Complaint Against SAU21 Filed with the New Hampshire Dept. of Education: Breaking the Law and Political Bias

What is going on in SAU21? From teacher training presented by a leftist political organization to canceling religious Christmas Carols and now political indoctrination in the classroom, parents wonder why academic excellence is no longer the focus.

I recently posted information about the politicized teacher training in SAU21 by Seacoast Outright. This kind of WOKE agenda in the schools means that they are abandoning their primary task –academics! Make no mistake about it, when you see this kind of WOKE agenda in the schools, there is more that you haven’t seen.

We recently discovered that religious Christmas carols would be canceled because the principal mistakenly said there is a “Separation of Church and State” law. This highlights the need for schools to focus on knowledge instead of woke ideology. If the administrators tasked with educating our children do not understand the basics, how will our children? Read more about that here.

As if this wasn’t bad enough, now I’m learning how this political bias has been pushed on students in some of the high school classes. This isn’t really surprising given the uprising around the country by parents who are exposing political indoctrination in their child’s classrooms.

These parents aren’t demanding teachers force conservative viewpoints on children. They simply say, don’t push a leftist’s agenda on their kids. This is a public school where they serve all families. Academic excellence should be the top priority, not anyone’s political agenda.

You would think that AP U.S. History would be an area where the teacher would keep that kind of bias out of the classroom and just teach the facts and information.

Of course there are historical events that are a stain on this country. Slavery, and denying women the right to vote needs to be taught so that we can learn from the mistakes of our past, and not repeat them. That’s not a political agenda, that’s teaching the next generation information facts and truth. But the United States of America is also exceptional because the founding was revolutionary, and rulers weren’t replaced with the next generation of rulers. We do not have to overthrow the institutions because the political power now lies in the hands of the people.

That’s not good enough for political activists working in our public schools. It’s not enough for them to come to school, and educate our children. They use our money to fund public schools with an agenda to change the values, attitudes and beliefs in our children. And make no mistake about this, this is a recipe for illiteracy. Your child may learn and know every one of the 68 genders (and counting) but do they know basic math? Are they reading the great works of literature? Do they know how their government works? How does a Bill become a law? Are they required to read the founding documents? The United States Constitution, Bill of Rights, Declaration of Independence, The Federalist and Anti-Federalist Papers? Can they even comprehend these documents, or are they graduating on a reading level that prevents them from understanding what they are reading? I know home-schooled high school graduates who have learned all of this.

What are your kids learning compared to what students learned in the 50’s? Take a look at what 8th grade students in the 50’s were learning in Civics here. We have high school graduates who’ve never read the United States Constitution. Are 8th graders in SAU21 able to answer the questions Kenny Hignite had to answer in 1954? I think we all know the answer to that question. We have a problem of illiteracy, and instead of focusing on teaching rich academic content, teachers are focusing on shaping a child’s political views.

Here is a summary from students on what is being taught in the AP History class at Winnacunnet High school. Several of the students in this class were bothered by the overt political bias:

This is the survey and slide documents used in a class presentation. The teacher was careful about the words he used in class but also asked the class, with a show of hands, if anyone had a political dislike for Hillary Clinton. The teacher has a framed picture of Hillary Clinton on his wall, and has expressed his negative view on politics by using President Trump, having classified nuclear documents at Mar A Lago, as the example. The teacher said that Trump said, “there were fine people on both sides” in South Carolina to prove that Trump was siding with white supremacists.

The teacher would bring up topics in class about whether the U.S. should rename certain buildings, remove statues, and determine what is racist, and what is not. Some of the kids walked away thinking that this was based on Critical Race Theory to which the teacher denied and said CRT is what is taught in college.

The teacher brought up the 1619 project and denied knowing what that was even though he had brought it up in a class a short time ago. This discussion was recorded.

Some of the students talked about how this class felt like a hostile environment for students who didn’t share the views of the teacher, and then they questioned if they would receive a fair grade. Some students said they will just go along with the teacher to please him instead of expressing their honest views.

