Tag: U.S. Department of Education

Puzzling banner at U.S. Department of Education

In celebration of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Department of Education has chosen a questionable way to display its mindset. I suppose it accurately portrays the mindset of the Trump Administration, but one-third of the presentation seems odd, inappropriate, and partisan to me.

I did not find a photograph of the building including the banners I am referring to, so this picture will have to suffice. If you have not seen the banners I’m blogging about today, you can find various pictures by using a search engine.

U.S. Department of Education office in Washington, DC.
Photo by Andy Feliciotti on Unsplash

Keep in mind that Donald Trump promised in his campaign to abolish the Department of Education. As a first step toward doing that, his nominee to head the department was a woman whose administrative work experience was in the wrestling industry. Her job description was essentially: ‘Demolish the department you oversee.”

Since his inauguration in January 2025, Trump and his Department of Education have attacked education on every turn. But one of the three banners now hanging from the Lyndon Baines Johnson Department of Education headquarters in Washington, DC surely wins the prize for the most inappropriate way the department could have marked our country’s 250th birthday.

(I take that back. The most inappropriate banner would have been one of King George III of Great Britain.)

Two of the banners make sense. Booker T. Washington and Catharine Beecher had huge influence and impacts on education in the United States. But what did Charlie Kirk do for education?

Charlie Kirk founded Turning Point USA, a conservative nonprofit organization. Through Turning Point, Kirk held political debates on some college campuses. I do not see how that in any way qualified him for the third place in a total of three banners at the Department of Education. Surely there was someone else in American history who contributed more to public education than Charlie Kirk.

Julius Rosenwald readily comes to mind. Rosenwald was the financial and driving force behind the building of approximately 5,000 schools for black students when schools for non-white citizens were not supported by the government. I wrote a series of newspaper articles about Rosenwald Schools. (Those articles are included in my book, Harrisburg, Did You Know? Cabarrus History, Book One, available on Amazon.)

Photo of the front cover of Harrisburg, Did You Know? Cabarrus History, Book 1, by Janet Morrison
Harrisburg, Did You Know? Cabarrus History, Book 1, by Janet Morrison

Or perhaps a better choice than Charlie Kirk would have been a banner filled with the multi-racial, multi-ethnic faces representing the millions of teachers who have taught generations of Americans.

The banner displaying the stern and threatening face of Donald Trump hanging off the side of the U.S. Department of Justice headquarters marking our 250th birthday is reminiscent of the images I have seen of dictators adorning buildings in China and North Korea, except the facial features of those dictators are not as menacing as the images of Trump.

It is the image of himself that Trump chose to represent his second term in office. His squinty eyes project a sense of foreboding. I imagine it scares children. There is nothing comforting or reassuring about it.

When I saw pictures of that banner of Trump at the Department of Justice, I do not recall mentioning it on my blog, but what has been done at the Department of Education caused that image to come back to mind.

I do not recall other U.S. Presidents hanging banners of their faces on government buildings. Much of this seems like a frivolous waste of money. Am I wrong about that? It seems un-American and creepy to me for a U.S. President to plaster his name and glaring face on so many things.

The Trump Administration turning our nation’s 250th birthday into a political prop and personal display should come as no surprise. It would have been a perfect opportunity for the administration to put politics aside and celebrate like we did our 200th birthday in 1976, but they just cannot do that.

That is unfortunate, especially for the children and young adults who could have learned so much from a year-long true celebration. An organized year-long celebration could have inspired patriotism. I just don’t see the boxing or wrestling match planned for what’s left of the White House lawn doing that, but I digress.

Meanwhile, every day the Trump Administration gives us a different explanation for why we bombed Iran on Saturday morning. They apparently expect the American people to get as excited as they are about this war without telling us the same story twice about why they started this war. In fact, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told us that we did not start it.

Janet

The government should be afraid of its citizens, not the other way around.

Lessons in Civics

It is not humanly possible for one person to keep up with more than a fraction of the bad things that have happened this week to the American way of life. I have blogged the last two days about the demise of freedom of speech under the Trump Administration.

I will just mention three other items of concern from the last seven days.

NATO, tariffs, Russia

Trump went on a rant on social media on Saturday morning in which he laid out how he is going to blackmail all the other NATO countries into not buying any oil from Russia. He said when they all agree to that, he will in turn place sanctions on Russia.

What a lame way to announce he has no intentions of sanctioning Russia! Any former U.S. President would not have had to wait on all other NATO nations to act before he could put tariffs on Russia.

