Education

GUEST POST: Dear Dr. Grunewald, Conscious Discipline = SEL and SEL = CRT, So Don’t Tell Us EPS Is NOT Teaching CRT

This article was written by Emily Wright, an Edmond Public Schools parent.

Conscious Discipline – Social and Emotional Learning
“Conscious Discipline believes that trauma-responsive social and emotional learning (SEL) is a lens through which transformational change in the areas of racial equality, equity and inclusion is not only possible, but essential.”

Conscious Discipline is the elementary Social Emotional Learning Curriculum, used in Edmond Public schools. Click on the name and try not to vomit as you explore the site. Let not your heart be troubled and drop those Tums!

Edmond Public School superintendent, Dr. Angela Grunewald, insisted once again that EPS does not teach Critical Race Theory during a 25 minute phone conversation with me on November 12.

Why did I get a phone call?: I sent her an email you can read here, in response to her rebuttal of the speaker comments made at the November 1 school board meeting.

Dr. Grunewald’s response to the Social Justice/CRT platitudes galore littering the Conscious Discipline (CD) site was that in the wake of the 2020 death of George Floyd, many companies put out these kind of messages on their websites.

I then asked her what CD edition EPS is using and are teachers/counselors just omitting any subject matter deemed to violate HB1775. She gave the same response: EPS does not teach CRT. She then invited me to come look at the curriculum, and/or sit in on a lesson and attend a parent meeting regarding CD. (I will be attending a parent meeting in January)

Dr. Grunewald then REPEATED that EPS is not teaching CRT.

Read the letter below written by Conscious Discipline creator, Dr. Becky Bailey, that I’ve included in its entirety. You will see that CRT is embedded in Conscious Discipline’s curricula and teacher/counselor training and come to the conclusion that our tax payer dollars are funding the brainwashing of our children!

Posted on July 29,2020 by creator Dr. Becky Bailey:

