Category: Local Interest

Editor’s note: Initially published October 24, 2022, last updated September 5, 2024.

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Introduction

In 2021, a student club titled SPIDEE (Students Promoting Inclusion, Diversity, and Equity through Education) began operating at Oakwood High School, followed by Harman and Smith schools.  While SPIDEE is portrayed to students and the public as a “student run” club, parents discovered that the club, its concept, its contact person for students, its curriculum (or at least the supervision of its development), the initial running and organization of its student meetings, and then the supervision and logistics of those meetings are all the work of an outside activist organization that created it: the National Conference for Community and Justice (NCCJ).  In SPIDEE meetings, NCCJ staff work directly with and train OHS students, who then give presentations about SPIDEE and its curriculum to sixth graders in Harman and Smith schools. Information obtained from the Oakwood School District shows NCCJ actively recruits for its other youth programs such as its Agents of Change and Anytown programs (also covered in this article) from among students participating in SPIDEE, and by enlisting the help of SPIDEE club students and the school system’s administrators and staff.

NCCJ and SPIDEE students have asserted the club’s purpose is to promote ostensibly noble objectives of fostering diversity, equity, and inclusion and opposing bias and bullying, as NCCJ claims with its other youth and adult programs.  If that is the sole purpose and function of SPIDEE and other NCCJ programs operating in Oakwood schools, then they should be wholeheartedly welcomed.  However, as this article shows, an extensive review of NCCJ’s publications and its programs and seminars for adults and youth reveals that the organization also consistently advances radical, divisive, and controversial Critical Race Theory (CRT)/Critical Theory-oriented and other social and political agendas similar to those used in “student run” groups across the country that are run by other activist groups such as the GSA Network, and the Anti-Defamation League whose No Place For Hate club is also operating in Oakwood schools. Curiously, NCCJ deleted several of its web pages that display evidence of these teachings less than two months after some of them were reported in the first publication of this article in late October 2022, and less than a month after emails show Principal Waller and Traci Hale met with NCCJ staffers Lake Miller and Adriane Miller to discuss “concerns” about this article.  At the time they were deleted, they had been published for more than two years; however, those web pages are preserved here^[i].

The agendas and teachings advanced by these programs include the following, as evidenced by sources in this article and a related OCSS article on NCCJ’s Anytown overnight youth camp program:

• core CRT teachings of ubiquitous  “systemic” or “structural” racism, white supremacy and “white privilege”^[ii], together with other forms of systemic demographic oppression and privilege as taught by Critical Theory and Critical Legal Studies;^[iii]

• lumping individuals into “privileged” or “oppressed” identity group categories and negatively generalizing them based on their demographics such as race, sex, income, sexual orientation, gender identity and even religion rather than viewing them for who they are as individuals, effectively conditioning kids to think like racists and bigots.  Examples range from the SPIDEE curriculum teaching “privilege” to Harman and Smith 6^th graders, to “white privilege” in the Agents of Change curriculum for OHS students, to videos of high school students in NCCJ’s Anytown program being lined up, singled out by race and tearfully expressing guilt and shame for their “white privilege”, while other Anytown participants admit in Instagram posts to being taught about “systems of oppression”, to “check” their “privileges” and learn their “responsibilities” for being white, male, middle class and/or “cis(gender)”;

• advocating or condoning reverse discrimination, with seminars advocating slavery reparations, promoting Ibram X. Kendi and his book that explicitly calls for racial discrimination and reparations, and “Social Justice Definitions” of “racism” and “religionism” that expressly exclude prejudice and mistreatment towards whites and Christians, respectively;

• content that advances, and effectively pressures kids to agree with, controversial positions on sexuality and gender identity; and

• promoting BLM, key CRT figures such as Kimberlé Crenshaw, and along with Ibram X. Kendi, other extremist authors teaching that whites are inherently ingrained with and contribute to white supremacy as part of a reading list “for white people to read” distributed to NCCJ seminar participants. 

In short, these teachings and agendas promoted by NCCJ are more akin to political and social indoctrination than genuine attempts to reduce bias, prejudice, and bullying.  Further, they display characteristics of DEI programs that studies have shown to fail rather than those that have been shown to succeed in achieving their stated purposes. 

Just how pervasive are those teachings in SPIDEE and NCCJ’s other youth programs?  At this point, it’s not entirely clear, since NCCJ’s website on its SPIDEE and other youth programs gives no meaningful, specific information about their curricula or teachings and NCCJ staff have repeatedly failed to honor, or have outright ignored, repeated requests by multiple Oakwood school student parents and residents to disclose SPIDEE’s curriculum and program materials. Further, as explained in this article, during a May 11, 2023 meeting among Oakwood parents, Principal Waller and key NCCJ staffers Lake and Adriene Miller, NCCJ staff expressly refused requests from parents to disclose the curriculum and program materials for SPIDEE and other NCCJ programs that are operating or being promoted in Oakwood schools. To the amazement of the parents, the NCCJ staff also reacted with surprise when the parents raised concerns about their organization promoting the radical content discussed in this article, effectively denying it despite compelling evidence to the contrary that is detailed in this piece.

A request for curriculum, meeting, and other program materials for the SPIDEE and other NCCJ programs in Oakwood schools has also been submitted to the Oakwood School District under the Ohio Public Records Act, and despite multiple follow-ups on that request to date, the District has failed to comply with those requests, possibly in violation of the Act. 

However, information obtained thus far shows that SPIDEE program and other NCCJ programs promoted in Oakwood schools include at least some of the problematic teachings discussed above. More importantly, information obtained from the Oakwood School District and NCCJ shows that NCCJ is using the SPIDEE program, and Oakwood students and staff, to actively recruit Oakwood students into NCCJ’s other activist youth programs (e.g., Agents of Change, Anytown and possibly others) that clearly appear to include these controversial CRT, Critical Theory, sexual and gender identity teachings.

Please peruse the article below for more details and pay close attention to what NCCJ has published and promoted on its web and social media pages, and in its programs and seminars as summarized above, including in Oakwood schools, be it SPIDEE, Agents of Change or Anytown.  Note their similarity to the contents of the GSA Network’s and Anti-Defamation League’s publications and actual student club materials (not to mention their similarity to certain professional development materials presented to Oakwood school personnel).  Then ask yourself: Is this what we want to teach our children to believe?  If this is what these NCCJ programs teach, as is apparently the case, would it really achieve NCCJ’s purported goals of reducing bias, division, discrimination, and bullying? Or, would it do the opposite by actually inciting more of it? Would it instead amount to controversial political and social indoctrination without the knowledge or consent of parents?  Is this really an organization that should be given such a direct and elevated platform of influence over Oakwood school children?

