. As Executive Order 13985 states: ‘Our country faces converging economic, health, and climate crises that have exposed and exacerbated inequities, while a historic movement for justice has highlighted the unbearable human costs of systemic racism. Our Nation deserves an ambitious whole-of-government equity agenda that matches the scale of the opportunities and challenges that we face.'”

It goes on to cite the 1619 Project and Ibrahim X. Kendi’s book, How To Be An Antiracist, saying, “there is growing acknowledgement of the importance of including, in the teaching and learning of our country’s history, both the consequences of slavery, and the significant contributions of Black Americans to our society;” and, later, “It is critical that the teaching of American history and civics creates learning experiences that validate and reflect the diversity, identities, histories, contributions, and experiences of all students.”

Federal grantmaking dictates local policy

The Department of Education (DOE) engages in grantmaking to researchers, federal agencies, local and state school districts, non-profit organizations, and institutes of higher learning. These grants ostensibly advance the effectiveness of public education through research, program funding, enhancement of low-income and rural budgeting, and other uses of federal tax dollars. The grants also, almost always, come with strings attached.

Under the first priority of this rule, the DOE would consider applications for grants that “propose projects that incorporate teaching and learning practices that reflect the diversity, identities, histories, contributions, and experiences of all students create inclusive, supportive, and identity-safe learning environments.” Applicants would be encouraged to note systemic marginalization, biases, inequities, and discriminatory policy and practice in American history; and create inclusive, supportive, and identity-safe learning environments.

The second priority of the proposed rule would promote information literacy skills. It cites the an article by the American Federation of Teachers that encourages students to “learn how to gather and evaluate sources of information, and then use evidence from that information to develop and support their ideas and advocacy positions.” One could reasonably conclude from this sentence that the AFT, and by extension the Biden administration, advocates for students to embrace the logical fallacy of attacking the source instead of the information itself, while also engaging in activism in their primary education years.

Stanley Kurtz wrote in response to this rule proposal at National Review. He described Kendi’s anti-racism movement, saying it “advocates a massive and indefinite expansion of reverse discrimination,” and is much more like neo-racism. Kurtz rightly points out that this proposed rule is the beginning salvo in making critical race theory a centerpiece of American education:

The programs immediately targeted by Biden’s new priority criteria for American history and civics grants are small. Once in place, however, those criteria will undoubtedly influence the much larger and vastly more dangerous “Civics Secures Democracy Act.” That bill would appropriate $1 billion a year, for six years, for history and civic education. Support for leftist “action civics” is already written into the priority criteria of the bill itself. I have argued that additional anodyne-sounding priority criteria in the Civics Secures Democracy Act — criteria favoring grants targeted to “underserved” populations and the mitigation of various racial, ethnic, and linguistic achievement gaps — would be interpreted by the Biden administration as a green light to fund Critical Race Theory in the schools. The new draft federal rule for grant priority in American history and civics education makes it clear that this is indeed the Biden administration’s intent.

Tying federal funding to critical race theory, Kurtz says, puts pressure on even the states controlled by Republicans. This could lead to those states having no choice but to implement CRT if they want fully funded schools. The political pressure to accept federal funding even with these conditions could be too much to resist.

As Mike LaChance wrote in March for Legal Insurrection, it’s become clear that the Biden administration is jumping headlong into social justice as a driver for its public policy stances in every area.

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Jeff Reynolds is the author of the book, “Behind the Curtain: Inside the Network of Progressive Billionaires and Their Campaign to Undermine Democracy,” available at www.WhoOwnsTheDems.com. Jeff hosts a podcast at anchor.fm/BehindTheCurtain. You can follow him on Twitter @ChargerJeff, on Parler at @RealJeffReynolds, and on Gab at @RealJeffReynolds.

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Comments

because of course they will…

can’t have a Cultural Revolution w/o an army of Red Guards.

this civil war is going to be bloody anyway, but, if they actually succeed in disarming the general public, it will be a genocide as to set records.

“It goes on to cite the 1619 Project and Ibrahim X. Kendi’s book, How To Be An Antiracist, saying, “there is growing acknowledgement of the importance of including, in the teaching and learning of our country’s history, both the consequences of slavery, and the significant contributions of Black Americans to our society;”
_______________

So they’re going to acknowledge the importance of learning our country’s history by . . . pushing a demonstrably false account of our country’s history on our schoolkids?

Is the Biden administration going to ignore the significant contributions of the eminent black historians who say that the 1619 Project is historically inaccurate?

How very raaaaaacist and triggering and microagressive of them.

The idiot who voted for this mess
We of course will never know how many because Biden lost and he knows it

This is not going to end well

The Friendly Grizzly | April 19, 2021 at 9:09 pm

And, people will rise up and…

No. They won’t.

How do we maintain any society, let alone a civil one, when 13% of the population is absolved of any responsibility for their lives and circumstances as long as they blame whites, and how do we then expect those whites to accept that they are irredeemable unless they agree?

