Emails Reveal Nebraska Ed Bureaucrats’ Disdain for Parents in Pushing Radical Sex Ed Curriculum

Opponents of a proposal to makes changes to the sex education guidance for teachers, ralli
AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli
Dr. Susan Berry

Emails obtained by Nebraska parents through a public information request revealed a state board of education member facilitated outside activists to advise in the drafting of a controversial state sex ed curriculum, while telling parents no outside activists were involved, the Washington Free Beacon reported Thursday.

Though the Nebraska Department of Education (NDE) told parents no external activists were involved in drafting the radical curriculum, the hundreds of pages of documents parent Jason Martinez received reportedly revealed what the report noted as “snide remarks state bureaucrats and their activist allies made” as they drafted a curriculum that would teach children about transgender hormone treatments and abortion.

The report observed:

In a May fact sheet, titled “Points of Clarification,” NDE insisted the curriculum “was not written by activists” and that “Planned Parenthood is not funding or helping to write the Nebraska Health Education Standards.” Internal communications, obtained by the Free Beacon from a concerned parent, paint a very different picture. Emails and text messages from elected board of education representatives, NDE employees, and advisory board members show that activists were not only closely involved but disparaged parents and froze out teachers who were supposed to write the curriculum.

According to the report, the emails showed how Deborah Neary, a state board of education member, achieved bringing leftwing activist Lisa Schulze, a Friends of Planned Parenthood board member and former employee of the abortion business, onto the advisory board to help with the draft of the sex ed curriculum.

Subsequently, Schulze connected NDE members with other national activists who assisted as well in advising on the curriculum.

“The internal communications contradicted the agency’s public denial that activists shaped the controversial standards,” the Free Beacon reported.

The proposed sex ed curriculum that resulted was the subject of intense controversy as hundreds of parents rallied against the program at school board meetings.

The original draft was nearly identical to the 2020 National Sex Education Standards, which was written by three well-funded left-wing activist groups: the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS), Advocates for Youth, and Answer.

In Illinois, for example, Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) signed a bill into law in August that requires public schools in the state that offer sex ed to align their curriculum with the same national standards.

Creators of the standards also boast they have been updated to include:

Continual evolution in language related to gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, and sexual identity;

Inclusion of power and privilege, conscious and unconscious bias, intersectionality, and covert and overt discrimination, and the principles of reproductive justice, racial justice, social justice, and equity

The Free Beacon reported on some of the controversial elements of the first Nebraska sex ed draft:

The first draft of the standards detailed a plan to teach gender identity in first grade, transgender hormone therapy in fifth grade, sexual orientation in sixth grade, oral and anal sex in seventh grade, and abortion in eighth grade. That draft mirrored a sex-ed curriculum designed by leading liberal groups. Some children’s health experts expressed concern about the provocative material in the lesson plan. Dr. Sue Greenwald, a retired pediatrician in Nebraska who worked with childhood victims of sexual abuse for 35 years, said the standards are like a manual on child grooming.

“This is exactly the type of graphic material that a pedophile would use to groom a young child to be their next victim,” Greenwald told the Free Beacon. “Young sexual abuse victims do not know they are being abused, they think they are being taught.”

The emails reportedly revealed NDE employees mocking concerned parents, including one staff member referring to a grandmother’s complaint as a “load of crap,” adding, “It’s literally science and anatomy that she has a problem with!!!”

Neary also complained to fellow board members through emails about parents having so much say in the development of the sex ed curriculum.

When the uproar over the first draft led to another that minimized some of the sexuality language but kept lessons on gender identity, parents still insisted on more change.

“Most of the testimony we have heard has been hate-speech—not facts,” Neary emailed the education board president, according to the Free Beacon report. “I hope they are not going to merely leave the decisions up to public testimony as you are asking our board to do.”

In response to the revelation of the NDE employees’ comments, a spokesman for the department told the Free Beacon the staffer’s private remarks do not reflect their manner in dealing with parents.

“Parental engagement is encouraged and sought after,” an NDE spokesman said. “We continue to encourage parental engagement, not only with state standards, but also within local communities where decisions about curriculum are made.”

Martinez eventually joined with Greenwald to create a Facebook group called Protect Nebraska Children, which currently boasts more than 21,000 members.

Katie McClemens said the Facebook group grew out of wanting to educate parents about the sex ed standards.

“They didn’t anticipate the storm that would come against them because for so long they had been able to work in the shadows,” McClemens said about the education bureaucrats.

The Associated Press (AP) reported in July the sex ed draft that included gender identity lessons had been scrapped after parents and some top state officials insisted the topics were inappropriate for children.

AP reported:

The new draft of the proposed sexual standards from the Nebraska Department of Education came after agency officials faced intense criticism from parents, school boards, state lawmakers and Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts, who held town hall events to blast the proposal. Opponents flooded a meeting of the Nebraska State Board of Education, an elected board that oversees the agency.

Ricketts, a Republican, said sex education should be taught at home, not in schools.

“The continued presence of gender ideology in the standards leaves the door open for this material to be expanded either before these draft standards are approved or in future years when these standards are revisited,” the governor said.

Ricketts told the Free Beacon the emails obtained through the public information request confirmed what he had suspected: that education bureaucrats sought to give their special interests an upper hand above the needs of parents and their children.

“These advocacy groups definitely have an agenda they are pushing—and it is one that sexualizes children,” the governor said. “This was never about the parents—it was about the advocates.”

In September, the Nebraska Board of Education voted 5-1, with Neary abstaining, to suspend the approval process for the standards, blaming the coronavirus pandemic.

But State Sen. Joni Albrecht (R) said parents did not buy that excuse.

“They, the activists on the other side, are so darn mad they cannot stop us from protecting the culture in Nebraska,” Albrecht told the Free Beacon. “We are going to protect the children. We are going to let the parents know this is happening.”

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