On this episode of the Bespoke Parenting Hour, host Julie Gunlock talks to Texas mom, lawyer, and community activist Hannah Smith, who made national headlines when she won a seat on her local city’s school board. Hannah is no stranger to politics or education policy, and she knew someone needed to stand up to stop this dangerous trend in education. Julie and Hannah chat about what made her step into the race, why more parents need to do it, and how she plans to change her town’s educational policies for the better. Tune in to hear Hannah’s inspiring story.
TRANSCRIPT
Julie Gunlock:
Hey everyone, I’m Julie Gunlock, host of the Bespoke Parenting Hour. For those new to the program, this podcast is focused on how parents should custom tailor their parenting style to fit what’s best for their families, themselves, and most importantly, their kids. So the viral videos are everywhere, all over the country, parents are pushing back on school boards and on the new woke policies, they’re trying to put in place. But I think it’s important to point out that many of these parents aren’t just challenging these woke policies, they’re challenging the idea that the school board members get to do whatever they want, with no accountability, and no feedback or input from parents.
I think parents have had it with the audacity of the school board members who are elected, not all school board members are elected, I think in some regions and cities, they might be appointed, but they’re largely elected, and they get elected, and they go on these power trips, and we’re seeing it all over the country where they don’t even want to hear from parents. They’re dismissive, they’re smug, they’re rude, they cut parents off, they cut their mics off, they sit up on these daises, surrounded by plexiglass with masks on, they’ve been vaccinated for months, they make the parents stand behind plexiglass and wear a mask. That’s what’s going on in my school. But again, they clearly don’t want to hear what’s being said from these parents.
So I think there is just overall frustration with the attitude from a lot of these school board members. So, one of the people that has had enough is Hannah Smith, she’s a Texas mom, who recently won in a special election in the Southlake Texas area that is a suburb of Dallas. In that special election, a whole new slate of candidates for mayor, city council and two for school board, including Hannah, were elected in a landslide. This next part is really important. More than 9000 voters cast ballots. Three times as many in similar contests years prior. It just shows that the apathy is gone, people care and they’re showing up.
Hannah has an interesting story, and she’s no stranger to education or law. Hannah graduated from Princeton University, where she focused on education policy, and then she went on to earn her law degree at BYU. Hannah spent the next two decades involved in high profile litigation at top law firms and at the Supreme Court, where she even worked directly for Justice Clarence Thomas and Justice Samuel Alito, and later advocated successfully for religious liberty and state and federal courts, including four landmark victories at the U.S. Supreme Court. She has served as a legal spokeswoman on major news outlets. She’s authored opinion pieces and articles on legal and religious liberty subjects. She’s briefed policymakers at the White House, the U.S. Capitol, and State Department.
She’s provided expert testimony in support of Justice Neil Gorsuch, during his confirmation to the U.S. Supreme Court. In other words, she is no slouch. In addition to all that, Hannah has been an active member in her community, and she has volunteered in various community roles, and she says she’s always cherished her role as wife and mother, she and her husband, John have four kids. I mean, these kids aren’t out of the house. Her youngest is still in elementary school. So, she’s a very busy woman. Hannah, it is such an honor to talk to you. Thanks for coming on.
Hannah Smith:
Thank you so much for having me. It’s great to be with you.
Julie Gunlock:
Well, Hannah, there’s a lot of interest in your story, and I know you’ve gotten a lot of media coverage, and from all sorts of media, and people, especially parents, parents like me are interested in your story. I really want to know, and have you explain to the audience, was there something in particular that happened? Was there something that was sort of, I’ve had it? I’ve had those moments where I’m like, “I’m done.” Right? So, was there something that happened a moment, or was it a slow bill? Tell us a little bit about your decision to run for school board.
Hannah Smith:
Well, thank you so much for having me on, first of all, and I’m so excited to talk about this with your listeners. We moved to Southlake Texas about two years ago, and we left the Washington D.C. area because we wanted to raise our kids in Texas. We had lived here once before, and we knew what a great environment it was to raise kids in faith, family, and football-
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah.
Hannah Smith:
It’s a great place to live. So we moved to a very conservative town, Southlake is in the middle of Tarrant County, which is probably the reddest county in North Texas. We did that by design. We wanted to live in a fairly conservative area, and we wanted to send our kids to public schools that reflected the values of that community. So we were here, and we were enjoying our kids and their new schools, and then COVID hit, and so we all went home for COVID quarantine. It was during that time period, that our school district tried to introduce this radical plan. It was a 34-page plan, it was called the Cultural Competence Action Plan.
