Fairfax County Teaches Course, ‘How to Be an Antiracist Educator,’ Steeped in Critical Race Theory

  • Fairfax County Public Schools - Virginia

Incidents

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Since Wednesday, October 6, 2021, Fairfax County Public Schools staffer Rob Kerr has been teaching a regular two-hour, seven-class course, “AC-1608: How to Be an Antiracist Educator,” to school district teachers at Marshall High School in Falls Church, Virginia, according to a copy of the syllabus that a whistleblower provided Parents Defending Education.

Despite statements from school district officials and others that critical race theory is not taught in Virginia schools, the course includes lessons steeped in the divisive, racially-charged, race-obsessed ideology of critical race theory, including a module: “Exploring and Understanding Whiteness.”

Staff are also required to listen to a podcast by controversial speaker Bettina Love, cofounder of Love Educational Services LLC and the Abolitionist Teaching Network, who teaches that schools are “spirit murdering” black children.

What’s more, they have to study the ideas of consultant Glenn Singleton, founder of the Pacific Educational Group Inc., regarding “The Sixth Condition-Let’s Talk About Whiteness,” which argues that “whiteness” is a problem.

Fairfax County Public Schools – 2021 – ‘How to Be an Antiracist Educator’ SyllabusDownload

In a statement, a spokeswoman for Fairfax County Public Schools said,

Critical race theory is a specific theory that has 5 tenets,” which she said are not in the course, noting, “While this is a course about race and racism is discussed, that alone does not make it emblematic of critical race theory. If you review the course outline you will notice these ideas are not present.”

Using Fairfax County Public Schools’ definition of critical race theory, Parents Defending Education did an analysis of the class syllabus and found the topics of study do indeed include the five elements identified by the school district as the “5 tenets” of critical race theory.

Fairfax County Public Schools statement: “Critical race theory is a specific theory that has 5 tenets that include:“

  1. “The notion that racism is not an aberration”
  2. “Interest convergence”
  3. “The social construction of race”
  4. “Story telling and counter story telling”
  5. “A critique of liberalism”

“AC-1608: How to Be an Antiracist Educator” syllabus, taught to teachers at Fairfax County Public Schools, includes:

  1. The “creation of Racist Systems”
  2. “Exploring and understanding whiteness”
  3. The “building blocks of racism in the United States”
  4. Writing a “Racial Autobiography”
  5. Learning to “disrupt and dismantle the status quo”