Recently we shared a public statement about racism, injustice and inequity and outlined our organizational commitment. This follow-up message is the first of many public updates we will provide as we strive to be both transparent and accountable in this critical area.
I firmly believe systemic racism must be dismantled, and I will be part of the solution both personally and professionally. As the voices of the Black Lives Matter movement call for increased equity and social justice, Conscious Discipline will answer with unequivocal support and actionable change.
Conscious Discipline’s methodology is based on and steeped in inclusion. Inclusion and unity are inseparable from our philosophy. Having said that, we are acutely aware that our company profile— particularly that of the independent contractors who make up our Certified and Master Instructor program— does not sufficiently represent the diverse cultures of many of the schools we support. Although our methodology is inherently culturally sustaining and inclusive, we believe increasing our team’s diversity will strengthen our resource offerings, our organization and ourselves, and is essential in supporting racial justice. With the urgency and importance of current events laying many of these issues raw, I feel it is important to convey some of the efforts we’ve taken over the past few years and our current commitments toward lasting change.
CERTIFIED INSTRUCTORS (INDEPENDENT CONTRACTORS)
Conscious Discipline Certified Instructors and Master Instructors are independent contractors who are licensed to teach Conscious Discipline. The first 15 years of our Instructor Certification program relied on candidates seeking us out in order to become consultants. This yielded some phenomenal Instructors, but also resulted in many who came from similar life experiences— most were white, female, 35+ years old, suburban and middle class. Our pool of Instructors did not reflect the rich diversity of our nation.
In 2015, we paused in accepting applications for Certified Instructors in order to undertake a dramatic reorganization. In 2017, we launched additional organizational shifts to increase equity, address the lack of diversity, and provide additional training and coaching in our onboarding process. Most significantly, we reorganized into “family” units to provide better mentorship, and we changed from an application model to a recruitment model in order to focus on engaging people of color, especially Black Americans. This intentional shift helps us to actively identify, support, remove obstacles and fast-track promising candidates who are more diverse. It also helps us to better support our growing Instructor family. This worthwhile shift has required a significant investment of time and financial resources. Even with these focused efforts, this is a long-term endeavor as many of our Instructors implement Conscious Discipline for 5+ years before becoming Certified.
We will continue to build diversity and equity in our Certified Instructor program in the following ways:
We will evaluate our Instructor Certification process to accelerate the multi-year requirements around the study, implementation and coaching needed for Certification in order to meet an initial goal of a minimum of 30% people of color, with an emphasis on Black Americans.
We will provide diversity training to all Instructors via our family structure in order to encourage individual growth and assist Instructors in creating events that are culturally informed, inclusive and equitable.
We will enlist a racial equity consultant and a committee from within our organization to work together to formulate the steps for these processes and assist in implementation. Establishing the committee, the specific steps and a timeline are all in-process, and we will periodically post progress updates.
ADVANCED INSTITUTE
The Conscious Discipline Advanced Institute (CD2) is an intense training limited to only 48 attendees and an essential step needed for Certification. In 2017, we shifted CD2 from open registration to an invitation-based event. We reserved 50% of CD2 invitations for people of color, with a definite focus on recruiting Black attendees. We then gifted scholarships to those for whom finances were a barrier. These endeavors have not yet yielded the diversity we seek, so we are examining additional ways to recruit more effectively. We will continue this initiative indefinitely as a specific, actionable step toward increasing equity within the Conscious Discipline community and within the educational system at large.
TRAINING
Over the past decade, I have intentionally sought out research and amended trainings to include information about intergenerational, cultural and generational trauma specifically as it relates to Black Americans and Native Americans. I will continue this internal educational process for myself and our Instructors in efforts to address cultural responsiveness, microaggression, unconscious/implicit bias and the general historical perspective that is neglected in our educational system at large. We will also continue to increase the prevalence of Black and brown teachers, administrators and mental health professionals featured in videos and images during our trainings.
Additionally in our trainings, we will be more intentional and direct about sharing the way Conscious Discipline is designed to function in relation to one’s personal experiences. Conscious Discipline utilizes skills, powers and structures, but no prescriptive curriculum. Our approach supports mindset shifts, a compassionate cultural climate (the School Family), and skills of interaction that promote resilience and healthy relationships for all stakeholders (children, adults, schools, communities, etc.). We ask adults to digest and internalize Conscious Discipline into their mental models of their world, culture, jobs, relationships and children in their care— especially regarding misbehavior. We ask each adult to utilize what they deem helpful and set aside anything that doesn’t resonate, essentially making each person’s experience with Conscious Discipline uniquely their own. One outcome of this personalization is the ability for Conscious Discipline to be culturally sustaining, accessible and applicable to all communities, including communities of color. In efforts to further ensure access to training and resources, Conscious Discipline has invested $1.5 million dollars into under-resourced areas to support their goals with Conscious Discipline in the past three years.
STAFFING
Since 2018, we have engaged a reputable external partner to guide our hiring processes. Our directive is to elevate the best possible candidates for each position, with a priority on increasing diversity in our offices. We currently have two leadership positions and one staff position open. Our goal is to fill these positions once we recover from the economic impacts of COVID-19. Promoting diversity will be a lead factor in filling these and future positions.
OFFICE EDUCATION
Moving forward, Conscious Discipline will provide ongoing education and growth opportunities for our office leadership and staff in the areas of unconscious bias and racial equity. We will engage independent experts to help assess and train employees in regard to our antiracism goals, beginning with our most critical leadership and public-facing job positions. This effort will start immediately using Insperity HR Services, and will expand as we identify additional partners.
SOCIAL MEDIA
In early June, we began to prioritize using social media to share antiracist and race education content from respected thought leaders, including Ibram X Kendi’s Raising Antiracist Kids event, CASEL’s SEL as a Lever for Equity series and the APA’s Uplifting Youth Through Healthy Communication About Raceresources. We will continue to share antiracist content as an ongoing component of our messaging on all of our social media platforms. Our intent is to amplify leading voices and resource providers that encourage safe, productive conversations about racial equality, and to present educators, students, families and communities with opportunities for growth.
LEADING BY EXAMPLE
Like the world we live in, I am in a perpetual state of change and growth. Mistakes and missteps are essential to this process, and I have made many in my lifetime. A foundational concept in Conscious Discipline is to expand the pause between stimulus and reaction to create room for a conscious response. I am a teacher of this process, yet I am still learning this process. I believe the path to systemic and systematic change begins within each individual, and I am leading the way the best I know how— through continuous devotion to learning and improvement.
Over the past two years, these books and online courses have deepened my understanding of race issues and social justice, and helped to uncover my own unconscious bias:How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X Kendi, Biased: Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice that Shapes What We See, Think and Do by Jennifer L. Eberhardt, Ph.D., Cultural Somatics online course by Resmaa Menakem, Spare the Kids: Why Whupping Children Won’t Save Black America by Stacey Patton, Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain by Zaretta Hammond.
I am currently reading My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies by Resmaa Menakem and it is profound. I will continue to seek out powerful resources to shape my personal growth as well as the content and organizational policies of Conscious Discipline.
PRODUCT CONTENT
Conscious Discipline has consistently sought to prioritize cultural sensitivity and accessibility in our products and materials, including inviting input and making related improvements. For example:
We have historically instructed our directors and managers to ensure cultural diversity in the content and images featured in our products and support materials. This will continue in a more strategic way, including increased staff training and enlisting guidance from independent experts.
In 2019, an outside firm reviewed the Conscious Discipline e-Course to reveal implicit bias in the content. My team corrected the content that could be changed, and I used the insights as an opportunity for improvement and growth.
We have made multiple adjustments to the fabric of the Feeling Buddies in order to address color variances in certain manufacturing runs. (The desired form for the Buddies is a unisex, racially ambiguous “gingerbread” appearance.)
Moving forward, we will more closely review all new products through the lens of diversity, cultural sensitivity and inclusiveness. Our internal diversity committee and independent experts will work together to develop a Diversity Assessment Framework that will help guide new product development, training, and the marketing of our products and resources.
IN CLOSING
These are initial steps that lay the foundation for much larger shifts to come. I am eager to actively seek ways to create equity and dismantle systemic racism through awareness, compassion, connection and action— starting within myself and Conscious Discipline, and extending outward to those we serve.
Our next step toward these commitments is to develop a specific and measurable plan that will include key milestones, metrics and timelines, and will grow as our knowledge expands. As new opportunities and concerns surface, we will responsively adjust this plan. We will strive for transparency by periodically sharing updates, benchmarks and celebrations on our website and through social media.
We will be listening throughout this process, and are eager to hear from you about addressing racism, our progress or related matters.
Please email drbeckybailey@consciousdiscipline.com with your input.
As Maya Angelou famously said, “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” I am committed to learning more and doing better. My personal commitment to act in support of equity and social justice begins with myself and extends to my office staff, our Instructors and the Conscious Discipline family. We are all in this together, and we will continue the lifelong process of uncovering our false beliefs and unconscious biases; acquiring new skills; ensuring our policies and actions reflect our core principles of love, unity and equity; and actively living these values embedded in Conscious Discipline.
Thank you for your willingness to join us on this journey.
Wishing you well,
Dr. Becky A BaileyFounder & Chief Knowledge Officer,
Conscious Discipline

Curriculum is designed to teach set objectives. SEL is the latest fad in education and hundreds of curriculum companies have sprung up to cash in on the federal government’s and academia’s push of this garbage.

Curriculum is approved by local school boards of education and must align with the state’s department of education standards that must align with federal standards to access any federal and/or state funds/grants. Therefore state, federal and local education entities are working in tandem to turn kids into social justice/CRT warriors meanwhile SEL/CRT curriculum companies are getting rich off our tax dollars. Federal, state and local governments are complicit in this money laundering, socially indoctrinating scheme.

Progressive SEL foundations/organizations provide funding via grants or awards too. In fact, an Edmond elementary counselor, Janessa Bointy, received the National University System-Sanford Teacher Award for Oklahoma in 2020. She was awarded $10,000 for indoctrinating school children by “demonstrating high levels of inspirational teaching practices by engaging students, building student confidence, motivating students to succeed, giving students a voice and creating an inclusive environment.” “She has been a pioneer in using the Sanford Harmony social and emotional learning program to promote strong peer relations, self-regulation, tolerance, and understanding among students.”

During my conversation with Dr. Grunewald I brought up this counselor and her use of the Sanford Harmony Curriculum and she knew nothing about its use in our district or about this honor that was bestowed upon Ms. Bointy. In my letter to Dr. Grunewald I provided this link: Sunset Counselor Wins Award and $10,000 Prize – Edmond Public Schools (edmondschools.net) I also provided CRT-laced evidence from the Harmony website. Obviously, she failed to read my letter completely, as well as answer all my questions in concerns in a professional, truthful manner. If you or Dr. Grunewald would like to know more about the Sanford Harmony program here is a link from Ms. Bointy’s above mentioned blurb:

Sanford Harmony is a PreK-6 research-based social-emotional learning program that cultivates strong classroom relationships between all students. Sanford Harmony has been recognized by the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL) as a quality program. http://sanfordprograms.org/

Back to the phone call.

