Stand up for students and write to your school administrators today.
Below is a letter template that we encourage humanists to send to the administrators of their local school districts. But first, some context:
The last two weeks (or decades depending on your perspective) have been hard. Executive order after executive order, legal assault after legal assault, fear tactic after fear tactic. Regardless of the form it takes, the bad news keeps coming. And the new administration is counting on folks being too exhausted and beaten down to respond.
Among the sea of rotting fish masquerading as policy coming out of the White House, was an executive order titled Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling (available here). The bizarrely worded executive order attempts to undermine the health and wellbeing of transgender and other LGBTQ students, and attempts to censor historically accurate curricula.
The order uses coded language to disparage basic best practices for creating safe and supportive school environments for students and curricula that deals seriously with the United States’ history of racism and white supremacy. Words like “false ideologies,” “discriminatory equity ideology,” and “social transition” are used in opposition to phrases like “patriotic education,” “national unity,” “parental authority.”
The order conflates basic gender affirming practices (like using a student’s correct pronouns or allowing a student to use the bathroom in accordance with their gender) with sexual exploitation, and calls evidence-based curricula about race “anti-American, subversive, harmful, and false ideologies.” Bottom line: the order incoherently misuses English words to create a distorted view of American schools. The language is intentionally unclear; the meandering and unclear definition of “discriminatory equity ideology,” for example, gives agencies broad authority to decide what is or is not discriminatory.
In effect, the order instructs agencies to issue regulations to deny federal funding to K-12 schools that provide gender affirming support of students or teach fact-based curricula. The order also instructs the Attorney General to hold educators criminally liable for supporting students and teaching about racism in America. Lastly, it reestablishes Trump’s 1776 Commission.
Dictating how educators support (or if the White House gets its way, don’t support) transgender and other LGBTQ students—contrary to the recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics—is actively harmful, and censoring what students can read, discuss, and learn is a hideous affront on freethought.
Although executive orders cannot change federal law, the claims made in this order are intended to have a “chilling effect” to scare educators, and, ultimately, to deprive young people of supportive school environments.
In unprecedented times, the easiest thing to do is retract into ourselves; but that won’t help humanists build the world we know is possible and necessary.
The American Humanist Association, alongside our national partners in civil rights, offers the following template letter for concerned parents and community members to send to the principal of your child’s school, local superintendent, or school board urging them to affirm their commitment to all students and to ensure schools are safe and welcoming. We are already witnessing school districts speak out loudly, and hopefully, actions like this can create the groundswell that’s necessary to stop these attacks on kids. Please join us in standing behind the students in your lives, and the educators who have dedicated their careers to supporting them.
SUBJECT LINE: Support ALL of our students
Dear Principal/Superintendent/School Board Member,
I am the parent of a ____ grader at ______ school. I’m writing with deep concern for recent statements from the White House and executive orders that target inclusive learning and diversity and seek to scare schools away from providing the protection and support students need.
Schools in our community should be a welcoming place for all students, where every child can learn, grow, and thrive in pursuit of their full potential. Recent executive orders, although they cannot change any law, including civil rights laws, are scaring our families and communities. These executive actions do not require any changes to school or district policies or practices.
I am writing to make sure that the schools in our community continue to support all of our students, respect all of their rights, and continue to work in partnership between families and teachers. Whether we are Black, white, or brown, Native or newcomer, nontheist, transgender, disabled, or not, we want our kids to have the freedom to be themselves and pursue their dreams. All children deserve to learn about our nation’s history, the contributions of all communities, and the unfinished work of building a more perfect union.
I am asking you, as an educator and a leader, to show the children and families in our community that you will support, protect, and respect them. I am asking that you publicly share our school district’s commitment to welcoming schools where all children are free to learn all that they—and our country—have the potential to be.
Sincerely,
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