Here are copies of an assignment that includes a survey on the students’ political views. This survey was not approved by parents in spite of state and federal law that requires parental consent on non-academic surveys. You can find those laws here and here.

I filed a complaint with the New Hampshire Department of Education on behalf of several parents and students who attend Winnacunnet High School. Teachers must follow a Code of Ethics and Conduct, they cannot ignore laws that govern our public schools.

Dear Ms. Fenton,

After several parents contacted me about a recent survey their children completed in Andrew Gushee’s AP History Class at Winnacunnet High School, I filed a 91-a Right-to-Know request asking to see:

1) A copy of the Political Identity Survey distributed to students at Winnacunnet High School.

2) A copy of the parental consent form that was sent to parents prior to the distribution of the Political Identity Survey.

3) Confirmation that this survey was posted on the district website prior to the distribution of the Political Identity Survey.

4) A copy of the privacy policy from the Political Identity Survey vendor.

As you can see from the attached file, the survey was provided to me but no parental consent form was included. The survey was not posted on the website prior to the distribution as also required by law.

I am asking you to conduct an investigation because it appears as if RSA 186:11, IX-d was violated when the attached survey was given to students in this AP History class:

IX-d. Require School Districts to Adopt a Policy Governing the Administration of Non-academic Surveys or Questionnaires to Students. The policy shall require school districts to notify a parent or legal guardian of a non-academic survey or questionnaire and its purpose. The policy shall provide that no student shall be required to volunteer for or submit to a non-academic survey or questionnaire, as defined in this paragraph, without written consent of a parent or legal guardian unless the student is an adult or an emancipated minor. The policy shall include an exception from the consent requirement for the youth risk behavior survey developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The policy shall also allow a parent or legal guardian to opt-out of the youth risk behavior survey developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The school district shall make such surveys or questionnaires available, at the school and on the school or school district’s website, for review by a student’s parent or legal guardian at least 10 days prior to distribution to students. In this paragraph, “non-academic survey or questionnaire” means surveys, questionnaires, or other documents designed to elicit information about a student’s social behavior, family life, religion, politics, sexual orientation, sexual activity, drug use, or any other information not related to a student’s academics.

In addition, Federal law also requires informed parental consent when children complete a survey on the following:

§98.4 Protection of students’ privacy in examination, testing, or treatment.
(a) No student shall be required, as part of any program specified in §98.1 (a) or (b), to submit without prior consent to psychiatric examination, testing, or treatment, or psychological examination, testing, or treatment, in which the primary purpose is to reveal information concerning one or more of the following:(1) Political affiliations;(2) Mental and psychological problems potentially embarrassing to the student or his or her family;(3) Sex behavior and attitudes;(4) Illegal, anti-social, self-incriminating and demeaning behavior;(5) Critical appraisals of other individuals with whom the student has close family relationships;(6) Legally recognized privileged and analogous relationships, such as those of lawyers, physicians, and ministers; or

(7) Income, other than that required by law to determine eligibility for participation in a program or for receiving financial assistance under a program.

(b) As used in paragraph (a) of this section, prior consent means:

(1) Prior consent of the student, if the student is an adult or emancipated minor; or

(2) Prior written consent of the parent or guardian, if the student is an unemancipated minor.

(c) As used in paragraph (a) of this section:

(1) Psychiatric or psychological examination or test means a method of obtaining information, including a group activity, that is not directly related to academic instruction and that is designed to elicit information about attitudes, habits, traits, opinions, beliefs or feelings; and

(2) Psychiatric or psychological treatment means an activity involving the planned, systematic use of methods or techniques that are not directly related to academic instruction and that is designed to affect behavioral, emotional, or attitudinal characteristics of an individual or group.

(Authority: 20 U.S.C. 1232h(b))

While I did not see a vendor listed on the survey, the document was uploaded through Google Docs. If this was administered by a vendor, then there should be some kind of privacy statement. However, it looks as if the teacher may have drafted the survey for his students, and then used Google docs as the online source.