I bemoaned the fact that my tax payer dollars are being used to ultimately rewire my kid’s thoughts, values and beliefs. I also expressed my opinion that more SEL does not address Covid learning loss and more instruction of core subjects is the solution.

Upon expressing my disdain for EPS’s molding and shaping my child’s identity Dr. Grunewald said since my kids come from stable home with involved parents, they will be able to cope and think for themselves, but SEL is necessary because there are students that come from unstable homes and everybody benefits; some more than others based on individual needs. She said mental health is a district priority now more than ever in light of the Covid pandemic and SEL is great tool to address it. We also discussed the definition of SEL and the link she provided in her response from the OK State Department of Education to explain further why SEL is taught.

CASEL is the author of the definition and framework of SEL that school districts across the country use. I am guessing that CASEL provided this document to the state department and OK State Department just inserted their tag on it. CASEL is a clearing house for all these SEL curriculum companies.

The information provided under the heading Teacher and Parents and subtitle SEL Resources for Parents, Educators and School Communities Related to Covid-19 will lead you to another vomit-inducing link.

Under the Diversity, Equity, Inclusion subheading you’ll find, “Speaking Up Against Racism Around The Coronavirus – The coronavirus became racialized, so it’s critical that educators understand the historical context and confront racist tropes and xenophobia from students and colleagues”, from an organization called, “Learning For Justice”, which is a project of the “Southern Poverty Law Center“.

I also was able to find, COVID19 Resources From America’s Promise Alliance Partner Organizations a Google Document containing this link Talking About COVID-19: A Call for Racial, Economic, and Health Equity | The Opportunity Agenda.

From the Opportunity Agenda:

“We also need to step up our allyship with communities of color. As Race Forward stated: “Implicit and explicit racism has often historically driven government responses to urgent health situations…The Trump administration has used this crisis to stem travel from unaffected regions, including halting asylum seekers at the Southern border. Hate-filled and racist rhetoric has stigmatized people of color as “infected,” threats to public safety, and burdens to the health care system.”
“Being an ally for communities of color starts in our language and messaging. We must avoid slipping into the mindset of “othering” when talking about this pandemic or any other public health crisis.
America is currently grappling with its long legacy of racism and othering. This comes through in our messaging around COVID by allowing implicit and explicit bias to influence our thinking and language, whether it be the example of blaming specific races for the virus and its spread or referring to the virus using derogatory terms.
Instead, we should work together to actively dispel xenophobic myths and racist misinformation – and hold our elected officials and the media to doing the same. Addressing implicit bias and racism is not always easy, but it is imperative, which is why The Opportunity Agenda developed a messaging tool to help advance these conversations.”

Oklahoma has a law banning this type of curriculum/instruction, yet the OK State Department of Education has a resource sheet with clearly unvetted links to CRT political action organizations and CRT disguised as SEL curriculum resources?

Dr. Grunwald’s response to this was: “Well you know when you start clinking on links you could end up on a porn site.”

Parents, educators, patriots please understand that SEL is a conduit of CRT. IT IS A 12 YEAR PROGRAM THAT SOCAILLY ENGINEERS YOUR CHILD by transforming your child’s core values, attitudes and beliefs. SEL lessons focus on diversity, equity and inclusion to promote “kindness” and create a “safe” learning environment for all. These lessons already occur naturally in our homes, families, communities and classrooms. It is not the school’s job to focus on feelings. Their job is to impart objective truth.

YES, Dr. Grunewald CRT is being taught in our schools!

December 5, 2021 2

Why Would We NOT Want Schools To Teach ‘Grit’, ‘Tenacity’ and ‘Perseverance’?

True Grit is one of my absolute favorite movies of all time (both versions!). I LOVED the plucky spunk – grit – of Mattie Ross who stood against unbelievable odds and won the respect of a drunk old cowboy named “Rooster” – to find the killer of her father.

Note: No one in that movie taught Mattie Ross how to be ‘gritty’ – she didn’t learn it in her one-room school house – no teacher explained to her how exactly to behave. Mattie was apparently born a gritty young woman, but throughout the movie, we see her tenacity only increase as her mettle was tested again and again through uncertain and tough circumstances.

So why have we somehow decided that schools should teach ‘grit’, ‘tenacity’ and ‘perseverance’?

ROPE asked this question during the common core years over and over and over again.

Here’s the deal – no matter what any educrat says – THESE ARE NOT TEACHABLE CONCEPTS.

There is no curriculum that can do it. There is no teacher in the world that can instill them. They are personality traits and one cannot ‘teach’ an intangible concept, the extent of which varies from individual to individual, and the creation of which depends upon exposure to infinitely many and different tough sets of circumstances.

The idea that we can character concepts to children is inspired entirely upon the concept of collectivism – like everything else in ‘formal education’ given us by democratic socialists Horace Mann and John Dewey – who believed that somehow, collectively, once students are all in a room together, intangible personality traits can be cultivated by exposure to a teacher/counselor/guide imparting the right ‘skill set’ rather than exposure to difficult and/or trying circumstances.

Grit, tenacity and perseverance can only be developed in a classroom when students are taught age-appropriate/developmentally-appropriate content in their subjects (reading, math, history, English, science) and then expected to meet difficult, but reasonable, reachable goals set for them on a consistent basis and adhered to without exception. These circumstances PRODUCE grit, tenacity and perseverance in students, not some magical word potion from a teacher.

We don’t provide that circumstantial framework today, however. We don’t teach age-appropriate/developmentally-appropriate curriculum anymore – it’s been diluted by years of parent complaints that material is ‘too hard’ or there’s ‘too much’ homework, and by ever-changing guidelines established by ever-changing education fads created by authoritarian educrats who develop vapid, moronic and damaging curricula such as COMMON CORE, SEL, OUTCOMES-BASED EDUCATION, WHOLE CHILD, ect., while gazing out the windows of their ivory towers dreaming of molding the ‘perfect society’.

It’s no wonder we have kids who’d rather stay home from work when the government waves a check under their nose – they’ve never been expected to produce anything that takes even a modicum of effort during any of the formative years. They’ve never experienced the INFECTIOUS JOY of meeting a goal they once thought insurmountable, or even extraordinarily difficult.

Excepting possibly through sports – and the classrooms of the few good teachers left – students are not only not getting challenged, but they’re not being taught much that’s actually useful for either their own edification and personal growth, or for finding and sustaining gainful employment.

