School Board Members Quitting Over "Toxic" Parents Who Oppose Mask Mandates, Vaccines, And CRT
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School Board Members Quitting Over "Toxic" Parents Who Oppose Mask Mandates, Vaccines, And CRT

As schools across the country force masks and Critical Race Theory (CRT) on America's youth, a massive backlash from angry parents has proven to be too much for some school board members to handle.

In this Aug. 25, 2021, file photo, people hold signs and chant during a meeting of the North Allegheny School District school board regarding the district’s mask policy, at at North Allegheny Senior High School in McCandless, Pa. Alexandra Wimley/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette via AP

According to the Associated Press, "a growing number are resigning or questioning their willingness to serve as meetings have devolved into shouting contests between deeply political constituencies over how racial issues are taught, masks in schools, and COVID-19 vaccines and testing requirements."

A Nevada school board member said he had thoughts of suicide before stepping down amid threats and harassment. In Virginia, a board member resigned over what she saw as politics driving decisions on masks. The vitriol at board meetings in Wisconsin had one member fearing he would find his tires slashed.

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In his letter of resignation from Wisconsin’s Oconomowoc Area School Board, Rick Grothaus said its work had become “toxic and impossible to do.” -AP

"When I got on, I knew it would be difficult," Grothaus - who resigned Aug. 15, told AP. "But I wasn’t ready or prepared for the vitriolic response that would occur, especially now that the pandemic seemed to just bring everything out in a very, very harsh way. It made it impossible to really do any kind of meaningful work."

According to National School Boards Association interim executive director, Chip Slaven, the charged political climate 'has made a difficult job even more challenging, if not impossible.'

It's not just pissed off parents, either. Earlier this month, a Virginia teacher quit her job at a school board meeting, saying that she refused to “be a cog in a machine” that forces her to transmit their “highly politicized agendas” to children.

“Within the last year, I was told, in one of my so-called equity trainings, that white, Christian, able-bodied females currently have the power in our schools and that ‘this has to change,'” said the elementary school teacher Laura Morris during the public comment portion of the board meeting.

“School board, I quit,” she said.

“I quit your policies, I quit your training, and I quit being a cog in a machine that tells me to push highly politicized agendas on our most vulnerable constituents—the children,” Morris added.

At one Veil, Arizona school board meeting, angry parents alternated between blasting officials over masks, vaccines, and CRT - while the board has no intention of addressing and acting on any of those topics.

After the board attempted to shut down the debate, more angry parents stepped up to drag their noses back on topic.

"There is starting to be an inherent distrust for school boards, that there’s some notion that we are out to indoctrinate children or to undermine parents or things like that, when we are on the same team," said Vail, AZ board member Allison Pratt, who's been on the board for six years.

Pratt said she strives to view issues from the perspective of even the most extreme members of the community, and she has no plans to resign. But she has stepped up security at her home.

Police have been called to intervene in places including Vail, where parents protesting a mask mandate pushed their way into a board room in April, and in Mesa County, Colorado, where Doug Levinson was among school board members escorted to their cars by officers who had been unable to de-escalate a raucous Aug. 17 meeting. “Why am I doing this?” Levinson asked himself.

Kurt Thigpen wrote in leaving the Washoe County, Nevada, school board that he considered suicide amid relentless bullying and threats led by people who didn’t live in the county, let alone have children in the schools. “I was constantly looking over my shoulder,” he wrote in July.

In several states, board members who won't resign are facing recall efforts. According to Ballotpedia, 147 school board members are up for recall across 59 campaigns in 2021. Among them, Vail board president Jon Aitken - whose critics say the mental and physical health of students in his district has declined amid pandemic restrictions.

Tyler Durden Mon, 08/30/2021 - 18:00
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