Protect Nebraska Children Coalition Responds to Critics
by Katie McClemens
As children head back to school and an important election looms, educational issues have gained great attention, both locally and nationally. We at Protect Nebraska Children Coalition believe attention is typically good; however, attention to an issue without accurate information, true perspective, and broad experience can lead to wrong conclusions. In short, the future direction of education in Nebraska depends upon citizens whose understanding of the issues is deeper than slogans or headlines. For busy moms and dads, this can be a challenge. Protect Nebraska Children Coalition (PNCC) was created for the purpose of keeping Nebraskans informed on educational issues impacting our state.
Because truth matters, we at PNCC want to address some of the misconceptions and even misrepresentations that have confused many Nebraskans.
First, regarding the state health standards proposed last year, we would like to thank the hundreds of citizens who gave feedback to both the Nebraska Department of Education and the state board of education. Parents across the state became focused anew on their children’s educational experience - even if those in favor of the standards did not like what they had to say. The stakeholders who advocated for their children were well researched and articulate. They quickly understood that replacing the state’s current health framework with state standards (which are not required by our legislature and failed twice in the unicameral previously), might well impact their local district and student. They understood that curriculum must follow adopted standards. If readers watch the replays of the May and June 2021 State Board of Education meetings, they will hear parents using actual examples from Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) curriculum, citing pages and lesson numbers.
A popular CSE curriculum, “Rights, Respect and Responsibility” is readily available through the source website which is www.advocatesforyouth.org. This curriculum, currently used in Omaha schools, is produced by Planned Parenthood and offered free of charge to schools. Bravo to these informed, passionate stakeholders, who persisted and continue to persist even in the face of frequent slander and ridicule from those in favor of the agenda represented by the proposed health standards of last year.
We at Protect Nebraska Children Coalition understand the standard-development process well as we have studied NDE policy documents, spoken with NDE staff, and talked with teachers involved in standards creation at the state level. We also understand, thanks to public records requests, that the process was blatantly abused and manipulated last year, through the efforts of certain NDE staff members and at least one state school board member, with the assistance of a Planned Parenthood board member and CSE instructor who added to the proposed standards after teachers had written them. In the human development section, the revisions by this CSE activist were so extensive that one of the original authors, a Nebraska teacher, emailed the NDE and described the final version of the proposed standards as very different from the version she and other teachers on the writing team had written.
It’s important to note: Comprehensive Sexuality Education (“CSE”) is NOT sex education. Sex education teaches biological names and functions, human development, and the reproductive cycle. However, the newly proposed standards sought to replace the state’s current health framework (which is very good) with standards copied directly from www.siecus.org whose stated mission is “Sex Ed for Social Change.” SIECUS emphasizes “sexual rights” and gender fluidity as well as “social and reproductive justice,” including abortion on demand and sexually explicit materials for students. The smart stakeholders of Nebraska and experts from around the state sounded the alarm that early sexualization of our children is not best practice and would not result in high academics, much less physical or emotional health. Nebraskans further rejected the promotion of political ideologies focused on dividing our students. Time spent in our classrooms must be focused on academic excellence, not misplaced activism.
We at PNCC are motivated to keep working because we care about Nebraska’s children. We care about Nebraska’s families. And we care about our state’s teachers who are once again preparing to meet the challenges of another year with hard work, hope, and expectations for good. We believe that parents must take an active role in their children’s education and upbringing and students are best served when schools and parents work together. We believe divisive, politically charged, social ideologies have no place in our classrooms and classroom time is best spent honing academic skills and character development that will create lifelong learners and healthy, productive citizens.
Will this be met with vitriolic responses calling us haters? Probably. Will accusations of “misinformation” be slung our way? No doubt. But PNCC will just keep doing what we do best—keeping moms and dads across the state informed and involved for the betterment of our schools and communities. Join us at protectnebraskachildren.org.
Katie McClemens is a wife, mother, and life-long Nebraskan. She is an educator with a degree in middle level education from the University of Nebraska at Kearney and has served on the leadership team of PNCC since its inception.