Montgomery County principals blast school board’s no-opt-out policy in newly released documents
Heather Hunter
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Newly released documents show a group of Montgomery County Public Schools elementary school principals sent a letter to the county’s school board officials expressing concerns about the appropriateness of new language arts books featuring discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity for young elementary students.
The internal memorandum was released on Tuesday by the Maryland office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, after they submitted an open records request.
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The letter was sent by the elementary school chapter of the Montgomery County Association of Administrations and Principals, the union that represents administrators and supervisors employed by MCPS, in November 2022.
“MCPS has stated publicly that there is no option to opt-out, with the rationale that MCPS is simply providing books about inclusion of LGBTQ+ characters and inclusivity. However, due to the concerns shared earlier about the plot and nature of the books, this creates a significant concnerns by some parents about ‘indoctrination’ or ‘hidden agendas,'” the letter to Montgomery County administrators said.
In the internal memo, principals expressed concern about a classroom guide that was “dismissive of religious beliefs,” which then instructed teachers to push back on students who spoke out. The principals said they believed it was a “shaming comment to a child.”
“Numerous concerns have been raised by principals, teachers, and community members that the content of the books does not align with the stated messages. There are concerns that the plot of some of the books center around sexual orientation and gender identity. There are concerns that some of the books are not appropriate for the intended age group, or in one case, not appropriate at all for young students,” elementary school principals said in the letter.
The document revealed that “some teachers have shared their discomfort about the content” and “the terminology, and the appropriateness of the books developmentally as well as from a sexual education perspective.”
CAIR’s Maryland office has been a part of the interfaith parent groups regularly demonstrating outside the school board building of the state’s largest county to call on officials to instate an “opt-out” provision for the curriculum and classroom discussion guides related to gender, family life, and relationships in elementary English classes.
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Montgomery County mother Bethany Mandel told WMAL on Tuesday that school officials in the county have told her that the school board is putting them in an “impossible situation where we are now adversarial against children and parents. Let us just teach them math and reading.”
Mandel said there is “a lot of fear” and “bullying happening,” making it harder for staff to come forward in their disagreement with the school board’s opt-out policy. Parents have told her that the books that the school district is promoting are not “being read for their literary quality or teaching history or math” but are instead meant to “overturn our value system at home with their values.”