And parents were home, they were home from work, they were looking over their kids’ shoulders, on their computers, watching what they were doing in class, and paying much more attention to school board meetings. I give you that background because I do think it is vitally important to the story and how it unfolded. Because our community when they saw what our school district was trying to do, rose up and said, “We’re not allowing that to happen.” And that’s really when I started to get involved, helping with our volunteers and our grassroots organization, mobilizing the parents to speak at board meetings, and really fighting back against that 34-page plan.
So when the time rolled around to consider who had run for school board, I raised my hand and I said, “If not now, when? And if me, who?” I just felt like this was the right time, and the right place to be able to jump in.
Julie Gunlock:
It’s interesting to me to hear about this, because, you mentioned, you left the D.C. area, you wanted to raise your kids in a different environment. I’m still here, I live right outside of Washington and Alexandria, Virginia, and it’s so nice to talk to you because I feel like I don’t have to explain to you what a different world it is. I’m sure you know exactly what I’m talking about. It is a deep blue area all around. It’s not just Alexandria, Arlington, Fairfax County. Virginia would be a red state if it weren’t for Northern Virginia, and Northern Virginia is very much deep blue.
I want to talk to you about this too. There is a sense here of you just don’t complain. Did you feel that when you were in this area? Did you feel a sense of just don’t complain, stay quiet, and also a sense that if you do complain, you might pay a price? Did you feel that way when you’re here? I don’t mean to pivot away from what you’re doing. But I wanted to just get a quick sense from you of how you felt when you lived in this area.
Hannah Smith:
We loved living in the D.C. area. I totally identify with what you’re saying. We left in June of 2019. I think it was just six months later, that Virginia turned completely blue. All of the top elected officials and all of the state government were Democrats. We saw that coming, and that was part of the reason why we left to be quite honest, because we just felt like, at one point, Virginia was more Republican, but it has definitely taken a different turn in recent years, and so, I understand what you’re saying. I think anywhere really, it’s not just the D.C. area, but anywhere where you feel like you’re not in the majority, you do feel like there’s a certain risk to speaking out.
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah.
Hannah Smith:
And even here, I have to say, red Tarrant County, there are people who still feel like there’s a price you pay if you stand up and speak out. I think that’s unfortunate, because this cancel culture that has taken over, it pays a price for people to have to stand up and say what they really believe, they do risk getting doxxed and canceled.
Julie Gunlock:
Yes. There’s a risk to the children. I think there’s a lot of people who feel like, “Well, if I speak up, then my child may not get a particular spot on a sports team. My child maybe won’t get the attention.” I don’t want to suggest there’s some conspiracy, and might not be justified, but I do think some parents feel that way, that it’s better to be quiet and go along, get along and not really raise a stink. But I think it’s gotten to the point where … I think because of COVID what you mentioned being home, hearing things, listening, being present, being there in the classroom with their kids has made people go, “Hold on a sec, hold on a sec.”
So, you mentioned this group of parents, so it wasn’t just you, you had a group of parents that were very concerned, and I thought one thing that was really interesting about your story is the turnout of the vote. It was something like 9000 voters cast ballots, and that was three times as many as in years prior. That motivation, it’s great to see that, and I think that’s happening nationwide. Do you think that will continue? In other words, do you think the next year … I think nationally, the turnout for school board elections is very, very low. It’s like 5%. But do you think we’re going to start to see more of what happened in your town, more people showing up, more interest? Will that be prolonged, or is this just a temporary trend?
Hannah Smith:
That’s a great question. No doubt, we had the highest voter turnout in a non-presidential, municipal election in our city’s history. Normally, we had single-digit percentage turnout for municipal elections. Most of our current school board members were appointed, and then ran unopposed to get on the school board. We only had one other person who actually ran opposed to somebody out of the seven members of our school board. Traditionally in our town, there was probably, maybe 3000 people that turned out for a municipal election, and that’s if you had like a city council person running or a mayor running.
And our election, we had almost 10,000 voters turn out, and it was largely driven by the school board election, we did have two city council candidates running opposed races, and we had a mayor’s candidate running unopposed race. But it was largely the CCAP and the school board issues that drove the turnout, and we won in a landslide. It was a 70 to 30, a 40 point margin win, which was huge, huge, huge in our city’s history and huge around the country. People had just not seen that happen before.
