This week, we discussed the efforts of San Francisco Board of Education Superintendent Maria Su and the school district to implement a new policy called “grading for equity,” which aims to lower the standards for student grading to artificially improve their performance. While kept secret from the parents, news of the plan led to a public outcry, and Su announced that she would study the policy a bit longer. Now, however, parents have learned of another controversial plan of the San Francisco Unified School District to enroll their kids in a mandatory two-semester ethnic studies class.
Parents are again rising in opposition. With kids struggling to reach proficiency in basic subjects, the SFUSD continues to prioritize its social agenda over educational needs.
The two-semester ethnic studies class will now require students to explore topics such as structural racism and colonialism as a condition for graduation. The mandatory course was approved despite objections from Lainie Motamedi, the school board president at the time, that the board had never approved funding for the year-long requirement. Parents are decrying the continued lack of transparency and consultation in the school district.
Previously, parents could opt their children out of the course. That did not sit well with the social warriors at the SFUSD so they have now been told that their children must take the course or not graduate.
The course has long been controversial due to what parents view as highly political and biased material. Some raised reading assignments that equated capitalism with racism and other material viewed as anti-Israeli. The district later removed some of the material.
Critics also point to the original resolution and its co-author former school board vice president Alison Collins. Collin was criticized after a series of tweets comparing the Chinese community to a “house n****r.” We previously discussed how Collins denounced meritocracy: “When we talk about merit, meritocracy and especially meritocracy based on standardized testing … those are racist systems.”
Some teachers defended controversial material like a reading that denigrates white males. Ethnic studies teacher, David Ko of Washington High School, insisted
“there’s definitely moments with that article topic where students might feel uncomfortable. The extreme alternative is to avoid all discomfort, which means, at least potentially, not talking about anything that would make anyone feel uncomfortable. That means there’s a lot of curriculum that’s off the table.”
That is hardly compelling. There are many things that make people feel uncomfortable, but discomfort is not the measure of success. I doubt seriously that Ko or the district would relish the discomfort of assigning blatantly racist or sexist material.
In a school district that has long been criticized for a pronounced political and social agenda, the course is understandably concerning for many parents. Many others simply view it as a distraction from more pressing needs to improve proficiency in core educational areas from English to math to science.
The more pressing question is why it must be mandatory. There would be less outcry if students could opt in or opt out. Many students are trying to prepare for an increasingly difficult work environment. They may be more interested in additional math or science courses. Why not let the students and their parents decide?
Superintendent Su insists, however, that students must be forced to experience something that “honors their lived experiences.”
Some parents, however, are more concerned with the “lived experiences” awaiting their children if they cannot meet and exceed basic proficiency standards in an increasingly competitive job market.
No problem. The kids in the ethnically graded program will all get an “A” even if they never read any of the material. How can the kids be indoctrinated if they don’t pay attention in this course just like they don’t pay attention in any of their other courses. However, they will do quite well in Nose Picking 101 which is also a mandatory subject. We need to thank and raise the pay ( again and again and again…) of the educators in the wonderful State of California for their provision of such a beautiful curriculum. Bart says Barf.
TiT,
Just think, these kids are going to be the future of CA! They will not be able to read, write, do math, but they sure can tell you they are gender fluid. All about racism, which will amount to,
“White males, bad! Straight men, women, bad! Math, racist! From river to see!” (Note, I spelled “sea” as “see” intentionally as these future CA public education system grads will not know the difference in spelling.)
It is funny how all the various annony morons try to tell us conservatives are rednecks, hillbillies, uneducated, not smart, yet here we have actual, real world examples of leftist Democrats striving to produce those stereotypes.
*. California is no longer a part of the equation.
Lay your treasures up in heaven…
* Don’t forget the WH lawn circus topless I’m too hot for my blouse, train wrecks, plane doors falling off, Austin awol, Garlands testimony, seashells, they them, chest feeding, birthing people, transgender soldiers, hello good-night, RICO cortez, cowboy hats in congress, Hunters photos in congress, camp outs for Gaza, surge, I’m not a biologist, the border is secure, the eagle has landed…
How many of these teachers and adminstrators send their own children to government schools? This kind of propaganda can be viewed as a way of supressing the competence of government school graduates in favor the wealthier classes who send their children to private schools. Thus we develop a class system where the competent graduates of private schools have bright careers ahead of them in the private and public spheres (even if they are idiots), while the government-school graduates are left to scratch for a living.