Still and all, we throw hard-earned tax dollar after tax dollar at the system as though THAT will somehow overcome the fact that public education wasn’t even founded for the right purpose – exposure to the concepts of truth and beauty for the edification and personal growth of individual children – not instruction in skill sets deemed necessary by a government to sustain an economy.

December 5, 2021 0

Unschooling

This article is reproduced from the website, “The Best Schools“. “Homeschooling: Which Model Is Right For You” contains much of the text reproduced below. Please see the website and the article for more information.

Based largely on the work of homeschooling pioneer John Holt, Unschooling is a free-form learning model which is student-centered, unconventional, and individualistic. Learning plans and study projects focus largely on the student’s interests but with high priority on experiential, activity based, and learn-as-you-go education. Unschooling will consist of some systematic and rigorous teaching when it comes to basic skills like reading, writing, and arithmetic, but this is often administered with a variety of technology and materials, and typically without conventional testing/evaluation. Unschooling allows homeschool parent-teachers to question most everything about conventional schooling whether public, private, or homeschooling. In this model, parent-teachers tend to be facilitators rather than lecturers, instructors or otherwise “conventional” teachers. See also: JohnHoltGWS.com and Unschoolrules.com.

Adaptability: This method is easily the most flexible methodology out there. Unschoolers might even be uncomfortable calling Unschool a “method” at all, because it’s so adaptable to the needs and interests of each unique student and teacher.

Passion Driven: Unschooling allows students to academically explore their own passions—like skateboarding, whales, baking, gardening, medieval weaponry, African folklore, or mixed martial arts—so their study aligns with their interests.

Loose Structure: Parent-teachers can direct education loosely, by providing minimal structure and an array of options from which students can choose their unique course of learning.

Multi-Dimensional: While conventional schooling, and some of the other homeschooling methods, are two-dimensional, focusing almost exclusively on “flat” book learning and written words, Unschooling favors experiences, wholism, and interaction, all of which can facilitate richer learning. Unschooling typically incorporates lots of books, but adds a depth of experience through living encounters and access points for students with different learning styles (i.e., multiple intelligences).

Dignifies Diversity: Unschooling treats each student as a unique and creative individual. Unschooling is to conventional schooling as freelance art is to factory production. Unschooling savors the individual creative expression over assembly line efficiency.

Modified Parenting: Unschooling dovetails well with parenting. Both are typically free-form, both adapt to each child, and both invest in the child’s development according to their unique personality and gifts. Unschooling essentially adds an intentionally educational dimension to parenting.

Reactionary: While Unschooling offers an exciting alternative to other schooling methods, the very term “Unschooling” is reactionary. That’s not surprising. If you read Unschooling books by John Holt or Clark Aldrich, you’ll note this connotation. Unschooling reacts against the limitations and failings of other school models. This fact isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It does however carry the risk of being negative in its most basic orientation, as if backing away from the mistakes of others is a safe guarantee against making parallel mistakes in the other direction. Parent-teachers need to be careful that they aren’t just reacting against conventional models and throwing out the proverbial baby with the bathwater.

Lack of Structure: Students may need more structure and rigor than this (un)method provides. Unschooling allows for facilitators to implement added structure where needed, but it may not be sufficient order or oversight for some students.

Humanism: Underneath a great deal of Unschooling theory is a broadly humanistic view of children.[5] This humanism can be a good corrective against overly mechanistic and industrial models of education. But if you don’t agree with that psychological theory, then you may find yourself questioning the wisdom of such a “free-flowing” and “student-directed” education.

Knowledge Gaps: Unschooling can be sporadic and un-systematic in covering content. This pattern permits knowledge gaps for students and can leave them without important core competencies which they may need down the road.

Redundancy: Parent-teachers can be left “reinventing the wheel.” By rejecting schooling generally, one is left trying to remake ways to address the same timeless problems which school used to address. Sometimes, the “old-fashioned” way actually represents proven wisdom, not to be discarded lightly.

You are pretty cynical towards conventional/traditional schooling.
You think classrooms basically teach kids how to be in a classroom.
You believe that most of what we learn in school is useless information, soon forgotten.
You believe learning is richer, better, and more indelible when it’s aligned with our immediate needs and interests.
You trust your student, generally, to know what’s best for him or her, provided there’s a little structure and a lot of freedom.
You or your student tend to think like entrepreneurs, try new things, learn about distant and often unrelated subjects, and you like to invent things from scratch.
Your student already tends to create learning projects for himself or herself such as learning all the dinosaur names, memorizing baseball statistics, doing crossword puzzles, or cooking casseroles.

UnschoolRules.com

JohnHoltGWS.com

John Holt & Pat Farenga, Teach Your Own: The John Holt Book of Homeschooling, 1st Paperback Ed. (De Capo Press, 2003).

Clark Aldrich, Unschooling Rules: 55 Ways to Unlearn What We Know About Schools and Rediscover Education (Greenleaf Book Group, 2011).

Mary Griffith, The Unschooling Handbook: How To Use The Whole World As Your Child’s Classroom, 2d ed. (Three Rivers Press, 1998).

Oliver Demille, A Thomas Jefferson Education: Teaching a Generation of Leaders for the 21st Century. TJedOnline.com 2009.

“The Master List of Unschooling Resources” by WeedemAndReap

JohnHoltGWS.com – List of Unschooling Blogs

Unschoolers.com – Free Resources

Thomas Jefferson Education

December 5, 2021 0

Out of This World – Queer: The Ultimate Guide For Teens

Backtrack to June 2021. Queer: The Ultimate Guide for Teens by Kathy Belge is propped-up on display within arm’s reach of all children and teens who visit the Bethany Library. A teen, who could be your own son or daughter, flips the pages and finds details of two boys kissing and a page describing the attraction he might have to a certain character in the movie Aladdin.

Sound out of this world?

It’s not. It is real and it happened this past summer at every library in the metro. What about the month celebrating heterosexual attraction and a Biblical view of sex? It doesn’t exist.

But the Guiding Values of the Metropolitan Library System says the library is ‘inclusive’ and dedicated to ‘fair and equitable circulation.’

I have an idea. Let’s stop promoting books at the library. You can’t possibly make everyone happy. It’s like promoting OSU but not OU; I guarantee THAT would make the tax-paying citizens of Oklahoma County mad!

What if the library would promote character virtues: courage, friendship, honesty, responsibility, loyalty, work, compassion?

Until then, libraries will be busy keeping the LGBTQ+ community happy by promoting and celebrating their worldview in displays that confuse and harm our children.

