This is the 4th article I’ve published about Beaverton this year, which I don’t relish, but the extraordinary cluster of foolishness among the school district’s leadership keeps churning out news.
In May, Beaverton School District enthusiastically endorsed a Black Student Graduation Ceremony (in the name of social justice, per usual). This week, they are affirmatively declaring themselves “white supremacist” in a bizarre new “Antiracist Vision Statement” put forth by an “Equitable Policies Task Force.”
In the second paragraph of the “Equitable Policies Board Report” draft, which members anticipate will pass in a vote this evening, the task force affirms, unabashedly, that “Beaverton School District perpetuates institutional racism and embodies a white supremacist culture.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle at the unintentional genius of the line (recall, this same district endorsed a blacks-only graduation event, which, by the way, did not even require “graduates” to meet the normal qualifications of graduation). Yet, it turns out there is so much more to cringe at in this statement, which careens totally unselfconsciously from one glaring inconsistency to the next.
At various points, the vision statement vows, quite ambitiously, to “confront” and indeed “eliminate”(!) all forms of “conscious” and even “unconscious” racism and “bias” in Beaverton, only to later affirm the need for “permanent” funding and resource allocation to accomplish this.
Apparently, taxpayers in Beaverton are expected to swallow the absurd notion that this paltry committee of utopians can, through their combined intellect and rosy intentions, “eliminate” all forms of “unconscious bias” in the district (a problem most people consider inherent to the human species), if provided the right amount of cash…indefinitely.
The comments section was also a delight. Members primarily heaped praise on the vaguely worded one-page vision, including “Very thoughtful and inspiring!” and “I feel like this captures everything we’ve been working on the past few months.”
Meanwhile, others piped up with concerns, including, “I am not a fan of ‘people of color.’ I am uncomfortable with it and feel like every time it is used, it diminishes me. I would hope we could find another way to say non-white.”
One member demonstrated some prescience, if not wisdom, voicing concerns about declaring themselves “white supremacist.” He or she stated, “while I agree with the term and how it is used, I am concerned about spending unnecessary energy defending this one word.”
Personally, I am quite appreciative when so-called “equity committees” write with such illuminating honesty.
For Beaverton parents who naively believe that academics still remain “fundamental” to the school district’s mission, they would be wise to refer to this quote: “Eliminating racism and all forms of bias is fundamental to our work—not just a part of our work.”
Fortunately, documents from the meeting indicate that a lone dissenting member piped up with satisfying gusto.
Evidently ignored by the zombie conformists in his midst, Latino father of three, Joshua Guerra, penned a glorious paragraph of exuberant dissent, which proves that the candle of common sense still burns in even the darkest corners of Blue America. He writes:
The language and phrases used in this statement are alarming, irresponsible, unfounded and divisive. The statement contains radical presuppositions about the apparent structural racism and perpetuation of “a white supremacist culture.” These terms, when used in this context, are insulting to entire demographic groups within our community, and further perpetuate a radical racialization of our community members. The statement continues by committing to “dismantle policies and systems that perpetuate white supremacy” yet it fails to identify what policies and/or systems within the district actually perform this function or how the act of dismantling will be carried out. The statement further commits to “ongoing antibias and antiracist education to every staff member.” In this statement alone one can infer that antibias trainings, which are offered by Diversity, Equity, and Inclusivity consultants, will be based on Critical Social Justice pedagogy. The vocabulary used in the overall statement is indicative of the ideological underpinnings of Critical Theory, Applied Postmodernism, and Intersectionality. In particular, trainings by many (not all) DEI consultants include tests which purport to measure bias of individuals and are based on the implicit bias (implicit association) test. However, there is considerable debate and doubt in the psychological community about the application of Implicit Bias testing and what it actually measures about individuals. In short, the commercial use of the IAT on staff and faculty is not scientifically rigorous and should be regarded with extreme caution. Other radical and racialized practices of DEI training have been known to use racial and gender segregation as a training method, along with racial essentialism, the primacy of power dynamics, a victim and oppressor (privileged) narrative, and structural (racial) determinism. Perhaps most alarming, given that BSD is concerned with education, is the notion in Critical Theory that standpoint epistemology, or more commonly referred to as “lived experience” is a more robust form of truth than objective truth or empirical data.
The Beaverton School Board is set to vote on the resolution in a meeting tonight. As of publication, Guerra remains the lone dissenting voice on the committee.
This article is part of my ongoing efforts to expose radical ideology in k-12 schools and institutions. To share your story, contact me at [email protected] or on IG @georgiamaehowe
The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.