Julie Gunlock:
Oh, yeah.
Hannah Smith:
I give credit to our amazing community. I mean, we had an amazing group of volunteers who helped us, who helped mobilize the vote, we had a wonderful pack that was created, the Southlake Families PAC that helped raise money and who sent out mailers on our behalf. We had an amazing Facebook page group that was set up where we could communicate with each other, our campaigns had just amazing volunteers that helped knock on doors, pass out flyers, call and text people, we just had a really great ground game. And that infrastructure really helped us get our message out because we had a great message.
We scheduled about 70 different meet-and-greets with different constituencies around our city and our school district to talk to the empty nesters, and what this would mean for their property values, and to talk to the young families with pre-k students who are about to enter the district, and what this would mean for their students’ education in the future. And of course, then families that have kids in the district right now. So we really worked hard, and it paid off. I have to say it was a community effort.
Julie Gunlock:
That’s such a great story, it honestly is like this sort of all American story, right, of someone who just didn’t really see themselves with a political future necessarily, and then you run and the candidacy and the campaign, and the volunteers are really people who feel passionately about this, and the candidate. So, it’s just a great story. But your story is what we’re seeing all over the country. There are others like this that are concerned about CRT, that are, critical race theory, that are concerned about, for instance, the 1619 Curriculum getting put into schools, or people who are concerned about this equity versus equality, this is a big thing in my … and I want to apologize to anyone who can hear the lawnmowers outside my house, my windows are closed. So I apologize for that. We get a little bit of landscaping on this podcast.
So, you have these breakouts throughout the country. And yet in the mainstream media, you’re hearing a narrative like CRT is not being taught, that parents who are upset about this and going to school, because we’ve all seen the viral videos of parents going to school board meetings and saying, “I don’t want this in my school.” And then you have charged that they are all part of this AstroTurf, highly funded right-wing program. That’s not true. How do you hit back on that? I don’t know if you’ve gotten those kinds of questions in the media.
Essentially, what I see in the mainstream media is telling parents don’t do this, don’t complain, be quiet, and then painting these parents, like they’re part of some right-wing cabal that wants to essentially not teach about race at all in school and not teach about slavery, or Jim Crow or civil rights, which is absurd. How do you respond to that kind of stuff?
Hannah Smith:
Well, there’s a lot in that question. So let me address several of those points. So, there were two seats that were open on our school board. So I ran for place five, and then my fellow conservative Cam Bryan, ran for place four. So, we really had a dual message in our campaign. Right? We were talking to people not only about why you should elect us to be on the school board, but we were educating them about the CCAP and about equity, and about this new agenda. So every time we met with folks, we were talking to them about what is the difference between equality and equity.
Our system of government and our legal system is based on colorblind equality. It is based on the principle that everyone is equal before the law, no matter what your skin color, race, ethnicity, gender, disability, background, it doesn’t matter, everyone is equal. And we don’t look at skin color, we are colorblind. And yet this new agenda of equity is really different from that, and it tries to twist the principles of equality by actually using race and using ethnicity, and using gender as a basis for achieving certain equitable outcomes. So it’s a really much more results-oriented outlook. It says, “There’s all of these inequities in our society, so we have to use race as a mechanism to favor certain individuals so that they can achieve the results that we deem important.”
And that is a fundamental reshaping of American principles. It’s just a very radically different approach. So, I would have to explain that to folks as we were talking about it. Because the progressive left wants everyone to believe, “Oh, these programs are really just about teaching kindness and respect, and human decency.” I would say to people, if this plan was only about kindness and respect and human decency, I would be all for it-
Julie Gunlock:
Sign me up.
Hannah Smith:
Because those are principles that I teach my children in my house, I teach my children to be kind to other people, to be respectful of different cultures. That’s not an issue for me. The issue for me was the fundamental and radical reshaping of America through these educational programs that are just radically progressive. So, I would try and explain that, and I think we got the message across. I think people were deeply concerned about that changing our school system forever, and getting to a point where we really wouldn’t recognize our schools, once this plan was to be in place.
And you talked about being characterized as a well-funded right-wing organization. I just want to address that really briefly, because Cam and I, each of us raised over $60,000, for our individual races. And that is almost unheard of for a school board race. We made more money, we raised more money than the city council candidates and the mayor’s candidates in our same races who were conservative. So, it’s really important to understand that all of that money, all of it, came from our community. Our community was so concerned about our schools being radically transformed, that they opened up their pocketbooks, and they contributed, and they contributed very generously.