Please take time today to call the Executive Director of the Metropolitan Library System, Mr. Larry White, at 603-3725. Tell him you are a tax-paying citizen who is unhappy that the library displays books that have potential to harm the most vulnerable members of our community, our children.

December 2, 2021 0

On the Wrong Path – Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe

It would make you blush. It is “pure pornography” according to a parent in Washington State, yet it is written for 14-18 year olds and is available at your local library.

It is Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe.

The book, a graphic novel located in the biography section, appeals to teenagers. The explicit drawings are pornographic filth, including erotic pictures of sex and masturbation.

Thankfully, the book has been a topic of controversy across the United States and has been removed from some public school libraries. But it remains on the shelves within the public libraries of Oklahoma County.

If my 14 year old son were browsing the shelves of Belle Isle Library to find a biography for a school project, he could easily find Gender Queer, check it out, and take it home. The fact that this obscene book is marketed to minors is despicable.

Our libraries, where children have browsed books safely for decades, have caved to a disturbing trend in our woke culture, sexualizing our youth.

Call Larry White, the Executive Director of the Metropolitan Library System. Call legislators, spread the word. It is time to stand up for our children. We do not want our local libraries to market sexually explicit material like Gender Queer: A Memoir to our youth. It’s called pedophilia, and it’s wrong.

This book containing this picture of a bearded man having sex with a child is available to minors at your local Oklahoma County library.

More pornography available at your local library!

November 18, 2021 5

School Counselors Now Pushing CDC-Linked Gender Group To Public School Kids in Elk City

I was sent this screenshot from a fellow conservative activist who received it from a friend whose child is enrolled in Elk City Public Schools.

Beyond being COMPLETELY INAPPROPRIATE on its face, moreover, its’ hopefully a wake-up call FOR PARENTS about how many ways schools are contacting your children without YOU as the parent knowing about it.

First, let’s tackle the Genders and Sexualities Alliance (GSA).

The following can be found on their “Mission” page:

Our overall strategy for fighting for educational justice is to work with grassroots, youth-led groups and GSAs, empowering them to educate their schools and communities, advocate for just policies that protect LGBTQ youth from harassment and violence, and organize in coalition with other youth groups across identity lines to address broader issues of oppression.
All of our work with students focuses on leadership development and activism that prioritizes building alliances not only across sexual orientation and gender identity lines, but also across race, ethnicity, and class lines, and our resources and trainings are designed to facilitate coalition building.
Genders and Sexualities Alliance (GSA)

They also take an active role in “training youth leaders“, which includes recruitment for clubs. This page has numerous videos available prepared to do just that. In fact, GSA also has significant resources for use inside and outside of public schools, which include curricula and ‘took kits’.

This page is devoted to Civic Engagement and includes ideas such as:

Engaging in collective practices with a group is shown to increase resilience! This can be as simple as working on art or creative projects together, making music, dancing, or singing together, or trying out collective breathing or meditation. Our Virtual GSAs Resource Page and Queer and Trans Wellness Resource Page has many different activities you can try out!

What’s Wrong Here

1. This survey came as a Google Document, apparently via email: Google Documents are easily hacked so, despite what the email says, personal information can be collected and shared. Unfortunately, just because something says one thing, that doesn’t mean it’s done the way it was promised.

2. The survey was given to Elk City high school students by a counselor, bypassing parents. In many blogs, I’ve called attention to the American School Counselor Association and its link to SEL, which very much plays into the idea that equity includes LGBTQ students. From CASEL (Collaborative for Social Emotional Learning).

We imagine communities in which all young people—across race, ethnicity, family income levels, learning abilities, home language, immigration status, gender identity, sexual orientation, and other factors—have the skills, relationships, and environments to thrive.

NOTHING AT SCHOOL SHOULD GO TO AN UNDERAGED STUDENT INDEPENDENT OF PARENTS

3. Schools and teachers can contact students many different ways without parents seeing that information and that is according to state law, parents have the right to see anything the school provides their children – as it should be. There are texting apps and email apps and all kinds of apps schools use to communicate with children. Parents, you need to know what these are and have a copy of any correspondence with your child and the school/teacher cc’d to you.

4. Schools have several pipelines through which LGBTQ resources are perpetuated inside the district and the classroom even beyond the School Counselor: A. The CDC offers a great deal of information regarding LGBTQ youth the use of which schools justify because it’s CDC-provided. B. “Safe and Supportive Schools” – a concept developed at the Department of Education in Washington, D.C. to stop bullying, also provides resources and information to schools – perpetuating the LBGTQ lifestyle. The CDC actively promotes the GSA as a resource for ‘advancing safe schools‘.

5. The GSA isn’t the only LGBTQ resource to ‘recruit’ students and incite activation in LGBTQ issues. GSLEN is another organization that has made its way onto school campuses. Over a decade ago now, ROPE found something called “The Day of Silence” in which students pledged to spend the day in silence in solidarity to LGBTQ issues and – before they stopped publishing the list of schools participating – we found many Oklahoma schools were taking part.

GSLEN is an excellent example of how something is made to look ‘supportive’ of students, but has a backstory full of sexually disgusting depravity.

The founder of GLSEN is Ken Jennings – Obama’s Safe School Czar. The link over his name will take you to a Mass Resistance page which has documented information about this man, including The Fistgate Conference attended by students as young as 12.

6. Much has come to light following the Louden County VA rape case in which a ‘transgendered’ boy raped a girl in the girl’s bathroom and the Superintendent covered it up. Continuing to allow LGBT activism can – and will – only result in further such cases – especially when many schools simply refuse to discipline students anymore.

7. Anti transgender activist Walt Heyer, has made a career of warning parents about the evils of transgenderism since receiving treatment as a transgendered woman that allowed him to return to life as a man. In a Federalist article from this year, Heyer warns parents about the 5 steps used by transgender activists to GROOM children about which he says:

Children are attracted (and groomed) through the influence of their peers, social media, and teachers.
It’s easy to see why a child who hits a rough period emotionally, or feels socially awkward or isolated, would be drawn to identifying as transgender as a means to acceptance and attention.

These school clubs allow LGBTQ ideology to create an ‘affirming’ space where children who need affirmation or want attention, find a place they are welcomed. In fact, one mother of two transgender children explains it this way:

You get love-bombed online, you get love-bombed on at school, your social status goes up by at least 10 ranks. As soon as you say you’re trans, you turn into a star. And kids are thirsty for that kind of affirmation.

PARENTS: THIS HAS TO STOP, but the only way to stop it is to know exactly what’s going on with your child at every point possible. Here are some ideas for ways to help you correct this issue in your school.

