Virginia remains the ONLY state to close K-12 rather than integrate.
Forget George Wallace in ‘The Schoolhouse Door’ – a University;
Virginia remains the ONLY state to close K-12 rather than integrate.
So let’s keep that “divisive” tale off the books.
‘We will remove politics from the classroom,’ thus spake Governor Glenn Youngkin, Jan. 15, 2022
His Executive Order No. 1 would end “the use of divisiveness concepts” in education, like “Critical Race Theory,” and is “restoring excellence in K-12 public education” across the Commonwealth.
https://www.governor.virginia.gov/media/governorvirginiagov/governor-of-virginia/pdf/74—eo/74—eo/EO-1—ENDING-THE-USE-OF-INHERENTLY-DI
Huzzah! And three times more.
So again, it is time again to “Praise Famous Men,” like a Governor Youngkin for his inauguration address and first act as chief executive last month, and “our fathers that begat us.”
[Ecclesiasticus, 44:1, King James Version]To say that Virginia has a checkered [fraught, dismal, find your own synonym] history when it comes to “public education” of the “little ones” would be “divisive,” and we wouldn’t want that.
We’ve already seen the General Assembly’s uniting the commonwealth as one – over three-fifths of a person for representation and “Lost Cause.” Oh well, there was a small split between parties in February; but no matter!
Certainly, the “tip line” to turn in wayward educators to the new sheriff in town was a YUGE step in that Trumpian direction of seeing the “1776 Commission” as the proper way to go. And a by-the-way, how come there’s no bounty – Texas saw the light, money works on “dropping the dime” on abortion aiders and abettors.
So let’s back up a bit on talking about schooling in the “First Permanent English Settlement in North America.”
Nah, not to 1607. [Heaven forbid, 1619! Divisive by date alone.] Late 1860s will do.
You could say that “ free public schools” in Virginia were included in the price of re-admission to the Union in 1870 when Congress accepted the commonwealth’s new constitution. The bigger price was Virginia’s acceptance of the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments of the federal constitution.
Nonetheless, it was on paper.
And sure as shooting, when setting up those “free public schools,” you wouldn’t want any “standards” over what needed to be taught, length of school year, and how’s that county or city going to pay for this “largesse,” once the Washington readmission gate opened and their federal soldiers started disappearing.
[Won’t mention “race mixing” as proposed. Would be “divisive.][Public School System in Virginia, Establishment of the – Encyclopedia Virginia]
And we certainly don’t need to dredge up the Freedmen’s Schools during the “late unpleasantness” and what followed and their abolitionist New England school marms. [In 1866, when there were no state-financed public schools in the Old Dominion, 200 teachers worked in 123 Freedmen schools, teaching 11,784 students. You could damn this as “federal overreach.” – Richmond Times, Aug. 29, 1866; but they were “segregated,” so we’ll skip them.]
After denouncing divisiveness and noting “(o)ur politics have become too toxic. Soundbites have replaced solutions — taking precedence over good faith problem-solving,” he promised “the world” for education – keep the school doors open [a bow to beleaguered parents in these plague years and a better chance to learn for their children over “screen time], higher pay for teachers, and “(w)e will create innovation lab and charter schools of achievement – within the public school system.”
Youngkin was born in Richmond in 1966 and graduated from Norfolk Academy, the state’s oldest private institution. So he should be no stranger to Virginia’s history although he probably would find its public schools foreign territory. His son attends a private prep school on the other side of the Potomac.
[Governor-Glenn-Youngkin’s-Inaugural-Address.pdf (virginia.gov)]Pretty sure, the Norfolk Academy or likely any other school – public, private or home – even mentioned the 1957 gubernatorial campaign that was as venomously racist as any in the state’s long history. The “soundbites” came down to how do YOU stand on “race mixing” in any way – including public schools.
Even before the “tip line,” educators surely would be loath to explain how Youngkin’s Republicans compared to earlier versions of the “Party of Lincoln” in Virginia. Hey, his only party predecessor this century, Bob McDonnell, proclaimed April “Confederate History Month” in 2010.
