I remember how it was -- JR
Oklahoma Legislature Passes Bill Banning Mask Mandate, COVID-19 Vaccine Requirements in Schools
The bill, SB 658, passed the state House by 76–18 and was sent to Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt on May 26. The state Senate had passed the bill by 38–8 a day earlier.
“For the sake of children throughout the state, I’m glad this bill is one step closer to becoming law,” Republican state Sen. Rob Standridge said in a statement. “With this legislation, vaccine passports for Oklahoma students will not exist.”
Standridge is also one of the authors of the bill.
SB 658 (pdf) would prohibit the boards of education of all public school districts and technology center school districts—including those of higher education—from requiring vaccination against COVID-19 as “a condition of admittance to or attendance of the school or institution.” It would also prevent vaccine passports or similar documentation from being required.
Standridge explained during the session that the COVID-19 vaccine is different from other vaccines that are currently required, like those against diphtheria or tetanus, because it’s “still under emergency use authorization,” News9 reported.
SB 658 further forbids implementing a mask mandate for students who haven’t received COVID-19 vaccines.
Exceptions include when the governor declares an emergency or after the boards of education consult with their local county health department, but the mask mandate must be reconsidered at each regularly scheduled board meeting.
Democratic lawmakers oppose the bill.
“This legislation creates a barrier to local control that prevents locally elected school boards from being able to fully protect their students as they and their constituents see fit,” state Rep. Andy Fugate stated in a news release. “This is a clear government overreach meant to strip away the personal freedom of Oklahomans wanting to protect their communities.”
Republican state Rep. Kevin West, who is also an author of the bill, said: “Should the force of government be used to force citizens to do something they don’t want to do, or should it be used to empower the rights of citizens?
“This protects a student’s and a parent’s right to choose for themselves whether a vaccination is appropriate for them for their own personal health reasons or their religious or personal beliefs. This disallows discrimination against students and parents that choose to be exempt from such vaccinations.”
Texas and Iowa banned mask mandates in schools and local governments last week. Utah Gov. Spencer Cox also said earlier this month that schools will remove mask mandates for the upcoming school year. A number of states have banned vaccine passports statewide, either through executive orders or legislation.
SB 658 will take effect on July 1 if Stitt signs it into law.
Stitt’s office didn’t immediately respond to The Epoch Times’ request for comment.
Republicans have the supermajority necessary in both chambers to override a veto by the governor.
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Virginia Teacher Placed on Leave After Saying He Won’t Call Students by Their Preferred Pronouns
Byron “Tanner” Cross, who teaches physical education at Leesburg Elementary School in Loudoun County Public Schools, was placed on leave after he spoke against a proposed rule that would require teachers and staff to address students by their preferred gender-identity pronouns, according to the Loudoun Times-Mirror.
The policy, according to the district’s website, says that “LCPS staff shall allow gender-expansive or transgender students to use their chosen name and gender pronouns, regardless of the name and gender recorded in the student’s permanent educational record.”
Cross addressed LCPS school board on May 25 during a public meeting in which the proposal was discussed, saying he “will not affirm that a biological boy can be a girl, and vice versa,” because that would violate his Christian beliefs.
“It’s not my intention to hurt anyone, but there are certain truths that we must face when ready,” Cross told the board members. “We condemn school policies [that] would damage children, defile the holy image of God.”
“I love all of my students, but I will never lie to them regardless of the consequences,” he continued. “I am a teacher, but I serve God first and I will not affirm that a biological boy can be a girl and vice versa because it’s against my religion. It’s lying to a child, it’s abuse to a child, and it’s sinning against our God.”
In a May 27 email sent to parents, Leesburg Elementary Principal Shawn Lacy said Cross “is on leave beginning this morning,” but didn’t specify who made the decision or why.
“I wanted you to know this because it may affect your student’s school routine. Because this involves a personnel matter, I can offer no further information,” the email read, reported Loudoun Times-Mirror.
Loudoun County, which is home to some of the nation’s top-achieving public schools, gained national attention over the past months as the “ground zero” in a fight between parents and school districts seeking to promote “woke” progressivism such as critical race theory (CRT)—an ideology rooted in Marxist class struggle but with an emphasis on race, with the goal of dismantling all social institutions it deems inherently racist.
The school district made headlines in March when a Facebook group of current and former LCPS teachers created a blacklist of parents and teachers who expressed concern about elements of CRT being incorporated into classrooms. According to the Daily Wire, which first reported on the matter, the group members were encouraged to “infiltrate” the anti-CRT groups, to use “hackers” to silence their communications, and to “expose these people publicly.”
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A New History Curriculum or Anti-American Propaganda?
President Joe Biden wants educators to teach students that racism is endemic in America. He and his “woke” allies think students should learn that our nation was born of the desire to enslave other humans, not as a struggle for freedom. They also believe that the government should racially discriminate, today and in the future.
The president wants these things so badly he’s asked his secretary of education to prioritize grant funding for K-12 history and civics curricula that preach this revisionist history.
