In June of last year, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed into law House Bill 3979 prohibiting the teaching of a series of race-related concepts, many of which are facets of critical race theory (CRT). Now, the Episcopal School of Dallas (ESD) is allegedly lying to parents about teaching students CRT, according to a Dallas-based education advocate.
“They’re doing the same thing that other private schools and the public schools are doing,” said Alice Linahan, an education policy advisor with the nonprofit Women on the Wall. “The fact that it’s an Episcopal school is appalling but not surprising.”
Linahan was responding to an expose by The Federalist that accuses ESD of teaching middle school students in a history class that ‘Whiteness is a constantly shifting boundary separating those who are entitled to have certain privileges from those whose exploitation and vulnerability to violence is justified by their not being white.’
The school’s “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” page, last approved by the Board on January 13, 2022, specifies their “commitment and objectives” are: “Not a curriculum change to teach that being part of an ethnic or racial group makes a person responsible for systemic problems, or to cast blame on or shame any member of the community for actions that took place in history” and “Not the teaching of Critical Race Theory.”
Tuition at the tony school, according to media reports, is some $26,945 for kindergarteners and $34,075 for high school seniors.
“As a parent, if I’m paying that tuition, I would pull my kid out,” Linahan told The Dallas Express.
The Federalist also published documents and social media posts showing that certain faculty members support CRT.
For example, Jennifer Jarnagin’s Twitter bio states that she’s dismantling “white supremacy, misogyny, and heteronormativity” and that she is a Latin teacher interested in “proficiency, inclusion, and empathy.”
Jarnagin is chair of the school’s Classical and Modern Languages Department.
“There’s been this shift in education away from academics to values, beliefs, and behaviors,” Linahan said in an interview. “So, then it becomes a matter of whose values, beliefs and behaviors. We would think that when we send our children to a Christian school and you’re paying that kind of a tuition, that they’re going to share your values, beliefs, and behaviors.”
The Federalist article details the role that conferences are playing in the dissemination of CRT.
For example, the ESD website openly discloses participation by staff and students in the People of Color Conference, which is organized by the National Association of Independent Schools and allegedly teaches CRT.
“All teachers, whether it’s public school, private school, or charter school, are being trained by the same people and the same institutions, and those institutions have an agenda,” Linahan said. “So, when a private school brings in these learning theories and teaching strategies, and then they get questioned, they’re going to get defensive, and that’s what’s happening.”
ESD Communications Director Julie Clardy did not respond to requests for comment, but issued a statement to The Federalist:
“We present challenging material that asks students to consider multiple points of view,” Clardy said. “For instance, we present the 1619 and 1776 projects together and ask students to analyze and argue their merits. Students are edified, not damaged, when they are asked to examine ideas they may disagree with.”
The 1619 Project is a journalistic endeavor by the New York Times, first begun in 2019 for the 400th anniversary of the first enslaved Africans’ arrival to the English colony of Virginia. Its supporters claim 1619 is the actual date of the country’s founding, as opposed to 1776 when the Declaration of Independence was signed.
The project self identifies as an effort “to reframe the country’s history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of Black Americans at the very center of the United States’ national narrative.”
HB 3979 states that social studies curriculum may not teach that “the advent of slavery in the territory that is now the United States constituted the true founding of the United States,” and specifically prohibits that it “require an understanding of The 1619 Project.”
Linahan said Clardy’s statement smacks of the learning theories and teaching strategies teachers are indoctrinated with during their professional development.
These concepts “are designed to shift the focus of education from a transmission of knowledge, that parents still expect from our schools, to an emphasis on altering the student’s world views, values, attitudes, beliefs and behaviors. When education is focused on how students perceive the world, that is known as critical theory or cultural marxism,” Linahan explained.
“The board is held responsible for the professional development of its teachers, and if that’s how the board is going to respond, then as a parent, I would question why I am spending this money and pull my kids out,” she added.
The Dallas Express reached out to the Sunrise Movement, NDTDFW, Our Revolution Texas, Asian Democrats of TX, and Avow Texas, but none responded to a request for comment.