It’s almost like a corollary to Darwin’s theory that the strongest survive in order to pass on their genes to offspring. Another means to provide an advantage to your offspring to pass on their DNA is to make it disadvantageous for your competitor’s offspring to thrive. This seems to me to be playing out in government run schools.
*. You’re not wrong – biology feed and breed. Competitors may not want to survive. It’s not new. The survival instinct is the strongest instinct in living organisms. Intelligence dictates an awareness of that fact.
These moves are just the last slides of desperation as the progs realize that their grift has only worked on the lower IQ types or those few elites who are so far removed from reality that they will agree to anything spewing from academia.
As the last election proved, the majority of us are smarter than them. Let them legislate all the nonsense in a last ditch effort to push back against a rising tide of (We’re done with all this stupid sh*t).
Indeed. They had all of academia, most of media and government, and even were tightening their grip on the Pentagon… and still lost!! “Stupid is as stupid does.” China missed a real chance for world domination.
I am much more concerned about the forced indoctrination of our children with Muslim ideology that has been going on for years in our public schools.
I speak of course of the requirement for children to use Arabic numerals and learn algebra.
Arabic numerals were developed by mathematicians in Baghdad, the home of Saddam Hussein,
We fought a war against these people. They should not be allowed to indoctrinate and subvert our youth.
I demand that we return to the use of good old Roman numerals. We should use numerals developed by white Europeans.
Algebra was developed by the Muslim mathematician Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi in Persia, which is modern day Iran. The term algebra comes from the Arabic word al-jabr.
Iran is the greatest threat to peace in the world. They held American hostages for 444 days.
We should not be allowing them to indoctrinate our children.
The forced indoctrination of our children with this vile Muslim ideology has to stop.
What possible purpose could this indoctrination serve ????
Why must our children be forced to use Arabic numerals and learn about the vile Muslim ideology of algebra.
This has to stop !!!!!
Anonymous, false equivalence is a sign of a weak argument. Try again at Debate 101.
I always thought it came from the Arabic word al-Jabberjaw.
“Positional decimal notation including a zero symbol was developed in India, using symbols visually distinct from those that would eventually enter into international use. As the concept spread, the sets of symbols used in different regions diverged over time.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_numerals
edwardmahl
What is the point you are trying to make here.
Is it some lame attempt to say that Arabic numerals are not really Arabic numerals, but rather INDIAN numerals.
The Wikipedia article you cite makes it clear that the positional decimal NOTATION SYSTEM was developed in India, but they used Sanskrit numerical symbols.
As the notation system spread to the Middle East, each culture created their own numerical symbols to fit the notation system.
The western Arabs created the numerical symbols that we now use in the west.
A notation system is not defined by the numerical symbols used within that system.
The same system can be used with any kind of numerical symbols.
^^^ invented notation is India, spread to Muslim then fibonnaci burned rubber on it. What about those ancient Greeks? 🤔 and then the Chinese 🤔.
“Arabic numerals were developed by mathematicians in Baghdad . . .”
Try by mathematicians in *India*, some three centuries earlier. That’s why it’s called the Hindu-Arabic system.
“. . . Muslim ideology of algebra.”
You’re off your rocker.
Algebra, and the rest of the intellectual achievements during Islam’s Golden Age, were not because of Islam — but in spite of it. That era is well-known for being influenced by classical Greek knowledge, especially by Aristotle.
When you wish to mock others, start by getting the facts right.
It’s Commie-fornia, meaning it’s fine to poison young kids’ minds with Marxist claptrap.
Yesterday in the same state a young man won the women’s state track and field championship, depriving young women of what they worked hard for their whole lives. That kind of misogyny is also now all the rage with American commies. They make life worse wherever they are. Best to move as far from them as possible.