If you share our concerns and desire for more transparency and disclosure about NCCJ’s SPIDEE and other youth programs operating in Oakwood schools, please see the CALL TO ACTION section below for the NCCJ contact information to inquire about SPIDEE, and for questions that should be asked of NCCJ and the Oakwood school administration.  If you aren’t doing so already, please follow our Oakwood Community for Strong Schools (OCSS) website and Facebook group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/oakwoodstrongschools) for information and updates about this and other topics impacting our treasured school system and community, and sign up here for regular email updates.

Table of Contents

1. A “Student Run” Organization?  Not Really.
2. How Did NCCJ and SPIDEE Get Involved in Oakwood Schools?
3. Our Initial Reasons for Concern
   1. Contact Persons for the SPIDEE and Other NCCJ Programs
   2. Growing Trend of Activist Groups Injecting Their Agendas Into Schools via “Student Run” Clubs
4. What Does the SPIDEE Program Teach to Students?
5. What We Know So Far About SPIDEE’s Agenda
   1. SPIDEE Apparently Includes CRT Teachings Common to NCCJ Programs with Teaching and Recruitment Starting in Harman and Smith 6th Grade Classrooms
   2. NCCJ Sought to Ask Harman & Smith 6th Graders About Their Gender Identity and Discuss Their “Pronouns”
   3. SPIDEE’s Program Materials in Yellow Springs Schools and Other NCCJ of Greater Dayton Events Include the Same “Privilege Exercise” Used in NCCJ’s Anytown Camp, Which Effectively Singles Kids Out and Negatively Generalizing Them By Their Race
   4. NCCJ Uses SPIDEE to Recruit Students for its Other Activist Programs
6. What About SPIDEE’s Sponsor Organization, NCCJ?  What Does It Teach?
   1. NCCJ’s Publications, Seminars and Other Youth programs Promote CRT Ideologies, BLM, and Judgment of Individuals Based on Race, Sex, Sexual Orientation, Gender Expression, Income and Religion
   2. NCCJ’s Agents of Change and Anytown Programs Push Controversial CRT, Sexuality and Gender Identity Teachings
   3. NCCJ’s Online Seminars and Workshops on “Privilege”, “The Role of the White Accomplice” (vs. an “Ally”) and Slavery Reparations
   4. NCCJ’s (Now Deleted) Page on “Privilege”
   5. NCCJ’s (Now Deleted) “Social Justice Definitions” and “Black Lives Matter” Pages, and its Current “Intersectionality” Page, Promote CRT; Discount Discrimination Against Whites and Christians; Oppose Diversity of Religious or Other Belief on Sexuality
   6. NCCJ’S Publications Feature BLM, Ibram X. Kendi, and Other Major CRT Promoters
7. What’s Wrong with These CRT/Critical Theory and Sexual/Gender Teachings for DEI?
   1. Worsens Bigotry, Discrimination, and Division Rather than Ameliorating It
   2. Amounts to Political and Social Indoctrination
8. CALL TO ACTION: DEMAND DISCLOSURE AND TRANSPARENCY

A “Student Run” Organization?  Not Really.

In May 2022, parents observed the following poster throughout the halls of Oakwood High School, inviting students to join a “student run” organization titled SPIDEE (Students Promoting Inclusion, Diversity, and Equity through Education):

The representation of the organization as “student run”, however, is misleading at best.  The email address that the poster provides for students to contact and get involved in the club isn’t the address of a student or even a staff member of Oakwood schools, but an outside adult who works for the Dayton chapter of a nationwide activist organization called NCCJ, the National Conference for Community and Justice.  Interestingly, the poster doesn’t make clear to students who the contact person is or her role as an outside activist. Furthermore, it is clear from NCCJ’s website (https://nccjgreaterdayton.org/spidee/) and from the presentation NCCJ and some students gave to the Oakwood Board of Education during its August 2022 meeting (see here starting at 3:18) that NCCJ, not students, designed and operates the SPIDEE program and concept, designed its curriculum and instructional materials, and organizes and runs the initial regular program meetings with students, and only then transfers the running of those regular meetings to OHS students, with NCCJ staff then continuing to handle the “logistics” of those meetings and sit in on them to provide ongoing advice and coaching.  A SPIDEE club member nevertheless repeated the representation that the club is “student run” during the presentation to the Board of Education, while mentioning that NCCJ staffers had been running the meetings. The student then noted the meetings had been “more student run” only over the previous couple of months.

Based on remarks from an NCCJ staffer, Lake Miller, during the Board of Education meeting, those trained high school students then give presentations to sixth graders in Harman and Smith schools to promote the SPIDEE program, which they planned to do three times that year. He noted those presentations are intended prepare the sixth graders to involved in SPIDEE once they reach ninth grade, or to get involved in other NCCJ programs such as “Agents of Change.”  He added that there are discussions about possibly expanding SPIDEE’s role at the middle school level as well, and that SPIDEE-trained high school students can get involved in running “Change at the Middle,” an NCCJ program for middle school students currently operated in other school districts.

Given the obvious role NCCJ plays in the design and operation of SPIDEE, one must ask, how did this “student run” club come to operate in the Oakwood school system?  Was it at the organic request of students, or was it initiated by outreach from NCCJ or other outside organizations, and/or Oakwood school administrators or staff?

How Did NCCJ and SPIDEE Get Involved in Oakwood Schools?

Contrary to what the “student run” slogan would suggest, the SPIDEE club, NCCJ and its other programs did not arise in Oakwood schools as a result of any organic action or expressed desire of students to introduce clubs and programs that promote these radical agendas or even diversity, equity and inclusion.  Quite the opposite, emails obtained from the Oakwood School District show the organization and its programs were injected into the school system in a top-down arrangement between senior officials of the District and NCCJ, beginning with NCCJ’s Executive Director Adriane Miller soliciting Oakwood Board of Education member John Wilson to bring NCCJ and its programs into Oakwood schools.  In an August 7, 2020 email from Mr. Wilson to Kimbe Lange, Mr. Wilson cites a message he just received from Ms. Miller, in which she stated that she “just saw your post about making Oakwood more equitable and inclusive”, and that “NCCJ has funding from ADAMHS to provide FREE school programming.”  She then noted NCCJ’s Agents of Change (discussed in this article below) and Changing In the Middle as programs that could be offered, and asked that the District execute an MOU (shown in the emails linked above) to initiate NCCJ’s involvement in the District with those programs.

