The Pushback & The Science. Sarah Westwood Talks to A&G

Published Jul 30, 2021, 10:13 PM

Washington Examiner investigative reporter Sarah Westwood joins Jack Armstrong to talk about pushing back on Critical Race Theory, getting back into the classroom and the science (or lack thereof) being applied to masking guidelines.

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We'd like to say, welcome Sarah Westwood back to the Armstrong and get a show. Long time, no talk, Sarah. How you doing, I'm good, Thanks for having me. She is the political and investigative reporter for the Washington Examiner. First, I would I would appreciate it if all you Sarah's would get together and decide whether there's an H on the end of your name or not. Yesterday I was dealing with my son, a tutor and a therapist. One's a Sarah with an H and one is a Sarah with an A, and I kept getting mixed up, and I think you all should just decide on one and move forward. Well, if someone was an H, I would say that is the correct way to spell it without an age. She's forgotten the letter. Also, I think all Kirsten's, Kristen's and Kirsten's need to get there and get together and choose one's fair. Um. So a couple of different directions we could go. Um. First of all, I really I literally liked your article. Before we get into some of the critical race theory stuff and how it gets into the schools um uh. I liked your definition of critical race theory in one of your articles in which you said it is now a catch all term for lessons and policies that encouraged children to see themselves in others almost exclusively through the lens of race. I appreciate that because I feel like there's a lot of the pushback on some of the critical race theory says that that's not specifically critical race theory, but what most of us mean, those of us who didn't go to Harvard Law School in the nineties, we mean anything that leans towards um where we're focusing on race for for everything in society. That makes sense to me, right, And I think you're touching on something super important, which is that so much of the opposition to critical race theory UM or excuse me, so much of the supporters of things that would be classified as critical race theory or focusing the debate on how we define critical race theory. And if you're not specifically referring to the nineteen seventies academics framework from Bell, then you know you don't know what you're talking about, and you're not qualified to engage in this debate. I think it's a way of sort of trying to invalidate a lot of the feelings of parents by making them feel like they don't know what they're talking about. But ultimately, critical race theory has to mean any sort of policy that is focusing on race um and teaching children that they should see the world through the lens of race and see themselves through that lens of race. And so I think um by pushing back on the idea that critical race here even exists in K through twelve classrooms at all. Uh, it's a way for supporters of this kind of curriculum to avoid having to engage in a debate over the merits of teaching kids sort of way of looking at the world. I like. I like that distinction, Sarah Westwood of the Washington Examiners. So you got into a question that I think a lot of parents probably don't know and we all should. How does a particular curriculum textbook end up in the school? Is it come from the federal government, from the state, from the who who makes these decisions? And you looked into that, I did what what we you know sort of laid out in an article about this is that typically it's the textbook adoption decisions and curriculums decisions are made at the local level. Local school districts will have these sort of committees of educators and experts that will make recommendations to the school boards, and the school boards will approve what goes into the schools. And that's why you see so many eruptions of CRT opposition at school boards, because that's the pressure point for parents to express their opposition and try to get the school boards not to just rubber stamp some of these more controversial textbooks and lessons that the local committees are recommending. Yeah, we've been saying for a long time on this show that people and I include myself on this people are not active enough at the local level. Man, we're willing to get into an argument about who's going to be president or some federal policy. Don't go to the city council meetings. We don't go to our school board meetings the things that we can actually control and argue about things that we have very little input on. I've been to one city council meeting. I think in my entire life that I spoke at overall homelessness in my neighborhood. I should go on a regular basis. Same with school board means, we should get more involved, because, as you just laid out, it's at that local level that they're deciding what gets into your school, right, And I think this dr Key site has sort of raised a level of awareness that I haven't seen about the importance of the school boards. And you are seeing some of that activism take the form of politics in that some parents are organizing recall UH efforts, stuffs happening in Loudon County, Virginia, which is outside of DC, where parents have organized this massive recall effort for several school board members to try to get them removed from their seats through politics, and out of Texas in South Lake, Texas, which is sort of an affluent suburb, there was actually a fair