Justin Parmenter: Disingenuous Republicans want to force overworked NC public school teachers to post all lesson plans online because indoctrination
Justin Parmenter explains what’s behind the latest indignity foisted on North Carolina teachers.
The 2024 North Carolina General Assembly session has barely begun, and already Republican legislators whose favorite reelection campaign tactic is punching down on public schools are taking aim at our state’s long-suffering teachers.
Only weeks after the Department of Public Instruction released data showing North Carolina teachers are quitting in record numbers (1 in 9 resigned last school year), and just in time for Teacher Appreciation Week, four House members have filed a bill titled “Academic Transparency” which would force all teachers to post their lesson plans online with their names attached “no later than 10 days after the lesson was given.”
The bill’s primary sponsors are Jake Johnson of Polk County, Union County’s David Willis, Hugh Blackwell of Burke County and Allen Chesser from Nash County.
All four of these distinguished gentlemen have histories of fanning fake culture war flames and encouraging the public to distrust public schools because they believe it may help their chances at being reelected and holding on to power.
David Willis of Union County was a founding member of Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson’s 2021 FACTS Task Force. FACTS was Robinson’s witch hunt to root out indoctrination in North Carolina’s schools by encouraging the public to file complaints about teachers online. Those complaints were then published with no substantiation or redaction.
(Side note: most of the submissions to the FACTS web portal were from people roasting Robinson over his obviously political stunt.)
When he’s not hunting witches, Willis is talking about how much he loves public school teachers, who he says “deserve our respect, our support, and need to be more highly valued.”
Know anyone who’s in a position to make that happen, Representative Willis?
Read the full post here at Notes from the Chalkboard.