Parents suing their Virginia school district for forcing their children to learn critical race theory took their case to the appeals court Tuesday, alleging a slew of First Amendment violations.
Five families of Albemarle County Public Schools began their lawsuit in late 2021 after their children were subjected to a critical race theory pilot program that the district intended to be "woven through in all of the classes in Albemarle County."
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The "anti-racism" policy, which is ongoing in the county, is "racist at its core," the lawsuit alleges, and teaches children "the color of your skin determines what you can achieve in life, your privilege," Alliance Defending Freedom Director of the Center for Parental Rights and Senior Counsel Kate Anderson, whose organization is representing the families, told the Washington Examiner.
"They are telling kids that they personally are responsible for racism or so affected by racism that they can't achieve things in life," Anderson continued.
Some exercises children were forced to take part in were holding up fingers and having them lower one each time an example of their "privilege" was brought up, as well as writing a "vision statement" about how they are "going to be more anti-racist today," Anderson explained. "It would make clear to them that silence is racism, you have to affirmatively do something to be anti-racist, which is really adopting this critical theory ideology."
Parents and their children are alleging multiple violations of the First Amendment as well as violations of parental rights that they argue run counter to Virginia's Constitution.
"Children should not be forced to say that the color of their skin defines them and their future, and schools should not be hiding their ideological classroom practices from parent," the ADF said of one key free speech challenge. Parents were also barred from opting their children out of the program, which was made more difficult by the ideology being injected into all aspects of learning.
The families also allege religious freedom violations, in which children are being forced to learn that their peers are fundamentally different than they are based on their skin color, despite some families being Catholics who believe that "every person is created equal in the eyes of God," Anderson said. Another religious violation alleged is that children were also taught that "the privileged, the oppressors, were white Christians."
Teachers were trained to treat children differently based on their race, including in grading, setting up an equal protection clause challenge as well.
The case was thrown out of the lower court on preliminary procedural issues, in which the court found that the Virginia Constitution was not "self-executing," which Anderson explained means "essentially a person can't sue the government for violating their state constitutional right."
She said the ADF and the families feel "very positive" about how the court will decide that issue upon appeal. "It makes sense that citizens, if their civil rights are being violated by the government, they should be able to bring claims under the state constitution to vindicate their constitutional rights," Anderson added.
Albemarle County began its pilot program at Henley Middle School in 2019, which was based heavily on critical race theory, but the school district used the name "culturally responsive teaching," to replace the "CRT" acronym as a way to deny its relation to the divisive academic theory.
Despite that, the program cited as sources multiple purveyors of critical race theory, including Glenn Singleton, whose "Courageous Conversations" is the basis of Albemarle's program, and Ibram X. Kendi.
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The school district said it could not respond to a request for comment given the ongoing legal matter, but in court responses to the lawsuit, the district claims that the parents and children do not have standing to sue because they have not suffered "actual injury" in their allegations made against the school board.
The board also claims it is entitled to "sovereign immunity because the Plaintiffs' claims under the Constitution of Virginia are not self-executing" and therefore do not create a private right of action because the constitutional provisions cited "merely indicates principles, without laying down rules by means of which those principles may be given the force of law."