Childhood should be a magical time, filled with curiosity, exploration, and discovery. This exciting open-mindedness sets children up for a lifetime of new friends and new experiences – but some educators aren’t interested in promoting open minds.
K-12 children in some classrooms are being spoon-fed a political ideology, sorted into groups based on their skin color, ethnicity, or national origin, and encouraged to feel angry if they’re in one group and guilty if they’re in another. When curiosity and natural questioning are replaced with division and simplistic, black-and-white answers, kids are robbed of opportunities to use their imagination, explore, and truly learn.
Liberated Ethnic Studies (LES), a political educational framework, is similar to Marxism and fascism in that it’s built on falsehoods. Rife with judgement, it promotes an extremist ideology that peddles damaging notions of heritable guilt and ethnic preference. It operates in the dark, stripping power from parents and communities and indoctrinating impressionable young minds. Instead of teaching critical thinking skills, LES brooks no dissent – an approach that is fundamentally incompatible with American values.
I’m Mitch Siegler. I’m an Independent who believes in bipartisanship – I’ve supported Democrats, Independents, and Republicans for many years. Collaboration and compromise are my cornerstone principles. I think that high-quality public education, the American middle class, and centrists who build coalitions are all essential for a healthy, pluralistic, democratic society.
After a successful career as an entrepreneur and business executive alongside decades of volunteer service leading non-profit and community organizations, I founded the THINC Foundation to advocate for transparency, honesty, and integrity in the classroom. It’s time to shed light on the hypocrisy, falsehoods, and political ideology that have crept into too many K-12 schools.
I call it as I see it – teaching kids to value civics, know that a rising tide lifts all boats, and appreciate meritocracy sets the foundation for children to collaborate, compromise, and celebrate differences as they grow up. The opposite effects that stem from LES – anger, guilt, divisiveness, antisemitism and other forms of racism, disdain for free markets, and even overt anti-Americanism – simply have no place in our schools.
I invite you to join with THINC as we promote transparency, honesty, and integrity in the classroom. Sign up for our newsletter. Follow us on social media. And please help support our work. The next generation depends on it.
Mitch Siegler
THINC Founder
