A fourth-grade teacher in Utah has wondered if her brand new school will accept her colorful classrom. As indicated by recent a social media post, though William Penn Elementary School is a white-majority school, her room is set up for nonwhites.
Here’s how she put it in a video:
“So for the first time in my life, I’m going to be teaching at a majority-white school. And I’m kind of interested to see how students and parents react to my classroom — or if they even notice anything about it. Because it’s built for nonwhite students.”
Why would anyone “build” a classroom for every race but one? Perhaps institutions have taught them it’s virtuous.
Not long ago, it would’ve signaled something else; but in a very short time, all things have been made new.
The teacher went on to explain she’s into “multicultural education.” Hence, no whites will be represented:
“[I]f you look around and you interact with some of the materials I have, you’ll notice that there’s, like, no white kids represented in that. So just on, like, that, that very first level of multicultural education. And I don’t think, like, my new students will mind. But, you know, not a single white face there.”
Did you have coloring books in 4th grade? Current kids do:
“Same with my coloring pages. I have a big stack of coloring pages that students can use, and not a single one with a person on it depicts a white person or character. ‘Cause I just kept looking for…pages for them that they’d…relate to.”
The teacher also prefers POCs — Princesses Of Color:
“And then the only Disney princesses I have are Mulan and Moana, because they’re some of my favorites. And coincidentally, they are not white.”
As for “diversity,” contemporarily, the term rarely references anything related to thought. Skin shades must be varied; perspectives, not so much. And whereas someone’s eating proclivities don’t define their status, the opposite is true of their sexual interests or sex-related self-conceit:
“Then another thing is my classroom library. Of course, literature is kind of dominated by straight, cis white men. So there is a good deal of that in my books. But it is overpowered now from all the books that I’ve been purchasing to add on to my library that depict a lot of diverse peoples — whether that’s people of color or, I have, like, books on nonbinary, trans, otherwise LGBTQ characters.”
Are all “posh, white parents” the same? She’s interested to find out:
“So there’s just not a lot of adherence to the status-quo on just that, like, base-level of my classroom. So I’m kind of wondering if, I feel like some parents might have something to say about that — if my experience with posh, white parents in the past holds true for this year. We’ll see.”
Online response hasn’t been purely positive. As reported by Fox News, Sunday night saw a statement by the head of the school.
The principal…issued a statement late Sunday night, saying it was her “personal commitment…to ensure every student feels safe and welcome,” and it is “inappropriate for any employee to make students feel unwelcome in any way, shape or form.”
The principal also noted the teacher had deleted the social media post, apologized for her comments, and that the district was investigating the situation to identify whether any district policies had been violated.
The video can still be seen here:
The educator appears to overwhelmingly view the world through an identity-group lens — not unlike, increasingly, the entire culture. And like many TikToking teachers, she evidently sees her classroom as a personal space.
The Granite School District may not feel the same. Speaking to Fox News Digital, a spokesperson promoted the probe:
“It would be in violation of our district policies to teach anything other than the approved curriculum and standards or to discriminate against any student. As soon as our investigation is complete, we anticipate taking appropriate corrective action. We know that it is our role as educators to support parents and the families we serve, and we value our parents and their engagement in our schools and classrooms.”
Eighty-five percent of William Penn Elementary’s 560 students are white.
-ALEX
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