Wellesley Concerned Parents believe in action. We will continue campaigns such as this one in the future and push back on dangerous ideologic policies that divide us. We do not oppose teaching about America’s difficult racial history, including the evils of slavery and Jim Crow. But what we do object to is that our children are being told the lies that America has made little or no racial progress, that as a “white person” you are automatically racist simply because of your skin color, and that as a person of color you are automatically a victim.

Our children should understand our past to understand our present, including all our ugly history, but what has begun to emerge is a consorted effort to paint false narratives such as “America is a systemically racist country,” “your skin color is what defines you,” and “personal accountability is racist.”

WCP wants to ensure that our children have a well-rounded education, where we can discuss the past free of guilt or blame.

• Are there instances of racism in America today? Absolutely!
• Are there ugly events in our past from which we need to learn? Of course there are!
• Have we made immense progress in repairing our past transgressions? YES, we have!

We believe that our children can come to these conclusions from a human place of understanding our history — and NOT from being labeled as an “oppressor” or an “oppressed,” or from being forced to feel guilt or victimhood.

The U.S. Department of Education recently proposed priorities that will direct federal grant money to programs that teach the divisive narratives of Ibram Kendi and the 1619 Project, both of which encompass the racist ideological viewpoint that we oppose. This has been done without permitting any conversation that challenges these perspectives. In fact, the language proposed is that these beliefs are the only truthful and valid perspectives. Claiming that there is only one truth in perspective and disallowing any other opinion is what propaganda is all about.

Wellesley Concerned Parents support a more human approach to our children’s education where we study and learn from our mistakes but also celebrate and appreciate how far we have come today. So we support alternative curricula which take a more classical and chronological approach to history, rather than using historical jumping jacks to reinforce only the negative and the false narratives that the only thing that matters is race and that individuality is nonexistent.

We ask that the Wellesley Public Schools work with our group to ensure that our children receive a more human based approach to their history. We support a more well- rounded curriculum such as:

• Fairforall curriculum
• 1776 United