So, this narrative that we have this national right-wing, all-white, white nationalist Christian path behind us, that’s funding us for money outside of our town is just false. It just wasn’t the case in our race.
Julie Gunlock:
You told that story, we’d have to explain first, it’s interesting that that’s exactly right. When you are running against something like CRT, you do have to spend a while explaining this stuff, because what’s very concerning to me is that … I think more and more parents are aware that this is out there, and some of them may have a vague concept of why this is bad, but there’s an awful lot of people who don’t know why a lot of parents are concerned and that equity equality thing is so important to point out to people because I’ve seen people say, “I have some concerns about what I’m hearing about that, but I really believe equity should be an important goal.”
I’ve had the opportunity to sometimes ask people to their face and say, “I just want to know, do you think equity and equitable or equality rather, are equal words? Do you think they are interchangeable?” They always say yes. They don’t understand what a loaded term equity is. Right? And how it’s being used as a way to convey this idea of equality, that everybody has equality of opportunities. When I try to explain-
Hannah Smith:
That’s right.
Julie Gunlock:
It’s outcomes, they’re focused on the outcomes no matter what the situation is. But my point is, and talking about this, it’s really hard to explain this stuff. I think you have to be a gifted communicator to explain the difference in a way that people can understand because these are complicated. CRT, this sort of theory that only existed in law schools until recently. These are complicated topics, they’re not easy to understand. What bothers me so much, and why I’m so glad you’re out there really trying to inform people about the realities of these programs that have different names, like you said, the one in your school is different, ours is equity for all, that’s what my school district is launching.
But you do really have to explain these things, and I think it’s so important that people understand this, because this is particularly upsetting to me, and I mentioned this earlier that so many people think that this means that those who object to these equity and CRT, object to the horrifying part of our country being taught in schools, nobody objects to that. Nobody sees that kids don’t need to learn about slavery, and Jim Crow and the civil rights movement. Other parts of our history that are really horrifying, this is a part of it.
I think what bothers me also, is this idea that America hasn’t improved at all, since those parts of our history, there’s this kind of narrative that while it’s just as bad as it’s always been. Bill Meyer touched on this on his show about how … Look, can we just admit that things are getting better? So, it’s this very negative and kind of depressing message that I think that’s what a lot of parents don’t want to see. It’s the anti-Americanism. So it’s great that you’re also making education or made education a part of your campaign. I think that’s so important.
Hannah Smith:
Yeah, it really is.
Julie Gunlock:
Were people responsive to it?
Hannah Smith:
Yes, absolutely. I think people were really concerned because they see these words that have normal meanings that everybody understands, and they see these words being changed. We’re witnessing right now, I think, a moment in our culture and society where words are being redefined to be used and weaponized for a particular political agenda. So when you talk about things like equity, well, if you look at equity and equality in the dictionary, they actually do have very similar definitions, if you look at them in the dictionary, but that’s not what the political connotation is when they are being used in this context. So you almost have to just explain to people that our vocabulary is being redefined to achieve certain political agendas.
Another thing that I would talk to people a lot on the campaign trail about was, we’ve seen in other states where these equity programs have gone, we can look to California or Massachusetts or New York, or even Illinois, and see where equity audit have taken school districts, for example, in New York, Bill de Blasio, they had an equity committee, and he charged them with reviewing all of the gifted and talented programs. And the equity review decided that because there was a higher percentage of Caucasian and Asian students in gifted and talented programs, that they were going to completely disband the gifted and talented program, because there weren’t enough Hispanic and African Americans in those programs.
And I’m saying to myself, “Well, why don’t you do something to help the Hispanic and African Americans to qualify instead of getting rid of the program altogether?” And so we talked about that on the campaign trail. What does that mean for our school district? If we were to go down this equity path, where would that take us? Would our award-winning gifted and talented programs be taken away? It’s something to really consider. Our school district is pretty unique because we have a pretty small district, we only have about 8500 students, about 1200 staff. Our district is pretty much within the confines of one city, and we have five elementary schools, got two intermediate schools that cover fifth and sixth grade, we’ve got two schools that cover seventh and eighth grade. And then we’ve got one high school that’s for ninth and 10th, and one high school that’s for 11th and 12th.