Google has been sued by Attorneys General in New Mexico and Mississippi over children’s privacy violations. Several legislators in New Hampshire worked on this statute to prevent surveys like these from being administered without informed parental consent. This survey transmitted through Google Docs included the student’s name and email address. These are the surveys that legislators in New Hampshire said they wanted parents to be aware of, and that needed consent.

Please see testimony fromEmmet McGroarty who recently served as an attorney for the American Principles Project. This testimony was presented to the Commission for Evidence Based Policy on October 21, 2016 regarding student data privacy.

This survey was a way to gather personal information on students, versus an assignment that would have benefited children who could be learning historical academic content. This is happening more frequently, and it appears to be more about examining the values and attitudes of students. There is less of a focus on learning quality academic content in the core subjects, and more indoctrination as an attempt to change the political viewpoints of students.

Parents are fed up with this kind of approach used in the classroom. Parents are not looking for a teacher to push their political views but instead, one that will teach the academic content in an unbiased manner.

I am filing this complaint on behalf of several parents whose children took the survey but found out about it after it was completed. They do not want any backlash aimed at their children, so I am filing this request without publishing the names of those parents.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Ann Marie Banfield

TRUST REQUIRES TRANSPARENCY

As you can see, this is not an attempt to teach children U.S. History, this is a way to capture political data on their students. Teachers are now taking historical events and pushing a biased political narrative alongside it. Yes there is political content in this lesson, but you can also see the political bias too.

While the slide show doesn’t violate the anti-discrmination law, there is certainly a bias that could cause a teacher to violate a student’s free speech rights. I’d suggest you let your children know to watch closely because we have another example of that from the parent whose daughter in North Hampton, was told to remove “Merry Christmas” from the white board by a teacher who said it could offend someone. Students still have the right to free speech in this district and this parent could certainly challenge that action by the teacher in a court of law.

This AP History teacher seems to be framing the survey in such a way to make people affirm certain controversial propositions, like that the gender pay gap exists. The teacher likely cannot explicitly require someone to affirm a certain political viewpoint unless it is for a pedagogical purpose. This is why so many parents are saying, teach children how to think, and stop teaching them what to think.

Students shouldn’t even know a teachers’ political views, nor be asked about their’s. A child could say in a social studies class that the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was a war crime. Their social studies teacher could then assign a presentation defending the nuking of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This is an example of pedagogy and is permissible. Maybe the teacher wants the student to consider the other side in this historical event. Students would learn the historical facts but would also be challenged to look at different viewpoints. In this case, the teacher wouldn’t be pushing their biased political viewpoints on the students. Instead, the students would be learning more academic content on a historical event, and at the same time, possibly learn about a different viewpoint along the way.

We are not looking for WOKE graduates, we are looking for educated graduates. Ones who are literate, and adopt viewpoints based on knowledge and understanding.

This gets even more interesting when you peruse the “Equity Audit” that was conducted in SAU21. Under Classroom Environment question #6 asks: Is there an effort made to use non biased verbal and nonverbal language in the classroom? I think we can safely say in this example, the answer is NO.

With the examples from Project Veritas exposing teachers and administrators politicizing their schools, we see how prevalent this WOKE agenda in the schools has become. Illiteracy is never a good thing and yet this WOKE agenda is a recipe for illiteracy that we cannot afford in this district, state, or country.

Let Superintendent Nadeau and Asst. Superintendent David Hobbs know that this is unacceptable. Students should not know the political views of their teachers, and if the teacher discovers their students’ political viewpoints, that should never be held against them.

This has created a hostile environment in the classroom for children who share different views. Collecting data on their political views is not educating children, but it now has parents in Connecticut angry, and fighting for a quality education in their school district too.

SAU21 needs leadership that is free from political biases, and focuses on academic literacy versus woke agendas.

Author

Ann Marie Banfield

Ann Marie Banfield has been researching education reform for over a decade and actively supports parental rights, literacy and academic excellence in k-12 schools. You can contact her at: banfieldannmarie@gmail.com

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