Liberalism Run Amok: “The Saintly City” Going Through Hell

• Minority-dominated school incorporates “white privilege” curriculum for staff, teachers.

• Parents fight back against social engineering.

By Dave Gahary —

Nestled on the east bank of the Mississippi River, Saint Paul, Minnesota, whose motto is “The most livable city in America,” may soon be in the market for a new tag line. It seems a school in Minnesota’s capital city, frustrated with “achievement and disciplinary issues involving black students” has contracted with and paid millions to a San Francisco-based “educational” organization whose main purpose is to whip white teachers for being, well, too white.

According to its website, the organization, “Pacific Educational Group [PEG] is committed to achieving racial equity in education.”

“PEG packages and sells the concept of victimization,” reports EAGnews.org, “a news service dedicated to education reform and school spending research, reporting, analysis and commentary,” and “claims that the American education system is built around white culture, tradition and social norms . . . to the unfair detriment of black students.”

Black students can only achieve if school curricula are customized to meet their cultural specifications, PEG believes, and teaches that suspensions and expulsions to discipline black students are racist.

The results in the five years and almost $3 million since Harding Senior High School has been “doing business” with PEG, whose stated mission is to “engage in sustained partnerships with educational organizations to transform beliefs, behaviors, and results so people of all races can achieve at their highest levels and live their most empowered and powerful lives”: unimaginable chaos.

Black students assault white teachers and other students, enter and exit classes at their whim and roam the hallways, with no repercussions for their actions.

According to reports, when teacher Becky McQueen, who is white, tried to stop a fight between two black basketball players, one of them “grabbed her shoulder and head, throwing her aside.”

Another student barged into her class while she was standing in the doorway, smashing her into a shelf. The next week, two boys stormed in, smashed a girl in the head, and then exited. “One of them had already been written up more than 30 times,” revealed a school source.

Another student, who regularly dropped by her class to hit kids and curse at the aides, told McQueen once that he would “fry her ass.” Thinking it meant something innocuous, the students apprised her that it meant “he’s gonna kill you.”

It’s gotten so bad that Ms. McQueen has instructed her students to “use a secret knock on the classroom door, so she will know who to allow in.”

It’s not just McQueen who gets abused by the out-of-control delinquents.

Another white teacher, Erik Brandt, a “20-year veteran of the English department” and “a finalist for Minnesota’s Teacher of the Year,” who “doubles as a hall monitor,” one day noticed a black student walking down the hallway “wearing headphones, chanting along to violent rap lyrics,” when he tapped him on the shoulder and gestured to lower the volume.

The student glowered “at Brandt with chilling intensity,” pointed his fingers in the shape of a gun, mock shot him, and continued on his way.

Thanks to PEG, student suspensions are replaced by ‘time outs,’ and school officials are forced to forgive or ignore violence and other unacceptable behavior. PEG also advocated that special needs students with severe behavioral issues get placed into regular classrooms.

Things really started to deteriorate at Harding about two years ago, when more than 3,000 of those with “behavioral issues and cognitive disabilities were mainstreamed into general classes, along with all the kids who spoke English as a second language.” At the same time, the district decided that the alarming suspension rates for black kids should be dealt with differently. So instead of tossing the uncivilized student out, they receive a 20-minute timeout, counseling by a “behavioral coach,” and return to class “when they calmed down.” Suspensions would be “a last resort.”

The superintendent, Valeria Silva, made teachers responsible for dealing with these young animals, “lest they be complicit in the cycle of poverty among black and brown communities,” according to reports.

With PEG’s guidance, “teachers were asked to explore their biases, to preface their opinions with ‘As a white man, I believe . . .’ or ‘As a black woman, I think . . .’”

The district’s director of racial equity, Michelle Bierman, said: “The work begins with people looking at themselves and their own beliefs and implicit biases. If teachers could recognize their subconscious racism, everyone would work together to bridge the gap.”

Besides Silva and her cultural communist minions, other culprits in this absolute disaster include three school board members “who have supported the superintendent’s relaxed disciplinary policies.”

The good news is disgusted parents “convinced the powerful Democratic Farm Labor Party to withhold its endorsement from three incumbent school board members who had planned to seek another term in the November election.”

When Ms. McQueen recounted her beating and other assaults in her classroom to Silva, who took her post in March, instead of being sympathetic she issued “an unsettling warning” about suspending too many unruly students.

“We’ll be looking at your numbers at the end of the year,” she said.

The good news is disgusted parents convinced the local Democratic Farm Labor Party to withhold its endorsement from three incumbent school board members who had planned to seek another term in the November election. It has been reported that black and white parents will likely vote the entire school board out next year.

The worst part of all this, however, is that what Harding is experiencing isn’t much different than what most big city schools are dealing with.

Dave Gahary, a former submariner in the U.S. Navy, is the host of AFP’s ‘Underground Interview’ series.

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