Mr. Wilson enthusiastically promoted NCCJ’s involvement in the school system, noting his familiarity with NCCJ and its programs: “I have worked with them for years and their training is top notch for students and staff.  If you and Traci (Hale) are looking for an ‘off the shelf’ program in addition to what you all are putting together in house… this would meet the high standards of Oakwood and is something to implement this year without a heavy lift.”  Mr. Wilson even noted his familiarity with NCCJ’s Anytown camp which is addressed in this separate article on the camp program.  One must wonder if Mr. Wilson was aware that NCCJ and its programs promote the highly controversial and divisive teachings addressed in this article, such as Anytown’s CRT-fueled, virtual race-shaming privilege exercise, teachings of “systemic oppression” and the “responsibilities” that white and “cis” individuals have, or NCCJ’s and its programs’ teachings on sexuality, gender identity, and transgenderism.

In any case, it appears from these linked emails that the District’s Prevention Counselor, Joan Bline, was at least familiar with the basic elements of the Agents of Change curriculum, including its teaching of “White Privilege: What is it and do I have it?” and “Gender/Who Am I Now and What Do I Take With Me?” from Adriane Miller’s email with the curriculum.  In the email, Ms. Miller explains “[t]his curriculum was designed from the Anytown Youth Leadership Institute curriculum to help offer the program to more students and build future change agents” (query whether Agents of Change then include these troubling exercises and teachings of the Anytown camp explained later in this article and the separate OCSS article on that camp). In a subsequent email from the District’s Director of Curriculum Kimbe Lange, she confirmed that Ms. Bline “vetted” those Agents of Change curriculum materials and signed the MOU to initiate NCCJ’s involvement in the school system with that program.

Similarly, the operation of the SPIDEE program in the school system was initiated by its staff rather than by any organic action of students seeking a “student run” club.  Emails in January 2021 show the school system’s Elementary School Counselor, Michael Wadham, asking NCCJ staffer Lake Miller whether NCCJ offers a program like Anytown at the elementary school level, to which Mr. Miller mentions the programs they do offer for those grade levels, including SPIDEE, “in which we train high school students to go into elementary schools and teach about bullying peer pressure and diversity.”  Mr. Miller then states, “I actually think SPIDEE would fit very well into Oakwood.”

Emails since then have repeatedly shown Oakwood staff actively promoting these NCCJ programs to Oakwood school students, and even to their families in school publications in some instances.

Our Initial Reasons for Concern

Contact Persons for the SPIDEE and Other NCCJ Programs

After parents first discovered the above poster for the SPIDEE program in May 2022, the first cause for concern was an initial review of the undisclosed SPIDEE contact person whose email address appears on the above poster displayed throughout OHS, and who is also one of the two NCCJ staff members who has been running and then coaching the SPIDEE meetings.  A review of her social media postings included, among various left-wing political content, a pair of posts made just days after the outbreak of deadly and destructive riots following George Floyd’s death: one post voicing support for the Black Lives Matter movement whose name, slogans and logos were displayed by many of those who perpetrated the riots without any condemnation from the BLM organization; and, most troubling, a post that was clearly intended to defend the riots by likening them to other “riots that created change”, such as the American Revolution, and even the Marxist revolutions in Russia, Cuba, and South America:

Just five days after her above posts, it was reported the riots had already left 19 people dead (see here), and as a reminder, the riots went on to leave dozens dead, thousands injured, and approximately $2 billion in property damage, with stores looted and destroyed along with the livelihoods and finances of many of their owners, a historical 19th-century church in Washington D.C. and a police precinct in Minneapolis severely burned, a city block in Seattle overrun by violent extremists, and a federal courthouse in Portland besieged by Antifa and other rioters who attempted to set it on fire while federal employees were barricaded inside.  BLM not only failed to condemn the riots, but the Chicago BLM leader defended the looting as “reparations” (see here), and within about three weeks of this NCCJ staffer’s posting, the New York Chapter BLM leader declined to condemn the rioting and stated, “[i]f this country doesn’t give us what we want, then we will burn down this system and replace it … I could be speaking figuratively; I could be speaking literally. It’s a matter of interpretation.” (see here). This NCCJ staffer’s Facebook posts remain on display (as of June 29, 2023), and this is the individual who is given direct access to Oakwood students to influence their views on diversity, inclusion, and quite possibly, political and social advocacy.

A review of the social media posts of Lake Miller, the other key NCCJ activist operating NCCJ’s programs in Oakwood schools and the Dayton area, also reveals both his and his organization’s advocacy of core CRT concepts with their reference to “systemic racism” and “systematic racism” as the cause of unequal outcomes among racial groups^[ii].  In one prominent Facebook post that also features similar official statements by NCCJ of Greater Dayton, Mr. Miller even goes so far as to state “there is no debating” that “[s]ystemic racism exists”, and he issues a call to “dismantle systems that allow for this inequality to exist in our world”, which would include our criminal justice system, or laws and our economic system, assuming he like other CRT proponents view those as the causes of these inequalities. This embodies the neo-Marxist activism from which CRT was derived^[ii][iii].

Notice that among those “liking” Mr. Miller’s post is NCCJ of Greater Dayton’s Executive Director, Adriene Miller, who also plays a central role in NCCJ’s involvement in the Oakwood School District. As mentioned earlier in this article, she and Lake essentially denied their organization teaches these CRT concepts in a May 11, 2023 meeting with Principal Waller and parents.

Growing Trend of Activist Groups Injecting Their Agendas Into Schools via “Student Run” Clubs

For general background, the emergence of SPIDEE in Oakwood schools comes as a larger nationwide trend has emerged, of outside activist organizations injecting their influence into schools under the cover of “student run” clubs and organizations.  They often represent themselves to schools and the public under the reasonable and agreeable mission of promoting “diversity, equity and inclusion”, “justice” and “anti-bullying”, while imposing curricula that reflect attempts to indoctrinate children to accept CRT/Critical Theory-themed and other highly-controversial political, sexual and gender ideologies.  Two prominent examples are the Anti-Defamation League’s No Place for Hate club currently operating in the Oakwood School District and the Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) Network, which according to a thoroughly-sourced investigative report (GSA Clubs Smuggle Gender Ideology into K-12 Education) operates over 4,000 student clubs in elementary, middle and high schools across the country – including in Ohio – under the above-stated purposes of promoting inclusion and preventing bullying. 