So we’re pretty small district. And in this 34-page CCAP report, they actually said that they had done a review of all of the academic test scores of our students, and they had concluded that there was no statistically significant difference in educational outcome based on race. So what does that tell you? That tells you that there are no educational inequalities in our school districts based on race. So why on earth do we need to adopt an equity policy that would purport to achieve certain equitable outcomes in education based on race, when we don’t have inequalities to begin with? They don’t exist.
Julie Gunlock:
Right. Right. Right. And it’s interesting, because these are the questions that often … That’s part of the reason there’s an intimidation campaign going on. Because when you really get into the data, and when you really look at the facts, and then when you consider what they want to do, like take away AP classes and advanced classes, then it doesn’t make sense. You realize how damaging it’s going to be. I think parents once they realize this stuff, and giving parents specific examples is really important. Now, I will tell you, Hannah, they have removed advanced math classes in Virginia schools. This is at the behest of, obviously-
Hannah Smith:
Yes, I know, I saw a that, it’s horrible.
Julie Gunlock:
It’s absolutely horrible. It’s interesting that suddenly some people in my very, I call them like … they’re like timid in my community to speak up, suddenly, people are like, “Wait a minute, I’m not going to get advanced math, there’s not going to be TAG?” We call it the talented and gifted program here in the city. My gifted child who has always been interested in numbers and counting is suddenly going to be sitting in a class where he’s bored. What is so horrifying too is, many times these advanced placement classes, teachers will notice a child has unique abilities or unique interests, and they can pull some of these kids who do live in poor households, and they can see that, “Oh, they need these advanced math placement.” It really helps a lot of these kids in these poor communities or special needs communities.
Hannah Smith:
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Julie Gunlock:
So what’s horrifying is you’re actually harming the very children, because these are merit-based programs. I’m sure you probably also have heard that the situation in this community of TJ. Right? Thomas Jefferson High School, best high school in the United States. Right? It’s a Math and Science High School, and you have to take essentially a math and science test to see if you qualify to get it. I would never ever have gotten into this high school. Okay? These are the bright, brilliant children that go to this high school. Again, entirely merit-based, and they now taken away the test, because they … As you said, you mentioned this, they didn’t have enough, they had too many Caucasians, and it really was Asians. TJ has a lot of Asian students.
Hannah Smith:
Yup, that’s right.
Julie Gunlock:
And because there weren’t enough Black and Hispanic students, they have now taken away the test, and they’re going to offer these positions to Blacks and Hispanics students that probably aren’t going to do well or maybe too challenging, and then they’ll feel defeated. The whole thing is such a mess. And again, I think it’s important when you hear like Joy Reid on MSNBC say, “Oh gosh, Ole Miss, CRT isn’t in schools.” Well, the philosophy of CRT, which is obsessed with outcomes and is very narrowly focused-
Hannah Smith:
And undermines meritocracy. Right?
Julie Gunlock:
Exactly. Exactly. But I think it is important to point out to people, there are actual consequences, you said that, you were like, you got to point out that you can’t just talk about this up in like the ether and like with these very theoretical terms. “Oh know the difference between equity and equality.” I mean, that’s all great. We need to do that. But we also need to point out the real-world consequences of that stuff, and that is compelling. So you were doing that, you started to get parents nervous about this and that groundswell, that just huge numbers that turned out is evidence. It’s real evidence that parents are waking up to this stuff and they are afraid. What is on your agenda? What are you going to focus on when you’re in office?
Hannah Smith:
We hit the ground running in May. We took our oath of office in mid-May, and one of the very first things on the agenda was to look at the preschool curriculum. Our state required a new preschool curriculum. So, we started doing some research on it and the social emotional learning component of their pre-k curriculum was provided by a company whose website talks all about SEL as a lever for equity. So on our very first meeting, we had to go and ask, “Should we please postpone this discussion and look into this a little bit more so that we can make sure that we’re not introducing equity through the lens of social-emotional learning in our pre-k curriculum?” I mean, it starts that young for these people.
Julie Gunlock:
God.
Hannah Smith:
And the fact that they say, oh, CRT is not really in school, we’ve heard that so much. I have to tell you, again, parents being home during COVID, and seeing what their kids were doing, they saw it. I mean, there are so many examples that I have collected from around the country, where white kids were given assignments to go home and write an essay on their white privilege-
Julie Gunlock:
Privilege.
Hannah Smith:
And all the ways that they’re privileged over people of color. You know what I say to that? I say, that’s not only damaging to the white kid, but that is also demeaning to every student of color in this entire country.
Julie Gunlock:
Yes.
