The news that a new social-equity course was being planned at Highlands High School in Fort Thomas, Ky., first started bouncing around Facebook early this spring.
A proposed syllabus was leaked online. Students who signed up for the elective course would “develop awareness and engage in constructive discussion about social justice and diversity issues,” it read. They would learn about “the intersectionality of gender, race, class, and sexuality,” and begin to “create an action plan for future social change.”
Guest speakers were being lined up. The students would watch Dave Chappelle’s “8:46” YouTube special, where the comedian engages in a frank and explicit conversation about American racism in the wake of George Floyd’s murder at the hands of Minneapolis police last summer.
There would be “required textbooks” – Ibram X. Kendi’s How to be an Antiracist and Robin DiAngelo’s White Fragility – that for this class students would be asked to buy, with the hope that “these books will stay with you as a reminder of the work that we (society) need to do.”
The battle lines were drawn. There were dueling petitions for and against the class. And as has happened repeatedly in schools nationwide, parents and community members quickly retreated to their respective ideological camps.
To opponents of the course, it was apparent this was an attempt to inject critical race theory into the school, even if the syllabus doesn’t specifically mention it. “Anyone who believes this particular course is not critical race theory doesn’t understand what critical race theory is,” said Maggie McCluskey, a mom who helped lead the opposition to the class.
To supporters of the course, the opponents were flaunting their white privilege and trying to whitewash American history. “Many critics want to shroud themselves in the European fairytale that downplays the role of slavery and racism in our country’s foundation,” wrote Bonnie Jean Feldkamp, a newspaper columnist and Fort Thomas native who in May attended a packed community meeting about the proposed course.
The Kentucky case is emblematic of the cultural battles raging across the country in American schools, both public and private. While much of the attention has focused on schools on the liberal coasts or in big progressive cities, groups such as Parents Defending Education have noted that in many cases, like in Fort Thomas, the battles are raging in conservative communities in red states, including Utah, Oklahoma, Texas, and Florida.
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