Georgia school district intends to fire teacher after she read book about gender identity to fifth grade class, document shows

[Yes fire her]

She needs her teaching credentials revoked and to be fired.

A Georgia teacher is facing termination after reading a book about gender
identity – which some parents complained was controversial – to her fifth
grade class.

Cobb County School District (CCSD) informed the teacher, Katherine
Rinderle, that it “intends to terminate” her employment at Due West
Elementary School after she read the book “My Shadow is Purple” to her
students, according to a charge letter from the school district reviewed
by CNN. The school district told Rinderle that she was being fired “on the
grounds of insubordination, willful neglect of duties and any other good
and sufficient cause.”

In the charge letter, CCSD claimed Rinderle violated at least six district
policies and administrative rules, which include two polices based on
Georgia laws passed last year – one that restricts instruction of
“divisive concepts” and another that provides greater transparency to
parents and legal guardians regarding what their children are being
taught.

Rinderle said the school district has not told her what “divisive” means.

“They actually said that it was intentionally written in a way that left
room for it to be covered in various ways. So no, it has never been
answered to me,” Rinderle said.

The lesson was brought to the school district’s attention after several
parents complained that Rinderle had introduced “a controversial subject
(gender identity/fluidity) that is not an appropriate school topic for ten
and eleven-year-old students” in class, according to the document.

Rinderle told CNN that after reading and buying the book from a Scholastic
Book Fair held at the school in February, she presented the book to her
students who chose the title out of a selection of books she presented to
the class.

“I read it and I just knew that it had a great message. I really resonated
with its message of acceptance of oneself and others, and every book I had
in my classroom is one of acceptance,” Rinderle said. “I knew that this
book would fit perfectly in my classroom.”

Craig Goodmark, a lawyer representing Rinderle, told CNN he and his client
believe the book was neither inappropriate, controversial or divisive, and
disagreed with the school district’s position.

Written by Scott Stuart, “My Shadow is Purple” describes itself as “a
heartwarming and inspiring book about being true to yourself.” According
to a description of the book by publisher Larrikin House, “This story
considers gender beyond binary in a vibrant spectrum of colour.” The book
was nominated for a 2023 Australian Book Industry Award.

After reading it to the class, Rinderle said students “discussed the
overall message of acceptance,” and then did “a self-reflective piece with
their connections to their gifted side or whatever it may be through their
shadow poem.”

CCSD claimed Rinderle “implemented this lesson without informing
administration or families ahead of time or providing families an
opportunity to opt out of the lesson or address the topic with their
children first,” according to the document.

Rinderle, who has been teaching in Cobb County for 10 years, told CNN
that, with the exception of sexual education classes, teachers are not
required to obtain parent pre-approval of lesson topics before they are
taught to students.

When asked if the district has a required approval process for clearing
books used by teachers in the classroom, Rinderle said there was not.
Teachers use their professional judgment to review books before placing
them in their classrooms, she said.

CNN reached out to the principal of the school for comment but has not
heard back.

Rinderle explained she was placed on administrative leave less than a week
after she read the book to students on March 8.

The teacher said she was initially called into the principal’s office to
discuss an email complaint from a parent who “thought that this book was
inappropriate.” Several days later, she met with an investigator from the
school district.

By the following Monday, Rinderle said that she had been placed on
administrative leave. By May 5, the district told her she had the option
to resign or “they would move forward with the recommendation for
termination.”

After she refused to resign, Rinderle told CNN she received a charge
letter dated June 6, in which the district notified her of its intention
to fire her.

The district alleged that students reported that Rinderle taught this
lesson during a time designated for math instruction and claimed that the
teacher denied doing so. According to the letter, when asked to provide
evidence, Rinderle was not able to produce any showing that she had
“instructed students in math intervention on this date.”

The teacher was also accused of failing to acknowledge that reading the
book to fifth graders in a public elementary school was “inappropriate,”
as well as failing to acknowledge that the book dealt with gender
identity, the district’s letter said.

According to the charge letter, Rinderle was previously cautioned about
her selection of another book. In January 2022, she read the children’s
book “Stacey’s Extraordinary Words” by then Democratic gubernatorial
candidate Stacey Abrams and posted about it on Instagram. At the time,
some parents complained of the perception of political bias.

