top of page

Coeur d’Alene School Board Sends Health Curriculum to Public Comment

Writer's picture: Erin B.Erin B.

Monday’s workshop at the Midtown Meeting Center brought the Coeur d’Alene School Board members together to discuss a few items, including the procedure when there is a student expulsion hearing and the latest health curriculum for elementary schoolers.


I was always a rule-following good girl in school so I never had an expulsion hearing, so I found the procedures fascinating and informative. Some of the stories of previous hearings were interesting; one hearing happened because a student wanted to bake a cake for his favorite teacher and his mom sent a cake knife to school with him so he could cut the cake. Another year there were over 50 hearings because the district knife policy included pocketknives and, because we’re in North Idaho, every child living in the county carries a pocketknife. (The district changed the policy after that year because the hearings were ridiculous and unnecessary.)


Although the hearing presentation took up most of the workshop time, the important piece of the meeting was approving a new elementary health curriculum, Sources of Strength, to go out to public comment. The school board did NOT approve a new curriculum, they just approved it to be at the administration office for an extra length of time for parents and community members to peruse and comment upon.


The curriculum, however, needs allll the public comment as possible. Listening to the details of this curriculum I have some red flags, which I will list below, but I *urge* you to go into the administrative office and do your own research because my opinion may be way off base.


  1. This Sources of Strength curriculum is BRAND NEW to elementary schoolers. Curriculum like this has been available to middle school and high schools around the country for years but now it had been deemed necessary for elementary schoolers to find a safe space and learn about su1c*de, substance abuse, and violence.

  2. This curriculum was developed during the hell year 2020 and, like some v8cc1nes that will stay unnamed, there is not enough research and testing available to know if this is an adequate. It was mentioned in the workshop that they don’t know if there’s a similarity between correlation and causation (but they’re willing to use this curriculum and find out without research.)

  3. This curriculum is touted as aligning with “the core social-emotional learning competencies in the model developed by the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL).” Social emotional learning is the latest fad in the overarching Critical Race Theory praxis.

  4. The quote used on the elementary curriculum overview on the Sources of Strength website is by Paulo Freire, a Brazilian philosopher who used Karl Marx as one of his major influences.

  5. This has Frankfort School of Critical Theory vibes all over it which is the basis for Critical Race Theory and Social Emotional Learning.


Although these are my top 5 red flags, please go into the administration office and check out the curriculum for yourself. There are 2 curriculums: K-2nd and 3rd-6th. Please check out both and give your comments to the Clerk.




The curriculum will be discussed and voted upon at the October school board meeting.


Also, don't forget to vote on August 30th about the school maintenance levy.



74 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Comments


bottom of page