EDWARDSBURG, Mich. — REAL News Michiana has discovered one of the leading candidates to take the Superintendent position at Edwardsburg schools has a long history of pushing Critical Race Theory and radical Gender Theory onto teachers, staff and students in the classroom. Sarah J. Hickle is one of three of the final candidates who will be interviewed by the Edwardsburg School Board tonight. Hickle is currently the Assistant Superintendent at School City of Mishawaka.
PUSHING RADICAL IDEOLOGY
Hickle started to become a major influence in pushing Critical Race Theory and Gender ideology into the schools when she organized and developed a statewide professional development seminar called “The Whole Child Workshop” hosted at the Mishawaka High School in 2018. Hickle was the Director of Student Learning and Innovation at the time.
The keynote speaker during that event is one of the national leaders of pushing Critical Race theory into the classroom, Jamie Utt. Utt also had several breakout sessions during the seminar.
WHO IS JAMIE UTT?
Utt was ahead of the times when it comes to pushing Critical Race Theory tenets in public school education. In 2016, Utt published an article called “Race-Evasive White Teacher Identity Studies.” Utt also published an article in which Utt claims charter schools were founded by white supremacists in which Utt draws the research and conclusions from “critical race framework.”
During the 2018 seminar in Mishawaka, Utt did not hold back on teaching teachers how to incorporate CRT. One of the breakout sessions was titled “The unexamined whiteness of Schools: How understanding Whiteness can transform the work of white educators.” The following is a description pulled directly from the workshop schedule.
When we talk about race in schools, we usually talk about community members of Color. Rarely, though, do we talk about Whiteness. As an educator and scholar of Whiteness and teaching, Jamie Utt will help participants understand what Whiteness actually is (it’s probably not what you think) and will lead participants through a critical examination of how Whiteness is at play in the work of White educators. Finally, the workshop will empower White educators with tools for better understanding how they can craft more racially-conscious and anti-racist practices through understanding Whiteness.
Utt also had a breakout session titled “Identity-Based Bullying” — described as a workshop that “will posit an understanding of Identity-Based Bullying as central to addressing bullying behavior.”
Hickle herself took to social media to discuss how much she enjoyed the Critical Race Theory teachings by Utt. In a post on Twitter in June of 2018, Hickle wrote that Utt “was awesome, pushing our thinking about identity and power.”
Hickle also posted several pictures and comments showing Utt had been working with students before the seminar to push Critical Race Theory at the school.
RADICAL GENDER THEORY
At the same seminar, Hickle also had a man who goes by the name of Meghan Buell attend as a speaker. Buell, who identifies as a woman, is the head of the radical organization Trees Inc. (Transgender Resource, Education and Enrichment Services).
At the seminar, Buell gave a session called “Supporting Gender Variant Students” which is described in the seminar schedule as follows: “This presentation will focus on supporting students who do not identify within the gender binary. Attendees will gain a better grasp for the terminology and language that surrounds the transgender/gender non-binary community. The goal of the presentation is to help attendees to become culturally aware of their diverse students, develop respectful communication skills and connect with the best resources available for interacting with gender variant students.”
BACKGROUND OF HICKLE
The Edwardsburg School Board is scheduled to interview Hickle tonight at 8:00pm.
The current Superintendent is retiring at the end of June.
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One can only wonder about the A.P. version of U.S. History Hickle teaches. I’m sure Howard Zinn’s, A People’s History is required reading. We have to flush these idiots out of our school systems. No wonder Johnny can’t read, but he can put a condom on a cucumber, using only his teeth.