I’m a big advocate for parent involvement and empowerment when it comes to their children’s learning plan. I learned early on, as a school principal, that parents usually knew best when it came to what was in the best interest of their child.
With that stated, Moms for Liberty, pretending to be a parent involvement and empowerment group, is not good for our public schooling enterprise nor our democracy moving forward.
This past weekend, Scott Simon, host of NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday, spoke with reporter Jim Zarroli about Moms for Liberty and their recent failure trying to control local school boards across the country. Zarroli interviews Karen Svoboda, a mother of seven in a New York Dutchess County blended family, as a part of his report. Political scientist Maurice Cunningham, Katie Paris, a parent-organizer, and Kieran Lalor, a former New York State assemblyman, join in the discussion. Here is a transcript of their conversation:
“SS: The right-wing Moms for Liberty has been a force in clashes over what public schools can teach or not about sexuality and race, but its influence may be on the wane. Last week, the group lost closely watched school board races in Pennsylvania, Virginia and Iowa. As Jim Zarroli reports, Moms for Liberty is facing growing resistance at the local level.
JZ: Karen Svoboda and her husband have a large blended family of seven kids in New York’s Dutchess County. They try to pay attention to what’s happening in local schools. So when Moms for Liberty endorsed a slate of school board candidates last year, Svoboda did some research.
KS: And then I looked into the local Facebook page of Moms for Liberty and just browsed through some of the social media of some of these individuals. And what I saw was very upsetting.
JZ: The Southern Poverty Law Center has called Moms for Liberty a hate group. It supports efforts to oppose pandemic restrictions, suppress discussion of LGBTQ issues and remove books in local schools across the country. Many of the comments Svoboda read attacked her local school’s teachings on gender and racial equity issues. One post in particular bothered Svoboda, who has gay and nonbinary kids in her family. It said a gay students group at the high school was indoctrinating students.
KS: AS a mom of kids who are members of that community, it was very concerning to think that these people would be trying to get onto the school board, ‘cause what does that mean for my kids?
JZ: Svoboda knew Moms for Liberty had supporters locally. Dutchess County is an hour and a half north of progressive New York City, but it’s a swing district politically. Political scientist Maurice Cunningham says the group appeals to people who feel disenfranchised from politics.
MC: And that may be more potent in blue areas where very conservative people may feel like they don’t have a way to fight back. And Moms for Liberty give them one.
JZ: Svoboda started a group called Defense of Democracy to get the word out about some of the school board candidates. It’s part of a nationwide grassroots counteroffensive against conservative efforts targeting schools. Katie Paris, who founded a network of liberal suburban women called Red Wine and Blue, says the culture warriors running for school board in many places are out of step with most voters.
KP: They don’t represent the majority, but they are very loud, and their views are very extreme. And we have seen what can happen when just a few people start to sow chaos in any individual school district.
JZ: Svoboda’s group has had its successes. It helped defeat an entire slate of Moms for Liberty school board candidates last year. She also began to hear from people all over the country worries about the group’s influence in schools. And Defense of Democracy now has chapters across the country. They hold Zoom calls once a week. But it hasn’t been easy.
KS: In 2022 was my first death threat, yes, I received a message on social media saying they wanted to put me into a wood chipper.
JZ: She’s lost some battles. Her group tried and failed to get Moms for Liberty barred from a local community day parade. The Dutchess County Moms for Liberty chapter didn’t respond to interview requests, but former state assemblyman Kieran Lalor, a Republican, insists that many local parents share the group’s views.
KL: You need a club for sexuality in your high school, sponsored by the school? I don’t know. That doesn’t really reflect the values of this community, but it’s there.
JZ: Lalor says conservatives have had trouble winning school board races because of opposition from progressive teachers unions. But he says groups like Moms for Liberty can prevail.
KL: If they keep at it, and I hope they do, they will be successful and start to win back some of the school boards.
JZ: But in last week’s elections, candidates Moms for Liberty endorsed lost numerous high-profile races. The group points out that some 40% of its endorsed candidates did win, which it says is not bad considering that many were running for the first time. And it’s already preparing for next year’s elections. But it will do so facing an energized and growing grassroots opposition.”
Critics of my idea to create a new learning system, built around smaller learning cohorts, led by one or two learning coaches, focused on personalized learning plans, say it will separate kids into nothing more than special-interest groups. That may be true, but, after reading Jim Zarolli’s story on Moms for Liberty, would you really want to send your kids to learn beside children of groups like Moms? I sure wouldn’t.
I hate to write this, but maybe it’s time for all of us to join learning groups that we feel comfortable with. If white supremacists want to learn with those only from their own race, so be it. If homophobes want to learn with those who are anti-LGBTQ+, so be it. If book-banners want to go to school together, so be it.
I realize it might be anti-democratic, but it doesn’t seem like any of us really want to deal with “different” these days.
I hope I’m wrong, but maybe I’m not.
Til tomorrow. SVB
A Better Path to Learning 
Leave a comment