{"id":1376803,"date":"2022-03-14T23:06:11","date_gmt":"2022-03-15T03:06:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1376803"},"modified":"2022-03-14T23:06:14","modified_gmt":"2022-03-15T03:06:14","slug":"americas-fight-conservative-school-board-member-blows-the-lid-off-inner-workings-of-the-lefts-monopoly-on-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/americas-fight-conservative-school-board-member-blows-the-lid-off-inner-workings-of-the-lefts-monopoly-on-education\/","title":{"rendered":"America&#039;s Fight: Conservative School Board Member Blows the Lid off Inner Workings of the Left&#039;s Monopoly on Education"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">36<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Famericas-fight-conservative-school-board-member-blows-the-lid-off-inner-workings-of-the-lefts-monopoly-on-education%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1376803&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><\/div>\n<p class=\"subheading\">The battle over the nation\u2019s children \u2013 from flagrant indoctrination to forced masking \u2013 has emerged in the national spotlight during the last two years, becoming a widely-known issue as parents take matters into their own hands after years of the left maintaining a monopoly on the educational system, doing their best to keep the leftist agenda moving forward.<\/p>\n<p>However, in the last year, the woke left\u2019s agenda has been exposed, leading to massive conservative victories, as with Gov. Glenn Youngkin\u2019s (R) monumental victory in Virginia last November. Parents are fired up and taking power back, but this battle started years ago, as parents such as Bridget Ziegler waged a war against the radical left at the local level, even before it became a commonly known national issue. Ziegler shared her story in an exclusive interview with Breitbart News.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"D-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"gmxrevmore\" class=\"H\"><\/figure>\n<p><strong>The Inner Workings<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Ziegler, a mom of three and member of the Sarasota County School Board in Florida, has been at the helm of this fight since joining the board in 2014 \u2013 long before wokeness in school was a mainstream topic. At the time, she was the mother of an 8 month old and worked in the private sector, as she still does to this day. Her husband is heavily involved in politics, now serving as the vice chairman of the Florida GOP. But at the time, in 2014, a vacancy appeared on the school board, and he encouraged his wife to run, as she is \u201cpassionate\u201d about children\u2019s issues. She ultimately filed and former Gov. Rick Scott (R), now a Florida senator, appointed her at the time. She went on to win the election in a close race and stood out as a \u201cstaunch\u201d supporter of school choice, which she said was more of a \u201ctaboo at the time.\u201d But the union, she said, \u201cjust lost it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ziegler said she began to see things that were \u201cshocking\u201d to her upon joining the board, as it operates very differently than the business world. She described going to the Florida School Board Association meeting, a chapter of the National School Board Association, and at the time the unions were suing the governor and legislature for taxpayer scholarships \u2014 something she advocated for. It was odd, she said, for them to utilize taxpayer dollars to send her to this conference where they were touting issues she was against. Seeing this, she and other conservative board members formed the Florida Coalition of School Board Members, which she described as a \u201csmall but mighty group\u201d that passed a ton of legislation. While effective, she said the group did not grow exponentially, despite others showing their support, because there was \u201cvery much of an indoctrination to school board members, to policy makers.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B2\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cWhen you get up there and are elected, you\u2019re automatically part of this association and they tell you that your job is to support the superintendent. [It\u2019s] not about protecting, supporting, representing taxpayers or focus on financial stewardship or \u2026 it as very much about no dissenting, very much groupthink, get in line,\u201d she said, as this same tactic appears to be the common theme in school boards across the country. Many people, she continued, subscribe to it, even though they claim to be \u201cconservatives.\u201d But when they get on these boards, they \u201close their backbone.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019re typically in the minority and then they just wouldn\u2019t fight for a lot of these issues,\u201d she said, noting that many wanted to join the group but did not because they were nervous about losing their posts. Ziegler, however, a conservative firecracker in this realm, refused to go along with business as usual, paving the way for much of the mainstream exposure to the agenda items pushed by these radically left actors serving on school boards across the country as they dictate what children are exposed to in school.<\/p>\n<p>The conservative group worked with the legislature and had 3-4 years of wins and ultimately dissolved, but reframed because they \u201cknew something was there,\u201d particularly with the battle over parental rights. Some participants branched off, such as Tina Descovich, who served as the group\u2019s president, focusing on her group Moms for Liberty.<\/p>\n<p>Ziegler, who said she never planned on going for a third term on the board, stuck around.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI believe it\u2019s so important and haven\u2019t subscribed to the groupthink. I\u2019ve been independent and been very consistent on my policies over the years. I think we do have a moment to really change the tide and all the things over the last six years that I\u2019ve seen that are so incredibly broken, where people are not serving their community with the student\u2019s best interest. It\u2019s more about the system than it is the student,\u201d she said, pointing to the \u201cbig educational industrial complex\u201d and the millions that are \u201cin this same game to protect the system.