Step 1:Attend a school board meeting and point out a problem you’ll hope they’ll easily understand and work to change.
My husband and I did just that a few years ago. The audience seats at school board meetings were rarely occupied back then like they are today with concerned parents.
I first reached out to my school librarian, then school principal, with my concern over what I’d read in my kids 5th and 6th grade library. Then I was given Tom Streams phone number and ended up at another dead end conversation. Behind the scenes, another parent was fervently emailing back and forth with my children’s librarian and calling the ACLU on me to make sure that kids parents weren’t notified before their kids were given sexually explicit books. She was working with Jared Cramer from local wokal Grand Haven Episcopalian church.
I went to a board meeting that none of them attended….yet four days later Jared Cramer wrote in the Grand Haven Tribune like he had been there. Why don’t I just let you compare what I said (public record) so you can contrast it with Jared Cramers local media piece that made the rounds. Then I’ll show you how the school handled it.
Nearly empty board meeting #1 (no librarian, no Jared Cramer present):
Jared Cramers Grand Haven Tribune article four days later:
https://www.grandhaventribune.com/lifestyles/faith/against-those-who-would-harm-lgbtq-students-in-grand-haven/article_b8d7ad36-6b5d-5e15-b61e-b499faf4decc.html
Where was the disconnect?? Where did he hear that I asked for ALL LGBTQ books to be locked up??
Thru Foia request, I found out it came from the school librarian who had been emailing the activist parent working with Jared Cramer promising to support her in her efforts to keep these books unrestricted from parents because “they save lives”. The librarian emailed her and relayed that I’d asked for all LGBTQ books to require parental consent at the board meeting she never attended, although that wasn’t true. I made it clear there were sexually explicit books that were both gay and straight; I’d specifically asked for sexually explicit content to require parental consent. But the twisting began.
I mentioned LGBTQ books because I gave an honest explanation of how I came upon the book “One Man Guy” in the first place and the revelation there were sexually explicit books available to young kids.
So…… I went to another board meeting and gave more public comments:
And all of a sudden the argument changed. I was “book banning”. Jared Cramer attended board meetings speaking of how I wanted to ban “To Kill a Mockingbird”. He called the news, they interviewed him fresh faced and frocked up in front of his religious artifacts at his church. They found me after a school board meeting looking like a tired middle aged mom who was exhausted from all the intense backlash this request was causing. I’d asked for parent consent for sexually explicit books, yet the argument somehow became about getting rid of books, aka “book banning”, “book burning”. I just wanted parents to be involved and aware when their kids were reading heavy duty topics so they could counsel them.
Next, a cartoon of me was featured in the Bucs Blade, with the support of staff overseeing the entire operation. I think that’s supposed to be a picture of me? The monstrous mother of 6th grade boys who was asking for parental consent requirements before my kids were given sexually explicit content. I had to laugh at this point at the absurdity of it all.
https://bucsblade.com/opinion/editorial/2020/03/09/censoring-outside-perspectives/
Then a student under the age of 18 wanted to get together with me one on one and talk about the content in the books. I told him, through messenger, I would meet only if his parents were there because of the explicit nature of the books in question. I wasn’t really comfortable meeting with a minor to discuss lewd books candidly.
https://bucsblade.com/news/2020/03/09/ghaps-leaders-respond-to-parent-groups-criticism-on-literature/
I gave one last attempt to the school board to do the right thing…
then I pulled my kids from the school for their persistence in making concerned parents the enemy with the aiding and abetting of the local woke priest. I still get to pay for the schools and sexually explicit books for everyone elses’ kids now. We all do.
Do school administrators actively work with students to oppose their parents?
This was circulated when another school board meeting generated concerned parents over a CRT activist hired to train their kids. “Mrs. Wilson” is the Grand Haven Area public school high school principal. Why was she asking her high school students to come oppose the parents?