That would be a huge mistake. The vile, ahistorical teachings of critical race theory should be consigned to the ashbin of history, not taught as sacred ideology in our nation’s schools.
Like other forms of Marxism, critical race theory teaches young minds to see the world as divided into two categories: oppressors and their victims. The only difference with traditional Marxism is that the critical race theory categories consist of immutable traits such as race, sex, or national origin, not economic classes like the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.
Critical race theory eschews economic classifications because they are too fluid. People can change their stations in life—and under capitalism, they often do. Critical theorists readily concede this point as being one of the downsides of trying to start a revolution with classes that are not immutable.
Critical race theory wants to solve this problem by adding race to Marxism. Critical race theory teaches young minds to focus on nothing but skin color and power, and how one influences the other in public and private life. It promotes racial stereotypes and assumes that humans act according to their category, not as individuals.
This pernicious ideology is already making its way into classrooms across the country—even without the proposed stimulus of federal grants. One example is the Learning for Justice curriculum, a K-12 civics program created by an organization of the same name that operates under the Southern Poverty Law Center.
The Learning for Justice curriculum teaches that “White supremacy culture … appears in any organization that is not actively and effectively working to dismantle it.” Educators, it insists, must acknowledge how racism “is embedded into the fiber of our nation and our schools.”
The proposed rule from Biden’s Education Department goes much further. For example, it recommends material created by the National Museum of African American History and Culture. The museum’s website hosted a chart claiming that “hard work,” “objective, rational, linear thinking,” and following “rigid time schedules” are racist values, mere appurtenances of white culture rather than human practices that lead to success.
The museum, a Smithsonian institution funded through your tax dollars, didn’t remove this racist chart until officials received blowback for such propaganda.
The proposed rule also praises Ibram X. Kendi, one of the nation’s best known critical race theory trainers, who has written, “The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination.” This, one therefore assumes, is what the Biden administration wants American children to be taught.
The rule also approvingly cites The New York Times’s 1619 Project, a mendacious series of essays on race that historians spanning the ideological spectrum have denounced.
The project derives its name from its misleading contention that America’s birthdate is not signified by the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776, but by the arrival of the first enslaved Africans in 1619 on the shores of what would later become the United States. The project rejects the document that outlines America’s creed that “all men are created equal.”
The project couldn’t even meet basic standards of accuracy. Spanish conquistadors first brought slaves to what are today South Carolina, Florida, and New Mexico starting nearly a half-century before 1619. Another of the 1619 Project’s errors—one from which The New York Times later backed away—was its claim that the colonists fought the Revolution because they feared that Britain would end the practice of slavery. This is flatly false.
Let’s hope the president and his education secretary weren’t fully steeped in the tenets of critical race theory when they issued their proposal to subsidize this anti-American propaganda. If that’s the case, you can help straighten them out. If you agree that these pernicious ideas should not be taught to our children, you can submit your comments about the administration’s proposed rule (as we have) here.
https://www.dailysignal.com/2021/05/17/a-new-history-curriculum-or-anti-american-propaganda
********************************Gov. Ron DeSantis signs bill banning transgender athletes from female sports at public high schools and colleges: Florida becomes eighth and largest state to impose restrictions
Florida's Republican governor has signed a bill barring transgender females from playing on public school teams intended for student athletes born as girls, plunging the state into the national culture war over transgender rights.
'In Florida, girls are going to play girls sports and boys are going to play boys sports,' Governor Ron DeSantis said as he signed the bill into law at a Christian academy in Jacksonville on Tuesday. 'We're going to make sure that that's the reality.'
The new law, sure to face court challenges, inflames an already contentious discussion unfolding nationally as Republican-controlled states move to limit the rights of LGBTQ people. It also could impose severe financial consequences on Florida.
Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Montana, Tennessee and West Virginia have already passed similar legislation and South Dakota's governor has signed an executive order supporting a sports ban. All have Republican governors.
Governor Ron DeSantis has signed a bill barring transgender females from playing on Florida public school teams intended for student athletes born as girls +5
Governor Ron DeSantis has signed a bill barring transgender females from playing on Florida public school teams intended for student athletes born as girls
Supporters of the sports bills say they are needed to preserve fairness, asserting that biologically born women and girls would be at a disadvantage against transgender athletes who were born as male but have since transitioned to female.
DeSantis signed the bill flanked by several teenage women athletes. He said the law was needed to ensure fairness for women participating in sports across the state.
'We are going to go based off biology, not based off ideology when we are doing sports,' he said.
The Human Rights Campaign, an advocacy group, said it would challenge the Florida law in court as having been based on a 'false, discriminatory premise' that threatened the wellbeing of transgender children.
'Transgender kids are kids; transgender girls are girls. Like all children, they deserve the opportunity to play sports with their friends and be a part of a team,' Human Rights Campaign President Alphonso David said in a statement.
The Florida legislation passed over the objection of Democrats and civil rights advocates who call the banning of transgender girls and women from sports unnecessary and discriminatory and accuse Republicans of portraying them as a provocation to energize the right wing of their party.
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My other blogs: Main ones below
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://awesternheart.blogspot.com.au/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)
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