Category: Children and Families
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Shots and Masks in Richmond Schools
by James C. Sherlock Belt and suspenders? Vaccinations and masks now are both mandatory in Richmond Public Schools. Vaccinations because the school board ordered it last night. Masks because the Governor ordered it last week. The vaccination order, though many oppose it, has science behind it. Vaccinations work. For the vaccinated, though, the mask wearing…
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Virginia Beach and Afghanistan
by James C. Sherlock It was never a Navy war. But in this Navy town, it was brought literally home to us again and again. We are home to nearly half of the Navy SEALs, including SEAL Team 6. Something like 4,000 to 5,000 total plus their families. SEALs are America’s special operations forces specially…
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VDOE’s Plan to Impose Social Reconstructionist Dogma on School Children
by James C. Sherlock The 2020 General Assembly required the Virginia Department of Education to develop and publish standards for Social Emotional Learning (SEL) that start in Kindergarten and go through 12th grade. VDOE has done so, disregarding entirely hundreds of comments on Virginia Town Hall on the draft of those standards that had a 10-to-one…
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“Model Polices” on Transgender Students vs. Laws Guaranteeing Parental Rights
by James C. Sherlock Emilio Jaksetic wrote an excellent article this morning. Mr. Jaksetic, a lawyer, commented on the decision by Judge J. Frederick Watson of the 24th Judicial Circuit of Virginia, to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the Virginia Board of Education’s Model Policies for the Treatment of Transgender Students in Virginia’s Public Schools for…
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Flooding the Zone at VDOE
by James C. Sherlock The Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) is absolutely relentless. Defenders in a zone defense in football are responsible for areas of the field, rather than following a specific receiver. Offenses often attack these defenses by flooding a zone — sending three receivers into an area covered by two defenders. But…
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Richmond Public Schools Show No Progress on Staff COVID Vaccinations
by James C. Sherlock Last updated Just 15 at 4:16 PM I have long taken a personal interest in the City of Richmond Public Schools (RPS). Its students have a right under the Virginia constitution to a quality education that they are systematically denied. RPS has utterly failed to educate the children under its care. The…
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UVa Offers Social Warrior Lesson Plans to Virginia Kindergarten Teachers
by James C. Sherlock In case anyone thinks the left ever rests, the University of Virginia ed school has struck another blow to educate children as social warriors through its ”Educating for Democracy” project. “Democracy is not a spectator sport; it requires our participation, and this participation must be oriented toward justice. To create a more just…
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The Dems’ Conscience-Clause Dilemma
by Emilio Jaksetic Virginia’s statutory adoption conscience clause prohibits any requirement that forces private child-placing agencies to violate their religious or moral convictions when participating in the placement of a child for foster care or adoption. Virginia Democrats have advocated repeal or nullification of the clause on the grounds that the clause permits unequal, discriminatory…
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Where Are the Parents?
by Kerry Dougherty America has a problem. And I’m not talking about the police or racism or a political schism as wide as the ocean. I’m talking about parents. Rather, the lack of parents. In recent weeks the nation has been shocked by a series of horrific stories about kids being killed — by the…
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VDOE Transgender Policies Dangerous to Both Children and School Personnel
by James C. Sherlock Virginia’s Model Policies for the Treatment of Transgender Students in Virginia’s Public Schools is a bigger mess the more I study it. It is as far as I can tell unprecedented in scope. I checked parallel California, D.C. and Arlington County policies. None of them comes close to the dangerous nonsense…
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Virginia Board of Education – In Loco Parentis and Headed to Court
by James C. Sherlock Is your child yours or does he or she belong body and soul to the state in the person of the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE)? That is a question that is not only reasonable, but absolutely necessary after reading its new transgender student regulation. That regulation represents a straight-up, in-your-face…
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Child Endangerment at Home and on the Border
by Kerry Dougherty Baby Boomers are fond of social media posts that glorify their raised-by-wolves childhoods. They usually go something like this: We drank out of garden hoses, rode in the back of pick-ups, didn’t have seat belts let alone car seats, came home when the street lights went on, thought Howard Johnson’s was fine…
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We Are Losing Sight of Public Health in Vaccination Debates
by James C. Sherlock We in the process of losing our collective minds. I read a story in the Roanoke Times by LuAnne Rife “One-third of Virginia’s long-term care workers declined COVID-19 vaccinations, as homes reopen to visitors.” We read other stories about teachers refusing vaccinations. They do it pointing to the fact that the…
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Northam Gets an Earful on Marijuana Legalization Bill
by D.J. Rippert Slow burn. The General Assembly passed marijuana legislation and sent it to the governor to sign. However, almost nobody seems satisfied with the bill as it is written. Now Governor Ralph Northam must decide whether to sign the bill, veto the bill, or ask for the bill to be amended. As he…
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Private Sector Screws Up Vaccine Dispersal
By Peter Galuszka For more than a year, there has been a stream of criticism of government handling of the COVID vaccine. On this blog, there has been a relentless pounding of Gov. Ralph Northam for his role in trying to navigate the pandemic that has so far killed more than 500,000 Americans. This is…