Category: Education & Schools

Virginia parents group launches PAC to unseat school board members over reopening, race controversies.

A political action committee (PAC) launched Tuesday with the intent of unseating multiple school board members in one of Virginia’s most populous counties because of an ongoing feud over critical race theory.

The Loudoun County school board members showed a complete “misunderstanding of their duties and responsibility as elected officials,” reads a press release from Fight for Schools PAC.

It specifically names Beth Barts, Brenda Sheridan, Ian Serotkin, Denise Corbo, Leslee King and Atoosa Reaser. Each were reportedly part of a secret Facebook group where members compiled a list of parents who opposed critical race theory in the school district, according to the Daily Wire.

Tuesday’s announcement comes amid division and turmoil within one of the nation’s top counties for public education.

 

BLUF:
T. Patrick Hill Ph.D. is an associate professor at Rutgers University where he teaches ethics and law in the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy.

⇑⇑⇑THIS is why you must take extreme care in selecting which college, if any, you send your children to. Because these are the idiots who will be filling your children’s minds with crap like this⇓⇓⇓

Gun ownership, yes! As a right, no! | Opinion

So, we have to change the national conversation. A basic reason for the interminable debate over gun violence in America has been the general assumption that there is a right to a gun. However, given the nature and function of rights, is it conceivable that a gun as such, regardless of any consequences, good or bad, of its use, qualifies for that status? That is the question that has been and continues to be unexamined.

As long as it does, the very absurdity of such a notion will continue to offend our common humanity. With each new mass shooting, the shooter often possesses a gun to which, he has an unqualified and inviolable right to have, including the consequences of its use. But if a gun can be used with such devastating consequences, how can its possession qualify for the status of a right? A standard response has been that it is people, not guns, who shoot people. The sophistry here should be obvious.

Put simply, a right is a claim made to something perceived as a benefit to be enjoyed. The strength of the claim is derived from the basis on which the benefit is viewed as a right. That basis will also be a measure of the value, relative or absolute, separable or inseparable, of the benefits to be enjoyed. This also enables us to prioritize among rights, as a civil right like the right to vote, and a human right like the right to liberty, with human rights superseding civil rights.

The right to liberty, as a human right is both absolute and inseparable by virtue of its basis, which is being human. In the absence of being at liberty, one’s identity as a human being is at its core compromised. Liberty, in other words, is integral to human beings, by virtue of birth, and is independent for its origination of any authority such as the United States Constitution, which does not initiate but only confirms it. Despite the substantial difference noted between civil and human rights, it is clear that the function of a right in both instances is the same. It justifies the claim to enjoy the benefits of the objects to which a right is asserted, with the consequence that actions taken under the right are rightful actions. If so, then it is reasonable to ask what actions were taken under the right to a gun might be justified.

The most obvious issue that comes to mind is self-defense. But a Harvard study showed that people used a gun for self-defense in 1% only of 14,000 crimes committed between 2007-2011, suggesting that society has more effective alternative means of self-defense. That aside, gun ownership data are decidedly negative for society. A 2018 survey confirmed that American civilians own 393 million guns, even as other research shows unequivocally that households with guns are less safe, and run a higher risk for accidental deaths, suicides and domestic homicides. Compared with Canada’s gun-related death rates of 0.47 deaths per 100,000 people, the rate of gun-related deaths in the United States is nine times higher at 10.6 deaths per 100,000 people. In comparison with Denmark where the rate is 0.15 deaths per 100,000 people, the rate in the United States is 29 times higher.

Coincidently, during COVID-19, gun sales in the United States have grown exponentially, accompanied, according to research at the University of California-Davis, by an 8% increase in violence across the country. Last year, 41,000 people were killed because of gun violence.

Concede the Second Amendment was intended to confer the right to a gun, then in light of the inevitable loss of life in America from guns claimed as a right, one must also acknowledge an unavoidable trivialization of rights generally in which the rights to life or liberty of thousands have been sacrificed to secure the right to a gun. What absurdity is this not? Whatever the Second Amendment means, it must not be such as to allow a right to a gun to offend humanity by trivializing our rights to it.