U.S. Department of Education

One of the main things Trump ran on last year was the elimination of the U.S. Department of Education. It is ironic that the more department employees they fire, the more new ideas they come up with for new programs.

Photo of a stack of books with a red apple on top, with pencils lying beside the books and ABC blocks.
Photo by Element5 Digital on Unsplash

The illustrious U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon announced a new idea this week. Since her background is in the wrestling industry, I really doubt it was her idea. I think any thinking person can figure out the source of the new plans she announced on Wednesday.

McMahon said not enough young Americans love America because they don’t have any knowledge of America. (That’s a paraphrase, but you get the point.) To remedy this, the U.S. Department of Education (I guess until it no longer exists, if we can trust Trump to eliminate it) is partnering with 40 conservative organizations to create The America 250 Civics Education Coalition.

Someone apparently slipped up and told McMahon that 2026 will be the 250th birthday of the United States of America. Who knew! She is scrambling as 2025 comes to an end to teach every American student some civics next year.

The Administration that has pledged to root out all vestiges of wokeness and all vestiges of indoctrination is now partnering with the most politically and religiously conservative organizations in the country (including Turning Point USA, Turning Point Education, Hillsdale College, the America First Policy Institute, and The Heritage Foundation) to “encourage” all students in the United States from elementary school through higher education to learn about “American history, values, and geography with an unbiased approach.”

I’m trying to get my head around how one would teach geography in a biased way. I thought geography was factual. Oh, I just smacked my forehead. I just remember that I was told for 72 years that the Gulf of Mexico was the Gulf of Mexico, but President Trump renamed it this year to the Gulf of America. I guess teaching children and college students that it is the Gulf of Mexico is now considered “biased.”

I don’t want to beat a dead horse over this, so I will just leave you with a quote from Linda McMahon. Keep in mind that she is the U.S. Secretary of Education. She said the following on Wednesday in an interview with Marisa Schultz, news editor for the Washington Examiner:

          “”I mean, when you have high school students that don’t know you know what those three departments of our government are for heaven sakes, they don’t know what even that you have to register to vote in different states. I mean, it is appalling the lack of knowledge that many of our students have. And so one of my initiatives is to make sure that patriotic education, even though the Department of Education does not control curriculum, we don’t hire teachers, we don’t buy books, we don’t do any of that. But let’s encourage, if we can.”

          Two things jumped out at me from that quote: (1) The U.S. Secretary of Education thinks we have three “departments” in the U.S. Government and (2) The U.S. Secretary of Education has trouble forming a complete sentence.

          We are doomed.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for the teaching of civics in our schools, but I’m not in favor of a lopsided, skewed right-wing white Christian view of government, history, and geography being taught.

          There is no courage, bravery, or integrity in our corporate institutions. There is no courage, bravery, or integrity in our three branches of government.

          By the way, Secretary McMahon, we have three branches of government, not three departments of government. Maybe you aren’t the best person to be in charge of the teaching of civics in our country. Just sayin’.

Trump and his entourage are royally treated by the King Charles

There were more cringe-worthy photographs and quotes from Trump’s trip to London this week. I cringed to see how inappropriately the First Lady and the White House Press Secretary were dressed for dinner on Wednesday night, but I also cringed to see how King Charles kowtowed to Trump.

The British Royal Family sets the bar high for decorum, and Trump trips over that bar every time he goes across the pond.

With the demise of free speech in America this week, I admit I did not pay much attention to Trump’s trip, but I understand that he announced in front of God and everybody that he was the first United States President to be invited to Great Britain.

Does he not remember that he was invited there in 2018? Is he so ignorant of history that he does not know that numerous United States Presidents have been invited to Great Britain over the centuries?

It is just one more in a long line of indications that everything is all about him. I’m hard pressed to think of anyone in the history of the world who had a bigger or more fragile ego than Donald John Trump, Sr.

What struck me this week above everything else about Trump’s trip to England was that not only do citizens of Great Britain have more freedom than American citizens to protest the U.S. President, but the press there has more freedom to ask the U.S. President pointed questions than American reporters and journalists. That alone should be what Americans are taking away from the trip.

Let that sink in.

Janet

Public School Libraries in Texas and Monroe County, Tennessee

I was flabbergasted a couple of weeks ago to learn that a law had passed in Texas that will turn public school library book selection on its head.

