CCS board debates resolution on school health standards

    A “wait and see” direction was taken by the CCS board of education last week when presented a resolution against using NE Dept. of Education health standards in the school’s curriculum.
    Former school board member Sheila Stromberger presented a packet of information to board members, including the sample resolution, at the board’s July 13 meeting.
    She asked the board to consider adopting the resolution, or one like it, that opposes use of “any of this altogether.”
    She said that some of what the proposed health standard would teach to students younger than 16 (age of consent for sexual activity in Nebraska) include subjects she as an individual can’t talk to a child about for fear of being arrested.
    “But, they want our teachers to teach it,” she said.
    School board president Karl Meeske also received an email from State Sen. Dan Hughes on the subject.
    Hughes is one of 30 state senators who are contacting school boards in their districts, encouraging them to reject the proposed health standards, as well.
    While the CCS board chose not to adopt a resolution last week, Meeske said he does not foresee the CCS board “adopting the (state’s) health standards as proposed.”
    The state board is scheduled to meet in early August to discuss further the health proposals, after a couple months of input from across Nebraska.
    Stromberger noted the state board skipped its July meeting, after meetings in May and June in Kearney drew hundreds of people from across Nebraska.
    Their August meeting will be back east in Lincoln, she noted.
    It’s expected the NE Dept. of Education will come out with another draft after their August meeting.
    However, Stromberger said she is seeing mixed responses from the state board of education on how they’ll respond to the public comment when the second draft comes out.
    She said the NDE has also changed some of the verbiage since spring to include Critical Race Theory and Comprehensive Sexuality Education.
    “It’s all tied together,” she said.
    “The NDE denies they took any language for their health standards from CRT and CSE until it was put to them in black and white. The verbiage is exactly the same,” Stromberger said.
    In April, the CCS board sent a letter to the State Dept. of Education opposing the proposals, but questions arose if that’s enough.  
    Stromberger cautioned the board members with whom she used to serve.
    CRT and CSE “are going to be infiltrated in other standards the state is working on,” she said, adding it’s important to know where this is coming from.
    “I’m not here to say whether any of it is right or wrong. That’s not my place to determine, and it’s not the school’s place to determine,” she said.
    “I think that needs to be determined by parents at home.
    “These are social issues; these are political issues. They don’t need to be taught in the school system,” she said.
    Some of the information Stromberger gathered was put out by Protect Nebraska Children Coalition, which she admits is “one-sided.”
    Stromberger said the “sex ed” portion of the proposed standards is nearly word for word from national sex education standards, and identified as CSE.
    Much of its intent, as she showed information included in the proposed health standards, attempts to sexualize children early and teaches “gender identity” and “sexual orientation” in lower elementary grades.
    “I don’t want my grandkids taught that stuff in school,” she said. CCS form for student
physicals questioned
    Stromberger said if the board and patrons don’t think it’s coming here because “here we are, we’re on top of everything,” she asked board members last week to look at the physical form on the CCS website.
    It asks, “How do you identify your gender? Do you identify as a male or female, or something else,” she noted.
    “That’s our physical form I got off our website,” she said.
    Since last week’s meeting, the CCS form for student physicals has been changed.
    Now, it asks students to fill out “sex: ______.”
    Stromberger pursued her point on infiltrating schools, referring to a comment made by a state board of education member.
    He said, “If you think it’s just a 45-minute class in your child’s day that they’re signing up for this class and you can opt them in or out, you’re wrong.
    “That’s not how it’s coming into the schools—it’s coming in social studies, in the ELA (English language arts), it’s coming in through library books and other reading materials,” she added.
    “So I’m hoping you’ll consider a resolution opposing it altogether,” she said.
    She also asked them to review their policies on curriculum, and asked when the state comes out with new curriculum, “are you just going to adopt their standards?” or review them.
    Later in the agenda, there was a discussion item on the health standards and “any other potential controversial subjects that may impact public schools.”
    Board President Meeske said they need to “do our own due diligence and stay on top of this.”
    Meeske added that there will be more burden on administration if CCS puts something in policy on choosing what standards are used.
    “We will have to create our own (standards) for ones we don’t take,” he added.
    Stromberger said there are some good things in the first draft dealing with nutrition and heart health, “things we are already doing.”
    She suggested taking a roll of White-Out and removing the ones against, “what you feel are the parents responsibility to teach and adopt that.”    
    She wonders if the future will bring testing on health standards, and then eventually tie it to some funding.
    Her hopes are that as the NE Dept of Education pursues these things, that the Nebraska Legislature eventually dismantles some of its responsibilities, if not the entire Dept. of Education.
    “I believe if they continue on this road, there won’t be the current board of education as it stands now,” she said.    
    Board Member Laura Maddox said no matter what is taught, students are also getting it from social media.
    She encouraged the school to have some strategies to respond to children’s questions.
    Board member Jeff Olsen said he would not support a resolution at this time due to time constraints.
    “If we do what you’re asking, there isn’t enough time in the year for us to go through every document the state puts out to us,” he said.
    Olsen believes the power has to go back to the teacher to make those decisions.
    “If the parent disagrees with that fine, but every parent will look at it differently,” he said.
    Supt. Adam Lambert said the school is not required to follow every state standard.
    Lambert also referred to a letter he received from Education Commissioner Matt Blomstedt on the controversy that has arisen with the health standards. In one portion, Lambert said, it has a little bit of a “retreat,” as Blomstedt cited the importance of the local level.
    It reads that the second draft coming out in August will “reframe sensitive topics with the intentional inclusion of parents and families at the local level.”