If a foreign nation mandated such a policy of our schools, we would righteously declare war.

In the Name of Equity, California Will Discourage Students Who Are Gifted at Math
The new framework aims to keep everyone learning at the same level for as long as possible.

California’s Department of Education is working on a new framework for K-12 mathematics that discourages gifted students from enrolling in accelerated classes that study advanced concepts like calculus.

The draft of the framework is hundreds of pages long and covers a wide range of topics. But its overriding concern is inequity. The department is worried that too many students are sorted into different math tracks based on their natural abilities, which leads some to take calculus by their senior year of high school while others don’t make it past basic algebra. The department’s solution is to prohibit any sorting until high school, keeping gifted kids in the same classrooms as their less mathematically inclined peers until at least grade nine.

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Idaho Becomes First State to Ban Discriminatory Critical Race Theory

When Idaho Governor Brad Little (R) signed HB 377 into law this week, he made Idaho the first state in the country to ban its public educators from forcing the damaging ideology that underlies critical race theory on students.

The law’s objective is simple and should be noncontroversial, but the current state of education in America that begs action to prevent discrimination and protect intellectual freedom means Idaho’s anti-indoctrination measure is somewhat of a novel idea.

As the law explains, the principles of critical race theory “exacerbate and inflame divisions on the basis of sex, race, ethnicity, religion, color, national origin, or other criteria in ways contrary to the unity of the nation and the well-being of the state of Idaho and its citizens.”

Simply put, those who advance critical race theory are attempting to institutionalize racism by teaching the next generation that certain individuals and their ideas are more valuable than others simply because of the color of their skin or the things they believe.

To prevent this in Idaho’s public schools, Republican leaders have enacted a prohibition against students being forced to adopt the key tenets critical race theory’s proponents use to inflict their damaging goals.

“No public institution of higher education, school district, or public school, including a public charter school, shall direct or otherwise compel students to personally affirm, adopt, or adhere to any of the following tenets: That any sex, race, ethnicity, religion, color, or national origin is inherently superior or inferior; That individuals should be adversely treated on the basis of their sex, race, ethnicity, religion, color, or national origin; or That individuals, by virtue of sex, race, ethnicity, religion, color, or national origin, are inherently responsible for actions committed in the past by other members of the same sex, race, ethnicity, religion, color, or national origin.”

Critical race theory’s nefarious aims undermine the foundation of American freedom and our long-running work to create a more perfect union. To follow the Left’s direction and teach students their appearance—rather than their individual actions—determines their rights and value is to return to the very bigotry the Left claims to oppose.

Idaho’s bill protects the critical American principle that all life is inherently valuable and created with the same inalienable rights as everyone else. It’s a principle that we, as a country run by fallible people, have not always lived up to, but it’s one we’ve always strived for. Certainly, schools should not follow the Left’s attempts to institutionalize critical race theory. To do so would be to run in the opposite direction and undo the progress our country has made.

Parents organizing across US against ‘dangerous’ critical race theory in classrooms: Former professor.

“What they are doing with the critical race theory is pure indoctrination.”

Former professor Carol Swain told “Fox & Friends” on Thursday that parents are organizing across the U.S. against “dangerous” critical race theory in classrooms.

CAROL SWAIN: I can tell you that across the country people are pushing back. Parents are organizing, and they should be. And I would encourage whistleblowers to step forward with your information because what is taking place is very dangerous. It is creating a hostile environment for students, as well as teachers and administrators and I know from firsthand experience that if you are in an environment that feels hostile, you cannot be your best self. …

And what they are doing with the critical race theory is pure indoctrination. It’s not teaching young people how to think. In fact, it’s teaching the opposite because if they have questions…and the questions are not politically correct, then they risk getting themselves into trouble. …

I think it should fall apart and the man that is challenging that at the elite school with his daughter, he is absolutely correct that it is a national problem, and I think that when you point out that the learning environment is hostile and the environment for teachers, I mean, that’s running counter to civil rights laws when it comes to at least hostile workplaces. …

And teaching young children to hate themselves and their ancestry because of the color of their skin, I mean, that is not something we should be doing in America. We should not be shaming children or bullying them. We should not be creating, intimidating environments; we are doing that under the guise of educational equity and it’s very harmful to minority children because it teaches them that they’re victims. And it also breaks up relationships that they have. The critical race theory will come into environments where there are no serious problemsm and when they get there, they create problems. 

CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE FULL INTERVIEW

 

U. OF PENNSYLVANIA CAPITULATES; APPROVES HUNTING, ARCHERY, AND SHOOTING CLUB.

PHILADELPHIA, April 29, 2021 — After more than a year in limbo, the University of Pennsylvania’s Hunting, Archery, and Shooting Club is officially a recognized student group.

Under pressure from the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) and with help from FIRE Legal Network attorney Patricia Hamill, the university relented this week and processed the group’s registration.

On March 17, FIRE called on Penn to stop engaging in viewpoint discrimination and promptly recognize the club.

“We are pleased that Penn finally hit the mark,” said FIRE Senior Program Officer Zach Greenberg. “However, the approval is long overdue. It should not take a year for a university to make good on its promises to uphold students’ rights.”

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 School District Tells Principals To Create Fake Curriculum To Send Parents After Complaints Of Indoctrination.

Faced with complaints from parents about the indoctrination of children, an official in Rockwood School District, Missouri, instructed teachers to create two sets of curriculum: a false one to share with parents, and then the real set of curriculum, focused on topics like activism and privilege, according to a memo obtained by The Daily Wire.

Natalie Fallert, EdD, 6-12 Literacy Speech Coordinator, wrote to all middle and high school principals that parents had repeatedly complained that “we are pushing an agenda,” “we are pushing Critical Race Theory (I had to look this one up!),” “we are making white kids feel bad about their privilege,” we are “stereotyping,” “we are teaching kids to be social activists,” and “we are teaching kids to be democratic thinkers and activists.”

The problem was that, for the first time, parents could see what teachers were telling their children thanks to virtual learning, where assignments were visible for at-home learners in a tool called Canvas.

Fallert’s solution:

This doesn’t mean throw out the lesson and find a new one. Just pull the resource off Canvas so parents cannot see it …

Keep teaching! Just don’t make everything visible on Canvas. This is not being deceitful. This is just doing what you have done for years. Prior to the pandemic you didn’t send everything home or have it available. You taught in your classroom and things were peachy keen. We are going old-school. …

You could Duplicate an entry/lesson in Canvas (making 2 copies) Publish ONE for the whole class that is a LEAN version of the lesson. The “original” that has all the stuff on it, can be published and only assigned to specific students (IF NEEDED), OR you could specifically email those students a copy of what they need.

The reason I say “make a copy” You can publish the NEW one that has less information on it. Then for that kid who is all virtual and needs to full lesson, you can publish it and assign it ONLY that kid…

Anything that “could” be picked apart I would suggest using this above approach… Again I wouldn’t throw it out, but you could just not give them access to the story.

When you get to Power Imbalances – You might remove the two examples and just go over them in class (same as above). …

I hate that we are even having to have this conversation. 29 days and counting!

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Parents Revolt After Texas’s No. 1 School District Tries To Institutionalize Racism.

Parents of kids attending Texas’s top-performing school district found out what their schools have been teaching in the name of ‘racial justice,’ and they are livid.

A suburb of Dallas, Texas has exploded into national media coverage and arrests of school board members after parents found out what their schools have been teaching in the name of “racial justice.” They’re fighting back with lawsuits and challengers for two school board seats in an election that finishes May 1.

Carroll Independent School District of Southlake is the top-achieving school district in Texas. It has no racial achievement gaps, which is nearly unheard of. That’s because Southlake attracts high-achieving families of all races.

The local median income is more than four times the national average and poverty there is statistically nonexistent. According to district data, “microaggressions,” bullying, and racially charged incidents happen approximately three times per month in the district of 8,500 students, meaning they involve 0.3 percent of students a year.