Jonathan: In 2021 California passed a bill requiring all high schools to offer an ethnic studies course for this school year. It will be a graduation requirement by the 2029 school year. The SF Board of Ed is simply implementing what is required by state law. Something you missed in your column.
While some SF parents oppose the mandated course there does not appear a lot of opposition elsewhere around the state. But, of course, conservatives like you are opposed to any “woke” course that emphasizes “structural racism and colonialism”–especially a course you think “denigrates white males”. No, we don’t want that! But there is an alternative. Parents who don’t want their kids exposed to “woke” ideology can put them in private or religious schools—something you have been advocating for years.
Now there is one proposal that residents of SF universally oppose. DJT wants to reopen Alcatraz as a prison for the most “ruthless and violent offenders”. When DJT first proposed the idea most residents of SF thought it was a joke. But DJT is quite serious. FACT CHECK: Alcatraz was closed in 1963 by the Bureau of Prisons because it cost too much to operate–the cost of transporting food and water to the island alone was cost prohibitive. Nothing has changed since then. And it would cost billions in federal money to rehab the former prison. No one, except DJT, thinks the proposal makes any rational sense. One writer of the history of Alcatraz thinks it would be cheaper to house prisoners in Trump Tower. Now there is an idea!
So while DJT is withholding federal money for school districts with “woke” courses he wants to spend billions to rehab Alcatraz. Another DJT nutty idea that just won’t go away!
Enjoy your useless idiocy…
Funny how liars conflate “offer” with “mandatory”.
College not preparing students for workforce, managers avoid hiring them, poll finds
A May release on the Resume.org poll said that “the class of 2025 college graduates [are] entering a difficult job market. Not only is there economic uncertainty, but hiring managers also express skepticism about the capabilities and professionalism of young workers joining the workforce.”
https://justthenews.com/nation/states/center-square/poll-college-not-preparing-students-workforce-managers-avoid-hiring
This is what stupid and crazy leftist indoctrination looks like. Grads both high school and college level who are not capable of entering the workforce. As more and more of leftists force their woke indoctrination, fewer and fewer businesses will hire them, opting to hire ready and willing grads from conservative schools, homeschooled, private schools. If I owned a business, I would opt to hire high school grads who had good grades, a good work ethic, pay them as interns, teach them business in the real world and then after a two or three years, if they have accomplished all the tasks given them, have a clear understanding of the work, offer them a formal position.
Businesses will not set up in areas or states that have poorly educated pool of people to hire from, or ones that cannot function in the workplace. I expect more and more businesses and companies to set up in areas where there are better educated pool of people to pull from, namely Red states where they focus on the basics in education. Not leftist woke indoctrination.
NEW: Josh Hawley says Secret Service whistleblower assigned to Biden told him “Biden used to get lost in his closet in the mornings in the White House”🚨
“The guy, literally stumbling around in the White House residence, couldn’t find his way out of his own closet.”… pic.twitter.com/GFSG1ei0Ai
— Jason Cohen 🇺🇸 (@JasonJournoDC) May 31, 2025
ahhhh dennis It’s no longer 1963. We have many advanced systems in 2025.
You poor libs just can’t the future without you
There should be personality commissions. If it is determined that you have the personality of an a-hole, then your property will be confiscated, such as your vehicles, because a-holes shouldn’t get to live the good life, owning property and such. This would give you an incentive not to be an a-hole.
“Trump has declared full-scale war on Harvard, and like so many things he does, there’s a kernel of a good idea there,”
“I’ve been sh–ing on Harvard long before he was.”
“It’s because Harvard is an a–hole factory in a lot of ways that produces smirking f–k faces,”
–Bill Maher
I would expect that the best alternative for concerned parents is to move or send their children to private school. Or get together and build a home schooling consortium. You can repeatedly complain but it would appear that the majority of the voters in this school district support this approach or would have thrown out the school board. Since they have not then the parents will need to make the move or there will just continue to be new outrages.
Whether it was for college or med school or for residency or fellowship I never considered California for anything. They were crazy even in the 1960’s and 1970’s and it seemed to only get worse. The 1950’s seemed nice but I was only a child and it was in San Luis Obispo, not San Francisco. Pismo beach was beautiful and the strawberry fields were incredible.