That’s as far back as they likely want to go – publicly. Privately, I can only guess there is a much different story.
[Anyone remember the “tiff” over Sons of Confederate Veterans” personalized license plates? Then Governor Terry McAuliffe found the plates “unnecessarily divisive and hurtful” – has a familiar ring to it. Virginia to Stop Offering Confederate License Plates (nbcnews.com). Context, he announced the decision in 2015 closely following the killings of black church attendees in Charleston, South Carolina.}And likewise explaining to Democrats in Virginia now to even Chuck Robb’s party – the one that substituted “mansions” and “manor house” for “plantations” to sweep away any reference to slavery and boost tourism in state advertising, let alone slamming school doors shut.
The working premise of the Democratic Party in the state in the 1950s was:
“Sen. Byrd Appeals to South for Massive Resistance Against U.S. Court Ruling,” Richmond News-Leader, Jan. 26, 1956; and Virginia would lead the way.
Ignore what the Supreme Court ruled on “separate but equal.” “All deliberate speed” translated into Virginia meant fight every federal court ruling, cut off state funds to any district that complied – even when it applied only to certain grades, and shrug shoulders at what anyone outside the state said.
As an example, the Newport News Daily Press’s page one headline on a later high court ruling coming down on Virginia’s segregated schools was apoplectic:
“High Court Breaking ‘Massive Resistance.’” Oct. 22, 1957. [Of course, fear of “breaking” was very premature.]
The working premise of the Republican Party in the state then was:
“It’s Time for a Change in Virginia” or “Carry Virginia Back to Her People,” paid political ads for Republican gubernatorial candidate Ted Dalton, Richmond Times-Dispatch, Nov. 4, 1957.
Dalton was crushed, receiving only a little more than 36 percent of the vote; J. Lindsay Almond moved from the attorney general’s office to the executive mansion, wearing Massive Resistance armor from head to foot.
Four years earlier, Dalton, although decisively beaten, received a little more than 44 percent of the vote.
Well during those heady days of ”Massive Resistance,” even with the spigot of Richmond money available to private academies, Norfolk found it couldn’t put 10,000 high schoolers in those mushrooming institutions to avoid “race mixing” in 1958.
So “parental control” came down to — fill in the blanks.
[Massive Resistance – Encyclopedia Virginia]]My brother-in-law was one of those Norfolk high schoolers. His parents, a career Navy family, opted out of the city’s public schools for a military prep school out of state. His father and paternal uncles had attended the same school, so it was not a leap into the darkness.
For other parents, there was the “higher education light at the end of the tunnel.” Shining brightly for those with legacy ties and enough credits.
About 100 of those Norfolk high schoolers applied for early admission to William and Mary at the start of the February terms.
[Daily Press, “Norfolk Seniors to Seek Permit to Enter W&M,” Nov. 13, 1958.]“Divisive?” Or “parental control” or a “sensible way out?”
So here we are now in 2022 – another winter of plague and a deeper freeze of discontent over schools.
And one more thing as we plunge forward, Virginia ranks 41st among states on spending per pupil in 2022. BTW. Governor Youngkin, it’s among the richest as well.
[And quietly under your breath governor and Virginia delegates of all stripes, praise socialist Biden for shoveling that federal money to the states for plague relief with more coming for infrastructure, like school buildings; but shout from the rooftops, how you whacked the sales tax. Worked for Jim Gilmore on property taxes to win the election — until the economy went south and somebody, somewhere had to find cash to pay police and fire.] [https://thecommonwealthinstitute.org/the-half-sheet/high-capacity-low-effort-virginias-school-funding-is-low-compared-to-most-rich-stat]And oh yes, I worked for the Daily Press whose photographers took the picture of the protesting of busing in Hampton.
I left the newspaper 31 years after Brown vs; and federal courts in Tidewater were still dealing with “desegreation cases.”
No “divisiveness” there.