STATE HOUSE–Your child’s public education curriculum is being considered by the Indiana legislature. In Wednesday’s Senate Education Committee meeting, the committee heard testimony from parents and a teacher who says he’s being fired from Indianapolis Public Schools because he’s exposing the district’s shrouded teaching of Critical Race Theory (the district denies the accusation that CRT is being taught).
“I do see lots of acts of racism from teachers throughout the state,” said Kinnett, who has appeared on Fox News and other media, talking about what he says is inappropriate and divisive curriculum. “However, I have not seen large amounts of these outside Indianapolis Public Schools.”
LISTEN: A portion of the testimony
Senate Bill 167, also known as the “Education Matters” bill, gives parents some oversight of district curriculum by requiring districts to establish committees with parents on them, which would have some say in what is taught.
The bill, if it becomes law, would also close a loophole that protects schools and personnel from being prosecuted for distributed sexually explicit material to students.
Cindy Black, whose children graduated the Carmel-Clay district, and whose grandchildren have begun attending the schools, recently participated in a public reading of material found in the school library, which she says was heavily criticized by the superintendent because the materials were inappropriate.
“My heart sank as I discovered that our shelves were filled with inappropriate books: books that pushed divisive social and political agendas, books that have explicit sexual conduct, books that do not meet our community standards,” she said to the committee.
Jennifer Hendricks, also a Carmel-Clay parent, testified that she believes by sharing student data with third parties, student privacy is at risk. The bill provides that third parties may not obtain the identities of students from any surveys.
“I’m disappointed that the majority of time was spent discussing a proposal to ban curriculum that’s not being taught in our K-12 schools,” said Sen. Eddie Melton, Senate Assistant Democratic leader. “Critical Race Theory is not a subject being taught in Indiana and continued efforts to make it a focus of topic are divisive and partisan—especially when there are so many matters in our education system that we could be having a productive discussion around.”
Sen. Shelli Yoder (D-Bloomington) called the bill a waste and a distraction.
