Study: U Cal Education Schools Indoctrinate Future Teachers in Critical Race Theory Exploiting ‘Ethnic Studies’
Fox News reports on Legal Insurrection study: “California public schools are ‘saturated’ with teachers who were taught critical race theory at University of California Schools of Education and teacher preparation programs, according to a new study released Monday.”
The University of California system, which trained more than 28,000 K-12 teachers between 1999 and 2019, is pushing Critical Race Theory on its education students.
That’s the conclusion of Brandy Shufutinsky, Ed.D., in a study prepared for Legal Insurrection Foundation and our CriticalRace.org website, as reported by Fox News. After exploring education programs at UC Berkeley, UC Irvine, UCLA, UC Riverside, UC San Diego, and UC Santa Cruz, Dr. Shufutinsky concluded: “University of California Schools of Education and teacher preparation programs are saturated with critical theory ideology that is directly impacting what future and current teachers bring into K-12 classrooms.” Many of the teachers who have been teaching children lessons on racism, gender identity, sexuality, politics, and history – lessons that incorporate Critical Race Theory (CRT) concepts repackaged for children – were themselves indoctrinated in CRT when they were in graduate school, Shufutinsky says.
The report also touches upon how Critical Ethnic Studies influences teacher preparation. That includes inculcating hatred of Israel by slurring “the Jewish people’s rejuvenation of their ancient homeland as simply ‘colonialism’ by supposedly alien settlers against supposedly indigenous Arabs.”
It is reasonable, Shufutinsky concludes, to suppose that this teacher training in Critical Theory is directly impacting what future and current teachers bring into K-12 classrooms.
Fox News explains:
CriticalRace.org, which monitors critical race theory (CRT) curricula and training in higher education, unveiled its latest report, “Who Teaches The Teachers?”, which focuses on teachers’ training programs in the University of California Schools of Education system. Often likened by critics to actual racism, CRT is a school of thought that focuses on how power structures and institutions impact racial minorities.
“CRT and related ideologies have spread like wildfire through higher education, professional schools, K-12, and even military academies. The question is how this happened. Part of the answer is that CRT is deeply embedded in teachers’ colleges, with ‘ethnic studies’ being a primary vehicle. Teachers are taught to teach CRT through ‘Ethnic Studies’ courses,” CriticalRace.org founder William Jacobson told Fox News Digital…
The detailed, 32-page study explores everything future educators learn if they attend University of California Schools of Education at Berkeley, Irvine, UCLA, San Diego or Santa Cruz. CriticalRace.org’s look at teachers’ training programs aims to help understand who, exactly, will be teaching the next generation of Americans and determine if CRT is directly influencing teacher preparation.
“Ethnic studies, particularly so-called ‘Liberated Ethnic Studies’ which started in California and is moving to other states, is a Trojan Horse through which CRT and related ideologies are snuck into children’s education,” Jacobson said.
“What started in California with ethnic studies as the vehicle for spreading radicalized and racialized ideologies is spreading to other states,” Jacobson continued. “Our report is both a case study and a warning to other states about how the innocent sounding ‘ethnic studies’ programming has become not so innocent.”
Shufutinsky holds a Doctorate in Education from the University of San Francisco in International and Multicultural Education and an MSW from the University of Southern California. Her findings are detailed in the paper published by Legal Insurrection Foundation at CriticalRace.org:
The Covid-19 pandemic ushered in many changes to work and learning spaces, including pulling back the curtain on what material, pedagogy, and ideology were being disseminated in K-12 classrooms. The brighter the light shone, the more concerned parents became with what their children were learning in American public schools. Lessons on race, racism, gender identity, sexuality, politics, and history are just some of the issues that concerned parents, students, educators, and others. Many lessons appear to incorporate Critical Race Theory (CRT) concepts repackaged for children.
