Test Scores Plummet After School Rolls Out 'Woke Kindergarten'
Here’s more evidence that the phrase “go woke, go broke” might have some truth to it.
A California elementary school paid an organization called Woke Kindergarten $250,000 to train its teachers how to “confront white supremacy” and “disrupt racism and oppression,” the San Francisco Chronicle reported Feb. 3.
Woke Kindergarten has been conducting training sessions at Glassbrook Elementary School in Hayward, south of Oakland, for two years. The program is funded through a federal program assisting low-performing schools, the Chronicle reported.
Not surprisingly, the focus on wokeness and racism has been detrimental to Glassbrook’s students.
The Chronicle reported that English and math scores hit shocking lows in spring 2023, with less than 4 percent of students proficient in math and a little under 12 percent scoring at their grade level in English. Those figures were a nearly 4 percent drop in each category.
According to its website, Woke Kindergarten’s goal is “supporting children, families, educators and organizations in their commitment to abolitionist early education and pro-black and queer and trans liberation.”
Woke Kindergarten is a real organization that sells their services to schools. Their mission is teach kids we can abolish work, landlords, Israel, and borders! One Bay Area school paid them 250k and watched student scores drop. Their “woke wonderings” are sadly hilarious. pic.twitter.com/kPTp223HDN
— Carl (@HistoryBoomer) February 4, 2024
University of California, Berkeley education professor Zeus Leonardo told the Chronicle that the idea behind Woke Kindergarten is to make “politics part of the framework of teaching.”
But the program, and its mission, have had mixed reviews from staff. Tiger Craven-Neely, a teacher at Glassbrook, was confused by the program’s objectives of “disrupting whiteness” and the use of the phrase “so-called United States.”
“What does that mean?” Craven-Neely said. “I just want to know, what does that mean for a third-grade classroom?”
An anonymous Glassbrook teacher said the program offered only one viewpoint and “it slowly became very apparent if you were a dissenting voice that it’s not what they wanted to hear.”
However, Hayward Unified School District Superintendent Jason Reimann claimed Woke Kindergarten has been a net benefit.
Reimann told the Chronicle that the organization’s training program is supported by parents and teachers and that school attendance has increased from 61 percent of students chronically absent to 44 percent.
“We are in favor 100 percent of abolishing systems of oppression where they hold our students back. What I do believe is we should pick providers based on their work and how effective they are,” Reimann said.
If that’s the case, what metric is the district using to determine how effective providers are?
This program shows the significant danger that organizations like Woke Kindergarten pose to the development of our nation’s youth.
They do not care about the future of these children. They do not care if their programs are setting the children up for failure. They only care about indoctrinating children with their ideology, in hopes that they will grow up to spread these views far and wide.
But these students are not adults who have the ability to discern which political path they wish to take. They are young children who have little to no concept of what politics, racism, wokeness or any of the goals of Woke Kindergarten really are.
It’s abhorrent that these organizations refuse to allow children to be children and instead only see them as prospective members who can prolong their mission.
This all comes against the backdrop of the significant setback American students suffered during the COVID-19 pandemic. Education Week reported in 2022 that post-pandemic scores in the National Assessment of Educational Progress aptitude tests in math for fourth- through eighth-graders saw the biggest drop in performance since the program began in 1990.
It also said a third of students cannot even read at the basic achievement level, which is the lowest level of the tests.
It’s safe to say that education in America is in a crisis — and organizations like Woke Kindergarten are doing nothing to help.
What kids really need is to be taught basic skills in reading, writing and mathematics, not that all white people are evil and deserve to be punished.
In effect, by teaching students and teachers that certain groups are racist and evil and others are perpetually victimized and subjugated in society, organizations like Woke Kindergarten keep the racist flames from dying out.
By refusing to let our country heal from its racist past, they will never let us take a step forward to a better future.
But they don’t seem to care about the future, given that they are content with American students scoring at ridiculously low levels across multiple subjects.
Any parent who cares about his or her child’s future would serve them best by taking them out of any school that seeks to promote woke ideology, and instead focus on what the schools themselves should focus on: educating.
Not only is the future of children, and the lives they made lead, at stake, but so is the future of our nation.
Parents need to take control of their children’s education and prevent woke organizations from diluting the minds of our youth. Without such action, the future of the ones who need our protection the most is in jeopardy.
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