Rinderle said the district’s inclusion of the Abrams book in the charge
“is a bit ridiculous” because no issue was brought up to her regarding
that book.

“I did read that book, and there was never an issue with that book. There
was never a conversation about that book as far as, you know, me not
needing to read that book,” Rinderle said, “My principal thought it was a
great book.”

Goodmark said the reasons laid out by the school district for the
termination remain unclear. “If you’re going to fire a teacher, it needs
to be done on a policy that people understand and can predict whether or
not they’re in violation of it,” he said.

“All relevant facts and policies will be reviewed during the employee’s
hearing,” the district said in an email. “Without getting into specifics
of the personnel investigation, the District is confident that this action
is appropriate considering the entirety of the teacher’s behavior and
history. The District remains committed to strictly enforcing all Board
policy, and the law,” the Cobb County School District said in a statement
to CNN.

Jeff Hubbard, president of the Cobb County Association of Educators – a
teachers advocacy group representing Rinderle – told CNN that the divisive
concepts law focuses on race and political teachings, but that “My Shadow
is Purple” doesn’t focus on either.

“There’s nothing in that story that talks about race or political
teachings,” Hubbard said, adding that legislation such as this has made
teachers question what they can teach in class.

Goodmark noted that the lesson about “My Shadow is Purple” included
“various types of concepts of acceptance and diversity, both between
gender identity and racial diversity and all the other ways that we want
our kids in the fifth grade to be able to interact with each another.”

Goodmark said Rinderle’s personnel file has “no negatives in it.”

“She has a sterling record. Her evaluations are strong. She’s a tenure
educator who has not, to my knowledge, ever received a negative
evaluation,” Goodmark said.

Rinderle remains on “administrative leave with pay pending the outcome of
her termination hearing,” Goodmark said. Her hearing is set for August 3.

Ray
1 day ago

I seriously doubt that she did not know that the gender identity/fluidity
ideology is controversial.

I also see that insubordination is one of the reasons she is being fired.
The article does not give the whole story here about that. As a
supervisor where I work, insubordination would be ascribed to an employee
deliberately refusing to perform a work duty or assignment they have been
given directly either verbally or in writing.

https://news.yahoo.com/georgia-school-district-intends-fire-001913091.html

[Farm animal report]

Woke is eating it's own.

Aformer community college Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) director
and tenured faculty member is suing her former employer for allegedly
stunting her free speech and academic freedom.

DEI is almost everywhere in current U.S. society, including in
congressional amendments for military-related funding and across the
business sector. Questions remain about its overall effectiveness,
however, as only approximately three in 10 workers value a diverse
workplace and about 30 percent of American employers have a staff member
who promotes DEI, according to the Pew Research Center.

Tabia Lee, who is Black, was recently terminated from her position at De
Anza Community College, located in Cupertino, California, as a full-time,
tenured member after working in the education field for approximately two
decades.

A 53-page lawsuit filed July 10 claims that she was accused of
"whitesplaining" and not being the "right kind of Black person," as well
as vilified for refraining from invoking racial stereotypes and refusing
to use the term "Latinx" instead of "Latinos."

In March of this year, she was informed by De Anza that she would be
terminated "because of her viewpoints and protected public speech and
because of De Anza and the District's ideological opposition to Dr. Lee's
humanism in the classroom," according to the complaint.

"These are people who should definitely know better," Lee told Newsweek in
a phone interview. "And the way that they behaved was what they claim
other people do to marginalized people. They literally marginalized me as
an individual, and they shunned me and they worked really hard to push me
out."

She is currently without a job and wants her old position back, plus
benefits and other financial damages incurred.

"Foothill-De Anza Community College District has an obligation to protect
privacy in personnel matters," a spokesperson for the college told
Newsweek via email. "Without commenting on any specific matter, we can
share that faculty members have comprehensive due process and appeal
rights both under the law and negotiated through their bargaining unit."

A 'troublesome habit of thinking rationally'
Lee, who is from Sacramento, has a sociology background and has instructed
students of different age levels at multiple institutions.

