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Yes, we know how thrilled everyone was to see Trump's Executive Order that directed all departments and agencies to end DEI discrimination.
And yes, we heard the cheers when the Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights from the Department of Education sent out that letter clarifying and reaffirming the nondiscrimination obligations of schools and other entities that receive Department of Education funding.
The letter said, "educational institutions have toxically indoctrinated students with the false premise that the United States is built upon “systemic and structural racism” and advanced discriminatory policies and practices."
"Proponents of these discriminatory practices have attempted to further justify them—particularly during the last four years—under the banner of “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (“DEI”), smuggling racial stereotypes and explicit race-consciousness into everyday training, programming, and discipline," the letter continued.
Educational institutions were reminded that discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin is, has been, and will continue to be illegal, and that treating students differently on the basis of race to achieve nebulous goals such as "diversity, racial balancing, social justice, or equity" is also illegal.
Ending blatantly discriminatory practices based on DEI and social justice sounds awesome, at least in theory.
But completely eliminating DEI and social justice won't be that easy in practice, especially since these concepts have been baked into public schools, teachers colleges, teacher's unions (e.g., NEA, CEA, AFT), state-based educational associations (e.g., SERC, CAPSS, CABE) and even by the State Department of Education for years by now.
And it's not always obvious where these concepts are being employed either, and schools are notorious for burying and hiding things they don't want you to know about.
If you peruse the staff directory, you will not find a single employee with a job title like "DEI Program Coordinator" or "DEI Administrator" nor will you find anyone with "equity" or "diversity" in their job titles.
The only "official" DEI position you will find is co-chair of the PTA DEI Committee -- and since this group is a non-profit that operates independent of the public school, it does not have to comply with Trump's Order, unless it's seeking a federal grant.
In fact, if you search the entire Greenwich Public Schools website for the acronym "DEI", the only thing that comes up is the PTAC DEI committee.
If you search for "equity", you get a few more results, including the school's "Nondiscrimination and Equity Statement" which doesn't actually mention "equity" in the body of the statement, the preschool program which virtue signals that it "promotes equity for all children" and a number of new hire announcements for educators who all coincidentally have an "equity" mindset - more on that later.
Nonetheless, the false premise that the United States is built upon “systemic and structural racism” has been propagated in our schools in Greenwich.
So have the “nebulous” concepts of equity and social justice.
Let's start with that time in August 2020 after the "Summer of Love" when Superintendent Toni Jones and Deputy Superintendent Ann Carabillo had administrators participate in a struggle session using the critical race theory classic White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo, the same author who was exposed as a race huckster in Matt Walsh's film, Am I A Racist?
Coincidentally, that same academic year, students in 7th grade were given a reading assignment and corresponding survey to help them "unpack their white privilege" and a bulletin board promoting "equity and anti-racism" was installed.
Greenwich Superintendent Toni Jones buried more equity training inside the $10 million grant application she submitted for covid bail-out money from the Biden Administration's ARP ESSER III program.
ARP ESSER III was intended to “reimagine schools to transform student’s lives” according to the State Department of Education, and of course "transforming" means "advancing equity."
Toward that end the Greenwich application included a consultant to deliver professional learning on "UDL, MTSS and Equity" along with copies of an "equity book" for all teachers and administrators.
It's unclear exactly what the total equity training cost is since Jones does not break down the $200,000 in consulting fees. She also seems to have the "equity book" listed on the Purchased Professional and Technical Services budget line for $19,800 and possibly again on the Supplies budget line for $18,000.
By the way UDL, aka "Universal Design for Learning" was implemented for Greenwich Public Schools administrators and staff starting in August 2021.
The concepts have been fully embedded in lesson planning and instructional practices.
The "equity book" that Jones highlighted in the ESSER application, Equity By Design: Delivering On The Power And Promise Of UDL, makes a direct link between social justice and UDL.
The book offers "culturally responsive" and "equitable" strategies for educators to use with all students, along with examples, case studies and "spotlights" on programs that embrace the "social justice imperative."
The program also promotes "restorative practices" -- which offer a mechanism for "repairing harm" caused by student misbehavior where the ultimate goal is reconciliation between the offender and the victim instead of traditional punishments, like suspension or expulsion.
It's worth noting Greenwich uses restorative practices, per BOE Policy 5144.5 on Discipline.
Coincidentally, in the ARP ESSER III application, Superintendent Jones earmarked money to hire SEL consultants ($100k per year for two years) and for additional staff to deliver SEL content.
It's unclear exactly how much of the $3,555,000 in salary and $720,000 in benefits for the new ~22 FTEs was dedicated to SEL since Superintendent Jones declined to provide that level of detail in her application.
It's worth mentioning we've been through the wringer with Superintendent Jones over the two SEL programs that have been used in Greenwich (Second Step and RULER), and how SEL is being used to promote equity and social justice.
It's not like we went out on a limb to make this connection between SEL and equity -- the organization that created the SEL framework used by both programs, CASEL, wrote all about it in: Toward Transformative Social and Emotional Learning: Using an Equity Lens.
And we're not exactly going out on a limb by saying Greenwich Public Schools supports DEI, either.
We're just repeating what Superintendent Jones said in a 2021 letter to families that described the "long history" Greenwich has "of standing tall supporting diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) as part of our curriculum and student supports."
"We have not wavered on these ideals, and we intend to continue growing stronger as a school system," promised Jones who went on to detail her "commitment to DEI" across the district.
But like we said, you can't easily find details about the DEI commitment on the GPS website.
Instead, the information is hidden and buried -- you have to know exactly where to look or what to FOIA in order to find out.
In May 2024, the Greenwich Board of Education approved new criteria for judging educators based on whether they promote equity and social justice.
The criteria already seems to be at work in the hiring process, like when Jones hired a couple of ethically-challenged educators as elementary school principals, including one who highlighted “antiracism and DEI" as his strengths, and another who came from a social justice middle school.
Sure makes you wonder if Jones gave equal consideration for those jobs to educators without equity and social justice blasted all over their resumes?
In another example, students in 11th Grade Honors English this year were given assignments that emphasized DEI, equity and social justice concepts, directing them, for instance, to focus on themes of oppression by race, gender and class.
They were also told that "Lift Every Voice and Sing" was "widely accepted" as the African American National Anthem when, in fact, there is only one National Anthem in this country.
And of course there is still the Black, Puerto Rican and Latin American studies course that all public high schools are required to offer under Public Act 19-12 -- this is the course designed by Miguel Cardona when he was in Connecticut that pushes systemic racism and Black Lives Matter. Cardona even wanted an antiracist feminist "teacher of the year" on the curriculum committee to ensure teachers were supportive of the new "woke" curriculum they were developing.
He actually wrote in an email, "We need teachers behind this wave of our curriculum becoming more 'woke.'" More woke? And then this guy went on to be the US Secretary of Education after that?
So, yes, we are absolutely thrilled that our favorite President is doing what he promised, taking steps to end discriminatory DEI and equity policies, and threatening to defund institutions that don't.
But the truth is many (not all) educators, especially the younger ones, have been fully brainwashed as "antiracist educators" into promoting hateful, divisive DEI and social justice propaganda.
It's become second nature by now after pushing this agenda for so long.
And in order to reverse the years of brainwashing, we're either going to need some kind of nationwide cult deprogramming effort or perhaps a Men In Black-style neuralyzer.
