CRT in Schools is Pointless if the Schools Suck
Trying to teach people who can't read well, university-level sociological theories? LOL
For whatever reason, Critical Race Theory (CRT) has made itself a significant element of debate in the mainstream culture wars. What was online, now has spiraled into material reality. State legislatures are ensnared in a battle between progressive and conservative beliefs regarding education, particularly through the K-12 level. This has dominated the summer’s discourse on racial equity, just one year after the outbreak of nationwide protests (arguably turned riots).
Obviously, these are generalizations, as the spectrum of opinions regarding CRT in K-12 education is broad, but generally, they can be synthesized as such:
Progressives see CRT as the academic technique needed to reorder what they view as societal power imbalances, starting in early education. For example, a perceived power imbalance (between White and Black Americans) would stem from the lack of in-depth education on the historical persecution of minorities in American schools. A progressive might argue that the reality of violence, bigotry, and racial supremacy is softened or glossed over to the benefit of groups dominant in society (i.e. the white majority).12 34
To teach a child say, of the 1619 project in early education serves to raise an adult who understands the way in which historical narratives have been oriented to serve those in power, and how that intersects with current political and sociocultural predicaments. To a minority child, it is an assurance of identity, a validation of generational suffering, and an opportunity to succeed in a system being reorganized to be inclusive of them. To a white child, it is a check on behavior (curbing bigotry), a moderation of social/institutional power, and an opportunity to learn a more inclusive (or accurate, by progressive eyes) history.56 Though some argue that Conservative opposition generalizes CRT as any anti-racist teaching, in this essay, it is defined as it appears in discourse — broadly applicable to anti-racist education in its attempt to restructure the national historiography into one that is appropriately “anti-racist” or acknowledging of its racism.78
Conservatives argue that CRT is grievance politics infiltrating child education. It is not an academic technique, but rather a tool of ideology. It is propaganda that demonizes white students and reorients the American historical narrative into one that is both A) rhetorically manipulative (to the ideological benefit of the progressives) and B) factually inaccurate.9 Conservatives fear that the implementation of the 1619 project in schools as reading material, for example, teaches students an American history that has the historical narrative reframed around the Transatlantic slave trade, only in the interests of the progressive narratives. There are concerns that CRT public education would also lead to the social vilification of and discrimination against white students, as the discipline is perceived as being focused on portraying White Americans poorly.10
The fervor of the discourse has many seeing it as an urgent matter, particularly due to the transitionary/unstable state public schools have been left in due to the pandemic. The emotional uproar behind perceived racial inequities has brought it to the attention of major officials (local, state, and federal) and pundits (online and off). But it makes one wonder, “…does any of it really matter?”
Around 21 percent of adults (somewhere in the ballpark of 43 million) in the United States qualify as being illiterate/functionally illiterate (incapable of performing the reading necessary for daily tasks).11 Non-US-born Americans make up a significant minority of this percentage (~34% illiterate, of ~15% of the population) however still, 66% are native-born. 69% of this illiterate population identifies as White or Hispanic (35% and 34%, respectively).12
Nearly 2/3rds of fourth-graders read below grade level, and a concerning number of students graduate high school and continue to matriculate through university reading below grade level.13 In spite of the money invested into each student, the United States does about the same, academically, as other OECD countries. For example, the Slovak Republic invests around 53,000USD per student compared to the American investment of 115,000USD per student and still ranks about the same in terms of student performance.14 Relative to the size of its economy, the United States ranks quite lowly.
