When culture wars rip through California school boards, should the state intervene?

Last week’s tussles between state officials and a pair of Southern California school boards may have died down, but they’ve thrown a spotlight on deeper tensions over who makes decisions for local schools — a rift that’s likely to grow as the culture wars escalate.

Both incidents, which garnered national attention, centered on LGBTQ issues and the state’s ability to rein in local boards that it says may have violated California’s education and civil rights laws.

“We can expect to see more of this as these right-wing groups now follow a scripted  playbook and there’s a new level of organization,” said Bruce Fuller, a UC Berkeley professor of education and public policy. “And certainly as long as we have an ambitious governor, we can expect to see these battles repeated.”

Last week, Chino police escorted the state’s top education official, Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, from a school board meeting after he urged the board to reject a plan he viewed as harmful LGBTQ students. The plan, based on a stalled Assembly bill, called for school staff to notify parents if a child identifies as a gender they weren’t assigned at birth. The board ended up approving the proposal 4-1.

Please help put parents in charge of their child’s education by forwarding this article to other parents, family, friends and voters.