amount of money that was thrown behind UH some parents who challenge school board members on the basis of those over support for CRT. So you are starting to see that happen in isolated places, and I think as local elections creep up and as we get into this next school year starting in the fall, you're going to see a lot more of that in parents realizing the importance of focusing on those elections. So I was looking at your Twitter feed there Sarah with an h And I saw your retweeted an article and I don't know if you've written anything about this or you're just more or less commenting on it. It was a New York Times article from a while back where it talked about, um, we're stigmatizing children by labeling them as behind. All these kids that haven't been in school for a year and a half, um with regular learning, and some schools are going to continue with the zoom learning, where if you're a parent and you've got kids doing the zoom learning, you know they aren't learning even close to normal level. And uh, and you retweeted this idea that it's traumatizing to school to children somehow to tell them that they're behind. Well, what else are we gonna do? We're going to ignore it? Right? That seems like a convenient way to avoid accountability for the learning loss is that the schools and the teachers unions have inflicted on these kids by keeping the schools closed for so long. And there's just an overwhelming body of evidence that the benefits of having kids in the classroom outweigh any remaining risks to these children. And yet we're seeing, you know, these Massy mandates being imposed on the schools, which isn't necessarily detrimental to learning in itself, but it certainly taves the way to have some of the commitments to full reopenings rolled back. And so I think that's why a lot of parents, you know, including myself, I started kindergarten this year, are a little bit worried, may not open us scheduled? Your son will start kindergarten this year? Yes, okay, good because I know several people who'se uh whose kids started kindergarten last year, and it just was heartbreaking because kindergarten is such a special time. I mean, you know, it's it's all about fun and play and learning to be around other kids and stuff like that, and it's just so cute. And the fact that there's a you know, a million and the kids across the country that missed out on that experience and we're sitting there staring at a zoom camera as a five year old is just ridiculous. I hope your your your son gets to be in school. Um, how's the masking around where you where you live in DC area? I M yeah, I do live around the DC area, and recently, you know, after the CDC guides came out in the spring, suggesting that vaccinated people didn't necessarily have to wear mask indoors or outdoors or anywhere. The masking really fell around the districion. You know, for the first time, I felt comfortable going places without wearing one. It'll be interesting to see the level of compliance though. That follows this latest move from the find administration yesterday to try to encourage people, even vaccinated people, to mask up once again certain indoor situations, because vaccinated people have been told that they didn't need to do that by the President of the United States just days ago, and he said, he specifically said, I repeat, if you are vaccinated, you do not to were a mask just a couple of days ago, right, And it's the science behind you know, these decisions hasn't changed. There were variants in the spring, and it's clear that the vaccine continues to protect vaccinated people against severe cases and cuts down on transmission significantly. And yet because the Biden administration has missed its vaccination targets, they're trying to keep the virus under control. But the problem is that this severely under cuts the argument for the vaccine has of course, of course this could serve to really undermine their vaccinies. Yeah, I was just talking about that. It's absolutely amazing. The stick is so that my theory is there's a carrot and a stick on the COVID right or the vaccine, and the stick apparently doesn't bother people that are vaccinated. They've decided for whatever reason, and fine with me that I'm not worried about it. Okay, so you're not worried about the stick end of it. Now the carrot of you don't have to wear a mask anymore has been removed, so now there's no reason for those people to want to get vaccinated. Um, do you ever wish you were still the White House reporter for CNN? So like yesterday when they did a one eight in the mask, you can say, hey, what the hell? I don't know if that would be my styness on the air at least, but definitely the messaging from the left from the DA has been for incoherent when it comes to mask are they and to the vaccine as well? Does it work? Or should we be worried about the delta variant? Should we be celebrating the efficacy of vaccines enough that we don't need to worry about it. It's it's been very confusing, and for anyone who is still wrestling with the decision of whether to get vaccinated, you know, there isn't a lot of reliable message coming out of the government about what they should do and what risks their case, no doubt. Sarah Westwood political and investigative reporter the Washington Examiner, follower on Twitter or just read the newspaper or whatever. Sarah, thanks for your time to I really appreciate it. Thanks for having me Armstrong and Jetty

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