Hannah Smith:
If you suggest that students of color are automatically in a position of inferiority just because of their skin color, I cannot think of a more demeaning thing to say to a young student than that. I think that’s why I’m really opposed to it. It’s both sides that really suffer when we start educating our kids that one side is an oppressor, and one side is oppressed, and you can never overcome those labels. That is inherently destructive and will do great damage to our kids.
Julie Gunlock:
It’s abusive. What upsets me too Hannah, is they are starting all of this intersection of COVID and George Floyd and the BML rallies and protests and the looting that happened this summer and then people staying home. And also we know the reports on children experiencing greater levels of depression and anxiety and higher rates of suicide, more trips to the emergency room. I mean, just horrifying data on this. Then you have them returning to school, and many schools, since the death of George Floyd are now instituting these CRT policies. Many schools have now adopted the 1619 Project Curriculum, which is a joke.
This isn’t just some right-wing thing, I mean, the nation’s most respected historians have written alarming letters about how this is not factually based, and this has historical fiction essentially, and we really should not be teaching students that. Since it’s just amazing to me that it was the COVID, and then the death of George Floyd kind of coming together to create this, I think, just radicalism, radicalism-
Hannah Smith:
It’s a perfect storm. It’s perfect storm.
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah. It’s a perfect storm, but it’s also like … It’s literally like some of the school administrators and some of the school boards, and I’ll include my city school board in that. There’s no stopping them. They just are going full steam ahead, and it has emboldened them. I think they also sense the media is … In the mainstream media, there’s very little pushback on that. In fact, there’s an effort to smear the parents who … It’s just horrifying. In Fairfax County, a woman who grew up under Mao. I mean, she grew up in China. She immigrated here. She gets up and she says, “This reminds me of Maoist China.”
I mean, now, which AstroTurf group is she a part of? It’s just so insulting. And so, it really is alarming. I think that, like you said, that perfect storm. So kids are now vulnerable, they are on edge, they’re dealing with more anxiety, and then they’re going to go to school, and they’re going to be taught this hopeless message about how you live in a terrible country, and your white friends are superior to you, and you’ll never reach the American dream. It’s really horrible. It’s a terrible thing to do to them.
Hannah Smith:
Yes. It is. Like you said, it is abusive. I think we need to really remember that we set the tone for our children, we set the expectations that they will live up to. And if we are teaching our kids that there’s no way that they can overcome their oppressive state, then that’s a really depressing outlook for these kids. I mean, we need to be teaching them that you live in the land of the free and the home of the brave, and you can pick yourselves up by your bootstraps, and you can achieve the American dream. That’s what people all over the world have come to America to do. And that is why America is the greatest country on earth.
So, you’re right, and you’ve talked before about the history of our country. We need to teach our history honestly and openly, warts and all. But I still say even with our faults, and even with the things that have gone wrong in American history, we still are the greatest country on earth-
Julie Gunlock:
100%
Hannah Smith:
And we need to teach our children that.
Julie Gunlock:
Well, and I feel sometimes when people have this line about America being the worst country in the world, and in no way evolving and in no way facing their past, like you said, warts and really some horrible incidents in our country. We do face them, we talk about them endlessly. We talk about everything. That’s the thing about Americans, we never shut up. We’re just always talking about things. But if you go to another country, go travel, go to other parts of the world, see how the LGBTQ community is treated overseas, see how certain races are treated in certain other countries, it is not a pretty thing.
We are flawed, Americans are flawed, but every country is flawed. I think we grapple, Americans grapple with it much more than other countries. I think some of these lessons are just … they show that people don’t really understand the wider world and how people are treated in other countries. I think if you did have those experiences or knew that, you might appreciate the United States a little more, but unfortunately, people aren’t getting that view. I wanted to just ask you-
Hannah Smith:
I think that’s exactly right.
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah.
Hannah Smith:
Yeah. Absolutely.
Julie Gunlock:
I wanted to mention, I had put up a blog post, and I want the listeners to understand the difference here and how great it is. Because I think obviously you’ve been elected and you clearly want to have rigorous conversations, you want to have these conversations, you want to talk about this. I think if a parent came to a school board meeting who was really upset about the things that she heard about CRT and really thinks that CRT is important in schools and that we have to talk about this, I think you would talk and you would want to listen to her and you’d want to have a really interesting conversation.
