Military families seek school choice to avoid radical teaching in the system run by the U.S. Department of Defense; a pilot program will serve some students.
By Eileen Griffin
A pilot school choice program has been proposed for military families.
The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) created a voucher program for children whose parents are serving in the military or working for the Department of Defense (DoD) outside of the country, The Federalist reports.
As a pilot program, school choice will be offered to 30 students living in Bahrain before expanding to other locations. These students will follow the regulations already in place for students who live in areas not served by a DoD school.
While the State Department has had school choice for many years, the Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) has been the only option for military families. Under the voucher program, parents will be allowed to leave their children in the DoDEA school or select a private school in the country where they reside.
The move toward school choice for military and DoD families comes after parents filed complaints against the DoDEA schools and a report titled “Schools for Radicals,” by Adam Andrzejewski and Thomas W. Smith, was published by the watchdog group Open the Books in July of this year.
“Like many educational institutions over the past few years, DoDEA has come under fire for extreme radical pedagogical practices under the umbrella of ‘Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion’(DEI),” the report begins.
In 2020, the executive director of DoDEA mandated the implementation of DEI practices throughout the educational programs in DoDEA schools. The curricula and practices were all adjusted to accommodate DEI.
The report concluded that there were several problems with DoDEA, and those problems became considerably worse after implementing DEI. Even after being directed to remove DEI, the DoDEA executive director continued the practice, but made it less transparent to parents and investigators.
A DEI Steering Committee was formed, and DEI-trained personnel have been scattered throughout the agency. The influence of DEI continues to be a concern.
Radical ideologies are pushed in the classrooms using curricula provided by places such as the far-Left Southern Poverty Law Center. The use of such organizations also made the level of integration impossible to determine due to the use of “free” resources provided by the SPLC.
DoDEA has prioritized the use of social and emotional learning (SEL). The agency regularly collects personal data from students through the discussion of social and emotional topics. Parents may have no idea what information DoDEA teachers have gleaned from discussions with their children.
“Struggle sessions” are encouraged for staff and students within DoDEA programs. Lessons designed to denigrate the history and traditions of the country are included in those sessions.
“These children are subject to frequent moves and unique family stressors, making them particularly vulnerable to the emotionally manipulative pedagogical methods described in the report,” the study states.
Content is purchased for DEI lessons with a budget of $1.3 billion. Although the agency is not forthcoming with full budget data, it is estimated that the organization spends millions on DEI materials.
Another problem cited in the report was a continued lack of transparency. Even when requests are made through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), the DoDEA leadership would resist responding or delay response to the request. There is still much that is not known about what happens inside the DoDEA schools.
In the Claremont Institute’s September 2022 report, “Grooming Future Revolutionaries,” it was revealed that the military is deliberately attempting to indoctrinate the children of U.S. servicemembers.
The military school system is centrally controlled so curricula can be consistent throughout the nation-wide school system. What is mandated at the top is implemented without local community involvement.
There is no local school board to question central authority and the DoDEA is fully engaged and committed to implementing a woke agenda.
“Lesson plans are infused with cutting-edge left-wing pedagogical techniques in the service of radical gender ideology and white shaming/antiracism,” the report reads.
“The new military education aims to detach military brats from their families and their country, all the better to make them global citizens. It seeks to disrupt stable sexual identities. This education undermines justice, truth, and the American way of life.”
Students are taught that the only place that they can be themselves is at school. Their homes are considered “unsafe” and “filled with deception.” A key to indoctrination is for teachers to develop a “special” relationship with the student, which could involve keeping secrets from parents.
Children are trained to object to order and truth. They are encouraged to demand that the environment adapts to them as they become more and more obsessed with the concepts of radical gender ideology.
“If students are used to restructuring their school environment, they will become activists for restructuring the general culture once they leave school.”
The pilot program is expected to give some students an opportunity to escape the DoDEA schools and experience a different learning environment. There is no guarantee that the pilot will expand to more military families at this time.
If the program is not expanded, families will continue to have no choice but to send their children to the DoDEA schools with DoDEA trained teachers.
“Future citizens, sons and daughters of military personnel, will become much more like their teachers than like their parents.”
“Our military families and children have been held captive for far too long, and school choice, where the money follows the child, is a 21st-century solution for a 20th-century relic that has shown itself either unwilling or unable to change,” writes Amy Haywood for The Federalist.
“This is why House and Senate negotiators must prioritize keeping Banks’ pilot program for education vouchers in the fiscal 2025 NDAA during forthcoming reconciliation of the House and sure-to-pass Senate versions of the bill.”
The indoctrination of military children is deliberate and purposeful. It will likely reduce the next generation’s service participation as children will not follow in the military parents’ footsteps. Fewer recruits, particularly from traditionally military families, will reduce military readiness, the report concludes.
“It is simply too much to ask those in the military to put both their lives and their children’s well-being on the line.”
For more great content from School Reform News.
