Southern California school board bans Critical Race Theory

A Southern California school board voted to ban Critical Race Theory throughout the district.  

The Temecula Valley Unified School District board voted 3-2 Tuesday night in favor of the resolution written by its newest board member, Joseph Komrosky.  

“Are children really to judge and even hate each (other) because of race?” Komrosky asked in an emailed statement Monday. “Parents want to be sure of two things; that their kids are safe and their kids are actually getting an education, instead of being indoctrinated by social/political theories such as this.”  

The resolution forbids district schools from teaching doctrines derived from CRT – such as the idea that an individual is inherently racist or sexist, is oppressed or an oppressor, or has inherent superiority because of his or her own race or sex.  

The resolution condemns racism and discrimination and argues CRT views racism incorrectly by saying prejudice is only racism when it is coupled with power.  

The local community had mixed reactions.  

“I am not sorry if a white student feels uncomfortable about learning about our nation’s true past,” said Madison Fuller, a student and president of Great Oak High School’s Black Student Union. “What’s used in our classrooms is critical, unbiased thinking, based on facts that help explain why our world is the way it is now.”  

Others lent their support to the board’s decision.  

“Temecula parents have a voice now,” said local resident Christopher Bout.  

Another resident called the board members who voted for the resolution “advocates and guardians of truth.”  

A third simply saw the resolution as unnecessary.  

“CRT is not taught in our public schools,” said Alexis Sanabria, a local parent of three. “Name a school, a classroom or a teacher who is teaching this anywhere in our system.”  

Whether or not the principles of CRT are taught in Temecula, they have certainly spread to other places, with unsettling results.  

As The Lion previously reported, one Kansas elementary student was given an assignment to “write a sentence explaining why you’re sorry for being white.”  

In March of 2021, an African American mother sued a Nevada charter school for giving her biracial son a failing grade after he refused to link aspects of his identity to oppression and dominance. 

Dana Stangel-Plowe, a New Jersey teacher, even resigned because her school required her to teach about “white privilege.”  

“The school’s ideology requires students to see themselves not as individuals, but as representatives of a group, forcing them to adopt the status of privilege or victimhood,” wrote Stangel-Plowe. 

In Temecula, Komrosky wants to be sure such ideology stays out. 

“CRT has no place in our schools,” he said. “CRT divides, and it is divisive.”