Yet, beginning in 2018, the district rushed into an eye-popping “cultural competence” plan after two videos of students singing the n-word along with rappers went viral on social media. Media outlets went nuts on the story, and so did local school board meetings, where sometimes-crying taxpayers, parents, and students spent hours insisting their lives have been forever damaged by the kind of “institutional racism” in Southlake illustrated by the rap sing-alongs.

They weren’t complaining that rappers stud songs with racial slurs, or that parents let their kids listen to such music. They were complaining about things like teasing and graffiti. They demanded the school district end such annoyances, and even treat them like crimes, or be convicted in the court of public opinion of enabling “institutional racism.”

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BLUF:
The go-for-broke approach of the Biden administration to upend bulwarks of the American constitutional republic, from Supreme Court-packing to open borders to emptying the public treasury to ensuring federal control of elections, reveals the true agenda: the consolidation of power. And nowhere can this be seen more clearly than in its drive to replace history, reading, and writing with noxious doctrine designed to replace both parental control and constitutional rule of law.

The End of Basic Education: Biden Issues Public School Critical Race Theory Order

The Biden Department of Education has quietly proposed a new rule prioritizing the use of federal tax dollars for K-12 schools that replace traditional education with “culturally responsive teaching and learning” – more commonly referred to as critical race theory. This is the most significant move by the federal government to redefine the nature of state-funded public schools in U.S. history.

Although the current effort to push public schools receiving federal funding to adopt a detailed indoctrination agenda may feel new and overwhelming for parents, the truth is that the Biden attempt is simply the last phase in a decades-long effort to control local schools and press the progressive agenda on our children. With the power of taxpayer-funded purse strings, the federal government sends a message to public schools that if they want financial aid they must “teach” critical race theory and prioritize its ideologically anti-American, anti-traditional agenda over traditional education.

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Student Fires at Officers at Tennessee School, Is Killed

A student opened fire on officers responding to a report of a possible gunman at a Tennessee high school Monday, and police shot back and killed him, authorities said. The shooting wounded an officer and comes as the community reels from off-campus gun violence that has left three other students dead this year.

Police found the student in a bathroom at Austin-East Magnet High School in Knoxville, a city about 180 miles (290 kilometers) east of Nashville, Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Director David B. Rausch said at a news conference. They ordered the student to come out, but he wouldn’t comply, and that’s when he reportedly opened fire, Rausch said. Police fired back.

The student died at the school, and the officer was taken into surgery after being shot at least once in the upper leg, authorities said. The officer was expected to recover, and no one else was hurt. It wasn’t yet clear why the student brought a gun to school or why he fired at officers.

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This moron level, word salad BS is what passes for ‘higher education’ today

University researcher: ‘Intelligence is a White man’s mythology.’

A University of Cincinnati graduate assistant wrote that “intelligence is a White man’s mythology.”

“Stop calling your female colleagues ‘smart,’ or ‘clever,’ or ‘brilliant,’” wrote Mel Andrews, who studies cognition and evolution. “It’s sexist and infantilising… it shouldn’t be surprising to you in 2021 that women are capable of thought.”

 

“You’re doing the same thing when you describe your Black and Latino students as ‘very bright,’” added Andrews.

“Intelligence is a White man’s mythology. A phantasmal concept. A non-referring term. Syncategorematic,” Andrews wrote.

Indicating that the post was entirely serious, it was followed by an excerpt from a chapter Andrews wrote for a book entitled Handbook of Parenting.

Andrews cited works claiming that “more than a century of wanton reductionism and definitional vagueness in the study of intelligence and human potential has perpetuated a stratified social order and obscured the true dynamic complexity and diversity of human cognitive development.”

 

Andrews’ most recent research paper received several thousand downloads.

“I was addressing a phenomenon that I have noticed to be common in academic philosophy wherein individuals emphasize the intelligence of minority scholars and students over the quality of the work they produce,” Andrews explained to Campus Reform.

“It is the same phenomenon that occurs when a white instructor says to a Black student, in a surprised tone, ‘oh, you’re so articulate!’ It implies an expectation that Black students will be ineloquent. It was not—as is contextually obvious from what I had initially posted—a condemnation of intelligence ascriptions simpliciter.”

