by Gregory Thayer
Regarding the non-educational, social justice stuff happening in local schools: it is time we stand-up against this marxist ideology and say no, and give the rights of our children back to their parents or guardians, and force the schoolboards to teach our children the Three R’s, truthful history, correct mathematics and sciences, and arts, theatre and music curriculum. This is the time in our children’s lives that is most impressionable, and it is their foundation for the future.
Parents have the right to direct the education and care of his or her child, to direct the upbringing and moral or religious training of his or her child, and to make health care decisions for his or her child. Parents are their child(ren)’s first and most constant and absolute teacher, and their unequivocal protector in this world.
“Vermonters for Vermont” recognizes this fact and honor that thinking. We put together a “Parent’s Rights in Education” resolution that is going before Schoolboards across our great State. This resolution, modeled after some language from other State’s resolutions around the country and is worked to fit Vermonters.
During the spring and summer of 2021, V4V Initiative hosted many Townhalls on Critical Race Theory (CRT) – Equity around the State with various professional speakers on the topic, and parents and students from various schools districts in communities that we hosted these Townhalls. We listened to many people’s assessments and first-hand experiences of their local schoolboards, schools, and Superintendents and we are not impressed with their teachings to our children.
V4V also organized various forums on “Americanism & Marxism” Symposium around Vermont. The things we learned are very concerning and eyeopening to the “everyday” Vermonter! These social justice teachings in our schools were a major point of my platform in my recent run for Vermont LT. Governor in the summer/fall 2022.
Please see the attached resolution; “Parent’s Rights in Education” that “We The People” must work together to present to our local and District Schoolboards today. We have training platforms to assist you in the process to advocate for the children in your public schoolboard meeting. Contact us today at: V4V2018@aol.com.
PARENT’S RIGHTS in EDUCATION Resolution.
A Resolution in Support of the Rights of Parents to Direct Their Children’s Education
WHEREAS, parents have a fundamental rights to oversee the upbringing and education of their children;
WHEREAS, these rights are well established in the constitutions and laws of the United States and of the State of Vermont;
WHEREAS, parents shall maintain direction and authority over all decisions impacting the health, healthcare, and well-being of their children; to ensure the best interests of their child;
WHEREAS, all academic success begins by embracing parents as the foremost guardians of the best interests of their own children, both at home and at school;
WHEREAS, academic focus shall be developed in partnership with parents and community members and shall avoid slanted bias, political opinion or indoctrination;
WHEREAS, the US Supreme Court has held that the State’s interest in universal education is not totally free from a balancing process when it impinges on other fundamental rights, such as those specifically protected by the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment and the traditional interest of parents to direct the upbringing and education of their children.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that The School Board affirms our commitment to the fundamental rights of parents to direct the upbringing and education of their children, including the right to play a central role in what their children are learning, and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that The School Board, administration and employees will uphold the traditional partnership between teachers, students and parents in light of the parents primary role in the upbringing and academic success of those children, and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that The School Board, shall respect a parent’s right to see and evaluate all educational aspects and data regarding or involving their children collected, administered, or held by the school system to ensure the proper direction of the child’s upbringing and education.000
If you are a parent, grandparent or a concerned citizen in your community, and you are willing to help “Vermonters for Vermont” Initiative introduce this Resolution at your local and/or District Schoolboard meeting. Please contact us today at: V4V2018@aol.com or by visiting us at our Facebook page at; https://www.facebook.com/V4V2018 We have a good Team of concerned Vermonter’s ready to go into their local Schoolboards to demand change. Are you ready to join us today? Thank you.
Categories: Commentary, Education
There are a couple good parts to this, but some laughable parts too. As a teacher, I don’t think that I will be asking Greg to review my personal finance or ethics syllabi anytime soon.
CT: Why wouldn’t you want to have any part of your “teaching” be reviewed by anyone? What is it that you are teaching in personal finance or ethics? Do you have something to hide? Are you divulging personal information in those classes? If so, why are you doing that? If not, why wouldn’t you want other teachers, parents, school board members and members of the public to see what you are teaching?
Because, Madam, child abuse notwithstanding, it’s none of anyone’s business but the parents as to what education program best meets the needs of their children.
Of course, when the omnipotent moral busybodies among us, those who torment us for our own good and torment us without end to satiate the approval of their own conscience, dictate what we should and shouldn’t do, we have a problem.
To: H. Jay Eshelman-
Sir or Madam, you are decidedly wrong when you are speaking about public schools. The School Board, the parents, the teachers, the students and the community all have a moral right and duty to oversee what is taught.
And by God, if you’re going to take my money and pay for the school, teachers and administrators then I will have a say.