The public school system, plagued with dysfunction and inefficacies, enables this. Government funding disparities (or the mismanagement of government funds) are a massive obstacle facing school districts - in terms of their capacity to provide students with teachers, programs, and other resources.15 16 Poor literacy rates have caused an estimated $225 billion in non-productivity-related losses.17 75% of state prison inmates are either classified as low literate or did not complete high school and it’s reported that 3 out of 5 cannot read.18
CRT is an academic methodology and outlook promoted by civil rights scholars and activists. It developed as a discipline that sought to reexamine the existing liberal order and its legal system by interpreting them primarily through their racial origins and the implications of those origins. CRT’s basic tenets promote the notion that disparate racial outcomes in society are the product of social and institutional dynamics, and seeks to analyze how race and other identities can produce complex sociological/economic power structures. It is a method of higher-order thinking and analysis.
The mainstream narrative is focused on whether or not CRT, a university-level academic discipline, is appropriate for K-12 education. The ridiculousness of that statement seems lost on broader media and activist groups. Conservatives fear the implementation of an academic method their children likely won’t have the comprehension skills to understand, nor their teachers the capacity to teach. Regardless of its association with equity movements, and its potential to correct systemic injustices, the American public school system surely does not have the capacity to implement an academic method and have it be meaningfully retained by students. So much money is already being wasted on an academic system that poorly serves its student body for its cost.
The discourse of CRT works to the benefit of institutional elites, such as the Democratic and Republican establishments, by further accelerating the divide between their represented constituencies. For the Democrats, it aids in orienting the Republicans as a racist ‘other’, focused on perpetuating the racial indiscretions endemic to American education. For Republicans, it aids in orienting the Democrats as an unreasonable ‘other’, one that seeks to indoctrinate the youth into their ideological system and worldview. Broadly it obfuscates core issues within the American education system, ones that are too complex for the simple bipartisan framing mainstream media and politicians benefit from proliferating.
The use of identity politics in the school system, as a doctrine that organizes curriculum, seems like an irrelevant argument when analyzing K-12 education in terms of meeting productive ends. If you cannot read well, in an understaffed school that manages its budget poorly, what does the addition of another academic perspective do to help? Adding the burden of a new curriculum onto an overworked and underpaid teaching staff will likely produce students with poor technical skills, ones that should be developed prior to university. The CRT in schools debate just seems like another culture war preoccupation that has no meaningful weight in terms of producing positive material policy and outcomes. For students and their families, it is another activist and university elite-driven political distraction. However this time it is getting in the way of urgent pandemic and post-pandemic education policy.
(Ray and Gibbons 2021)
(Illing 2021)
(“American Education Is Founded on White Race Theory” 2021)
(Round 2021)
(Farrow 2020)
(Naomi Schaefer Riley 2020)
(Illing 2021)
(Ray and Gibbons 2021)
(“Critical Race Theory” 2019)
(Dorman 2021)
(“Adult Literacy in the United States” 2019)
(“Adult Literacy in the United States” 2019)
(Rea 2020)
(EVANS Juliet 2014)
(“TCF Study Finds U.S. Schools Underfunded by Nearly $150 Billion Annually” 2020)
(“Education Underfunding Tops $19 Billion over Decade of Neglect” 2018)
(Rea 2020)
(Rea 2020)
Works Cited
“Adult Literacy in the United States.” Ed.gov, 2019, nces.ed.gov/pubs2019/2019179/index.asp. Accessed 29 July 2021.
“American Education Is Founded on White Race Theory.” The New Republic, 29 July 2021, newrepublic.com/article/163093/critical-race-theory-history-white-american-education. Accessed 29 July 2021.
“Critical Race Theory.” The Heritage Foundation, 2019, www.heritage.org/crt. Accessed 29 July 2021.
Dorman, Sam. “What Is Critical Race Theory?” Fox News, Fox News, 14 May 2021, www.foxnews.com/us/what-is-critical-race-theory. Accessed 29 July 2021.
“Education Underfunding Tops $19 Billion over Decade of Neglect.” American Federation of Teachers, 15 July 2018, www.aft.org/press-release/education-underfunding-tops-19-billion-over-decade-neglect. Accessed 29 July 2021.
EVANS Juliet. UNITED STATES Key Findings. 2014.
