Arizona Launches Hotline to Report CRT, Gender Ideology Lessons in Schools

A recently launched hotline by Arizona’s top education official, a newly elected Republican, gives parents the opportunity to combat “woke” lessons being taught in Arizona schools, including “inappropriate” sexual content and other radical ideology.

Arizona’s Department of Education introduced a hotline last week for the public to report classroom lessons promoting critical race theory (CRT), gender ideology, and “inappropriate sexual content,” topics that have long faced conservative criticism. 

Superintendent Horne believes in empowering parents, and that's why he launched the Empower Hotline. No educator should discuss politics, critical race theory, or social emotional learning with students. Every educational minute is precious for our students. #EducationForAll pic.twitter.com/aGHndxkmkJ

— Arizona Department of Education (@azedschools) March 10, 2023

The “Empower Hotline,” which “empowers” concerned parents by encouraging them to report lessons that “detract from teaching academic standards,” was a key promise of Republican Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne’s recent campaign, which aimed to prioritize math and reading instruction while declaring “war” on unnecessary and potentially harmful discussions about emotions and identity, according to the Arizona Republic.

The Department of Education’s website allows for Arizona residents to report “inappropriate lessons that detract from teaching academic standards,” which includes topics such as those linked to CRT and “social and emotional learning” programs accused of promoting “woke” concepts regarding race, gender, and sexuality.

“Some say critical race theory is a graduate study, not taught in K-12 schools. The evidence is to the contrary,” Horne said, demanding that teachers “teach academics [and] not use their power over a captive audience, to promote their personal ideology.” 

“That is unprofessional conduct,” he added.

He also assured educators that “as long as they are teaching academics, they have absolutely nothing to worry about.”

“I want to be sure that we get rid of distractions, and the teachers are teaching the academics bell-to-bell the way they’re supposed to be doing,” he said. 

The Arizona schools chief explained how the establishment of the hotline offers Arizonans the opportunity to “report the teaching of inappropriate lessons that rob students of precious minutes of instruction time in core academic subjects such as reading, math, science, history and the arts.”

He also claimed the effort was intended to stop dividing students by “irrelevant” criteria.

“I believe we are all individuals, brothers and sisters under the skin, entitled to be judged by what we know, what we can do, our character, and ability to appreciate beauty,” he said. “Race is irrelevant to anything.” 

According to Horne, who was sworn in as superintendent of public instruction in January, CRT “teaches the opposite, that race is primary.”

“They divide students into ‘oppressors’ and ‘oppressed’ based on what race they were born into, which is irrational,” he said.

The new effort, which allows for the dispatch of investigators to schools and disciplinary moves for violators, has also been met with criticism.

Arizona Education Association president Marisol Garcia slammed the hotline, describing it as “disrespectful” to educators and their profession.

“Looks like Arizona is giving DeSantis’ Florida a run for its money now in being the most fascist white supremacist state in the country,” said educator Sari Beth Rosenberg.

If you want to reach out to the Arizona Empower Hotline, it is available at 602-771-3500, or through email at empower@azed.gov pic.twitter.com/FMRwMFfJgY

— Sari Beth Rosenberg (@saribethrose) March 11, 2023

On Wednesday, Horne explained that during the pandemic, when children were learning online from home, a “parents revolt” developed when parents expressed outrage after seeing what their children were being taught in school.

As a result, he promised to fight against the “abusive” and “poisonous” practices which “detract from academics.”

The matter comes as woke initiatives seek to incorporate gender ideology and queer theory in the educational system, including the dissemination of sexually explicit, pro-LGBTQ, and transgender propaganda in elementary and kindergarten classrooms.

In December, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued an “assessment tool” for teachers and school administrators to measure their commitment to “LGBTQ inclusivity” in the classroom.

The tool asks leading questions about school personnel and their commitment to queer theory, including encouraging sexual education teachers to have gender-neutral anatomy, referring to a boy as a “body with a penis” and a girl as a “body with a vagina.”

Earlier this year, parents in Wisconsin’s second-largest school district were informed their children — as young as kindergarteners — would undergo a week of “gender identity” programming where they will learn about a “spectrum” of genders and sexual orientations.

Actress and education advocate Sam Sorbo accused today’s schools of “child abuse” while slamming the “craziness” surrounding gender ideology in schools. 

“Your children have been stolen from you by a system that seeks their destruction,” she warned as she called on parents to “save your families” by considering “home education” instead.

Meanwhile, the battle over CRT in schools has resulted in nationwide tension in recent years.

The theory, which is promoted by many on the left, claims that American institutions — the government, economy, and culture — are based on racial hierarchy, with white people at the top and black people at the bottom, and even that which appears race-neutral is, on closer inspection, rooted in racism. 

As a result, it urges reform in virtually all of its institutions.

In January, a Washington Post piece accused Gov. Ron DeSantis (FL-R) of being a “full-blown white supremacist” for banning an African American studies AP course, allegedly containing radical content, from Florida’s schools.