Critical Race Theory (CRT) has been making headlines in recent years and while CRT is relevant to this research, I have chosen to use the broader term, Critical Theory, when examining the pedagogy and ideology that is informing programs at University of California Schools of Education (SOE). Ideology that is coming into K-12 classrooms is not solely based on race and addressing issues like racial diversity and racism. Critical theories are being used to inform discipline and restorative justice practices in schools, meritocracy and grading, and teacher professional development…
Many parents and others are asking where this ideology is coming from. This research scratches the surface of the question by examining what future and current teachers are being taught in Schools of Education, teacher preparation, and educator/administrator professional development programs in the University of California (UC) system.
According to universityofcalifornia.edu, there are more than 28,000 UC-educated teachers in California public schools. These teachers are responsible for teaching in approximately 77 percent of the public schools throughout the state. The impact that UC educated teachers have in shaping the minds of future generations is substantial. Because of the impact UC trained teachers have on students, it is essential that the pedagogical frame(s) used in schools of education and teacher training programs are examined for politicization and biases.
The report below examines curricula used by University of California Schools of Education for minors, majors, and graduate programs. It focuses especially on teacher preparation programs, as it appears that these programs offer more divisive ideological pedagogy than minor, major, and graduate programs alone. Specifically, UC Berkeley, UCLA, and UC Riverside have “centers”, attached to the universities, that provide teacher preparation and continuing education programs. These centers are steeped in critical theory and social justice ideology that discourages viewpoint diversity and critical thinking. This is outlined in detail within this report. Please note that not all of teacher education programs reviewed within this report are blatantly centered on critical theory. However, in the majority of programs, an association can be drawn between critical theory ideology and the substance of teacher preparation and administrator programs…
University of California Schools of Education and teacher preparation programs are saturated with critical theory ideology that is directly impacting what future and current teachers bring into K-12 classrooms. The fusion between Ethnic Studies and Education as disciplines is leading to K-12 educators using a critical ethnic studies lens to inform the framework they use to teach children. An indication of this is the many joint programs like Ethnic Studies in K-12 Education held at many different UC campuses. Some examples are provided within this report, including the Pathways program at UC Riverside and events at UC Santa Cruz and UC Irvine.
This report also includes just a small sample of how Critical Ethnic Studies is directly influencing teacher preparation. Many are pushing back against the divisive critical ethnic studies ideology seeping its way into K-12 schools. However, it is apparent that the fight against critical ethnic studies in favor of an inclusive, constructive approach to ethnic studies will not be successful if the rhetoric being cultivated by Schools of Education is not challenged.
Over the past 2-3 years there has been outrage at what is happening in K-12 classrooms. No matter the evidence, educators have repeated the lie that CRT is not being taught in schools. What they failed to admit is that critical theory is the framework that is being used to teach the teachers of multiple subjects, from social studies to language arts to math. The material provided within this report gives a glimpse into how divisive rhetoric is making its way into K-12 classrooms through teachers, who are being trained by schools of education, teacher preparation programs, and professional development.
You can read the entire research paper here, and check out Fox News’ summary here.
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Comments
Who teaches teachers?
It depends. There are two types
1. Those who were spoon fed
2. Those who fed themselves
Open space to study education independent of the payload — how it works, what it does, tools n techniques — becomes irresistible to people who want to push their particular payload. Everything’s an opportunity for The Great Agenda; whatever that may be, whatever destruction trails behind. Recall the trail of smoking cars and buildings behind Jake and Elwood (Blues) on their “mission from god.”
One agenda for public education is curating people to go live their own lives, whatever those might be. Another is curating bonsai-people trimmed to fit a picture in someone’s mind..(*) There’s a reason pruning bonsai over time is called “training.”
What do we want public education to be for?
(*) Miyagi in The Karate Kid: “See tree. Think only tree. … Now, make like tree.”
Ima teecher, and I garinty that Murkin Edykashun idda best inna world.
Sarc. Big time.