While the GSA Network’s presumed purposes of combating bullying and fostering respect and inclusion of LGBTQIA+ individuals would certainly be respectable and agreeable, a review of the GSA Network’s publications and its instructional materials for its student clubs show its agendas, including for student clubs, extend far beyond such aims.  As the above report shows, the organization’s administrative materials and literature advance the beliefs that “white European men created an oppressive system based on capitalism, white supremacy, and heteronormativity”, that “to fight back, racial and sexual minorities must unite under the banner of ‘intersectionality’ and dismantle the interlocking ‘systems of oppression’”, and the GSA Network’s manifesto calls for the abolition of the police, of borders and of ICE, and “the overthrow of the cisgender heterosexual patriarchy.”

Further, the GSA Network’s instructional materials for its student clubs, which it repeatedly brands to the public as “student run” as NCCJ does with SPIDEE, include a Digital Organizing Toolkit (see here) teaching children to do the “self work” to understand “’how [their] actions, lack of actions, or privileges contribute to the ongoing marginalization of the oppressed”.  The Toolkit includes a Critical Theory/CRT-themed chart that groups individuals into those holding “Systemic Power (Privilege)” who are allegedly responsible for specified forms of “SYSTEMS OF OPPRESSION” and “PREJUDICE”, versus those holding “LESS OR NO SYSTEMIC POWER (OPPRESSED)”.  These groups are assigned these judgmental classifications based on their race, sex, gender expression, sexual orientation, and even their lawful citizenship status.  For example, white people are deemed responsible for “White Supremacy”, straight and “cisgender” people are responsible for “heteronormativity” and “transphobia”, and citizens are responsible for “imperialism” and “settler colonialism”.  The Toolkit includes common neo-Marxist themes of repeated calls to work for “(collective) liberation” and “dismantling” of “systems of oppression” and features a photograph of children each with an activist fist in the air, along with a quote from longtime activist and former longtime Communist Party USA member Angela Davis.  It is clear that much of the content and apparent purpose of this toolkit strays far from LGBTQ+ inclusion or anti-bullying.  The investigative report also notes the GSA Network’s literature is replete with anti-capitalist rhetoric.  These concepts of white privilege, systemic racial oppression, and anti-capitalist sentiment are hallmark concepts of CRT^[ii].

The GSA Advisor Handbook, which is the manual for GSA personnel to use in “setting up, running and sustaining” the “student-run” club, includes instructions on hiding student participation in the clubs from parents: “Know the laws in your state around students’ privacy rights and what you do and don’t have to tell parents/guardians/families.  This is important so you don’t inadvertently out a student as a member of the GSA.”  It further states, “[n]ote that in many cases, it is not required that parents/guardians know that students are part of a GSA” (see p. 24 of the Handbook).

A more recent and troubling example is the No Place for Hate club developed and operated by the left-wing Anti-Defamation League. This club is also operating as a purported student and teacher run club in Oakwood Junior High School (see here).  As seen by the above link for the club, the pages of ADL’s website for the club describe it as a “movement” and a “student-led” program with more than 1,800 participating schools and “[o]ver 1.4 million students supported by 100,000+ educators”.  The website represents that the program’s purposes include to “proactively address bias and bullying incidents” and “[i]mprove your school climate through anti-bias and bullying prevention education”.  The program and website include resources for teachers as well, such as lesson plans and webinars (see here).

The program’s activist CRT, Critical Theory, sexual and gender ideologies are more blatantly revealed in its official manual, the No Place for Hate® Coordinator Handbook & Resource Guide (see here).  The manual’s “guidelines for brave spaces/classrooms” includes a direction to “[e]xplore, recognize and acknowledge your privilege.”  Under the ”SYSTEMS OF BIAS” section, the handbook effectively parrots a core tenet of Critical Theory and CRT with the statement that “[t]he specific, pervasive systems of oppression and marginalization described below are upheld by institutionalized, cultural and historical ideologies and discrimination.” ^{[ii] [iii]} As with other purveyors of CRT and Critical Theory, though, the manual never attempts to specifically identify – much less prove – where these systems are that constitute “systems of oppression” (or “systemic racism” for CRT in particular), or which component(s) of those “systems” actually discriminate based on race or other demographics.  The manual avoids this by conflating “systemic” with “individual acts of” discrimination, to perpetuate the myth of “systemic” oppression as follows: “Individual acts of prejudice and discrimination are informed by and perpetuate these systems, which exist regardless of individual prejudices and interpersonal acts of bias.”

The manual then defines various forms of “systems of oppression”, revealing its support for these ideologies:

Therefore, program participants presented with these terms are pressured to agree with transgender ideology, that gender is malleable, subjective, and separate from biological sex, and that sex is “assigned at birth” rather than determined genetically at conception as was universally recognized by biologists.  Participants must also reject the belief that heterosexuality “is the norm”, and presumably adopt the beliefs of activists that homosexuality, and presumably its sexual behavior, is just as normal, moral, and healthy as heterosexual behavior, possibly without regard to one’s moral, religious or biological science and/or public health-based views on the subject.  One must also agree with the core CRT teaching that racism is “systemic” or “structural” and results in “systemic oppression” of non-white people and “privilege” for white people.

What Does the SPIDEE Program Teach to Students?

NCCJ’s SPIDEE webpage states that its lessons “focus on diversity and inclusion, the danger of stereotypes, and the value of differences”, and its programs are “designed to promote anti-bullying behaviors and positive-decision-making in the lives of the students served.”  In its presentation to the Board, NCCJ presented itself as a “diversity, equity, and inclusion nonprofit dedicated to eliminating bias, bigotry, and all forms of discrimination”.  A SPIDEE club member then asserted that the SPIDEE curriculum for Oakwood schools was made to be “special so that it could really touch on the heavy subjects that we think are really important and that can make Oakwood a better community and make everybody feel more accepted and included”.

If the SPIDEE program is simply focused on teaching students to foster an inclusive environment that eschews and works to eliminate bias, prejudice, and bullying while leading students to treat each other with equal respect and dignity without regard to demographic differences, then the program should be welcomed as a valuable addition to the Oakwood school system and community for so long as it adheres to those laudable aims and does not incorporate divisive or the controversial teachings such as those discussed below.  Unfortunately however, that does not appear to be the case based on information about SPIDEE, NCCJ and its other programs that has been obtained since the initial publication of the article, and which is reported below.