“The Handbook is a text written for scholars in the field of developmental psychology, it would not be used in undergraduate or even graduate coursework,” Andrews clarified.

Andrews also asked to be referred to as a “Marxist and an anarcho-syndicalist” with “they/them/theirs” pronouns, adding, “Your readers should love that.”

See the source image

hmmmmm.

Academic researchers claim gun rights advocates have anti-black racial biases
University of Illinois at Chicago academics say ‘racially conservative Whites’ view gun ownership as a sign of good citizenship

Researchers from the University of Illinois at Chicago have published a study that claims “racially biased conservative Whites” support the Second Amendment right to bear arms because they identify gun ownership with good citizenship and suggests mass shootings “may be a symptom of the country’s enduring legacy of racism.”

This analysis was published in the Washington Post by associate professor of political science Alexandra Filindra, Ph.D. student in political science Beyza Buyuker, and clinical assistant professor of political science Noah J. Kaplan of the University of Illinois at Chicago. They published their findings in the Post after two mass shootings occurred within one week of each other in Georgia and Colorado and amid a renewed national debate over gun control.

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TPTB don’t want a literate, intelligent people. They want an indoctrinated one that will do as they’re told. The word that comes to mind is ‘serfs‘.

Comment O’ The Day: Sarah Hoyt-
Up to the first World War, books that were considered high literature and won awards were the ones that had allusions to Greek and Roman myth, or dropped other historical allusions, casually, into the prose. It was a way of saying “I had an excellent education.” These days excellent education in terms of expensive colleges means Marxism Leninism, so of course awards and admiration goes to the “woke” stories that push “social justice.” It’s a way of screaming “I have an excellent education.”

BUT at least the nineteenth and early twentieth century taught people to write so they could be understood.  Now?  Well, I’m old enough to have taught some people who are teachers now and I can tell you, it only goes down from here.

Growing number of English, writing scholars prioritize social justice, reject ‘standard’ academic English.

As critical race theory burgeons within higher education, writing centers have taken the cue, with a growing number trading in traditional grammar, spelling and punctuation corrections for a focus on antiracism.

Examples range from subjectively disavowing writing that “denigrates” others to mission statements that prioritize social justice over teaching students how to write well.

“We … must teach black students about anti-black linguistic racism and white linguistic supremacy,” argues one group of scholars calling for “Black linguistic justice.”

Myriad examples of such efforts can be found on websites from university writing centers and English Departments.

University of Michigan Sweetland’s Center for Writing states in its Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion statement that they “reject rhetoric that denigrates others based on any identity category, such as race, religion, gender expression, sexual orientation, immigration status, national origin, language, ethnicity, sex, ability status, socioeconomic status, age, body type, or political party.”

The University of Michigan English Language and Literature Department confirms that their department is still not “free of [systematic racism’s] damaging habits.” However, their statement of solidarity assures readers they are “approaching a new academic year, to the thoughtful scrutiny and revision of our own entrenched practices, priorities, and assumptions.”

Similar to the Sweetland Center, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Writing Center says in its mission statement they “advocate for writers from historically marginalized or oppressed groups and for writing that counters traditional accounts of ‘standard’ academic English by extending conceptions of audience, purpose, and meaning.”

UNL’s Department of English lists their top core values. The first two on the list are “pursuing social justice” and “affirming diversity.”

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Guns-in-schools bill passes [Idaho] House on 52-18 vote…

The Idaho House backed Rep. Chad Christensen’s guns-in-schools bill on a 52-18 vote this morning, sending it to senators for consideration. The bill, HB 122, allows school employees who have enhanced concealed-carry permits to carry concealed guns at school, whether or not the local school board approves. “I know in the past this has been an issue about local control,” Christensen, R-Iona, told the House. “This is a 2nd Amendment issue, and for me, the 2nd Amendment doesn’t stop at the door of a school.”

He noted that the Idaho Sheriffs Association, state chiefs of police, and schools all oppose the bill, but said one sheriff from Caribou County, which is in his district, “fully supports” it. “This is a bill about school safety and our children,” Christensen said. “The firearm is a tool, simple as that, and the fear of this tool is, I don’t get it, it’s just a tool, to help our children, to save lives.”

