By Diana Lambert. EdSource.
Counterfeit dollar bills with a caricature of a black man and racist remarks circulated at a Sacramento high school. A 10-year-old girl was called a “slave” by a classmate in Orange County. Bay Area high school students filmed themselves laughing and repeating a racial slur against black people. All this month in California.
They are children who are collateral damage in the culture wars, with Black students more often the targets of racial hostility than any other student group, according to “Educating for a Diverse Democracy in California,” a joint report by the UCLA Institute for Democracy, Education and Access and the UC Riverside Civic Engagement Research Group. As part of the study, researchers surveyed 150 California principals about how the political dynamics of their communities have impacted their schools.
Sixty-six percent of principals reported they are aware of racist comments made against black students on their campuses; one-third said such incidents are frequent. These verbal attacks speak to the presence of anti-black racism that undermines young people's ability to learn, said John Rogers, one of the study's authors.
"We cannot normalize the fact that these (attacks) have become commonplace in our public schools," he said.
Political polarization and conflicts over racial and gender equity are now commonplace at school board meetings and on school campuses across the state. They are negatively impacting school staff, undermining school governance and increasing anxiety and hostility among students, the report said.
“The ground shifted beneath their feet for a year and a half, and significant political events occurred: the murder of George Floyd, Brianna Taylor, etc., the rise of Black Lives Matter and protests, the responses to protest, the blue line flag, the 2020 election, and January 6,” noted one California student director. “All of these things happened while kids were in spaces that weren’t with us.”
Students, most in distance learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic, were unable to discuss these events at school with a diverse community of students. Instead, they either didn't have these conversations or had them around the dinner table, hearing only their family's perspective, the principal said.
“So our kids came back to school with this very narrow perspective,” she said. “It was something we hadn’t necessarily seen in the past. We didn’t necessarily have kids running around with political statements on their hats or T-shirts, but I do think they struggled a little bit to have empathy for groups they didn’t necessarily understand.”
Political polarization grows
Nearly two-thirds of California principals surveyed reported substantial local political conflicts over educational issues in their schools. In many school districts, community members have sought to limit or challenge teaching about race, policies related to LGBTQ students, and access to social-emotional learning or certain books in the library.
Political partisanship began to boil over after COVID school closures. Parents and other activists showed up at school board meetings to demand that schools reopen. They returned to protest mask mandates, vaccine mandates, and other safety requirements. Once COVID-19 protocols were loosened, conservative activists began fighting education policies on gender identity and racial equity.
“It seems like political polarization and conflict continues to grow,” Rogers said. “More recently there seems to be a focus on rolling back LGBTQ rights or anything resembling gender issues, such as the recent protests over a program at an Elk Grove high school where students were wearing gender-based clothing.”
The performance at a multicultural assembly at Pleasant Grove High School on March 3 sparked protests from parents at a district school board meeting, according to SFGate. A similar performance planned at a Roseville high school in Placer County was canceled this month after it sparked anger from parents and local political groups, according to The Sacramento Bee.
Three-quarters of California principals surveyed say LGBTQ students in their schools have been subjected to verbal attacks.
The California analysis follows a national survey released last year. Researchers interviewed principals in blue, red and purple congressional districts during the summer of 2022 to determine how the partisan divide has affected schools. Principals’ names were not included in the report.
Researchers labeled districts blue if fewer than 45 percent of voters voted for Donald Trump for president in 2020, purple if between 45 and 54.9 percent voted for Trump, and red if more than 55 percent of voters chose Trump.
The national study found that uncivil speech and hostile political rhetoric have seeped into the nation’s classrooms, leading to a decline in support for teaching about race and racism and a sharp rise in bullying of LGBTQ youth. Principals in politically divided communities were twice as likely to report multiple instances of conflict in their schools related to LGBTQ topics or learning about race and racism.
Political division affecting student education
"Much of the political dynamic that has played out in conservative grassroots activism is also occurring in many California communities, with serious consequences for education," Rogers said.
At least one California principal has told his teachers to avoid talking about politics, elections and current events.
Students must understand the history of various groups to have respectful, evidence-based dialogue to help build a diverse democracy, the report said.
In California, educators in purple and blue communities were equally likely to support LGBTQ students’ rights compared to the rest of the country. Principals in purple communities were 5 percent more likely than those in blue communities to offer training to teachers and staff to support learning about literature and history by people from different racial and ethnic backgrounds.
“It’s refreshing to hear that while California is experiencing these issues, many educators and school staff are not backing down when it comes to racial and gender equity,” Rogers said. “Unfortunately, certain individuals representing particular segments of the Republican Party believe that highlighting culturally divisive issues and attacking schools for teaching the full history of American society and protecting LGBTQ rights is in their partisan interest.”
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This publication was supported in whole or part by funding provided by the State of California, administered by the California State Library.
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