At this point, however, it is unclear what the SPIDEE program actually teaches or presents to students.  NCCJ’s  SPIDEE webpage provides only scant and very general information about what the program actually teaches.  Moreover, multiple Oakwood residents and parents of students in the school system have reached out to NCCJ via the “REACH OUT TO US TO LEARN MORE” portion of its SPIDEE web page to inquire about the program, and while they initially received a prompt and enthusiastic reply from the same NCCJ staffer whose email address appears on the above poster, or from other NCCJ staff, as soon as those residents and parents then asked for copies of the SPIDEE program and curriculum materials, they received no further answer, even in response to follow-up requests.  As noted, a request for curriculum, meeting, and program materials for the SPIDEE and other NCCJ programs in Oakwood schools has also been duly submitted to the Oakwood School District under the Ohio Public Records Act, and to date, despite multiple follow-ups, the District has failed to comply with that request, possibly in violation of the Act.

During a May 11, 2023 meeting among NCCJ staffers Adriane Miller and Lake Miller, Principal Waller and Oakwood parents, NCCJ staff expressly refused to disclose SPIDEE and other NCCJ program curriculum materials to the parents, on grounds that they are NCCJ’s “intellectual property”, while stating that such materials could be disclosed by the Oakwood School District.  This is a rather dubious excuse for NCCJ’s refusal to disclose these materials.  If the intellectual property rights they are citing are copyrights, parents are not requesting the right to copy those materials, they are merely asking to be provided copies for their review.  If they are citing trade secrets, i.e., that the materials provide commercial value and competitive advantage to NCCJ by virtue of their being kept secret, why, then, does NCCJ readily disclose those materials to school districts and students?  Emails show the SPIDEE 6^th grade curriculum was presented to school officials, and that NCCJ has reviewed and developed other curriculum and program documents with Oakwood school officials and students in various meetings.  Further, the Yellow Springs School District produced more than 450 pages of NCCJ curriculum and program materials in response to parental requests, for the same programs and others that NCCJ of Greater Dayton operates in that school district. Obviously, those materials would have been disclosed to that school district by NCCJ.  If NCCJ could claim any risk to its commercial advantage from disclosing these program materials, though, it would seem to be from disclosing them to school districts not parents, since school districts might engage with other competing DEI program providers at some point and possibly share such materials in the process. Why, then, do these intellectual property concerns only apply with a few Oakwood parents and residents ask to see those materials?  Or perhaps, it’s a pretext for hiding materials they don’t want parents to see.

What We Know So Far About SPIDEE’s Agenda

What we know so far is based on information obtained from school personnel and representatives, and this article will be updated as more information becomes available

SPIDEE Apparently Includes CRT Teachings Common to NCCJ Programs with Teaching and Recruitment Starting in Harman and Smith 6th Grade Classrooms

A SPIDEE club social media post and emails obtained from the school system regarding the SPIDEE presentation to Harman and Smith 6^th graders show that the SPIDEE program – approved by Principal Waller – does include, at a minimum, CRT/Critical Theory teachings of racial and other demographic privilege, and thus presumably, the accompanying principles of systemic racism and systemic oppression^{[ii] [iii]}.  This is fully expected since, as this article shows, those teachings are consistently interwoven throughout NCCJ’s other publications, seminars, and programs, including for youth.  Specifically, an Instagram post from the presentation notes “privilege” was among the topics presented to the 6^th graders, along with “equity, inclusion, diversity” and “prejudice”:

The post claims the curriculum was created by the students, which is unlikely given that, as this article shows, the SPIDEE program and its student meetings are effectively run or supervised by NCCJ staffers, who presented this curriculum to and negotiated it with Principal Waller months before SPIDEE meetings transitioned to being “more student run” according to a student at the August 2022 SPIDEE presentation to the Board of Education.  Further, these just so happen to be largely the same topics covered in NCCJ’s other DEI programs for youth and adults (whose curricula are not purported to be designed by the program participants).  That seems an improbable coincidence.

Emails exchanged among NCCJ staffer Hannah Brown, Oakwood High School Principal Paul Waller, and Smith and Harman School Principals Chrissy Elliott and Sarah Patterson also show that “privilege” was among the topics to be included in the curriculum those Principals approved for the SPIDEE presentation to Smith and Harman 6^th graders (see e-mails here and referenced Kahoot quiz here).

NCCJ Sought to Ask Harman & Smith 6^th Graders About Their Gender Identity and Discuss Their “Pronouns”

These emails linked above also show the 6^th grade presentation curriculum NCCJ initially proposed to Principal Waller included asking 6^th graders whether they “identify” as male, female or “out of the gender binary” in a “Closing the Circle” exercise, and it included discussing their “pronouns”.  That content was removed, apparently at Principal Waller’s direction.  In an email to Principal Elliott (and possibly Principal Patterson), NCCJ staffer Hannah Brown noted she met with Principal Waller regarding the curriculum and that she “will make those changes in the curriculum about pronouns and the first three Closing the Circle questions”.

SPIDEE’s Program Materials in Yellow Springs Schools And Other NCCJ of Greater Dayton Events Include the Same “Privilege Exercise” Used in NCCJ’s Anytown Camp, Which Effectively Singles Kids Out and Negatively Generalizing Them By Their Race

While little information has been made available about SPIDEE’s curriculum in the Oakwood School District other than as noted above, records obtained from the Yellow Springs School District reveal that NCCJ’s SPIDEE and Changing In The Middle programs in that district included conducting the “privilege exercise” used in NCCJ’s Anytown camp program according to NCCJ’s own videos featuring that program.  The Anytown camp is summarized in this article below (see here) and in more detail in the separate OCSS article on the program (see here). The exercise lines kids up and directs them to step forward or backward based on whether positive or negative life circumstances apply to them, with the calculated effect of sorting kids by race and leading them to believe the false narrative and core CRT teaching that those life circumstances are occasioned by their race, with no regard to other well-documented causes of these statistical disparities among racial groups. The separate article on Anytown shows kids expressing shame and guilt for their supposed white “privilege”, with testimonials of Anytown participants on NCCJ of Greater Dayton’s Instagram page acknowledging having been taught they were privilege for being white, among other demographics.

The excerpt of the Yellow Springs SPIDEE program training document (see here) shows this privilege exercise is included in the SPIDEE program’s presentation to 8^th graders who participate in NCCJ’s Changing In the Middle program for middle school kids. Since records obtained from that district show the same NCCJ activists (including Hannah Brown and Lake Miller) are operating NCCJ’s programs in that district as in the Oakwood School District, it seems likely this racist and divisive indoctrination exercise is used in the SPIDEE program in this district as well.  It would align with the fact that “privilege” is clearly included in the SPIDEE presentation to 8^th graders for Harman and Smith schools.

