By Robert Sencenbaugh | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice
If you are on the left or the right, Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) in the average classroom does not look like one tends to believe. Both are far more subtle. Thus, any debate on these issues devolves into both sides yelling at one another with neither actually listening.
During a House Oversight Subcommittee on Health Care and Financial Services Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) declared, “We can stop with the nonsense because K-12 was not teaching critical race theory…in our country K-12 is not learning critical race theory. Just for those who are unfamiliar.”
Having taught in both Texas and Colorado, I can tell you that she is not being completely honest. While she is correct that “CRT” is not directly taught in any K-12 school or part of any state standards, it would be dishonest to believe that the ideas behind CRT are not taught in our schools. I have observed classrooms and read over lessons that assume CRT to be accurate.
Teachers who perhaps studied CRT or have learned some of the ideas behind it are passing this onto their students as factual. While college professors and other elites debate what CRT even is, many teachers in our classrooms implement it as truth.
However, CRT is not the whole issue here. CRT is just a part of a greater trend happening in education. That trend is students are learning that the United States is an evil country. While teachers oversimplify issues of race, slavery, and civil rights they ignore the very freedoms the U.S. ensures.
I believe that we can all admit that the U.S., like any other democratic nation, is flawed.
Further, students should learn to question and be able to form their own ideas and theories. That can only happen when students are presented with the least bias and most complete picture of our past.
After all, can one truly take the moral high ground on the 19th century slave economy while supporting a modern economy that relies on goods made in China or produced by those who work for less because they are in the U.S. illegally? How did we even get to this point?
The original thinking was that students were only getting a positive view of the U.S. This was viewed as a potential indoctrination. Therefore, to balance it out, they needed to show the other aspects to balance out the lessons.
Except, what the teachers seem to forget, is often this the first exposure students are getting. They did not go through the education system of the 20th century. So, instead of creating balance, what gets taught is yet another narrow and biased lesson. They have done the very thing they set out to correct.
DEI is yet another movement to correct past failures as well. The basic idea is that every student should have the same educational experience. This is a good idea in theory.
However, diversity in particular will look very different and even have different meanings on a macro and micro level. Often, diversity on a macro level tends to ignore the much more important socioeconomic challenges.
I spent my entire career working in Title I (schools that have more than 50% of the students on free or reduced lunch). My experience has shown me that financial struggles do not care about being diverse – from a student in my first year who waited until November for his mother to finally get out of prison, only to watch her get arrested 3 days later – to the student my last year who had a distant father consistently lead her on and let her down.
I have had students who were here illegally and their families only expected them to get to middle school, and then they would drop out and return home. I also had families who moved back and forth from Mexico and the U.S. as they tried to become citizens and follow the rules, wanting a better life for the family.
I’ve had students who were members of gangs and tried to assault me – and students who had difficulty controlling their emotions assault me.
This is what diversity really means and it has nothing to do with race.
This is where we need our best teachers, but instead this is where we send our beginning teachers. Often, those who wanted to be a teacher since they were in primary school are leaving the profession behind within two years.
This is where equity comes in. However, because equity comes with diversity, this means that while we work to bring students up, we are ignoring those students who are on level.
The solution has been to create individual lesson plans for each and every student.
Now, keep in mind that a typical lesson plan takes 30–40 minutes. Then, we take that lesson and modify it for the 25–30 students in primary – or 100–200 in secondary.
All this is expected to happen within a 50-minute planning period. What are teachers going to focus on?
It is not going to be the students that are at grade level. It is going to be the students who are below grade level, because if those students do not show growth, the teacher is most likely going to lose their job.
The more equity and inclusion in the classroom, the more time it is taking for planning and grading. Instead of bringing students up, we are lowering the bar to ‘make’ them successful.
The revelation here is that students can see it. They know when the work they produce is not where it should be. Thus, success is empty. The student is not developing the self-confidence that should be tied to success.
There are solutions for this. It starts with not getting rid of classes and programs that challenge and allow students to be successful above grade level. It means that not all classes can be equitable because success is not going to look the same for all students.
This does not mean we forget about those students who struggle. But expecting a 5th grader to read on a 6th grade level at the end of the school year when they are on a 2nd grade level at the start is not entirely realistic.
Two or three years’ growth is possible. It just takes support for the teacher, support for the student – and a lot of work from the teacher, student and family.
This can happen by putting money into the classroom – not administrators who tell teachers what to do without giving them the tools to actually do it.
DEI may sound like a good ideal to strive for, but in practice it is not actionable and tends to lead to academic mediocrity.
Instead, we should be striving for academic excellence. And to achieve that, students need plans that are specific, measurable and actionable.
Robert Sencenbaugh is a former Colorado middle school history teacher and seventh-generation Coloradan with a diverse background in education, broadcasting, and the oil and gas industry. He has taught 5th grade, Design Thinking, middle school history in Texas and served as a substitute teacher in several Colorado school districts. Currently, he works as a consultant and freelancer.
Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in commentary pieces are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the management of the Rocky Mountain Voice, but even so we support the constitutional right of the author to express those opinions.