Battle Over Schools Heats Up // (John Hinderaker).
As in other states, Minnesota’s concerned parents have joined forces to take control of public schools from teachers’ unions. This is to improve education quality and stop left-wing indoctrination. To lead these efforts in Minnesota, we established a 501(c),(4) organization called Minnesota Parents Alliance.
Today’s stories were published by the Star Tribune and the St. Paul Pioneer Press on the MPA. The Pioneer Press article, which is long and titled “Social Issues Bring Wave of Conservative Candidates to MN School Board Races” is called “Social Quality Now a Social Problem.”
The Pioneer Press piece is fair and includes a history of MPA’s foundation:
The Center of the American Experiment, a prominent think-tank and member of the State Policy Network that promotes conservative positions such as opposition to public sector unions and support voucher laws that allow parents to redirect tax dollars towards private school tuition, visited Minnesota last year to fight against an “alarming” rewrite of the K-12 social sciences standards for Minnesota schools.
Bill Walsh, the Center’s spokesperson, stated that “We filled rooms across the state.”
All truthful so far.
After the tour was over the Center used the momentum to hold a candidate school, where 30 school board candidates learned about critical race theory and school funding.
Last fall …. was a tough one for them.
Many of the insurgents and candidates who attended our training session won. But that was just the beginning. We had enough time to organize this year.
The Center had plans to create a spinoff organization that would be devoted to school board elections.
Cristine Trooien (a Mound woman who ran a campaign for a school board last year) would be the founder of Minnesota Parents Alliance. Center president John Hinderaker, chairman Ron Eibensteiner, and Cristine Trooien would join her on the three-person governing body.
is the MPA’s website. Its voter guide, which endorses approximately 120 candidates, can be found here. In an effort to support Education Minnesota, the media tries to make school board races about “social problems” and “culture war.” However, it is true that liberals have used public schools to wage war against American culture and history as well as normal values. The Minnesota Parents Alliance and its endorsed candidates are focused on educational excellence. The state’s schools are in crisis because only 36% of 11th-graders in Minnesota can do math at grade level.
MPA’s voter guide says:
Minnesota Parents Alliance endorses candidates for school board positions across the state that align with our mission to prioritize academic achievement, equality, and parental rights in school districts.
Liberals prefer to talk about George Floyd or LGBTQ+ issues. However, the Pioneer Press article acknowledges that academic achievement played a central role in the “conservative insurgency”.
[MPA] voter guides include brief statements from 104 candidates. These statements were analyzed by Pioneer Press
* 60 candidates indicated a desire for schools that focus on academic achievement or simply “teach basic skills.”
* 45 people discussed wanting to remove politics, bias, or activism from schools or stop schools indoctrinating kids.
* 45 cited parent empowerment to be a value.
* 17 people were dissatisfied with the way schools handle issues related to race, gender equity, or sexuality.
* Nine people opposed mask mandates and other measures taken by schools to protect students, staff, and faculty from the coronavirus.
American Experiment’s polling shows that Minnesotans want their public schools to be a place where academic excellence is prioritized over politics or culture war issues. Even though there are only a few incumbents, many MPA-endorsed candidates will win.
The Star Tribune story remains a mystery. It was posted this morning, but soon the story was replaced by a “404 error message” – “The page you requested couldn’t be found.” The story was up for a while, but is now gone again. Cristine Trooien was told by the reporter that he believes the story will be published tomorrow. We’ll see.
In any case, I have the Strib article saved to my phone so that I can write about it. The headline reads, “Culture War Issues Drive Debate in Some Hotly contested School Board Races.” Like the Pioneer Press the Strib doesn’t want to make public the fact that parents are unhappy about the quality of their children’s education. The “culture wars” are a result.
This is how the Minnesota Parents Alliance is introduced by The Strib
A slate of conservative candidates in New Ulm is railing against LGBTQ friendly policies.
Did you know that liberals don’t “rail”? It’s quite obvious.
Two of these candidates were endorsed by a parent association that supports conservative school board candidates throughout the state.
Cristine Trooien, Mound, founded the Minnesota Parents Alliance. This was to reach out to parent groups via Facebook after the disappointing performance of conservative school board candidates in 2021.
I believe the reporter is whirling by the graveyard. The movement to establish parental control over schools had just begun in 2021. We will see candidates who represent educational excellence win lots of races this year and in the years to follow against the formerly all-powerful teachers union and its defenses of the indefensible status Quo.
Trooien declined to interview but she stated via email that the prerequisites for an endorsement were that candidates pledge to support “academic achievement”, equal and inclusive treatment of all students, and respecting parental rights.
It is noteworthy that both the teachers’ union and the liberal establishment in general view these principles as a threat to their hegemony.
I expect conservatives to win on November 8, especially in many school board elections. Although it is not what the Star Tribune and Pioneer Press intended, I believe that most readers will be able to find the MPA voter guide and determine which candidates they should vote in their school district.