1: Find a group of parents who are interested in the issue and are willing to come together to remove LGBTQ clubs and resources from your school. Working as a united front will help your school administration see you as a force with which to be reckoned.

2: Confront your school board and continue to confront your school board about the issue until they act. If you are able to create a group, make sure that each of your members says something about the issue at each board meeting. Eventually the Board will tire of hearing about it if they are not sensitive to your initial concerns.

3: Create a social media account and post articles about the fallout the LGBTQ lifestyle causes in children. Post videos from GSA and GLESN that show how they organize and activate students to to get attention from parents.

4. Write opinion pieces in the local paper (if they’ll take them) drawing attention to the issue as a way to create awareness in the community about what is going on in the schools their taxes support. Remember – angry taxpayers can be great allies!

5. DON’T GET FRUSTRATED AND QUIT! I often tell exasperated parents who have tried for an entire school year to make something happen that wouldn’t, that it took us four solid years of work here in Oklahoma to repeal Common Core from state law. Taking back school districts that have been allowed to flourish into parent-destroying, authoritarian-loving black holes on their own with minimal parent participation aren’t going to turn around in 15 minutes. But that’s okay. The victory will be even sweeter once it comes!

November 12, 2021 0

Edmond Public Schools Superintendent, Dr. Angela Grunewald’s November 2nd Response To Parents, Is Either Deliberately False, Or Uninformed By Reality

In a post made to the Edmond Public Schools website, Superintendent Dr. Grunewald addressed what she characterized as “negative and sometimes false comments” made by parents at the 11.1.21 Board Meeting. On the playground we used to say, “It takes one to know one.” Dr. Grunewald’s response to parents in this missive is either deliberately false, or – worse – uninformed by reality. Here’s how we know.

I have known Molly Jenkins – like every other ROPE Board Member – for 8-10 years. She’s tough and smart and like the rest of us, VERY concerned about what is happening to our children in public education.

In the Spring of 2021, she was very troubled by an assignment that was brought to the attention of the EPS Board at a regular Board meeting by a parent who was alerted to the assignment by their child who was completing work online due to COVID.

The class was reading The Absolutely True Diary of A Part Time Indian, a book about a native American boy who lives on a reservation, has troubles in school, reads books and draws cartoons.

Unfortunately, what might be a really interesting book, centers a great deal on the differences between Native Americans and white people from his perspective. Another book in a long litany of books for young adults that introduce race (or sexuality) as a way of indoctrinating readers into certain worldviews.

In May, after the passage of HB1775 preventing the teaching of Critical Race Theory ideals, Molly – still concerned about the “white vs indian” assignment she’d seen – drove to the EPS Administration building and asked for a meeting with Superintendent Grunewald.

She wanted to speak with the Superintendent personally to make certain they were going to follow HB1775 after seeing what she felt to be a completely inappropriate narrative.
An appointment was made and on the day she returned for the meeting with Dr. Grunewald, she was interested to find 10-12 copies of a book sitting on a table in her office with the word ‘equity’ in the title.

“That looks like an interesting book,” she remarked to the Superintendent who then suggested she take a copy to read.

During the meeting, Molly shared her CRT concerns with Dr. Grunewald who assured her they were not teaching CRT tenets in Edmond Public Schools. So, with little further to say after that ‘assurance’, Molly headed home to read the book she was given.

Once home, it took her just about four hours to read the book from cover to cover, she found it so unnerving. On nearly every page she made notes to herself about what she was reading and how it directly connected to the ideals which derive from CRT – the ones specifically outlawed by HB1775.

After reading the book, she immediately contacted EPS Administration to make a further appointment with Dr. Grunewald, which was granted.

At that meeting, she explained to the Superintendent what she had found in the book and that she found CRT tenets on nearly every page.

She asked Dr. Grunewald if she had read the book in its entirety and was told NO, BUT SHE HAD SCANNED IT.

Molly asked the Superintendent who she was giving the book to read – since there had been numerous copies on the table. Dr. Grunewald would NOT give her a clear answer, saying only, “some people around here”. She felt that the Superintendent was very dismissive with her – almost a “you do you we’ll do us” kind of attitude.

Now, let’s examine Dr. Grunewald’s statement from November 2.

Look at the first bullet point. Now, look at this:

What Dr. Grunewald said was simply a talking point described by leftist educators to defend against the use of CRT in schools. In literally means nothing. It’s a deflection for parents who have done their homework and know better.

Bullet point 2 – no one has said it was a standard. Another deflection.

Bullet point 3 – this point references the book we’ll discuss in the next frame – “Belonging Through A Culture of Dignity”.

Bullet point 4 – SEL=CRT. Guest poster Emily Wright (EPS mom of 3) made that abundantly clear in her blog of this week. You can find that here. SEL is Social Emotional Learning, another education fad created by a bunch of leftist teachers in order to indoctrinate children. If you don’t believe me, read this page. Talk about mumbo-jumbo, word salad – not to mention that children’s EMOTIONS are strictly the territory of PARENTS, not schools.

In this portion of her response, Dr. Grunewald claims she’s read the book “Belonging Through a Culture of Dignity”. Here’s what WalMart said about the book when I went searching for it.

“Once these fundamental human needs are understood, educators can gain clarity of the barriers to meaningful student relationships, especially across dimensions of difference such as race, class and culture…Through their work, the authors aim to equip educators with the tools necessary to deliver the promise of DEMOCRACY through schools by breaking the cycle of equity dysfunction once and for all.”
Belonging Through a Culture of Dignity: The Keys to Successful Equity Implementation Kindle Edition
by Floyd Cobb (Author), John Krownapple (Author), Brenda CampbellJones (Foreword)

FULL STOP. There is so much wrong with those sentences it’s hard to breakdown in a blog, but let me do it by asking some questions:

How did public schools create students OF EVERY COLOR and sex smart enough to put a man on the moon without this tripe?
Has anyone looked to see what the National Assessment of Academic Progress scores of Oklahoma students are in Math, Science and Reading? (I have – they’re dismal and have been for a decade) Have schools been teaching, or modifying behaviors?
If you specifically hone in on race, class and culture do you make disparities clearer to children or less clear?
Since when are schools a DEMOCRACY?
Who says there is a “cycle of equity dysfunction” except for the people like Dr. Becky Bailey who stand to make a KILLING on all the stuff she sells to promote ‘dignity’ through SEL programming? Is this about money or the welfare of kids?