Other evidence of how widely NCCJ of Greater Dayton uses this privilege exercise can be seen in footage of its Friendship LIVE 2020 event, in which a student’s remarks at the podium mention the exercise being done in an NCCJ of Greater Dayton event held between students and local police (see here at 9:50: https://youtu.be/8Toh-04uv1g?feature=shared). As a side note, this video also shows that this event, and NCCJ of Greater Dayton itself, are actively supported by the Rubi Girls, a Dayton-based drag queen group, with members of the group discussing how they gain confidence by their sexualized cabaret performances.

NCCJ Uses SPIDEE to Recruit Students for its Other Activist Programs

Emails obtained from the school system also make clear that once Oakwood students are in contact with NCCJ staff to participate in the SPIDEE club, they are actively recruited to participate in, and to encourage other students to participate in, NCCJ’s other activist youth programs. Those programs also promote many of these same CRT-related concepts of white/demographic privilege, systemic racism or other systemic demographic oppression, and controversial teachings on sexuality and/or gender identity.  These include NCCJ’s Agents of Change program, which NCCJ is pushing for students to attend before or at the beginning of their involvement in SPIDEE (see here and here), and NCCJ’s Anytown overnight camp (see here), for which this email shows Agents of Change participants being recruited to attend.   Emails also show NCCJ staff directing Oakwood school personnel to promote these NCCJ programs to students and within the school system, such as for the Anytown camp which is addressed in this separate article on the camp program.

Little else is known at this point about what is taught to students in the SPIDEE program due to the above-noted failure of NCCJ personnel to respond to multiple requests for curriculum information, and the ongoing failure, thus far, of the Oakwood School District to comply with a longstanding Ohio Public Records Act request for curriculum and program documents for SPIDEE and other NCCJ programs, and despite multiple follow-ups to that request.

In addition to NCCJ’s failure to respond to multiple requests for the SPIDEE instructional and program materials, there are compelling grounds for concern about the scope of the program’s advocacy. Specifically, the content uncovered above and other content from NCCJ’s website and programs show that the SPIDEE program almost certainly extends beyond the noble purposes described above and into highly controversial, divisive, and even radical political and social activism.  This includes activist content that even contradicts the stated purposes of the program and of NCCJ that are represented on its website and its presentation to the Board of Education.  Further, this is consistent with the content seen from other activist organizations operating programs that are purportedly “run” by students or staff under the banner of diversity, equity, inclusion, or preventing bullying.

While virtually anyone would agree these are ostensibly noble and respectable goals, the website also makes clear that the program’s underlying ideology and teachings include the Critical Theory (including CRT) belief in ubiquitous “systemic oppression” of various demographic identity groups in our society, by noting one of the program’s core activities is to “[e]xamine the relationship between individual biases and systemic oppression, including the impact of intersecting oppressions.”  (see here). 

What About SPIDEE’s Sponsor Organization, NCCJ?  What Does It Teach?

NCCJ’s Publications, Seminars And Other Youth programs Promote CRT/CRITICAL THEORY Ideologies, BLM, and Judging Individuals Based on Race, Sex, Sexual Orientation, Gender Expression, Income and Religion

A review of NCCJ’s website similarly shows the organization actively promotes and teaches concepts of CRT and Critical Theory generally, including in its online publications (some recently deleted) and in seminars it offers to the public, some of which are presented under the oft-used rubric of supporting “diversity, equity and inclusion”, “anti-racism” and “anti-bullying”.  These include promoting blanket judgments of whites and other demographic groups of people based on their racial and other demographics as “privileged” oppressors versus “oppressed” victims, teachings of the existence of “systemic racism” and other forms of systemic oppression as the cause of racial and other demographic disparities^[ii], that any system or standard that yields or permits unequal outcomes is therefore systemically unjust, as well as controversial activist positions on sexuality and gender ideology.

NCCJ’s Agents of Change and Anytown Programs Push Controversial CRT, Sexuality and Gender Identity Teachings

NCCJ’s other youth programs also teach these CRT concepts of white and other demographic privilege, systemic racism and oppression, and appear to pressure students to accept controversial activist positions on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Agents of Change includes teachings about “white privilege”, controversial sexual and gender concepts of “heterosexism”, “cisgenderism”, “Gender Issues”/”Who Am I”, various purported gender identities, “sex assigned at birth” and other aspects of transgender ideology, based on disclosed emails that were sent by NCCJ to Oakwood students and to top Oakwood School District personnel (see here, and here, and here). The last of these sets of emails shows that the Agents of Change curriculum was developed from Anytown’s curriculum; one must wonder, then, if it includes the divisive and disturbing privilege exercise, teachings of “systemic oppression” and other teachings encouraging negative generalizations of people based on demographics that are discussed in the next paragraph below and in more detail in OCSS’ separate article on the Anytown program.  See here in this article for a discussion of these teachings and the problematic nature of pressuring students to accept them in these programs.  Again, the predictable result of teachings of “heterosexism”, “cisgenderism” and other concepts of gender ideology is to pressure kids to accept their underlying, controversial positions on sexuality and transgender ideology to avoid those disparaging labels

The Anytown overnight camp program, as shown by this separate article, includes a privilege exercise where students are lined up, singled out and led to believe that various favorable or unfavorable life circumstances are caused their race, with even videos published by NCCJ about the program showing kids reduced to tears expressing guilt for their white privilege.  A news report shows the camp segregating kids by race, with a camp counselor acknowledging the program is no longer takes a colorblind approach as before but instead teaches about white privilege, while another teen participant acknowledges the program conveys the appearance of racial shaming.  NCCJ Dayton’s Instagram page includes numerous testimonials of kids acknowledging the camp led them to believe they were privileged for being white or middle class, that they were educated about “systemic oppression” or that they have certain “responsibilities” by virtue of their status as being white, middle class, male and “cis(gender)”.  It effectively teaches kids to develop negative generalizations about people based on their race or other demographics.  Brochures also show the camp teaches about gender identity and “heterosexism” alongside the seemingly contradictory teaching about religion (assuming it is intended to oppose prejudice against others based on their religion or religious beliefs). Again, see here in this article for a discussion of these teachings and the problematic nature of pressuring students to accept them in these programs.