Photo of opened books scattered on the floor
Photo by Vrînceanu Iulia on Unsplash

As of September 1, 2025, school boards in Texas will select all books for public school libraries instead of professional librarians. I’ll bet the Texas state legislators thought it would be easy-peazy, so let’s just let the local school board members do it.

Local school board members tend to be just regular people. Most of them do not have college degrees in library science. Dare I go out on a limb and say that none of them do? How many course hours have they studied library collection development?

Why is it that humans assume their job takes a high degree of training and skill, but no one else’s job carries any requirements?

Since I live with a retired public school librarian, I have a ton of questions.

Can all the local school board members in Texas read on a 12th grade level?

What do they know about reading levels?

What do they know about age appropriateness?

Do they know how time-consuming the book selection process is?

Do they know anything about book selection, such as where to even get a list of books available for school libraries?

Do they know how to balance book selection against a budget?

Do they know who the award-winning authors and illustrators are?

Do they know what books are already on the shelves in all the schools in their district so they can avoid duplication and maintain a balance of subject matter?

Do they know everything that is taught on every grade level so they can be sure to order books that will supplement or enhance what is being taught in every classroom?

Does a school board have to be unanimous and vote on each book?

I could list more questions. Those 10 are just the ones that came to me immediately when I read the news report.

What are they thinking in Monroe County, Tennessee?

I read on Sunday that in a report from PEN America that book banners are going after books about cats. No one seems to know why book banners have a vendetta against our little feline friends, but it is happening in Iowa, Florida, and in Monroe County, Tennessee.

Monroe County has banned almost 600 books from its public schools. The Complete Book of Cats and The New Encyclopedia of the Cat are just two of the cat-related titles being pulled from the school library shelves.

I don’t even know what to say about that. I love dogs. I don’t like cats very much (aside from being fascinated by the beauty of tigers), but I would never want books about cats to disappear from libraries.

But wait! On Monday, I learned that one of the books banned from schools in Monroe County is The Complete Book of Dogs, by Rosie Pilbeam! Now they have gone too far!

You can’t go around banning books about dogs! You just can’t! That’s un-American. Dogs are love universally. Every library in the world should have books about dogs – and even cats.

Why in the name of everything reasonable is Monroe County, Tennessee banning cat and dog “encyclopedias” from school libraries? What if that 8th grader or 12th grader aspires to be a veterinarian? Is that student not supposed to learn about animals until they get to college? How ridiculous!

In what universe does it make sense to ban books about cats and dog?

In what world does it make sense to ban ANY books?

Digging deeper into this on the internet, I found that this is the result of Tennessee’s Age-Appropriate Materials Act, which went into effect this summer.

In addition to apparently any book about cats or dogs, the usual book banners’ target are on the list: To Kill a Mockingbird, Of Mice and Men, Fahrenheit 451, Lord of the Flies, Grapes of Wrath, Hidden Figures, Brave New World, Animal Farm; and Aztec, Inca, and Maya.

In my opinion the book above all others that should not be on anyone’s banned books list is Hidden Figures, by Margot Lee Shetterley. Heaven forbid a young black girl (or brown girl, or white girl) reads that book and is inspired to be a mathematician!

All kidding aside about dogs and cats, how dare they take Hidden Figures off the public school library shelves! How dare they!

There is such a thing as age appropriateness, but books should not be banned anywhere.

What are they afraid of?

Fortunately, Monroe County, Tennessee, only has a population of 46,250 as of the 2020 U.S. Census, so it’s book banning decisions won’t affect a huge number of children. But, since the Tennessee Age-Appropriate Materials Act applies to the entire state, will other county school systems follow Monroe County’s lead and ban the same 574 books?

North Carolina has some faults, but I’m so glad I don’t live in Texas or Monroe County, Tennessee! How embarrassing for the people there.

A bit of good news out of Washington, DC!

North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson announced on Monday that the U.S. Department of Education decided to unfreeze the money it froze a week or two ago that was earmarked for after-school programs. This means North Carolina will get $36 million of the $165 million the Department of Education originally said it was freezing.

Jackson vowed he will see the U.S. Department of Education in court to try to recover the other $130 million.

Until my next blog post

Read anything and everything you can get your hands on.

Don’t let anyone tell you what you should not read.

Look for my blog post tomorrow about the 596 books the U.S Department of Defense has banned this month from the schools it operates for the children of our military personnel.

Remember the people of Ukraine and western North Carolina.

Janet