CRT presumes diversity [dogmatism] (i.e. color judgments) not limited to racism, which denies individual dignity, individual conscience, intrinsic value, and normalizes color blocs (e.g. people of white), color quotas, and affirmative discrimination. One step forward, two steps backward.

Joe Biden is the most disgusting modern American President and that includes LBJ.

    theduchessofkitty in reply to Danny. | April 19, 2021 at 10:27 pm

    This! ^

    CapeBuffalo in reply to Danny. | April 20, 2021 at 4:52 am

    Joe Biden is the most dangerous President because he is a simpleton puppet being manipulated by handlers who are following the edicts of the Obama cabal in what they see as the final acts of the fundamental transformation.
    Locked and loaded here, better dead than Red!

If Donald Trump had announced visual health as one of the keystone goals of his administration, Biden would be shoveling out eye-poking grants to people with sharp sticks.

Good thing we have Rona Romney and McConnell out there slugging for our side.

Or not.

A good example of leftist racism is in the movie Black Panther. Black people are supposedly united by race against the evil whites. This is unbridled racism! Then there is the imaginary Black Homeland of Wakanda where blacks have technology that is superior to whites.

    henrybowman in reply to ConradCA. | April 19, 2021 at 11:16 pm

    The only reason it’s superior is that they discovered the secret of what 2+2 is. Hint: not 4!

    JusticeDelivered in reply to ConradCA. | April 20, 2021 at 9:08 am

    I won’t watch anything by Marvel. The probability that there would ever be an American black Einstein is about one every 1500 to 2000 centuries. It is far lower when looking at Africa.

That pretty much summarizes the communist curriculum, racism and fake history.

Is it too late to start another 1619 Project with the same name, but truthful history, and priced at about half of the Communist version?

George_Kaplan | April 19, 2021 at 10:26 pm

Is there anything preventing state governments from prohibiting CRT and other racist ideologies being taught in schools which accept taxpayer funds?

NO. HELL NO.

Nearly 40% of the employees at the federal Dept of Education are black — it basically functions as an adjunct of the civil rights division of the DoJ, one specifically concerned with education — matters re education, including curriculum, have always been handled at the state and local level, as they still predominantly are today.

The federal Dept of Education should be abolished.

    CapeBuffalo in reply to eah. | April 20, 2021 at 4:58 am

    Could you supply a verification that nearly 40% of the DOE is black? I don’t doubt you but before I use this fact I would like to have solid numbers. Thanks

      Sure — here is the link I used before:

      https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/diversity-and-inclusion/federal-workforce-at-a-glance/

      I titled this bookmark ‘Diversity & Inclusion – FEDERAL WORKFORCE AT-A-GLANCE’ — the page had a drop down menu used to choose any department or branch of the executive branch in order to get info on its workforce vis-a-vis ‘diversity’ — unfortunately if you go there now, that content is gone, although it worked the last time I was there approx 6 months ago; no idea why it would be moved (?) — this info is probably still there somewhere; I don’t have time to look for it now, but perhaps you can have a look yourself (or I can later) — as I recall, the Dept of Education was 38% black — and you probably won’t be surprised to learn that Blacks were also significantly over-represented in other federal depts: IMO, without affirmative action in govt employment, there would be practically no black middle class.

      >(or I can later)

      Sorry, but I cannot find the same info/content — I found this page, which still links to the ‘AT-A-GLANCE’ page (see ‘Landing Page’ / ‘Visit page’):

      https://catalog.data.gov/dataset/federal-workforce-at-a-glance

      So they seem to have ‘disappeared’ this info (?) — you can speculate re why; I have my own suspicion.

        henrybowman in reply to eah. | April 20, 2021 at 4:15 pm

        I found the page in the Internet Wayback Machine (archive.org), but the agency information is only available via a Javascript dropdown that doesn’t operate in the relocated page environment. 😡 Maybe somebody with better Javascript chops than me can reconstruct the proper URL within archive.org.

Largely preaching to the choir, but here it is anyway . . .

https://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/critical-race-theory-fight/

Critical Race Theory and the 1619 Project …….. now that’s the way to improve our education system that is deficient in math, science and logic…….. /s

    MAJack in reply to Ghost Rider. | April 20, 2021 at 10:30 am

    The Chinese are laughing at us.

    JusticeDelivered in reply to Ghost Rider. | April 20, 2021 at 2:03 pm

    “deficient in math, science and logic…”

    Just like a very high percentage of blacks. Look at k-12 performance stats.

    I had always accepted the melting pot assimilation narrative. I have seen arguments that diverse culture s cannot function well. I do think that is true for wester cultures, those which are similar and where people share similar intelligence levels.

    Bringing slaves to America has turned out to be a huge mistake, allowing them to remain after slavery was ended was an even bigger mistake, a mistake which has been compounded by allowing more in since that time. Take Somalians with an average IQ of 68, how in hell can morons become productive in a technological society like ours?

      henrybowman in reply to JusticeDelivered. | April 20, 2021 at 4:17 pm

      They can… but not with the government deciding that equity mandates we give a “fair” number of them jobs as architects and brain surgeons.