NCCJ’s Online Seminars and Workshops On “Privilege”, “The Role Of The White Accomplice” (vs. an “Ally”) and Promoting “Reparations”

NCCJ has hosted a series of online seminars, workshops, and “training” sessions whose titles and descriptions show they also promote these CRT/Critical Theory-driven ideologies of white and other demographic privilege, that such demographic privilege and oppression are systemic or structural, and calling on participants to do the “self-work” to “dismantle” “systems of oppression”  as seen with GSA Network’s Toolkit for student clubs.  Some seminars go so far as to advocate slavery reparations, and claim that oppression akin to slavery still exists in the present-day United States.

For example, NCCJ’s summary of its 2021 workplace DEI seminars stated: “NCCJ offers customized trainings for corporations, organizations and educational institutions doing business in a multicultural world that examine the systems of oppression and privilege, enhance communications skills, build cultural competences and create more inclusive work environments.  Topics include, but are not limited to; race, gender, LGBTQ, abilities, class and more.” (emphasis added).  (See here).

NCCJ’s workplace DEI seminars currently include “Understanding Privilege and the Responsibility of Being an Ally” (see here: https://nccjgreaterdayton.org/training/). The webpage for the seminar asks “What privilege do you carry in your backpack?”, and explains that the seminar “will help participants identify how privilege may unknowingly play a role in their life experience, and participants will discuss how they can use privilege to create a more level playing field for all”. A social media posting for the course in 2020 stated that participants will learn how privilege “is carried out in today’s climate by identifying ways that privilege is present throughout corporate environments, organizational structure, and how privilege can serve as a barrier to individuals in marginalized communities.” (emphasis added):

In 2022, its seminars included a two-day “Anti-Racism” session billed as “a live, online training program that explores bias, discrimination, oppression, and privilege in the United States” (see archived 2022 NCCJ webpage here: NCCJ 2-Day Anti-Racism Program – Event – NCCJ (archive.org))  along with another two-day program titled “Dismantling Anti-Blackness” that “explores bias, Anti-Blackness discrimination, oppression and privilege in the United States”, with teachings on “Policing & the Criminal Justice Movement”, “Modern Day Enslavement” and “Reparations” (see here: NCCJ 2-Day Dismantling Anti-Blackness – Event – NCCJ (archive.org)).  NCCJ also apparently promoted reparations advocacy in a 2021 seminar titled “The Need for Reparations”:

This follows an NCCJ Facebook post on the anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, which also appears to assert the shockingly absurd proposition that there is modern day “oppression” in this country that is somehow comparable to slavery, but that the term “slaves” is “inadequate to describe the magnitude of oppression” in this country:

NCCJ also conducted a free seminar titled “The Role of the White Accomplice”, where one learns “the difference between an accomplice and an ally” (see here: NCCJ Community Perspectives: The Role of the White Accomplice – Free Program! – Event – NCCJ (archive.org))  According to a participant of the program, the seminar included teachings about “oppression” and “white privilege” with supporting slides, and the moderator promoted the teachings and literature of Ibram X. Kendi, who explicitly advocates racial discrimination and reparations, while opposing colorblind standards and capitalism, as discussed in the next section of this article below.  After the seminar participants were provided a free list of books and resources to read, titled “White Accomplices – Additional Resources”. Select portions of the list are linked here.

As seen by the list, it is replete with sources and authors that promote the same CRT ideologies of systemic racism or oppression and white or other demographic privilege found throughout NCCJ’s publications and programs, along with the 1618 Project and other similar radical ideologies.  For just a few of the plethora of examples that could be cited, in its section titled “Books – white focused / for white people to read” on the third page, it features “How to Be an Anti-Racist” by Ibram X. Kendi, which promotes his radical and racist teachings discussed below.  It includes “Me and White Supremacy” by Layla Saad, which teaches that our society, and in fact white people themselves, are infused with white supremacy to dominate people of color, with quotes such as “[w]hite supremacy is not just an attitude or a way of thinking. It also extends to how systems and institutions are structured to uphold this white dominance” (p. 38); “…use this work to interrogate your complicity within a system of privilege that is only designed to benefit you to the extent that you can conform to the rules of whiteness.” (p. 47); and “[i]f you go deep, if you tell the real, raw, ugly truths so you can get to the rotten core of your internalized white supremacy, what you get out of this work and put out into the world will be beyond transformational.” (p. 49).  Those two books are boldfaced as NCCJ “staff favorites” on the list.

“Anti Racist Ally” by Sophie Williams, second on the list “for white people to read”, teaches the core CRT belief that “Modern racism is … systemic, and structural.”  (p. 15).  It later asserts that simply being white is “white supremacy”, by stating “White supremacy isn’t just having extreme views on race, it’s the privilege of being born with a skin color that doesn’t suffer at the hands of society’s prejudice.” (p. 24).  “Western culture was built … to protect the privilege and rights of white people, and to ensure their children enjoyed these too.” It then gives examples of “ways in which white people have benefitted from white supremacist society”.  (p. 25).

Other choice titles from the list include “They Can’t Kill Us All” by Wesley Lowery, “What’s Up with White Women? Unpacking Sexism and White Privilege in Pursuit of Racial Justice” by Ilsa M. Govan, and “Raising White Kids: Bringing Up Children In A Racially Unjust America” by Jennifer Harvey, among many others.

NCCJ’s (Now Deleted) Page on “Privilege”

As with the GSA Network’s Toolkit for its “student run” groups, NCCJ, in its recently deleted publication “What is Privilege” (see here: What is Privilege? – NCCJ (archive.org)), teaches the typical CRT/Critical Theory worldview of grouping and judging individuals based on their racial or other demographic identity group membership as either holding “Privilege” or being in one of a number of “Target or Oppressed Identities”^{[ii] [iii]}.  Sporting the organization’s political bias with a picture of Fox News personality Tucker Carlson as a purported epitome of privilege, this publication defines “privilege” as “unearned access to resources (social power) that are only readily available to some people because of their social group membership”, and as “immunity granted to or enjoyed by one societal group above and beyond the common advantage of all other groups”. 

The page then singles out and defines the various types of “privileged” groups to include whites, males, heterosexuals, “cisgender” people (defined as having a “self-perception” and “expression of gender” that aligns with their sex “assigned at birth”), upper and upper-middle-class individuals, thin people and even Christians, with each group alleged to have their privilege “at the expense” of an oppressed group.  So according to the NCCJ, someone who enjoys an upper-middle-class standard of living as a result of having worked hard and made responsible choices in life is nevertheless judged to have “unearned access to resources” at the “expense” of less economically successful socioeconomic groups.

