Portside

From culture war to civil war?

Nobel awards an African author — what's the history? School boards showdowns, and more

From Occupy Wall Street to DSA and from anti-vax to Lord Valdemort

Getting to the bottom of the great polarization, Roe v Wade showdown, and more

It is time for educators to go on the offensive against the conservative campaign to ban “critical race theory” from schools. The story of American democracy cannot be told without according a central role to the Black freedom struggle.

Some 25 states have already enacted or are considering laws to ban teaching what they call “critical race theory” (“CRT”) in public schools, a concept that school officials around the country deny they even teach.

Israel lobby groups are once again attempting to manipulate public education in California in order to censor Palestinian and Arab scholarship, under the guise of fighting anti-Semitism.

Jefferson County school board politics have made headlines across the state and the nation for nearly two years. Pundits called the election Tuesday a political “proxy war” over larger right-left economic and cultural issues, a key battle for the future of public education, a warm up for the 2016 presidential election year in a bellwether county in a crucial swing state.