In my town, I sent you a picture I’d put this blog post up this week about how my town school board, we had a school board meeting and the entire school board came out in. I am on an anti-racist journey. This is the words of Kendi X Abraham, he’s … I got that wrong, it’s Abraham X Kendi.
Hannah Smith:
Sure.
Julie Gunlock:
Sorry.
Hannah Smith:
Yeah.
Julie Gunlock:
And he’s a part of this movement, right, to get this anti-racist training, which is all kind of connected. These things all connect, the anti-racist training, the CRT, the 1619 Project. I talked about how intimidating that would be for a parent who might be worried about this stuff, and genuinely worried, not like just to have questions or just to say, “I’ve read some worrying things about this.” I mean, they come out with these t-shirts that say, “I am on an anti-racist train.” I found that deeply irresponsible for a school, and it shows the group think, it shows that they have decided and that they’re not interested in alternative thought or any pushback. I just love your opinion on that, as a sitting school member, what did you think of that? I apologize, I don’t know that you got the picture we sent it on, but I assume you did?
Hannah Smith:
Yeah, no. I really want to encourage everyone who’s listening who has any concerns about this being in their school district to do what we did. I didn’t mention this before, and I want to make sure I do this before we move on. But we issued hundreds of open records requests to our school district to get the information that we needed to be able to fight back. It was through these open records requests that we found the slide deck that were used for the teacher and administrator training in our district, and one slide deck, in particular, from an administrative retreat in 2019, was replete with CRT concepts, teaching the staff about white privilege, and white supremacy and white fragility, and intersectionality.
There was even a slide that asked people to reflect in their groups about characteristics of white culture. So when they say this is not part of your school district, you need to do some open records requests to show that it is. So, this 34-page plan, the Cultural Competence Action Plan that they wanted to pass in our district had so many things wrong with it, but it was fundamentally an assault on basic American principles. Principles of free speech, due process, freedom of association, freedom of religion.
They wanted to track microaggressions, they wanted to do audits of our student clubs, including our student religious clubs. They wanted to do audits of our curriculum. They wanted to do invasive teacher trainings that were probably a violation of Title VII, grouping teachers by race and talking about issues of race. They actually did an exercise with our teachers that was called How Diverse is Your Universe? They asked teachers to pick out a bead from a cup, and the bead would reflect the color of skin of their spouse, their friends, their neighbors, their doctors, their attorneys, their colleagues, the people they go to church with. And then they were supposed to look in their cup and see if their beads were too white.
So these were the kinds of things that they were doing with our staff, they wanted to implement teacher training, excuse me, a teacher performance review mechanism where they would see if our teachers were sufficiently woke to consider whether or not they should stay on in their position. I mean, there were just page after page of radical things that they wanted to introduce into our school. So, when they said, “Well, it’s not really CRT based, the word critical race theory is nowhere in the CCAP.
Julie Gunlock:
Right.
Hannah Smith:
That’s really not the point. The point is that all of these things that they wanted to introduce were a fundamental attack on the basic principles of American democracy, free speech, freedom of association, Title VII protections, Title VI protections, all of these things that create a colorblind society, they wanted to strip those away, and that is fundamentally a neo-Marxist, critical race theory type effort. So I would really encourage anyone whose district wants to adopt an equity policy, push back, you’ve got to stand up instead of saying no, we don’t need these policies, we’ve got all of the laws that we need in Title VII and Title VI, and the federal laws that protect against race discrimination in our country, we don’t need anything more.
What we said on the campaign trail, I continue to say, as an acting school board member, we need to enforce our student code of conduct. If there are kids that are being bullied because of their race, if there are kids that are being harassed because of their gender orientation, if there are kids that are really hurting, and there are occasions when the student code of conduct is not being enforced, when it’s not being used to protect those kids, we have to make sure that they are protected. No one wants anyone to be discriminated against, and no one wants anyone to be hurt.
But what we don’t want is for our schools to be radically transformed, so that we don’t even recognize them in 10 years. So that’s really what we’re trying to do as members of the board right now, is just make sure that our student code of conduct is enforced that we have the proper mechanisms in place to make sure that kids are safe when they come to school. But we don’t need this radical transformation.
Julie Gunlock:
Hannah, you are so eloquent on this issue, what can I do to get you to move back to my town and run for a school board here? That would be great. I can offer you about 10 bucks and a couple of casseroles to make your move easier.
Hannah Smith:
It takes a village, I tell you. It takes a village.