Molly read the entire book. Here are some of the most horrifying nuggets from the book:

Pg 42: “Schools routinely offer our students on the margins (e.g., impoverished and minoritized) inferior academic experience to students of affluence and cultural dominance. – Nor did it require educators to prioritize a sense of belonging for students racialized as Black (or otherwise) who were displaced and had to leave the safety and belonging of home schools and move into often unwelcoming school cultures that were exclusively White. Thus a “belonging gap” emerged within racially integrated schools. (Hilariously, ‘bussing’ was created by liberals believing that black students couldn’t possibly get a good education in black schools – a racist notion in and of itself – so they moved them from their homes into white areas to get equal access to education excellence. Yet another one of the ‘liberals screw it up and screw it up worse trying to fix their original screw up’ because they simply have to find fault with something all the time.)

Pg 62: The whole page is filled with racist nonsense, but here are a few examples: “To redress inequity and create a socially just system of education, ensuring access is not enough For educational equity, access and belonging are both vital”. “Historically marginalized identity groups are most vulnerable to the stereotype threat and belonging uncertainty when aspiring to achieve in the dominant culture.”

pg 76: “Perhaps the concept of race (being White, more specifically) is the most prominent example of social exclusion and belonging in US history.”

pg 77: “Whiteness, as Joe Feagin (2013) argues, is more definitely characterized as the absolute right to exclude and, ultimately the entitlement to determine who belongs.” “Entitlement has determined, among other things, where groups of people can live or work, whether or not they have basic rights (e.g., voting, health care), and what type of social activities and relationships they can have with whom (e.g. marriage). In 2018 and 2019, the hashtag #LivingWhileBlack went viral on social media, documenting racial exclusivity Droves of videos show White Americans calling the police on everyday people – Black, Latinx, Muslim, Americans – going about their lives (without markers of Whiteness in places where they are perceived not to belong: Starbucks, swimming pools, golf courses, fitness centers, sidewalks, parks, picnic tables, libraries, college campus tours, and more. To this day, the markers of race often determine the extent to which people feel they belong in any given environment.”

Look up HB1775 and then compare that to these book excerpts. Everything here DEFIES letters a, b, f, g and h of that bill, causing the book – and Dr. Grunewald by pushing it – to violate HB1775.

Now let’s look at her next statement:

Once again, we find that Grunewald has little to say but echoing the talking points of others in the public education cabal.

Apparently, she just surfed the internet and came up with the definition the rest of the sheep use.

And now, how about the concept that we must ‘heal the child before we can educate the child’? That’s a concept that’s been pushed since John Dewey wanted to take control of society by getting between parent and child since parent wouldn’t necessarily bring the child up to be a democratic socialist the way he envisioned children should be brought up. (Read more about Dewey in “John Dewey & the Decline of American Education: How The Patron Saint of Schools Has Corrupted Teaching & Learning” – It was VERY enlightening about why public education is the way it is.)

Now look at her last bullet point.

So they’ve increased the number of counselors. Why? Because the state Department of Education gave schools money to hire counselors – $35 million dollars in ESSR funds to be exact – because, well, COVID. Schools pay half – the state pays half – everyone’s happy. Except that the “School Counselor Corps” as they are being called, apparently come mainly from the American School Counselor Association (ASCA) – an organization that says:

School counselors work toward cultural competence and engage in anti-racist actions by advocating to change racist policies, procedures, practices, guidelines and laws contributing to inequities in students’ academic, career and social/emotional development
American School Counselors Association

You can see more about the ASCA here. The ASCA also pushes SEL, driving more CRT tenets into children through counseling and data-collection surveys (from the company owned by the husband of the daughter of Merrick Garland, the federal Attorney General who told the FBI to investigate parents at school board meetings – oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.)

So, yet again, Superintendent Grunewald seems to literally be falsifying information or have no idea what she’s reading, what she’s saying or what goes on in her own schools.

Clearly EPS is saturated with SEL and clearly, SEL is the pipeline for CRT pushed by counseling services and Dr. Grunewald herself through “Belonging Through a Culture of Dignity”.

In closing, Dr. Grunewald is doing little more than many Superintendents do anymore when confronted by parents who actually care – they are either outright lying, or are too soaked in their own indoctrination to understand what they’re doing to our kids.

This is another excellent reason why SCHOOL BOARD ELECTIONS ARE PARAMOUNT. School boards can literally get rid of these kinds of Superintendents and hire ones that actually care about kids, not merely pushing what the education cabal wants pushed on kids.

GET INVOLVED IN SCHOOL BOARDS AND SCHOOL BOARD RACES IN YOUR DISTRICT TODAY!

November 12, 2021 0

Classical Education for Homeschool

By Jessica D. Lovett

History and Concept
The classical model of homeschooling was used by many of the great thinkers of the past, such as Aristotle, Plato, C.S. Lewis, and Thomas Jefferson. One main differentiation between classical homeschooling and the other main styles is that it separates learning into three stages, collectively called the Trivium: grammar, logic (or dialectic), and rhetoric. Originally featured in Plato’s writings and used extensively in ancient Greece, these were only named the Trivium in the Middle Ages. Trivium means “the place where the roads meet” in Latin. The stepping stones are to teach children the mechanics of language and to use their own five senses (grammar), use complex thought and analysis (logic), and finally to instruct and persuade others with that gained wisdom (rhetoric).

Who might this work best for?
Home educators who are “less concerned about whether students can handle iPads than if they can grasp Plato” might enjoy the classical education model. It emphasizes truth, goodness and beauty over rote memorization of facts and leads educators and their students to explore classically regarded books and resources. It also gives the learner a palpable feeling of continuity with other students through the ages. Classical education’s main goal is to cultivate a passion for lifelong learning, to seek sound logic over chaos, and to focus on depth of learning over breadth.

www.homeeducator.com

November 11, 2021 0

Parents, Books Like “The Glass Castles” – And Worse – Have Been In Public Schools For Years – We Need To Get Them Out Now

I have to say, I’m more than mildly happy to read that parents have finally discovered the disgusting books being foisted upon their children in public schools and metropolitan libraries all across the nation – including Oklahoma – yes, “of all places” – but I have to say, I’m more than mildly frustrated that we’ve been trying to alert parents to this phenomena for over 10 years and not gotten much traction.

So, parents, please know; this is a trend that started years ago and is quickly getting progressively worse. There’s really no choice but to stop it NOW!

Those of you who have been followers know my story, but for those who don’t, suffice it to say that putting my kids into a nice public elementary in the nice neighborhood where I grew up as a kid, didn’t go the way I planned. You can read about some of our adventures here, here and here that led me to homeschooling three kids through high school with one still in high school left to go.