She said she was originally hired by De Anza in August 2021 and had
aspirations to retire there, but soon found out the situation was
"hostile."

Lee, whose name and work have been erased from De Anza's website, told
Newsweek that what she encountered there was something she never
previously experienced—including a constant "focus on whiteness" and
"white supremacy culture," which she said was weaponized against her and
other faculty members as part of chilled free speech and academic freedom.

One alleged instance resulted in Lee being called "a dirty Zionist" for
having certain speakers on campus, which reverberated up to the college's
Board of Trustees.

"I was elevating the wrong people," others allegedly said, according to
Lee. "They called and referred to Jewish people as white oppressors. I had
brought speakers into the campus to do antisemitism education and Jewish
inclusion education, based on community members coming directly to us and
saying they had concerns about our Jewish students at our school."

Michael Allen, one of Lee's attorneys in this case, told Newsweek via
phone that his firm only represents faculty and students against
universities. He referred to the Lee case as "a natural fit."

"[Lee] had this troublesome habit of thinking rationally, which they
really don't like at De Anza College," Allen said.

He said that while many community colleges provide courses for individuals
to get their GEDs, in fields like nursing or in the trades, De Anza made
it seem like the faculty's "sole purpose was to train revolutionary social
activists or something."

That included forcing faculty members to make "land acknowledgments"
recognizing Native American tribes in a manner that is not historically or
anthropologically accurate, or forcing the declaration of pronouns without
providing choice.

Leigh Ann O'Neill is the managing director of legal advocacy for the
Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism (FAIR), a nonpartisan
organization dedicated to civil rights and liberties.

She has known Lee for about 18 months, saying that education is supposed
to be about understanding different viewpoints and forging a meaningful
path forward.

"What we've observed is that in different ways her speech was censored or
chilled," O'Neill told Newsweek via phone. "And if it had been the same
type of speech from somebody else, that might not have happened.

"So, there's this really disturbing interplay that takes place between the
First Amendment rights and then how discrimination laws are impacted when
an institution that's as powerful as the employer doesn't like the
particular content of one's speech—and that's what we saw in her case."

Support from Educators Nationwide
In Lee's case, her criticism against the tenets of social justice and its
ties to identity-based power dynamics—as she wrote in an essay published
in Compact earlier this year—was deemed antithetical to the traditional
role DEI instructors and directors typically play, at least at De Anza.

"It is very unusual," Allen said. "Very often people who are hired in that
capacity lead the charge to suppress academic freedom and free inquiry on
campus when people object to their orthodoxy. Here, they hired someone who
really was teaching from a civil rights perspective.

"And really, this is a very simple issue: Tabia Lee was promoting civil
and human rights. In other words, that all people should be treated
equally."

O'Neill called De Anza's alleged thwarting of Lee's academic freedom
"particularly daunting" due to institutions of higher education being able
to exercise their upper hands.

"That limits the ability of students to learn and shut out diverging
viewpoints," she said. "You can only describe that as antithetical to
education."

Lee said she has heard from countless individuals since her story first
spread in the spring, including mentors at De Anza in addition to tenured
and non-tenured faculty members from both public and private institutions
nationwide.

She found that no matter the tenure or the institution, her situation is
"not unique" to De Anza and that a slew of educators is opposing the same
orthodoxy infiltrating schools across the spectrum. She said environments
of critical thinking should be the last place this occurs.

"[De Anza] couldn't silence me through any legitimate means or objectively
based means around my real performance, so they really subverted this
process to silence the emergent work that I was starting to do...I'm just
one person but I try to write back to each of them and to encourage them
because you can't give up," Lee said through tears.

She added: "We're interconnected whether we like it or not, and we need to
work together; we need to talk together. It doesn't mean we need to agree
and have rainbows from the sky. But we just have to be able to coexist
with one another and to be able to listen to someone who has a different
perspective and to still work with that person."

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/dei-college-director-fired-for-not-
being-right-kind-of-black-person/ar-
AA1dZizy?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=a38a2a4d9aa74c1b8829046b5a0b85c1&ei=13