This bill also would forbid schools from posting “Gun-Free School Zone” signs. House Education Chair Lance Clow, R-Twin Falls, asked Christensen if the bill would allow the general public to carry guns at schools; Christensen said no. So Clow questioned including that provision. “To me, that’s a sign that we’re telling the public, ‘Don’t bring your guns in to the school,’” he said.

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Virginia College Forfeits Basketball Game After Suspending Players For Kneeling During Anthem.

………The players claim that a pro-Trump rally held near the campus shows that some protests are OK with the school. But the school pointed out that the Trump rally was held on city streets, not college grounds.

That didn’t satisfy the players: “So it’s OK for everyone to have a Trump rally with Confederate flags, but it’s not OK for us to kneel for our people who’ve fallen,” Christian said. “He didn’t have an answer for that.”

This is the mind of a child in the body of a college athlete. The Trump rally was not on the college grounds. The school had no connection with it. [College President David Olive] tried to explain that to all the children on campus.

“We are a private entity, not a governmental entity,” Olive said in his statement. “We have policies and guidelines throughout the student handbook and the academic catalog that limit certain rights you otherwise might have elsewhere, such as in your home or in a public venue. The most important to me as it pertains to this matter, however, is what I shared earlier. When someone puts on a uniform or is performing a function on behalf of Bluefield College, that person is now representing Bluefield College. Heightened expectations are now placed on that individual as to what s/he can and cannot do or say as a representative of the College.”

Virginia school system cancels Dr. Seuss, citing racial ‘undertones’ in writings: report.

Celebrated American children’s author Dr. Seuss is now considered too controversial for one of Virginia’s largest school districts, a new report reveals.

For over two decades, Dr. Seuss’s birthday has been celebrated in schools as Read Across America Day — a day dedicated to the importance of reading and literacy. The day falls on Dr. Seuss’s birthday in honor of the impactful author, whose books have helped countless children learn to read across the globe.

But folllowing pressure from activists, Loudon County Public Schools is reportedly dropping the annual Dr. Seuss celebration.

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School principal suspended after teaching students about Big Tech censorship

A school principal in Tennessee is suing his school district and its superintendent for suspending him after he taught kids about Big Tech censorship. The lawsuit claims his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights were violated.

We obtained a copy of the lawsuit for you here.

Following the events of January 6, the Shelby County Schools superintendent Joris Ray told principals to discuss the Capitol riot as a “teachable moment.” Cordova High School’s Principal Barton Thorne did exactly what the superintendent said.

In a virtual classroom, Thorne talked to students about the threat of Big Tech censorship in the aftermath of the riot. The riot at the US Capitol was used as a justification for Facebook, Twitter and more to censor President Trump and other conservatives.

Thorne accused these platforms of deciding who gets to speak and what message or ideology to amplify.

“I’m not going to tell you what to think, I just want to help you think,” Principal Thorne told his students in a online class a few days after the Capitol Hill riot.

Read the full transcript of Thorne’s message to students here.

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I’m sorry, DNA and chromosomes are a thing. I don’t care what clothes you wear or what you want to call yourself, unless you’re dealing with a disorder; you’re “XX”? you’re a woman, you’re “XY”? you’re a man.

Student Suspended From Education Program For Saying, ‘A Man Is A Man, A Woman Is A Woman’

A New York university has suspended an education student from mandatory teaching programs for posting Instagram videos expressing conservative ideology.

State University of New York (SUNY) Geneseo sent an email to education student Owen Stevens placing him on suspension from his field teaching programs after his peers uncovered videos of him preaching conservative dogma. The school claims that Steven’s videos “call into question” his ability to “maintain a classroom environment protecting the mental and emotional well-being of all of [his] students.”

According to a copy of Steven’s suspension obtained by The Daily Wire, the education student will remain suspended from participating in in-school field experiences and courses that have field experiences until he completes a “remediation plan.” The remediation plan includes taking down his Instagram videos, toning down his social media presence, and attending school-sanctioned training.

Stevens told The Daily Wire he refuses to take part in “re-education” training.

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