“School board, I quit,” fifth-grade teacher Laura Morris announced Tuesday. “I quit your policies. I quit your trainings. And I quit being a cog in a machine that tells me to push highly-politicized agendas on our most vulnerable constituents ---the children.”
Before she broke down in tears, Morris blasted the school district’s superintendent for warning teachers and staff in a letter that criticizing the school district’s far-left policies, even in private, is not allowed. The tearful but defiant teacher also reminded everyone listening that the school district provides an anonymous form for teachers to turn in colleagues if they are overheard veering from the approved views.
That unheard-of policy is likely a reference to the “Bias Reporting Form” announced in May, a tactic that harkens back to families and neighbors in Communist countries who lived in fear the KGB, the Stasi, or the SB, would come knocking.
Facebook group didn't want 'middle ground'
In the name of promoting “equity,” the super-wealthy Loudoun County has emerged as ground zero for communist-like tactics. One that quickly caused an uproar was the private Facebook page in which community leaders who approved of the “anti-racist” training were quietly identifying opponents and plotting how to isolate and punish them. The group of social media plotters included school board members and teachers.
“I don’t understand why we can't have a difference of opinion without an intense fight,” Elizabeth Perrin, who was named in the Facebook group, naively told NBC News. “We can find some middle ground.”
The Washington Times reported the “Bias Reporting Form” is part of the school district’s “Detailed Action Plan to Combat Systemic Racism.”
In her departing speech, Morris also said she was leaving after sitting through mandatory "equity" training that suggested white Christian teachers hold too much power.
Responding to the quitting teacher, Victoria Cobb of the The Family Foundation of Virginia called it a powerful moment for teachers who are standing up despite the consequences.
"This is not just about parents,” she told American Family Radio host Sandy Rios. “This is about hundreds of teachers that are going to have to walk into that school building, and they are forced to swallow political ideology that in many cases violates their very own faith and conscience."
Loudoun County Schools also made headlines in May when it fired Tanner Cross, a physical education coach. He spoke at a school board meeting and stated he opposed the school district’s then-proposed transgender pronoun policy.
"I'm a teacher but I serve God first,” Cross said from a prepared speech. “And I will not affirm that a biological boy can be a girl, and vice versa, because it's against my religion. It’s lying to my child. It's abuse to a child and it's sinning against our God."
Cross was placed on leave then predictably fired, but he sued and was reinstated by a judge in early June.
Morris also cited her faith in her speech this week, telling the school board that it supports “political ideologies that do not square with who I am as a believer in Christ.”
In the AFR radio interview, Cobb said Family Foundation is holding training to help teachers prepare for the political battles ahead over transgender guidelines and the mandatory anti-racist "equity" training, which is really a tenet of Critical Race Theory.
“There are many Christians in these public schools who have been there to be salt and light, who have always loved these children, who have done their job with excellence,” she said. “Now they're saying, Is it really going to come down to this moment where I have to expect this environment? Where I have to teach this stuff? And where my co-workers are expected to report on me even if I, outside of the school building, have a negative comment about what I'm being forced to swallow?"
So far, the answers to those is-this-really-happening questions in Loudoun County is, “Da.”
Family Foundation is helping teachers who want to stay, Cobb says, "but not to cower to government officials, especially not when our children are at stake."
