Gov. Youngkin’s Executive Order No. 1 Addresses Education

Glenn Youngkin was sworn in as Virginia Governor yesterday, January 15, 2022.  As his first act in office, he signed Executive Order No. 1, which addresses Critical Race Theory and other divisive education policies.  A copy of the Executive Order is HERE.

The Order is a significant step in the right direction, but it is not a panacea for all the problems plaguing the Fairfax County school system.

Executive Order No. 1.

The Order states that “political indoctrination has no place in our classrooms. . . . Inherently divisive concepts, like Critical Race Theory and its progeny, instruct students to only view life through the lens of race and presumes that some students are consciously or unconsciously racist, sexist, or oppressive, and that other students are victims.”  As stated in the Order, “Critical Race Theory and related concepts are teaching our children to engage in the very behavior the Constitution prohibits,” i.e., discrimination on the basis of race, religious conviction, etc.

The Order directs the new Superintendent of Public Instruction to do a number of things immediately to identify and eliminate policies, programs, training and curricula at the Commonwealth level that embody “inherently divisive concepts,” which are defined to include several of the tenets of Critical Race Theory.  The Order also directs the Superintendent to (1) take action to ensure that parents have more open access to instructional materials and (2) put in place fair and open policies to address citizens’ concerns in a timely and respectful manner.

Significance of the Order

The Order is a significant step in the right direction, but it deals with only one aspect of the overall ideology of the Fairfax County School Board.  Its positive aspects are:

• The Order addresses a key campaign promise.  The issue of divisive ideology in Virginia schools was a major issue in the gubernatorial campaign.  Dealing with it in his first executive action suggests a real commitment by Governor Youngkin to eliminate Critical Race Theory and its tenets from Virginia schools.
• The Order was drafted with care and thoughtfulness.  Merely banning the teaching of “Critical Race Theory” would leave huge loopholes for avoidance.  The Order uses the term “inherently divisive concepts” to describe the doctrines to which it is addressed, and that term is defined with some specificity.
• The requirement for more open access to instructional materials is particularly welcome to Fairfax Schools Monitor.  Getting access to these materials in the Fairfax County school system has been a time-consuming process.  The social studies textbooks are hard to get unless you are a parent of a student taking a particular course, because they are online materials that are only available to students.  Even more difficult is getting access to the underlying curricula.  Although the materials are available via the Freedom of Information Act, it has taken several requests to bore down through the various levels of documents, and even now it’s not clear that all relevant materials have been obtained.

On the other hand, the Order does not address all the problems parents are having with the policies and curricula of the current administration.  For one thing, there are some issues — e.g., alleged pornography in the school libraries, balancing the rights of transgender students with those of other students, etc. — that are completely outside the scope of Executive Order No. 1.

Additionally, the Executive Order mainly deals with what can be described as the “micro” issues of curriculum content, not the “macro” issues.  The Order bans teaching that individuals of one race, sex, etc. are superior or inferior to those of another, that individuals of one race, sex, etc. bear responsibility for past injustices, and so forth.  The Order does not explicitly deal with “macro” issues, such as teaching that the history of the United States can be explained primarily by the influence of bias, privilege and powerful interests.

The Need for Diligent Citizen Participation Must Continue

Reversing the divisive policies and curricula that have taken hold will not be easy.  For one thing, Governor Youngkin’s Executive Order only deals with one issue, as explained above.  But even within the scope of the Order, compliance won’t happen overnight, and might not happen at all.

The Fairfax County School Board has been determined, aggressive and unanimous in putting in place the training materials and curricula that include the divisive concepts of privilege, inherent bias, inherent disadvantage, and the like.  It must be assumed that the authorities will delay or minimize compliance if they can.

For these reasons, concerned citizens must continue to keep informed and to make their voices heard.