NEWTON RESIDENTS SUE CITY’S SCHOOL COMMITTEE, SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS, PRINCIPALS AND TEACHERS FOR DISCRIMINATION AND INDOCTRINATION
Allege School Officials and Teachers Guilty of Dereliction of Duty
NEWTON, MASSACHUSETTS – On March 12, 2019, a group of Newton taxpayers filed a lawsuit against the Newton School Committee, Superintendent of Schools David Fleishman, the principals of the Newton high schools, and certain high school history teachers to compel them to stop discriminating against and indoctrinating students with anti-Semitism, bigotry against Israel, and Islamist religious dogma as part of the high- school history curriculum.
The taxpayers claim that Newton Public Schools (NPS) has deliberately failed and refused to comply with the Equal Rights Amendment of the Massachusetts Constitution, with the Massachusetts Student Anti-Discrimination Act, and with civil rights regulations that require schools, through their curricula, to encourage respect for the human and civil rights of all individuals regardless of race, identity, religion, color, sex, and national origin.
This suit is the latest in a long and contentious battle between concerned citizens and the embattled school administration, which is shielding its teachers from scrutiny and refusing to supervise what is being taught in its classrooms.
The massively documented 469-page legal complaint, available here, details the history of Newton residents’ efforts to have NPS address and correct the factually flawed teaching. Evidence described in the complaint shows how Newton teachers teach that the Jews and Christians deliberately forged their holy texts to contradict the Muslim Quran; that Zionism has “little connection” to Jewish history in “Palestine;” that the Jews took advantage of the Holocaust to gain sympathy for Zionism at the expense of the “Arab plight;” and that the Israelis treat the Palestinians like the Nazis treated the Jews. After being taught all this, under the guise of “critical thinking,” students are asked to debate whether there should be a one or two-state solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Despite significant community concerns, scholarly documentation of anti-Jewish bias, and formal citizen requests for remedial action, Defendants have categorically and repeatedly refused to remedy the teaching of false and hateful stereotypes about Israel, Israelis, and the Jewish people. They have also repeatedly refused to even read the studies of the curriculum presented to them. Instead, they have issued public statements that the taxpayers are engaging in scare tactics and that their claims are baseless.
Defendants have publicly described the Newton residents and Jewish community organizations who have expressed concerns about the curriculum bias as “hate groups” and “outside groups” with a “hateful agenda,” engaged in “unprincipled behavior,” through “baseless accusations without any evidence, without any proof.” School Committee Chairman Ruth Goldman has stated, falsely, that the School Committee has no authority over curriculum.
In late fall of 2018, the School Committee voted unanimously not to grant a formal citizen petition request to them asking that they vet teaching materials and initiate a policy of transparency so that parents and the public will know what the students are being taught.
Karen Hurvitz, attorney for the taxpayers, stated that her clients are not asking for any money damages, even though Defendants have certainly caused years of incalculable damage by their insistence on teaching impressionable students materials that slander Israel and Jews. “The taxpayers here are merely asking NPS to perform their duties and obey the law, which requires that their curriculum encourage respect for all people,” says Attorney Hurvitz. “Education should be based on fact, not on stereotypes and propaganda.”
***
This was sent to me by Karen Hurvitz
Law Office of Karen D Hurvitz
PO BOX 773
Concord, Massachusetts 01742
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.