Julie Gunlock:
Well, I will tell you, I am a little bit jealous. My husband and I always toss around the idea of moving, and I think to some degree, that is also important to do. I think you know, yes, fight back, fight back in your community. But I think for me, with the entire school board and the superintendent trotting out to the dais at the school board meeting wearing, we’re an anti-racist journey and with people at home, officials zooming in without being used as their background, there is a sense of, “Oh, good God.” It’s so in the back. Right? And they don’t want to listen to parents.
So I think part of fighting back is also finding communities that are better. Because I hate to lose good people in communities that are really fighting this, but I do think as people, they get married, they have children, at this point, you got to think about this stuff. It’s not just like … you know how you used to look for a house and you look at the school rating, right, and you go, “Oh, they get good ratings.” Right? It used to mean, for instance, maybe they have AP courses or maybe they have like good ratings on-
Hannah Smith:
Yeah, exactly.
Julie Gunlock:
Just the curriculum is great, or they have a lot of teachers, they have high retention rates. Now parents are going to have to start looking for this. That’s great, I swear, I’m giving someone an idea right now, a great app would be the CRT rating of the school.
Hannah Smith:
A rating.
Julie Gunlock:
A rating of some sort. I guess this school is dangerously woke. But the point is, is that I do think what you did, I think there’s a lesson here too in what you did, you got out. I know you like living here and stuff, but you mentioned that it has become really extreme in Northern Virginia, it has become a very unfriendly place for people with more traditional religious and conservative views. I think that people also need to consider not just running for office, but finding a community that suits them is better for them, and that’s what you’ve done. I’m telling you though, it is just such an exhilarating to listen to you talk.
It is exciting to think of women like you and people like you and people who can so eloquently talk about this stuff running, because you’re convincing, and you also obviously care, you care about minority children and children who might face some struggles in schools. I think that that’s the balance we need to find. It’s really exciting. I’m going to be watching your career. Who knows, maybe you’ll come back as a Congressman and maybe we’ll get you back here to D.C. eventually. So, really, thanks for all you’re doing.
Hannah Smith:
Thank you so much.
Julie Gunlock:
Well, listen Hannah-
Hannah Smith:
Thank you so much.
Julie Gunlock:
Go ahead. I’m sorry.
Hannah Smith:
No, thank you so much for having me on today. I really do want to say that I don’t think any community is immune from this. So, wherever you go, I mean, I certainly thought I was fleeing it coming to Texas, I thought we wouldn’t have to worry about this at all. In some ways, I think they thought if we can accomplish this in Southlake, we can accomplish this anywhere. So I do think that wherever you go, you’re going to find this, and it’s going to try and sleep in, and so we’re going to need people everywhere to just stand up and fight back.
Julie Gunlock:
That’s a really, really, important point, to not become too comfortable. To keep watching, to keep listening. Read your children’s curriculum, I’m always telling people, like you can get it, they have a PDF of it, they’ll send it to you. You’re entitled to see it. Be more active, go to school board meetings. Right? Join your PTA, lead your PTA, although that’s a whole nother overshow on PTA because that’s the end of a nightmare. But the point is that, get active and listen, and you did and so even if you’re in a comfortable area, I think that’s really good advice. Hannah, before I let you go, where can people find you and follow you.
Hannah Smith:
So my campaign website is still up, is Hannahsmith4cisd.com. I have a bunch of resources up there, some news articles and some interviews, and a bunch of things that people might find helpful. My social media is up there as well as my email, so people can get in touch with me that way.
Julie Gunlock:
Hey, well listen, it’s great talking to you. I’m going to keep following you. I hope you will come back either on this show, but this podcast is sponsored by the Independent Women’s Forum and we have a ton of events and speaking opportunities and other things. Right now I’m going to hang up and say, we got to get Hannah involved because you really are a great guest, and I appreciate what you’re doing, and I wish you all the luck. Thank you, Hannah.
Hannah Smith:
Well, thank you for IWF and all you do.
Julie Gunlock:
Thanks everyone for being here for another episode of Bespoke Parenting Hour. If you enjoyed this episode or like the podcast in general, please leave a rating or review on iTunes. This helps ensure that the podcast reaches as many listeners as possible. If you haven’t subscribed to the Bespoke Parenting Hour on iTunes, Spotify, Google Play, or wherever you get your podcasts, please do so, so you won’t miss an episode. Don’t forget to share this episode and let your friends know so that they can get Bespoke episodes on their favorite podcast app. From all of us here at the Independent Women’s Forum, thanks for listening.