Alpha News reports that the state teacher licensing agency is preparing standards which will require teachers to adopt and teach students Marxist ideological principles.
SD50 Newsletter has compared the fourteen specific claims Alpha News has made to the actual proposed rules and concluded that the Alpha News claims are generally sound, with a few technical exceptions. Unfortunately SD50 Newsletter doesn’t have the space to properly convey how bad these proposed rules are.
It is very difficult to sort out what the bill says because it uses language that means nothing in ordinary English. For example:
“ ‘Understand “systemic trauma,” including racism and “micro and macro aggressions ‘ [Trauma is presumed to have been inflicted upon victims from the oppressor classes.]portions in [ ] are comment by Alpha news, not quotes from the proposed regulations.
The actual language in the proposed rules is: “ 37.12 The teacher understands the diverse impacts of individual and systemic trauma, such as experiencing homelessness, foster care, incarceration, migration, medical fragility, racism, and micro and macro aggressions, on learning and development and knows how to support students using culturally responsive strategies and resources to address these impacts.” . (The number at the front is the location of the language in the proposed rule.)
In order to make any sense out of this you have to know what a ‘microaggression’ is. It took half an hour to find a definition that seemed to include most of what microaggressions are used for in news stories and on the internet. According to Auburn University an example of a microaggression is “When Blacks are told that “I don’t see color” or “We are all human beings,” the effect is to negate their experiences as racial/cultural beings.”
Yes, it is a microaggression to deny that you treat people based on race.
The proposed rules also routinely assume as proven facts assertions which are, at the very least, all debatable, and many of which are flatly untrue.
“42.9 C. The teacher understands the historical foundations of education in Minnesota,
including laws, policies, and practices, that have and continue to create inequitable
opportunities, experiences, and outcomes for learners, especially for Indigenous students
and students historically denied access, underserved, or underrepresented on the basis of
race, class, gender, sexual orientation, language, socioeconomic status, or country of origin.”
This requirement forces teachers to assert in class the idea that under-representation (which is not defined) automatically means a wrong has been done, the idea of ‘equity’ (guaranteed equality of outcome) versus ‘equal rights before the law’.
Or “The teacher understands how prejudice, discrimination, and racism operates at the interpersonal, intergroup, and institutional levels.”
…thus making the existence of ‘institutional racism’ a nondebatable fact in class, one which all teachers must, in order to get license, assert.
Finally, this one:
“38.7 The teacher fosters an environment that ensures student identities such as
38.8 race/ethnicity, national origin, language, sex and gender, gender identity, sexual orientation,
38.9 physical/developmental/emotional ability, socioeconomic class, and religious beliefs are
38.10 historically and socially contextualized, affirmed, and incorporated into a learning
38.11 environment where students are empowered to learn and contribute as their whole selves.” (bold emphasis added)
In order to be licensed to teach in this state under the proposed rules, all teachers must "ensure" that gender and gender identity claimed by a student are built into the learning environment. And the teacher must "contextualize" all religious beliefs for the student.
Oh yes – if a teacher wishes to get licensed by submitting a portfolio of past experience (often used when a teacher moves here from another state) the licensing board can deny it for any reason. I am sure they would never deny such an application because a teacher lacked sufficient woke warrior credentials.