Boring and irrelevant.
….strawberry fields were incredible
🎶 Let me take you down
‘Cause I’m going to strawberry fields
Nothing is real
And nothing to get hung about
Strawberry fields forever 🎶
GEB,
I agree with you concerning moving, sending their children to private school or a home schooling consortium.
Interesting, Blue states such as CA, NY, IL are all seeing a mass exodus of people who can afford to leave those states for betters ones, like TX and FL. Those states will have a better educated pool of people for companies to hire from. Those companies will avoid Blue states for not only their higher taxes, cost of living but those Blue states will only have poorly educated and high indoctrinated people. No one wants them in their workforce.
Private schools are not an alternative either. The accrediting organization for privater K-12 schools is nearly as woke as the S.F. school board so private schools must toe the culture warriors line or lose their accreditation.
@Anonymous
This is accurate. School choice means little when all teachers and faculty are coming from the same factory, and they are. 🤷🏽♂️
And to think we boys at Jesuit High grumbled that the administration made us attend Mass on Friday mornings at school. Looking back, it was part of a priceless formation as a Catholic student, and Im grateful the Jesuits formed the minds of us kids. So much so that I chose to attend a Jesuit college as well.
Yet, the San Francisco Unified School District lost touch with reality, as cited in the linked article Professor Turley provided:
One assignment had students role-playing as Israeli soldiers herding Palestinians into refugee camps.
https://sfstandard.com/2025/05/30/sfusd-new-ethnic-studies-mandate/
As a matter of diversity, equity and
inclusionmaking them eat crow, the SFUSC admins should role play as Chinese citizens, with the parents, acting as Mao Zedong “Great Leap Forward” planners, herding the SFUSC admins into refugee camps and experiencing subsequent starvation. As Vegans they can be offered a clod of grass for their cooperation.f they refuse to partake in the role playing exercise, they should have their Burning Man tickets confiscated and set on fire their Che Guevara tshirts in xim/xer/dem presence.
The San Andreas Fault “big one” is the only hope of saving California
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jp0YduNCwyQ
*. Great video, Estovir. It’s an example of too much time on their hands and not knowing what to do with it. Life became too easy, food too available so they opted for anesthesia as their drug of choice. Interesting isn’t it…
Isn’t it the US that throws away the most food?
I believe this is a video of Burners in Nevada. You know the summer festival where all the crazies go to pretend they are free for a few days.
@Estovir
Agreed. California is a hair’s breadth from ceasing to be an American state altogether, with or without formal secession.
For now they are an object lesson, but this is what our left would like the entire country to be if they ever have power again, and our laws are trivialities to them. We came very close, and in record time. We can’t allow it to happen again.
James,
Well said. The failed state of CA is a warning to all others of what will happen if leftist Democrats are in power. Just watch as they go down the drain. That is why so many people who can afford it are leaving the state.
You gotta wonder how long communism in California can last.
All the illegal aliens and various and sundry leeches and parasites in California believe that money grows on trees in America and everything is free.
California’s “sanctuary” status puts it in criminal rebellion against the U.S. government.
California’s roads are achieving third world status as junk and will be inordinately expensive to repair and rebuild.
California needs water, and rather than a pipeline to Great Bear Lake, Canada, it will have spent an estimated $100 billion on a nonsense “train to nowhere.”
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
“Despite some progress, state’s high-speed rail is $100 billion short and many years from reality”
– LA Times
______________
AI Overview
The California High-Speed Rail project is significantly over budget and behind schedule, with critics referring to it as a “train to nowhere” due to its wasted resources and lack of progress. The initial cost estimate of $33 billion has ballooned to over $100 billion, and the project is still not completed.
This is the big one, Elizabeth!
Thanks to communism, there are only 7 billion people in the world, instead of the 32 billion that there otherwise would have been. You benefit from communism by having fewer people around you.
Do you really want so many people around you, competing for space and resources?