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B3\" class=\"a8d adSo\"><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cAnd then you have the media that plays that role and protects the progressive left agenda that are being pushed in there, and also everyone wants to hide the \u2014 you know we can\u2019t say anything negative about the school because then you\u2019re anti-public school. It\u2019s not about correcting issues,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s about, your job as a school board member is to be a cheerleader, not to be someone that serves the public,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"D-ROS-B2\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<p><strong>Hidden Agendas<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>These school boards across the country often sneak in left-wing agenda items without parents knowing. Ziegler provided an example, pointing to the battle over the Parental Bill of Rights in 2018 in Sarasota County, as it embraced \u201cgender diverse guidelines\u201d as left-wing groups lobbied districts to adapt such \u201cguidelines\u201d \u2013 a term that helped them circumvent the board completely, robbing parents of a true say. These guidelines, Ziegler said, essentially stated that it was up to a student to determine what gender identity he or she wanted to go with and forbid staff to contact parents on this issue. She fought against this on the board, which fueled her drive to work with the legislature to draft the Parental Bill of Rights, which took three legislative sessions to pass in 2020.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut now it\u2019s very well known,\u201d she said, noting that parents were being \u201csystematically cut out of their parents\u2019 education on purpose.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B4\" class=\"a8d adSo\"><\/figure>\n<p>But in 2020, the indoctrination in the school system continued to become more mainstream nationally as leftists became more emboldened and \u201caggressive,\u201d partially triggered by the George Floyd protests. As another example of the left sneaking in their hidden agendas, Ziegler described a BrainPOP video\u2014 a program used in K-5 \u201cheavily across the country,\u201d which covers a myriad of topics for students and touts which she described as lots of propaganda. One video focused on the George Floyd protests, she said, with undertones about systemic racism and defunding the police. The video, she said, essentially told children that they need to act as an avenue for change.<\/p>\n<p>\u201c[It\u2019s] basically a training video for social justice warriors,\u201d she said, noting that another parent made her aware of the video, so she brought it to the attention of the superintendent. Many were not even aware of this video, she stressed, so it was pulled, although that triggered worries about censorship. These sort of issues continued to become more mainstream as some teachers in the district expressed concerns about professional development \u2013 which was supposed to focus on reopening schools \u2013 instead centering on training for white privilege and cultural responses.<\/p>\n<p>All of these micro-wins have continued to pile up, causing a groundswell of parents to see what is happening and take back control of their children\u2019s education. Ziegler credited Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) for publicly standing up for parental rights, further nationalizing the issue.<\/p>\n<p><b>A Crumbling Monopoly<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Over the past year, these issues have come to the forefront nationally, serving as a driving force in elections. Between the radical Black Lives Matter agenda and nonessential anti-science coronavirus rules, parents have a clearer picture of the left\u2019s long-held monopoly on their children\u2019s education. And now, leftists are not sure how to handle it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNationally, you see how concerned the left has become because they have had a full on monopoly on public K-12 education \u2014 if not all education as we see \u2014 and they\u2019re going to extraordinary levels because for the first time, I think they do see it\u2019s at risk.,\u201d she said, pointing to what we are seeing in areas such as Virginia, San Francisco, California. The left, she said, is \u201cpulling out all the stops,\u201d even stooping as low as deeming concerned parents domestic terrorists.<\/p>\n<p>These school boards, she stressed, are innately tied with the Democrat Party, doing their best to coordinate their moves\u2014a stark reminder that change truly does begin at the local level \u2013 a reality easily forgotten in a world of national headlines and personalities.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe coordination that I\u2019ve seen at the local level with the Democratic Party at the national level and state level with our local school boards to \u2014 for the mask mandates, to stick it to Gov. DeSantis because it was more about a DeSantis\/Biden thing than it was about safety \u2014 and then you see now that there is a very strategic, coordinated effort with these foundations,\u201d she said, using Sarasota County as a prime example and walking through the shift she has seen in the last 2-3 years.<\/p>\n<p>Typically, the district would utilize pilot programs through nonprofits, but recently, she said there is a shift where districts \u2014 instead of utilizing money they have through funding \u2013 will earmark salary positions and fund them through these foundations, giving them a \u201cstraight back door into school districts to push programs.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd then the district ultimately is overleveraged and then they garner control without being elected,\u201d she said. Leaders such as DeSantis pushing back against the woke agenda has \u201ctriggered a lot of these foundations who used to work behind the scenes to double down and go all in,\u201d she said, noting that it is happening in other districts as well.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Media\u2019s Role<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The establishment media, in its efforts to protect the left\u2019s agenda, has only exposed the radical left\u2019s agenda more. One recent example is their coverage of the Parental Rights in Education bill, which critics and establishment media outlets falsely deemed the \u201cDon\u2019t Say Gay\u201d bill, despite the fact that the bill simply protects children from age-inappropriate classroom discussions about sexual orientation and gender identity, applying to children in kindergarten through third grade.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBringing that up has been\u2013 I knew it was right,\u201d she said of the discussions over gender identity. The left, she said, is \u201cartful\u201d in their branding when they try to push their agendas, but the \u201creporting has gotten so ridiculous where they\u2019re pushing the left\u2019s narrative.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019re not [just] reporting on the left\u2019s narrative. They\u2019re pushing the left\u2019s narrative, just the same way like the textbook material and all that stuff is not just covering historical aspects,\u201d she said. \u201cThey\u2019re pushing a narrative. And so that is why I believe there\u2019s so much concern because there\u2019s way more awareness to it and they worked for decades to really play this ground game.