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When It Comes to Education, Do Parents Know Best?

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When It Comes to Education, Do Parents Know Best?

Aspen Institute,

15 min read
4 take-aways
Audio & text

What's inside?

When culture wars enter the classroom, parents are the foot soldiers, and children and teachers are the casualties. 

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Editorial Rating

10

Qualities

  • Controversial
  • Eye Opening
  • Engaging

Recommendation

The 2021 concern over critical race theory (CRT) wasn’t the first time Americans fought their cultural wars in the classroom, and it certainly wasn’t the first time greater conflicts concerning racism were enacted in the classroom. The CRT scare was in reaction to two upheavals: the murder of George Floyd had started another national conversation about racism, and parents were already frustrated with the school system because of school closures during the COVID-19 pandemic. During this session of the 2022 Aspen Ideas Festival, a panel of parents and educators discuss the most recent incarnation of culture wars in the classroom.

Summary

In the fall of 2021, critical race theory (CRT) became the newest hot topic in the US culture wars.

Google trends show that before 2020, the number of searches for “critical race theory” was negligible. The numbers show a slight rise in interest in the summer of 2020, and then an explosion in the fall of 2021, when CRT became the new hot topic of the culture wars in the United States. Eventually, searches for the term reached 14 million in April 2021. Some media outlets were putting forward an idea that some parents found concerning: CRT – which no one had heard of before, hence the Google searches – was apparently a pervasive and unrelenting component of the US public education system, and all children from age 8-18, in every school in the United States, were being indoctrinated by CRT. But what exactly was CRT? 

According to panelist and former lawyer, David French, conservative activist Chris Rufo roughly defined CRT as “basically anything you hear about race you don’t like.” Scattered reports of CRT-style teaching emerged around the country. Some reports were deeply troubling to people on...

About the Speaker

This session of the 2022 Aspen Ideas Festival includes host Jane Coaston, of The Argument podcast, and panelists Renee DiResta, the technical research manager of the Stanford Internet Observatory and mother of three; David French, senior editor of The Dispatch, former attorney arguing religious liberty cases in schools and father of three; and Esau McCaulley, professor of religion at Wheaton College, contributing writer for The New York Times and father of four.

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    G. B. 5 months ago
    "Conservative activists and politicians have successfully positioned themselves as the arbiters of “what parents want,” but the truth is that parents’ rights aren’t a right-wing construct."
    That's partially because conservatives tend to have more children on average. Liberals and progressives don't want to have children, they'd rather abort them, become teachers, and then convince the conservative parents' children that they can be the opposite gender. Dear reader, can they do that? And do you think abortion is bad, good, a necessary evil, or a constitutional right?
    Conservatives didn't construct parent's rights, they uphold them.

    "Generally, when parents fight over what’s taught in school, it’s because they want teaching that replicates their own beliefs, so it’s “reading, writing and more of me.”"
    Schools are for teaching reading, writing, and arithmetic. I agree. I think parents are tired of the government trying to teach ethics. Less than 25% of people on average trust the federal government, according to a study done by Pew Research. Why are we trusting the government, federal or local, to decide what kids should believe?
    Yes, parents want their children to believe as they do. To the childless, this might be a bit surprising, but if you believe something to be true, and you believe that your child will be happier for it, you try your best to not let others take that away from them.
    Ethics are really the job of the parents. Then again, with fatherlessness so high, it won't be easy to teach it to the next generation.

    I never comment, but I was so astounded as this article being rated a 10/10 that I couldn't help but point out its obvious flaws. Whoever you are, thanks for reading. I love you, no matter where you are or what you've done. Listen to your parents, they love you and know better than you. Be humble, it'll make you kind.