Great Move to that part of the world
I guarantee you that they would never allow anything that makes a supporter of the Palestinians feel “uncomfortable” while they have no issue making Jewish kids squirm for being who they are, white kids turn red with embarrassment for how they were born and cause straight kids (90% of all students) feel as if they are outliers for being the way 90% of people have been for ever.
The so-called ethnic studies requirement in California has been hijacked by hard-core leftists who are using it to spread their propaganda, not to educate students. Their materials are filled with criticism of capitalism, imperialism and white supremacism. Their position on Israel/Palestine is absurdly one-sided and, while they decry Islamophobia and racism, they refuse to address antisemitism. See: https://www.standwithus.com/factsheet-liberated-ethnic-studies-in-california
Thank you for addressing this problem, which has received virtually no attention from mainstream media.
We told you yesterday this was a lie from NBC.
Tulsi Gabbard’s Staff Torched NBC News for This Fake News Piece
Maybe Prez Trump should sue them like ABC?
SF Unified should be preparing students to thrive in an entrepreneurial, post-racial meritocracy. Ethnic studies is only going to make it harder, because it teaches lowered expectations based on immutables, and equips students with easy excuses for not trying to compete. If someone wants to learn about other people in SF, just be outgoing and make friends. Those social skills are the difference maker.
A model of Diversity (e.g. racism, sexism, etc.). That said, sadomasochism is a sexual orientation is legal under Democratic law. #NoJudgment #NoLabels #AllsFairInLustAndAbortion
“. . . mandatory two-semester ethnic studies class.” (JT)
In other words: Molding children into good little tribalists.
In education today, whenever you hear the term “anti-racism,” your first thought should be: Okay, this is racist. And worse, it’s an attempt to replace America’s individualism with socialism’s collectivism.
I’m all for people being made miserable. If this makes you miserable, then so be it. I’m glad that it does.
Does not make me miserable. It makes the children and the parents of those children miserable. So, the option for those parents is to either leave the failed state of CA, which many are in fact doing. Or enroll their children in private school or homeschool them. Those who cannot afford to do so, well, they need to change their voting habits and vote Democrats out and get back to sane and normal.
While I do feel for those parents who do not want this woke indoctrination in their schools, I am quite happy to see all those people who wise up, leave the failed state of CA for better states like TX and FL.
It makes little difference. The district scores highly on standardized tests mostly due to being a third HIspanic and a third Asian. Whites are the third ethnicity at 13% and blacks at 8%. You could probably end schools altogether and you’d have 40% reading and passing math at grade level.
All that said I see a long hard slog ahead to remove the idiocy from our educational system. Su is what Asians like to call a Boba liberal. Asians like to assimilate and to excel. If they are circulating in a woke academia they will try to be the most strident and sincere woke.
We all have to continue to take back our lives from the radical left. They must be fought everywhere because they are everywhere.
Take back…? Be fought huh? You’re no different than the liberals you hate. Another crazy conservative. This blog is full of them.
Yawn another lib who wants ou kids to be morons. That way they won’t thing when a lib comes come up with another nutty idea.
Saying someone’s kids deserve the worst encapsulates who you are beautifully in one little hate filled sentence. I can understand why you are “Anonymous”, you weak little child.
I’m just following the Bible, which states that, if a kid pokes out your eye, then you should poke out the kid’s eye. Out, vile jelly!
HullBobby,
Well said. The one upside to all the annony morons is they put on full display of exactly the kind of people they really are.
How marvelous!
Anonymous7:49AM-the pathogenic virus speaks again.
Such hate and venom.
Thanks you just proved my point.
Dustoff,
Well said. My kids study hard, work hard, are grown and very successful. My daughter did HAVE to take a mandatory DEI class to graduate. Despite that, she graduated third in her class.
Anonymous 7:21AM-Oh ATS speaks early this am and nobody cares. Obviously in a foul mood as he is every morning and he really likes being miserable so he continually comments on a blog that he hates. A normal person seeks a little pleasure here and there and even single called organisms withdraw and avoid that which is bothersome to them. So logic would suggest that amoebas have more rationality than him.
It is also rational to lash out at and destroy that which is constantly unpleasant to you.
