The number of ‘woke’ public school superintendents who are either resigning or retiring is on the rise.
In December, Dr. Jeannie Stone, superintendent of Richardson Independent School District (RISD), resigned, followed by the resignation last month of Dallas ISD Superintendent Michael Hinojosa and notice of retirement by Fort Worth ISD Superintendent Kent P. Scribner.
“The current progressive agenda pushed in schools isn’t by accident,” said Ethan Sabo, founder and president of Mission: DFW, a group of advocates that oppose ‘woke’ politics. “Parents are demanding answers on what far-left teachers are teaching their children, and the superintendents are catching the heat. Mission: DFW hopes both school districts hire someone a little less ‘woke’ and a little more focused on the next generation of Texans.”
Both Stone and Hinojosa caught heat for requiring masks in their districts’ schools despite Governor Greg Abbott’s ban on mask mandates. Lawsuits that were filed last year are still being litigated.
State Senator Bob Hall (R-District 22) said he characterizes the school system as having bought into the “COVID myth,” and educators as “extreme err-on-the-side-of-caution-type people.”
“The CDC said that 96% of people who have gotten COVID wore masks either all the time or most of the time,” Hall told The Dallas Express. “Between that and the teachers not wanting to get into the classroom, which makes no sense because we have no evidence of a child giving an adult COVID, we are now approaching two years of school lost for our kids. I don’t know how we recover. We have schools that are shut down and going back to virtual learning, and nobody’s learning anything on virtual learning.”
As previously reported in The Dallas Express, six elementary schools within the Mansfield ISD were temporarily closed in January due to an increasing number of COVID-related absences and a shortage of substitute teachers. The following week, Mesquite ISD closed its campuses to classes for another two days after Martin Luther King Jr. Day due to staff shortages caused by COVID-19.
“It was clear Hinojosa didn’t care about the health and safety of Dallas ISD students,” Sabo told The Dallas Express. “His only concern was how many political points he could score with the Dallas County Democrat party. Michael Hinojosa spent the last 13 years at DISD grooming his political future.”
It was widely reported in January that Hinojosa intends to run for mayor in 2023 after his resignation becomes effective at the end of 2022.
“How fitting, as Hinojosa tried to cement his mark as one of the most controversial political figures in DISD’s history,” Sabo said in an interview. “Dallas already has too many incompetent wannabes in City Hall. Hinojosa’s next move is much anticipated.”
Scribner was heavily criticized for his race- and gender- based ‘woke-ness’ as superintendent.
“After fixating on CRT and implementing ‘wokeism’ during school board meetings, we hope Kent Scribner is never allowed to create chaos as he has at FWISD,” Sabo said. “Let’s see what political office Scribner is after next. He desperately needs the attention.”
CRT (critical race theory) is a series of educational proposals that include teaching students that America’s history of slavery began in 1619, not in 1776 with the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
“Children are the easiest to brainwash, and that’s more of a reason to get rid of ‘woke’ superintendents who push a radical left-wing indoctrination syllabus,” Sabo said. “Teaching white children that they are somehow less equal to minority students because of the color of their skin isn’t arithmetic; it’s racism. Martin Luther King Jr.’s vision for America was colorblind. The radical left-wing vision for America is divisive.”
Scribner drew criticism from Attorney General Ken Paxton and Lt. Governor Dan Patrick after issuing school district guidelines that allow transgender students to use the bathroom that aligns with their gender identity, according to media reports.
“The obsession with the trans bathroom issue was the building block for Kent Scribner’s woke agenda at FWISD,” Sabo added. “Kent’s most prized obsession came in the form of CRT, and demonizing parents who dare speak out against his woke, leftist agenda.”
State Board of Education Member (SBOE) Jay Johnson said it’s not a bad trend that parents have awakened to some of the things happening in public schools, but that handling opposition appropriately is key.
“They need to work together rather than working against each other,” Johnson told The Dallas Express. “I’m not disappointed that parents are more aware. I’m just disappointed that [in] some instances, the parents misbehave and make it difficult for administrations to work with them.”
Johnson is one of the newer members of the fifteen-member SBOE. His term began January 1, 2021 and ends January 1, 2023.
“I’ve talked to several superintendents and COVID has made the job a lot more stressful,” he said. “There’s just so many things going on. Being a public educator in public school has always been difficult for the superintendents. It’s a different kind of stress than the teachers in the classroom. But I know everybody’s under a lot of stress trying to make education happen under the most difficult circumstances. I talked to the superintendent in Midland who said that everybody just needs to give all their teachers and their administrators a little love because times are hard right now. Not financially but emotionally.”
A Republican, Johnson represents District 15, which includes seventy-seven counties across the Panhandle, such as Baylor, Callahan, Castro, Dawson, Haskell, Lubbock, Midland, Shackelford, Taylor, and Wichita.
“I’m in favor of parents being involved,” Johnson said in an interview. “I think you’re always going to have a better result when all the stakeholders are involved, and the parents, the students, and the teachers are the primary stakeholders.”
“The stress is hard on these people (teachers) because 99% are committed to their calling, and their calling is to educate young people,” the Board member added. “They are there because it’s a calling for them and it’s a lot of pressure during these difficult times,” he added.
Of these three ‘woke’ superintendents who recently elected to leave their positions, none mentioned the backlash they had received as their reasoning for leaving.
Stone released a joint statement with Richardson ISD in which the former superintendent said she intended to pursue other interests, The Dallas Express reported.
“Dr. Jeannie Stone has announced her resignation as Superintendent of Schools for the Richardson Independent School District. Dr. Stone and the board have reached an agreement that allows her to pursue other interests and permits the board to pursue hiring another superintendent,” the statement said in part.
As previously reported by The Dallas Express, Hinojosa said he is resigning because it’s a good time for him to do so, claiming Dallas ISD is in the best possible shape for a transition. Though he will no longer serve as superintendent, Hinojosa said in a press conference he is “stepping up” rather than “stepping down” and will find something in Dallas to pursue in the future.
“I did warn the board that being a lame duck is no fun,” he said. “But I also told them, ‘I may be a lame duck, but I’m not a dead duck,’ so people better listen to me because we have to get a lot of things done for kids.”
According to a report from CBS 11 News, Hinojosa said the resignations of superintendents nationwide are a result of them becoming worn down by the “cultural wars” occurring in education right now, but that those challenges had not factored into his own decision.
Fort Worth ISD’s Scribner did not provide a specific reason for his departure in his public announcement, but mentioned that he valued his time spent in the district.
In a letter posted on Twitter, Scribner shared, “My time in Fort Worth has been the high point of my career, both personally and professionally. One of the primary reasons I entertained the move to Texas was that it allowed me to be near my aging parents. Losing both my mother and father in the past year has reinforced that coming to Fort Worth was the right decision for our family.”
Scribner stood behind the choices he made as superintendent in the letter: “Still, I am most proud of our work in the area of racial equity. Through the creation of our Division of Equity and Excellence, we have taken actionable steps to address gaps in academic achievement and dismantle systems that have historically reinforced those disparities. These efforts guide our pandemic learning recovery plan for students. Our plan, developed from this lens of equity, provides additional instructional time, increased social and emotional support, and an expanded academic calendar,” he wrote. “Also, our emphasis on social-emotional learning and parent partnership must remain in place for student academic growth.”