On the recordMarch 23, 2023
This is another effort to turn classrooms into the epicenter of a culture war. The politics over parents act doesn't do anything to actually help students succeed and seeks to scare parents into thinking that schools do not have their best interests at heart. Children benefit when their parents and teachers work together, but the politics over parents act would not take any meaningful steps to increase that parental cooperation. The bill would create necessary and burdensome reporting requirements on schools. It would divert essential resources and personnel from their jobs, meeting the family's real needs into reporting and everything else in the bill, and it would open the door to dictating what students can and cannot read or learn. The underlying bill distracts from what our public schools really need. Similarly, the manager's amendment does nothing to provide the families with real parental engagement as some of the amendments would have done that were rejected. The bill, for example, gives a so-called Federal right of action to address the school board. We know that many school boards in recent years needed police protection to conduct their meetings because of credible threats of violence. These are elected officials. They don't need a Federal law to instruct them to be polite. The voters can take care of that. There is no right that is being given. We already have the right.…