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd they have, between Gov. DeSantis being completely fearless when it comes to punching back, whether it be the media or education bureaucrats or the work school board members or the union, he\u2019s not backing down and thank goodness,\u201d she continued.<\/p>\n<p>The more DeSantis pushes back, she continued, the more people get \u201cexcited and applaud,\u201d but the left \u201cwho\u2019s been in complete control for so long\u201d is \u201cgoing to extreme measures and like you see, you see the media kind of becoming unhinged and being reckless with their reporting.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>A \u201cWild\u201d Moment<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf wasn\u2019t on the school board \u2014 I don\u2019t fault parents. I wouldn\u2019t necessarily know who my school members were,\u201d she said, speaking about the national awakening.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI mean, I might because my family\u2019s a little bit more politically active than the average person, but I understand that that\u2019s how \u2014 I understand that\u2019s why when COVID happened, people started to see and showed up to school board meetings and were met with complete disdain of which I had a front row seat to for years. They were shocked.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It was something to behold as school board members kept \u201cdoubling down,\u201d Ziegler explained. She said it was almost as if the school board members and the left \u201cdidn\u2019t know how to change their behavior because they\u2019ve been doing it so long and normally people burn out, they go away.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That was not happening this time.<\/p>\n<p>In her experience, Ziegler said it takes more time to see a change, \u201cbut they [the left] can\u2019t help themselves because they\u2019re so drunk on the power and shameless.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBecause historically, they\u2019ve been able to run out the clock,\u201d she said, identifying that tactic as a basic in the playbook of education.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s what is \u201cwild about this moment,\u201d she said, as these issues she has been fighting for are finally mainstream. \u201cIt\u2019s just like \u2014 I use this phrase a lot, but I feel like I was screaming in a crowded room but no-one would hear me.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><b>The Continued Fight<\/b><\/p>\n<p>It will be \u201cinteresting\u201d to see how this continues to play out moving forward, particularly ahead of the midterm elections, Ziegler noted. The battle against Critical Race Theory (CRT), for example, was fresh in Virginia, serving as a catalyst for Youngkin\u2019s victory. But in Florida, parents were not subjected to two years of closures, remote learning, and forced masking (outside of 11 counties). DeSantis listened to parents and waged a war against it all, long before the Democrat Party and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) decided to loosen mandates because they were getting crushed in the polls. But in other places in the country, she said, parents are grappling with some of those issues. Ultimately, she said it \u201cremains to be seen\u201d how this plays out in the future, as parents likely will not forget what the left put them through.<br \/>\u201cIt\u2019s almost Marie Antionette-style \u2018Let them eat cake,\u2019\u201d she said. \u201cThey\u2019re so disregarding.\u201d And still, people are still showing up \u2013 those who never voted or paid attention \u2014 \u201cand those people are mobilizing and activating people,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n<p>Some parents, she said, may not be as vocal, but when it comes down to decision time, \u201cit\u2019s hard to forget the complete disregard that they were met with when it came to policy decisions impacting their children.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The left is \u201cgoing to try very hard to make them forget \u2026 and try to flip the script,\u201d she warned, noting there are \u201cstill a lot of people who are just fed up with government institutions in and of itself.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd I think you\u2019ll see more conservative and even moderates all in to see \u2014 certainly for someone like Gov. DeSantis and school board members willing to serve parents and serve the people,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>However, Ziegler warned that the left will pull out all the stops to create their narrative and brand their opponents in a very particular way, \u201cjust like they do with DeSantis.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>They use extreme labels and see what sticks, she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat is their playbook. And they do it well. And they play nasty\u201d to maintain their power, she added.<\/p>\n<p><b>Local Beginnings, National Results<\/b><\/p>\n<p>While this movement made national headlines, there is still work to be done at the local level, as that is what has triggered so much of this change in awareness. Ziegler, for instance, has been in the minority since she has been on the \u201cnonpartisan\u201d school board, with the majority of school board members serving as \u201cprogressive liberal\u201d members \u2013 the \u201cnorm\u201d across the state and country, Ziegler explained.<\/p>\n<p>However, that could soon change. Of the five school board seats in the county, three are up, including Ziegler\u2019s, as she is running again. But the other two are not running for reelection. In other words, if Ziegler wins reelection and they flip just one of the open seats, they will successfully flip the entire board.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd that\u2019s big deal because we have, from a party standpoint again, the Republicans are very, from a conservative standpoint, very focused on school board and in Sarasota have the chairman of the party and the vice chairman of the party in Sarasota County\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGov. DeSantis is obviously been a big champion of parental rights and has highlighted some of the work I\u2019ve done which put even more emphasis on that race,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The battle over the nation\u2019s children \u2013 from flagrant indoctrination to forced masking \u2013 has emerged in the national spotlight during the last two years, becoming a widely-known issue as<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1376803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1376803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1376803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1376803\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1376803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1376803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1376803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}