Farrow, Hannah. “The 1619 Project Curriculum Taught in over 4,500 Schools — Frederick County Public Schools Has the Option - Medill News Service.” Medill News Service, 21 July 2020, dc.medill.northwestern.edu/blog/2020/07/21/the-1619-project-curriculum-taught-in-over-4500-schools-frederick-county-public-schools-has-the-option/. Accessed 29 July 2021.
Illing, Sean. “What the Uproar over Critical Race Theory and Anti-Racism Education Reveals.” Vox, Vox, 11 June 2021, www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/22464746/critical-race-theory-anti-racism-jarvis-givens. Accessed 29 July 2021.
Naomi Schaefer Riley. “‘The 1619 Project’ Enters American Classrooms - Education Next.” Education Next, 28 May 2020, www.educationnext.org/1619-project-enters-american-classrooms-adding-new-sizzle-slavery-significant-cost/. Accessed 29 July 2021.
Ray, Rashawn, and Alexandra Gibbons. “Why Are States Banning Critical Race Theory?” Brookings, Brookings, 2 July 2021, www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2021/07/02/why-are-states-banning-critical-race-theory/. Accessed 29 July 2021.
Rea, Amy. “How Serious Is America’s Literacy Problem?” Library Journal, 2020, www.libraryjournal.com/?detailStory=How-Serious-Is-Americas-Literacy-Problem. Accessed 29 July 2021.
Round, Ian. “Tennessee Students Don’t Learn Enough Black History, Professors Say.” Chalkbeat Tennessee, Chalkbeat Tennessee, 29 July 2021, tn.chalkbeat.org/2021/7/29/22575325/black-history-african-american-history-memphis-tennessee-students. Accessed 29 July 2021.
Sawchuk, Stephen. “What Is Critical Race Theory, and Why Is It under Attack?” Education Week, 18 May 2021, www.edweek.org/leadership/what-is-critical-race-theory-and-why-is-it-under-attack/2021/05. Accessed 29 July 2021.
“TCF Study Finds U.S. Schools Underfunded by Nearly $150 Billion Annually.” The Century Foundation, 22 July 2020, tcf.org/content/about-tcf/tcf-study-finds-u-s-schools-underfunded-nearly-150-billion-annually/?agreed=1. Accessed 29 July 2021.
I've been in the room when these people talk about Critical Race Applied Principles which stems from CRT. The material is overly focused on emotional appeal rather than logical or methodological processes and analysis. The material it self seems only to be geared towards pissing people off about the injustices perpatrated on their ancestors. And there is no lack of material there.
So then, CRT in shitty schools would be the worst of both worlds. You'll have bad teachers teaching to underdeveloped children and that is a recipe for disaster. Put on top this concept that certain ethnic groups learn in different ways, i.e. POC children can't think in linear time, and its a freaking catastrophe. In fact, I think more harm can come from CRT in poor schools.
Very good piece. It does seem true that CRT will only influence a small number of people, but the question is how big is this effect? There are many levels to this question. It seems obvious to me that CRT is enforcing a kind of social power dynamic that is meant to manipulate people regardless of whether they understand the underlying theory. People understand power even if they cannot understand theory. Whether this successfully coerces people to acquiesce to the power dynamic is not obvious, but that leads into the other side of the bell-curve.
Clearly, many of the brightest students will be able to grasp at least some amount of the underlying theory of CRT. Some may reject it, but most likely many will come to accept some of the principles in CRT; especially if exposure to other theories is limited. The net effect is a seeding of the higher learning institutions with students sympathetic to CRT.
Now, where does policy and culture flow from? The universities: especially the elite universities. In order for CRT to have an effect, it doesn't need to be understood by even the majority population of the U.S. The only people who need to understand it are the freshman class at Harvard. This alone would be reason enough for a CRT supporter to bring this pedagogy into K-12.
I hope this is helpful or interesting to anyone reading.