Dear Friend,
School boards like the Albemarle County School Board in Virginia say they want to stand against racism. But instead, they tried to combat one form of racism with another, resulting in a policy that is racist at its core.
Grounded in “critical theory”, the board adopted a so-called “Anti-Racism Policy” in 2019. That policy instructs teachers and students to focus on race, treat students differently based on race, and indoctrinate students in radical racial ideologies, including “critical race theory” (CRT).
In late December, Alliance Defending Freedom filed a lawsuit on behalf of five families against the board for enacting this discriminatory policy and indoctrinating students.
We’re asking a Virginia state court to halt the school board’s enforcement of its policy.
Students’ constitutional rights don’t end at the schoolhouse gate. Neither does a parent’s right to direct the upbringing of their children.
Every student deserves to be treated equally under the law, regardless of their race, ethnicity, or religion. Public schools cannot attack or demean students based on these, or any other, characteristics.
Friend, will you join with these families and help challenge racist, discriminatory policies like those implemented by the Albemarle County School Board?
How the policy violates the rights of students and parentsThe policy and corresponding curriculum:- Promotes race-based division and resentment, laying the collective guilt of racism at the feet of white students and their families. CRT wrongly teaches students of color that they have no hope to achieve success no matter what they do. It teaches white students that they have no hope of being found innocent of racism no matter what they do.
- Violates students’ civil rights by treating them differently based on race.
- Compels many students to affirm and support ideas contrary to their deeply held moral, philosophical, and religious beliefs.
- Forbids objections to the curriculum from students and punishes those who dissent, mislabeling any contrary opinion as “racist”.
- Disregards and violates parents’ rights by indoctrinating their children, undermining their children’s humanity, and denigrating their deeply held religious beliefs.
According to officials, the curriculum will be “woven through all the classes” in schools.
The U.S. Constitution prohibits students from being discriminated against on the basis of race. So does the Virginia constitution and state law.
Discriminating on the basis of race today won’t remedy any past injustice. It will only inflict more on a new generation.
You see, critical theory—in its various manifestations—holds the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and America itself, in contempt as irredeemably evil and in need of being overthrown.
America has not always lived up to her principles. But the solution is not to teach our children to reject the great American promise. Instead, we need to learn from the best and worst parts of our history and work to make the American dream a reality for all Americans.
Will you make a gift right now to help fund this critical case and other cases like it where fundamental rights are at stake?
Racist policies are not what students and parents deserve—or needEvery student deserves to be treated equally under the law, regardless of their race, ethnicity, or religion. And all parents deserve to raise their children according to their deeply held beliefs and values.
The last two years have been hard enough on parents, and especially on kids. It’s also been hard on students and teachers. Now that most are back in school, they want to focus on academics. The last thing they need are policies that perpetuate racial division and strife.
So, our clients are taking a stand.
These five families come from a wide range of backgrounds. One couple immigrated from Panama in search of the American dream. The father built a successful medical career and instilled his children with the idea that success comes from hard work. Another parent’s father came to the U.S. from Turkey with very little. He also built a successful career and taught his children to work hard.
But the families are united in their common goal of eliminating racial discrimination in Albemarle’s schools. And they’ve seen the damage wrought by critical theory in the classroom. Their faith and their beliefs lead them to wholeheartedly oppose Albemarle’s policy.
As ADF General Counsel Kristen Waggoner has said,
“The school district’s indoctrination directly contradicts the teaching of Scripture that we are all created in the image of God, equally fallen, equally loved, and given equal access to redemption. By telling students that guilt or innocence is based on one’s race or other characteristics, the district denigrated these parents’ Christian beliefs.”
The Albemarle County School Board—and other school districts across the U.S. that follow suit—are violating students’ and parents’ constitutional freedoms. And that cannot stand.
Will you make a gift right now to help fund this critical case and other cases like it where fundamental rights are at stake?
Friend, Chief Justice Roberts memorably stated: “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.”
Today, parents, like those in Albemarle County, are standing up against these policies. They refuse to stand by as children—the next generation—are indoctrinated in radical ideology and discriminated against based on race.
Will you stand with them?
For Truth,
Alliance Defending Freedom
P.S. This case is crucial as we begin to challenge the indoctrination of students in critical theory ideology across the country. Please give today.
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