I didn’t begin parent life with the notion that I would be spending 24/7 with four kids, but that’s how life turned out and I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Neither did I have any idea that I’d become an education researcher and activist, but putting my kids into public school sent me down that road, leading me to many, many days where I homeschooled with one hand while researching and writing a blog with the other. After seeing what I’d seen in our “Blue Ribbon” elementary in a nice, well-to-do neighborhood, I knew I HAD to wake up parents to either make their schools start educating their kids or get them to take them out!

Throughout our homeschool years, I’d take the kids to Half Price Books. They offer a 10% discount for homeschoolers/educators, plus, it’s always a great place to find any kind of reading material.

Unfortunately, my second-oldest daughter, Barbara, always seemed to pick out the most awful books every time we went – they had no compelling story line, there was nothing edifying or uplifting in them and they all seemed to be about vapid boy/girl relationships. I wouldn’t let her read them and we’d usually have some kind of argument, but my point always has been; why spend time reading something that doesn’t elevate you either mentally or spiritually, or teach you something you didn’t know?

She had been telling me she wanted to read some Judy Blume books – and I had heard they were fine – so one day while we were at Half Price Books, she pulled out several Judy Blume books to look through. One of them was a paperback called, “Forever“. It was used and without a cover for research so I skimmed several pages.

Unfortunately, I involuntarily screamed aloud (Barbara nearly died of embarrassment because people actually looked at us) when I reached a page with such sexually explicit detail that there was no way to refer to it but as pornographic!

Immediately I approached the young girl working close to us, held out the book and reported that it was NOT material for young teens. I then asked her to remove it from the Teen section. She shrugged affably, but seemingly uninterested so I thrust at her the page that had caused me to scream. Surprisingly, even this young, pierced and tattooed girl gasped and promised to immediately remove the book to the adult section where it would be away from young girls.

Not long after that incident really, I got an email from a member of our (previous board) telling me that one of her friends was really mad about the reading list in Edmond Public Schools, and asking if she could put her in touch with me.

After meeting with the mom, I wrote, “One Mad Momma Takes On Edmond School Board Over Sexually Explicit Books Assigned to Sophomores“, published in 2014. Today it has 9000 reads and 16 comments. I urge you to read them. It’s readily obvious someone read the blog and hit social media with a post about it claiming we were trying to “ban” books. Trust me when I say, leftists use the ‘straw man’ argument constantly and this was a perfect example. No one suggested the books should be banned, just not offered as class reading material to sophomores in high school, but that doesn’t matter. Leftists love to call names if for no other reason than it completely stops conversation on the topic. If someone is labeled a “BOOK CENSOR”, discussion stops in exactly the same way it does when you’re labeled a ‘racist’.

I didn’t use that blog to point to specific passages in the book, but because there was so much whining and crying about the blog and the poor mom’s (very brave) decision to speak out on the topic, I ran another blog copying and pasting actual passages from the book, “Complaints About Sexually Inappropriate High School Reading Material Part 2 – Garbage In – Garbage Out“.

Interestingly, THIS blog only got 889 views and only 4 comments, one of which was mine in response to leftist education political organizer Claudia Swisher, who – of course – called the mother and I “book banners” and “disingenuous” for ‘cherry-picking’ passages – because explicitly detailing everything in a sex scene needs context, right? <<insert rolled eyes emoji>>

So as not to relive the entire post here, check out the blog for the x-rated ‘cherry picked’ passages that made me a “disingenuous book banner”.

Not long after that, I received an email from a friend, Macey France, in Oregon who had found Tony Morrison’s, “The Bluest Eye” on the Common Core reading list. A blogger herself, she quoted portions of the book – including the unbelievably explicit child rape scene – in her blog and then linked it to the CC reading list, earning her a virtual firestorm of name-calling and derision from the Left all across the internet.

With everything in my blogs echoing what Macey was saying about the Common Core reading list and “The Bluest Eye”, I decided to pitch an article to my longtime editor Joy Pullman at the Federalist about the smutty books kids were being fed in public school through the eyes of the parents that were objecting to them – in 2014!

That article was my first for the Federalist, has been read thousands of times and is still – sadly – very timely today. I urge you to stop and read the whole piece because it explains very well WHY sexually explicit literature is not appropriate for K-12 students. There are reasons other than, “I just don’t want my kid reading that”.

But, I digress a bit. This is the article I wrote on our old website back in 2011 archived through the Way Back Machine (btw – support them so we don’t end up like 1984!) I recounted the story about Barbara, but here’s the IMPORTANT part. My Co-Founder, Julie McKenzie had gone out to the Norman High School Library website and pulled down the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA – which appears not to be a serviceable organization any longer) 2009 Best Books For Young Adults, copied the books and their descriptions and pasted them in the document. You can see all of them at the link, but let’s pull out a few here:

Geerling, Marjetta. Fancy White Trash. Penguin/Viking. 2008. 978-0-670-01082-0 $16.9 Abby Savage is determined not to be like her mother and sisters-each became pregnant as teens-but her only confidant is Cody who has his own sexual issues.
Harmon, Michael. The Last Exit to Normal. Alfred A.Knopf. 2008. 978-0-375-94098-9 $18.99 To get him on the right track, Ben Campbell’s dad and stepdad accompany him to Montana, where he encounters small town life, homophobia, an abused boy, and a special girl.
Scott, Elizabeth. Living Dead Girl. Simon and Schuster/Simon Pulse. 2008. 978-1-4169-6059-1 $16.99 Abducted at the age of ten, Alice has lived as a live-in rape victim for Ray for 5 years until he informs her that she’s “too old” for his love.

Okay, that’s enough, you get the idea. Sincerely? How many of you want your kids reading ANY of those? This was 2010!

WHERE HAVE PARENTS BEEN?

You think The Glass Castles is bad, try the new and improved Sequoyah Reading List for 2022, which you can conveniently find through the Oklahoma Library Association portal (with the convenient URL of OKLIBS).

We’ll tackle that in the next post – What Does The Library Want Your Child Reading? Shouldn’t You Know?

The last in the series will be, What To Do About Inappropriate Books in Your Public Libraries to give you a method to clean up your public reading spaces.

In the meantime, check out “Molly’s X-Rated Reading Room” on our website where ROPE Board member Molly Jenkins and our friend Andrea Crouch take on the inappropriate and awful books for kids in public school and the public library! Sign up to be alerted of their posts, so you don’t miss one!

Jenni White

November 11, 2021 0

Category

By Jessica D. Lovett