Pam, take it down a notch, I was referring to the time that Greg was publicly owned on WCAX by Joe Benning because he blacked out all financial information on his tax returns when he ran for Lt. Governor because he didn’t want people to know how little money he makes. I was also referring to his less than ethical behavior but I’ll save that one for another time.
For the record, Ms. Baker, please refer to me as Sir, or Mr. Eshelman, or Jay – if you don’t mind. And I’ve served on a Vermont public school board, while understanding education law as well as anyone.
I’m afraid you’re expressing an opinion that’s, with all due respect, meaningless. Yes, you have ‘a say’ – whatever that means. But I have ‘a say’ too. And your neighbors have ‘a say’. Even those who don’t pay taxes have ‘a say’. But under the law, once your school district budget is passed, you have ‘no say’.
Yes, you can run for the school board. But even then, you are one person on a three, or five, or seven-person board, with 80% of the funding you oversee controlled by the Federal Dept. of Education, the VT Agency of Education, District Superintendents, and School Principals. And 80% of the district’s control is beholden to the labor contracts controlled by the teacher unions.
What you’re failing to understand is that when you pay taxes, your control of those funds “…ends with the disbursement of benefits” to whomever those funds are lawfully designated. Be that a public school district or an individual’s school choice voucher.
You can ‘say’ whatever you like – as you are doing on this forum. But you can’t control the destiny of anyone else’s children, or the people who teach them, just because you pay taxes. Nor should you be able to do so.
But it gets worse.
As I mentioned below – our government has become totalitarian in order to control the tax revenue you pay and how and to whom those taxes are spent. It regulates public schools, independent schools, and homeschooling. If a parent deviates from those regulations, the parent will be charged with truancy, or worse… much worse, as is becoming apparent.
Again, figuring out how reasonable people counter this totalitarian governance is where we are today.
To CT: I was asking legitimate, calm and reasonable questions based on the information presented. I’m so terribly sorry I didn’t understand all the backstory and inuendo. Or pick up on the sarcasm. My apologies.
To Mr. Eshelman: You clearly are far smarter and better informed than I will ever be. Thank you so much for taking the time to educate me on my shortcomings. I appreciate how difficult it must be to have to put up with people like myself in your state.
CT: I appreciate the opportunity to engage a teacher. I have been extensively researching the impact UNESCO has on education in America. Research has revealed that international nonelected entities like UNESCO, OECD, the United Nations and National Education Association Foundation (funded by NEA dues) have been working in partnership to interject coursework and resources to promote the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and concept of global citizenship into American classrooms. UNESCO, the OECD and World Bank are using Social, Emotional Learning as a tool to provide children with political literacy aligned to Marxist education Paulo Freire regenerative themes model. Do you realize that these entities are collecting and building out an infrastructure to use SEL as a tool, with AI, for the economical and political management of children globally from cradel to grave. These entities have invested huge sums of money and will use SEL scores to determine if people are employable. The future of education is in the metavers, as the UN wants to create a global educational program that creates equal outcomes. They are very clear that our current educational model is not sustainable. The powers that be you as a teacher are aligned to call this a ” 21st century education”.
If you have any insider information and want to assist parents and tax payers please provide additional details. Although, as a teacher you may not even understand the role you play in this agenda.
Re: “… force the schoolboards to teach our children the Three R’s, truthful history, correct mathematics and sciences, and arts, theatre and music curriculum.”
Who do you think you’re kidding, Mr. Thayer? You can no more force a school board (or a teacher for that matter) to teach than you can force children to learn.
Yes, while your sentiment is poorly worded, I too think a parent ought to have the right to direct their children’s education… to the educational program they believe best meets the needs of their children.
But using force, Mr. Thayer, is the polar opposite of what successful learning is all about. Your directive in that regard is little different from what we might expect a teacher’s union official to say about parents.
To H. Jay Eshelman,
Dear Sir or Madam, from whence do you gather that “force” will be involved? I assume you mean physical force, or do you mean requiring a set of standards to be followed by educators and administrators? Which means the failure to follow said standards will result in termination? I see no mention of force in the article. I see people stating their intentions. Rationally, calmly and plainly.
Where is the force? They already have a set of standards they follow; the group above wants to change the standards and be informed of them.
Your comment is baseless or if there is some foundation of truth you failed to elucidate it clearly.
Read the article ‘Madam’. Then read my reference. The ask Greg Thayer what he meant when he said:
“Regarding the non-educational, social justice stuff happening in local schools: it is time we stand-up against this marxist ideology and say no, and give the rights of our children back to their parents or guardians, AND FORCE the schoolboards to teach our children the Three R’s, truthful history, correct mathematics and sciences, and arts, theatre and music curriculum.”
Capitalization by me, for emphasis…. so you don’t miss it again.
Is there a way to start a petition and platform to get this rolling !
“Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster… for when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.” ― Friedrich W. Nietzsche
The sad truth is a questionable amount of parents have failed at their duties as parents to raise and teach their own children
to be respectful ,kind ,regardless of gender ,race ,ethnic background ,socioeconomic ,status,spiritual beliefs and whatever preferred identity someone has decided upon.In school ,out of school we must
treat all people with respect kindness and love.Schools can support and teach this aspect of it and when needed deal with the situations at hand.The overreach of this unfathomable irresponsible push is to teach undeveloped, and malleable minds, what a small faction of the public’s belief system about what their sexuality , or sexual identify IS instead of teaching the Golden Rule for all .Now a flood gate of ridiculous demands for every ideology is crippling the education system with discipline, investigations and now feeding children with something that is really not in their conscience yet .Yes ,I witnessed first hand a child being told that if a person identifies as a cat that’s okay.Don’t laugh ! This is one example.There are many . I have also witnessed a child truly struggling at a young age concerning their gender .The school community was respectful allowing this student and their family to navigate ,process and make informed decisions to respect their child’s growth .NOT expecting or teaching the child and family what they should feel or should do, or what to believe.The obligation of the public school is to respect the situation and the family/child and teach others to do the same . The golden rule .The overreach of the federal and state is creating more hatred, and anger.Why ?
Is imposes ideas ,beliefs on vulnerable
children and families that want their children to learn math,reading ,writing ,how to make friends, be respectful, and work out conflict. The basics. Let’s have conversations without anger.We should be allowed to have respectful conversation .This is our public schools not a political playground.
Re: “This is our public schools not a political playground.”
I disagree. The playground is where we first learn the art of politics – of communicating, of coping with others. Apparently, your idea of a school and my idea of a school are different – public or otherwise. So, how do we accommodate those differences? That is the question.
Please read below.
Re: “Yes ,I witnessed first hand a child being told that if a person identifies as a cat that’s okay. Don’t laugh!”
I’m not laughing. I think I agree with you for the most part. But some kids growing up identify as all sorts of things – temporarily. I was Zorro for a while, with the cape and all. A friend of mine’s son was a snake slithering on the floor for a few days. I suspect many of us believed in Santa Claus as kids.
The problem isn’t that kids identify as a ‘furry’ from time to time. The problem is that a one-size-fits-all pedagogy in the public-school monopoly not only disregards our individuality, it tries to stifle it.
The other part of the problem is that, for generations now, parents have been convinced to distrust their child-rearing instincts and trust the so-called child-development ‘experts’. The problem with many ‘experts’ is that their points of view are self-serving, often citing their expertise to rationalize their own personal psychological deviations. One expert with whom I tend to agree is Dr Jordan Peterson.
There are no guaranties for child rearing success. Anyone who says otherwise is to be carefully scrutinized. For literally tens of thousands of years our instincts and social norms have gotten us this far. The destructive hubris prescribed by those who consider themselves ‘expert’, be it artificial intelligence, RNA and DNA manipulation, and so forth, can’t be exaggerated. Some call their condition a ‘God Complex.
Suffice it to say – I consider myself to be on my own. I don’t trust anyone without verification of some sort. And when someone claims that my verification process is dangerous to society, or they characterize my questioning as conspiratorial, my guard goes up.
“If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life.” – – Henry David Thoreau
“So, how do we accommodate those differences?”
Easy answer: Universal school choice.
Teaching and learning styles, abilities and disabilities come in all forms, no two alike. It is impossible for a top-down curriculum dictated by far left and corrupt organizations such as the state and national teacher’s unions and education administration establishment has become, to equally and effectively provide for each child’s needs, especially with little parental involvement. They are a parasitic drain on the economy and our children’s minds at our expense.
Only the free market merit based programs can solve these kind of problems. That will never happen as long as government inserts itself into every industry and every crevice of people’s lives, claiming their “expert” authority and some moral imperative only they possess.
Freedom does have a point, however. Many parents are either overwhelmed just trying to stay economically afloat and simply trust the system to do their job and look after their children while they are at work; some are fully on board, delivering their children to a cell block environment where strangers and (these days) potential groomers are their main influence.
I’ve been a strong advocate for School Choice for more than 30 years. But there’s a Catch 22. It’s the Agency of Education and its State Board of Education. We can choose the school we feel best meets the needs of our children. But the AOE and its board are now regulating all schools that receive publicly funded tuition to the point where all schools, including independent schools, don’t receive AOE approval to operate unless they mimic the dystopian public schools.
The government has become totalitarian in order to control education funding.
Figuring out how reasonable people counter that totalitarian governance is where we are today. And speaking one’s mind in that regard can lead to being accused of being a danger to society, a domestic terrorist, or worse.