Now you see why Uncle Cephas, American public high school social studies teacher, believes that he is involved in a swindle bigger than all the financial Ponzi schemes from Charles Ponzi to Bernie Madoff put together. Every so often, I get to point out to my classes that “Islamic tolerance” in its most mild form involved Dhimmi peoples having to put up with the abduction and Islamification of some of their children and despairing of ever getting justice against a Muslim in a civil matter.. But that is something that probably rolls off the students like water off a duck’s back. They come in so ignorant of anything other than video games, sports, and pop music that they may as well be ineducable.
The best students I’ve taught were always in private, often Catholic, schools where parents were paying to have their children educated by quality teachers with subject matter expertise, excellent communication skills, and models of good character. Unfortunately, even in those schools I’ve run across the “woke” ones – the slovenly, unkempt Zinn-quoting history teacher who hasn’t done a sit up in twenty years and blames all of their woes on Republicans and the white rap-listening “down” teacher who puts his hand up for high fives from the black students are two types with whom I’ve had to work. Thankfully, the students usually see right through these buffoons and show them zero respect.
@Thad Jarvis, you wrote: “educated by quality teachers with subject matter expertise.” This, I think, is a part of the puzzle that has been obscured for decades. As more and more “education” degrees require more and more “woke” nonsense courses, the level of knowledge that the vast majority of these future teachers have of their subject matter is pretty close to zero. They may take two, maybe three in the more rigorous education programs, courses in their subject matter, the rest is all social justice/woke/antiracist garbage. They come out of these indoctrination programs completely unable to teach their subject area but very eager to share their sex lives and habits with children.
This is becoming even worse as almost all colleges and academic disciplines are being gutted of any real learning about the subject matter because everything from literature to medicine to maths has to be taught and learned through the lens of white supremacy, etc. Usually with zero academic rigor that’s not appended to self-flagellation and struggle sessions for the oppressors (i.e. whites, males, Christians).
Teaching is unfortunately not an attractive career option for most people who have subject matter expertise in areas where the private sector pays more and there are fewer of the frustrations of teaching (apathetic students, obnoxious or absent parents, incompetent helicopter administrators, etc.)
There are too many people in the profession that are simply not qualified for many reasons, either lack of knowledge, lack of classroom management ability, or simply being of shoddy character. In the public sector bad teachers continue to just show up and phone it in because they have a job with union protection regardless of how poorly they perform.
It’s too easy to cater to the lowest level so that now you have students in college performing remedial work they should’ve covered in early high school at the latest. I tutored a college student in math who couldn’t describe the characteristics of a rectangle. I tutored a second semester economics major in calculus who didn’t know how to plot intercepts on a coordinate plane and didn’t know what a demand curve is.
Home school. There are lots of qualified and passionate teachers (such as myself) that are disgusted with the state of establishment education, woke coworkers and administrators, and apathetic unmotivated students. Many of us are tutoring and setting up home school learning pods using high quality curriculum and our teaching skills to deliver lessons and skills that are necessary to develop skilled, confident, well-rounded good citizens and scholars.
This should really be the focus of reclaiming education: Start by getting control of the curriculum at teacher’s colleges. Undo what Bill Ayers did.
Prospective teachers are thoroughly indoctrinated in these schools.
This is taxpayer subsidized Marxism -what starts in California festers all the way across to other blue states-if you have traditional moral and cultural values think seriously about other educational options for your children
So what else is new? The damage has been done. This sort of article needed to be written about 50 years ago, but then you’d be dismissed as an “anti-intellectual” crank, what these days is tarred a “conspiracy theorist,” Back in the 1980’s anyone objecting to critical studies was called stupid, unable to understand abstract concepts and academic language. Feminists were the academic pioneers of critical theory praxis and it has just expanded since then as the medium of “liberation” for minorities oppressed by the white man, who manages his depredations via “systemic racism,” which is never demonstrated with any instances of overt racism. It is assumed those with social or political power have this power thanks to racism or sexism or both.
It’s that sinister and that stupid and that old.
We will be decades reforming public education, if it is possible at all (I think not). Best thing is to build alternative institutions.