A Parents’ Rights Committee? We Have Questions

On Friday, the Newberg School Board announced on their social media platforms that they are forming a “parents’ rights advisory committee.” An email was also sent out to parents from Brett Royer on Friday with the same announcement. In both the social media posts and the email, parents were asked to email this address and answer several questions about why they would want to be on a parents’ rights advisory committee. 

In a later post, we will be doing a deeper dive into what’s potentially wrong with “parents’ rights” statements, and how parents’ rights have become another salvo in the cultural wars fought on the battlefield of schools nationwide. For a school board ostensibly intent on taking politics out of schools, discussions about parents’ rights are politically charged, suggesting that those hoping to save our schools from politics really had something else in mind. 

But another post, another time.

For now, given the confusing messaging around this parents’ rights advisory committee, its ambiguous intent, and the lack of clarity about who will be invited to this meeting, we have more questions than answers. Some of these questions were raised in comments on the school district’s social media page, which is a step in the direction of transparency; rather than turning comments off, someone was answering the questions raised. 

However, a number of questions about this committee remain, including 

• Who was answering the questions on the social media pages, and does the person answering the questions have the authority to clarify confusing parts of the invitation to join the committee?

• That person said all parents are welcome to be on the committee. Is it true that all parents are welcome? If so, why do parents have to send vetting questions to a specific email?

• Speaking of email, why is Brett Royer, the director of transportation for the district, sending a non-transportation related email out to parents? Is Brett Royer working for the communications department? Is he convening the committee?

• And if not Royer, who has convened this committee? The superintendent? The school board? Teachers? 

• Who will provide oversight in the creation of a parents’ rights policy? Why is such a policy needed, when parents already have significant rights granted them by existing policies, and by the Oregon Department of Education? 

• If the school board is about helping facilitate learning for children, why is the committee’s focus seemingly on being “positive voices for parents in the district” rather than a positive voice for children? (What does it mean to be a “positive voice” for parents?)

• Will this advisory committee push for the rights of all parents in the district? Wouldn’t creating a “positive voice” for parents mean assuring that the children of all parents have a safe environment in which to learn? Would that include those parents whose children have lacked IEP support this year? Those parents whose children are LGBTQIA, and are seeking a safe place for their kids to learn? Those parents who would like their children’s curriculum to include a robust understanding of history, one that acknowledges systemic racism? Those parents who would like to send their sons and daughters to high school knowing that the board’s recent policy discussions about hazing and teen dating violence have been renounced by the district’s leadership? 

If this invitation really is for all parents, then we hope the school board–or, really, whoever is putting this committee together–has space for a very big table, because there are many parents who have already been working tirelessly to make sure their children’s rights are protected.