Spring wildflower bonanza

 

On March 5th we made a circuit of nearly 150 miles east and southeast of Austin looking for wildflowers. North of Bastrop we came upon this florally rich site. I take the prominent species to be Drummond’s phlox (Phlox drummondii), sandyland bluebonnets (Lupinus subcarnosus), and the dry remains of last year’s little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparium).

 

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Consider these three scenarios:

 

• You’re an American couple who happen to be devout Muslims. You have a son in your town’s public high school. One day in class your son mentions to his social studies teacher that he’s interested in the world’s religions. The next day his teacher gives him information about Catholicism. Later the teacher arranges for a Catholic priest to come to the school and counsel your son. At a subsequent meeting with the priest, your son says he now wants to give up Islam and become a Catholic. He asks the priest to make arrangements to get baptized. Eventually you hear from one of your son’s friends about what’s been going on at school, so you immediately contact the school’s principal and say that the school has no right to be counseling your son about changing his religion. The principal tells you that the school’s client is the community, not you the individual parents*, and that the school has a policy allowing students to keep such changes secret from their parents.

• You’re an American couple who for ethical reasons have chosen to be vegans (people who eat no animal products) and have brought their children up as vegans too. You have a daughter in your town’s public high school. One day in class your daughter mentions to her social studies teacher that because her whole family is vegan, she has never tasted meat or eggs or even honey. The next day the teacher invites your daughter to eat lunch with her in the school cafeteria and buys her a ham sandwich. From then on the teacher eats with your daughter several times a week, always buying her a meat dish of some sort. After a month your daughter tells the teacher she’s come to like meat and has decided to give up being a vegan. Eventually you hear from one of your daughter’s friends about what’s been going on at school, so you immediately contact the school’s principal and say that the school has no right to be giving meat to your vegan daughter. The principal tells you that the school’s client is the community, not you the individual parents*, and that the school has a policy allowing students to keep such changes secret from their parents.

• You’re an American couple who have supported Progressive causes for many years. You have a son in your town’s public high school. One day in class your son mentions to his social studies teacher that he’s interested in contemporary political and cultural issues. The next day his teacher gives him pamphlets that sing the praises of Donald Trump. Later the teacher arranges for a representative from a MAGA (Make America Great Again) group to come to the school and counsel your son. After several more meetings with the MAGA representative, your son says he now wants to give up being a Progressive and join the MAGA movement. Eventually you hear from one of your son’s friends about what’s been going on at school, so you immediately contact the school’s principal and say that the school has no right to be counseling your son about changing his political and cultural beliefs. The principal tells you that the school’s client is the community, not you the individual parents*, and that the school has a policy allowing students to keep such changes secret from their parents.

 

Unless I’m much mistaken, you’ll find it appalling that the staff at a public school could work directly with your child to make a major life change and not even tell you about it. Yet that’s what’s been happening at increasingly many American schools. For a recent example, take the Linn-Mar Community School District in Iowa. As local television station KCRG’s Jackie Kennon reported on April 5, 2022:

“The Linn-Marr Community School District will move forward with a new policy for students who are transgender. The policy includes keeping their gender status secret, even from their parents, and letting students use the bathroom or locker room matching their gender identity.”

The text accompanying the video notes that “the policy will create a ‘gender support plan’ for students in seventh grade or older, which will include a student’s new name and pronouns. It will decide if students can use locker rooms, bathrooms or stay in rooms overnight correlating with their gender identity.”

That last part means that on overnight student trips, for example to a distant sporting event, a biologically intact male teenager who “says he “identifies as” a female may get to spend the night in a room with teenage girls. (Rest assured, nothing could possibly go wrong there: we all know that hormone-infused adolescents are in full control of their sexual fantasies and urges.)

Naturally many parents in the Linn-Mar district objected to the new policy. The group Parents Defending Education has filed a friend-of-the-court brief “on behalf of Parental Rights Iowa and The Justice Foundation, who have sued the district in support of parents’ right to make decisions about how their children are raised”:

Parents—not government officials—have the fundamental right to direct the upbringing, care, and education of their children. Yet Linn-Mar Community School District has joined a troubling trend of school districts enacting gender-identity policies that exclude parents from any knowledge or involvement in key decisions regarding their children’s care and education. As we explain in our brief, Linn-Mar’s policy assumes public schools are better guardians of children than their own parents—replacing moms and dads with teachers and school administrators. When government officials violate parents’ rights, it’s vulnerable children who suffer. We urge the 8th Circuit to affirm the legal and constitutional protections parents have to make the best decisions for their own kids.

 

I hope the lawsuit succeeds.

 

* The line about the school’s client being the community rather than an individual student’s parents comes from a statement to that effect by Rachel Wall, a board member of the Linn-Marr Community School District: “The purpose of a public ed is not to teach kids what parents want. It is to teach them what society needs them to know. The client is not the parent, but the community.”

If you don’t think that sounds dangerously like what went on in Communist China and the Soviet Union, you haven’t learned anything from history.

 

© 2023 Steven Schwartzman