It can no longer harm you after it has been destroyed.
GEB,
Great comment! And a great comparison of a single celled organism to the annony moron.
Look! Another Democrat came to their senses and left the stupid and crazy for sane and normal!
Kentucky state senator leaves Democratic Party, switches to Republican
“First and foremost, I’m a mother, a rancher and a lawyer with deep personal and professional roots in Kentucky’s coal country,” Webb said, according to Fox News. “As the Democratic Party continues its lurch to the left and its hyperfocus on policies that hurt workforce and economic development in my region, I no longer feel it represents my values.”
“It has become untenable and counterproductive to the best interests of my constituents for me to remain a Democrat,” shes said.
https://justthenews.com/government/state-houses/kentucky-state-senator-leaves-democratic-party-switches-republican
It cannot be repeated too frequently: the Democrats have forever forfeited any claim of right, ability or competence to govern a free people — including their children — in a constitutional republic such as the United States.
They hate the nation’s founding principles; they hate President Trump; and they hate the fact that a majority of the electorate now thinks, after four years of incompetence by Brandon and his autopen-hijacking marionette masters, the nation is back on “the right track.”
They are pitiful losers, and the sooner they disappear from the political scene the better.
In loco parentis means the schools are responsible for the minors’ safety. These communist school personnel are going far beyond their mandate with gender nonsense and socialist indoctrination.
I think we are approaching the point where parents will start using force as the more civilized methods of dealing with the Leftists are proving to be slow and ineffectual. Where the wellbeing of children is at stake the delays are unacceptable.
Where do these lunatics come from? What is the source of the mass insanity?
Communist personnel. My, talk about paranoia. You wouldn’t know a commies if it bit you in the a$$.
You are the lunatic.
Same answer as always. You offer nothing,
Dustoff,
He has nothing to offer. He never does.
Communism is the best form of government for humans. Look at what it has done to Russians, Chinese, and Cubans.
Yes, communism is wonderful! In order to achieve the destruction of the human spirit you just need to pay the entry fee of a few hundred million lives. I’m with you on communism🤣
Would you like to join my movement?
Having coffee on the porch. Yard as nice as any park. Pool gurgling, glassy pond broken only by bass chasing minnows, bluebirds nesting in a corner, steady stream of hummingbirds at the feeder, barn swallows looping through the porch, bluejays, cardinals, woodpeckers, doves, Cooper’s hawks, chickadees, a pair of geese all just doing their thing. No need to join anything🤣
Isn’t a movement like taking a crap? Independent Bob
Why are these people allowed to continue name calling here.
Police this blog or shut it down.
I call them communists or socialists for lack of a better term. Thay are certainly something other than healthy fellow citizens.
I knew some of them in school. There is an air of superiority in their whacky idealism. Their kumbaya hippie attitude of “we are enlightened and we know better than you” gives them license to do unto others in the name of their delusions of goodness.
Where I would never think it my place to try to teach others’ children about alternative genders and the associated abnormal sexual behaviors, would not hang BLM or AnalRainbow flags in a classroom, would not push religion on them, this cadre of lunatics is trying to remake the world in their image one child at a time.
If you have a more accurate name for these abusive lunatics please, enlighten me.
OldFish,
Great comment. Yes, their enlightened attitude is quite annoying.
However, the few times I have seen them try to make their way through life with that attitude and watch them fail when they meet reality. Most of the time they make up excuses as to why they failed or pretend they did not fail at all when it is obvious to all they did fail. A few did realize they failed and wake up to reality, humbled.
Anonymous7.22AM-says the pathogenic virus. Still full of venom I see.
You can always find the communist in the room, it’s that communist stench emanating from them that gives them away.
“Where do these lunatics come from?”
They are the progeny of academics such as this:
“A San Diego State University professor is under fire this week after celebrating the death of a former Israeli soldier who was eaten by a shark.” (JT)
You have to admit that “eaten by a shark” is a ripe opportunity for clever comments about poetic justice or karma, but in the case of the SDSU pseudoprofessor he just looks stupid. What else would you expect from La Raza?