This represents a quintessential and profoundly naïve Marxist economic and political worldview, that the better position or success of one group necessarily causes the lesser position or lack of success of another.  This mentality also serves to fuel more of the very division, resentment, and racism and other forms of demographic bigotry and prejudice that NCCJ and its programs are purportedly working to ameliorate.  If these concepts are taught in the SPIDEE program, it can hardly be said to serve one of SPIDEE’s asserted purposes presented to the Board of Education, to “make everybody feel more accepted and included”, particularly for students in one of those supposedly “privileged” groups. Videos were featured on the page, including with such inflammatory titles as “Dear White People- Racism Insurance Coverage for White Privilege (White Privilege)” and “White Boy Privilege”.

As often seen with CRT literature and activists such as Ibram X. Kendi who promote its precepts, the page’s discussion of “white privilege”, and its link to ”11 Facts About Racial Discrimination”, each cite statistically unequal outcomes among racial groups as conclusive evidence of systemic racism and white privilege, without any consideration of racially neutral factors that have been shown be significant causes of those outcomes.  For example, it cites the disproportionately higher share of police stops, frisks, arrests, and criminal detentions involving African-Americans without mentioning, even as a potentially-relevant contributing cause, the well-documented (and tragic) fact that a disproportionately higher share of crimes is committed by African-Americans, as evidenced not only by arrest records but also by similar results shown by victim survey data, each published by the U.S. Department of Justice (see here and here), as well as by higher crime rates in African-American communities (see here), among other sources of evidence.  By this logic, our criminal justice system could be deemed systemically sexist and rife with female privilege based on the sheer facts that men are slightly less than half our population but account for approximately 80% of those arrested for violent crimes.

“Christian Privilege”?

Among the “privileged” groups cataloged in NCCJ’s privilege publication are Christians.  This is presented in a linked video (https://youtu.be/IMWNYmuhTvg), apparently published by “The Atheist Voice”, showing a man angrily lecturing the “Christian Right” and complaining of the widespread acceptance and display of Christian customs and beliefs in our society, such as holidays and holiday greetings, various affirmations of shared Christian beliefs or values, songs promoting Christian beliefs (presumably Christmas carols and hymns, etc.), elected officials acting based on Christian moral beliefs, and even having private Christian schools.  It exudes a clear intolerance of and opposition to the prevalence of Christianity and its influence on our society and culture.  How does this reconcile with one of NCCJ’s stated purposes of “eliminating…bigotry”, as presented to the Board of Education?

NCCJ’s (Now Deleted) “Social Justice Definitions” and “Black Lives Matter” Pages, and their “Intersectionality” Page, Promote CRT; Discount Discrimination Against Whites and Christians; Oppose Diversity of Religious or Other Belief on Sexuality

Similar to its “What is Privilege?” page, NCCJ maintained “Social Justice Definitions” and “Black Lives Matter” pages that advanced CRT/Critical Theory principles and controversial teachings on sexuality.  Those pages were also apparently published for over two years before they were deleted in December 2022, less than two months after the initial publication of this article with its criticism of NCCJ promoting these ideologies on its web pages^[i].  The archived versions of these two pages can be viewed here and here. NCCJ’s “Intersectionality” page continues to promote these prejudiced definitions of racism, “religionism” and heterosexism discussed below (see here: https://nccj.org/resources/intersectionality/)

As with many of NCCJ’s other publications and programs, both pages teach that various demographic groups in our society are subject to “systemic”/“systematic” oppression, resulting in “privileged” and “oppressed” groups, which are core concepts of Critical Theory or Critical Legal Theory, from which CRT was developed.  This is evident from the pages’ definitions:

• “Oppression: When an agent group, whether knowingly or unknowingly, abuses a target group. This pervasive system is rooted historically and maintained through individual and institutional/ systematic discrimination, personal bias, bigotry, and social prejudice, resulting in a condition of privilege for the agent group at the expense of the target group.”
• “Privilege: Unearned access to resources (social power) that are only readily available to some people because of their social group membership; an advantage, or immunity granted to or enjoyed by one societal group above and beyond the common advantage of all other groups. Privilege is often invisible to those who have it.”

The deleted ”Social Justice Definitions” page, and NCCJ’s current Intersectionality page, define “racism” essentially – and exclusively – as it is taught by CRT, that it is “systemic”, and it expressly excludes whites among the racial groups that can be subjected to racism:

• “Racism: The individual, cultural, and institutional beliefs and discrimination that systematically oppress people of color (Blacks, Latino/as, Native Americans, and Asians)” (emphasis added).

Similarly, the “Black Lives Matter” page (see here) discussed further in a later section below, defined “Reverse Racism” as something that “doesn’t exist” because it is “categorized as ‘racism’ that is directed at “members of a dominant group” such as “white people”, who “cannot experience racism” due to their “dominant” status.

In other words, per NCCJ’s definitions, racism can only be racism, and thus presumably wrongful, if it is directed at certain racial groups, specifically excluding whites.  For example, if a person of color were to hate or assault a white person because of his or her race, this would not constitute “racism” in NCCJ’s view. This would explain why NCCJ would not consider the race-based redistribution of wealth and resources it advocated via its seminars on reparations for slavery (see here and here) to be racism. This discriminatory definition of “racism” is therefore, ironically, racist. 

By the same token, the “Social Justice Definitions” and “Intersectionality” pages define “Religionism”, or religious discrimination, to specifically exclude Christians:

• “Religionism: The individual, cultural, and institutional beliefs and discrimination that systematically oppress non-Christians, which includes Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia.”

Therefore, religiously bigoted acts of discrimination, hatred or even violence against Christians, such as by the trans-identifying individual who vandalized a Catholic church in Bellevue, Washington by inflicting $30,000 in damage, smashing the glass doors, destroying a statue of the Virgin Mary and spray-painting profane messages such as “F*** Catholics,” “kid groomers,” “woman haters,” and “rot in your fake hell.” (see here), would not be considered an act of “religionism” in NCCJ’s view. Neither would the March 2023 mass shooting that killed six students in the Christian Covenant School in Nashville Tennessee, which was perpetrated by a transgender-identifying individual whose writings right before the shooting clearly showed anti-Christian motives for the attack (see here: https://www.dailywire.com/news/covenant-journal-revealed-my-imaginary-penis). Since these vicious attacks were directed at Christians, they are not “religionism” according to NCCJ’s religiously bigoted definition of the term, but if substantially similar attacks were perpetrated against a mosque, a synagogue or Jewish or Muslim schools, they would be. 

One must ask, why define “racism” and “religionism” to specifically exclude whites and Christians?  Why not define these terms to include discrimination against or mistreatment of anyone based on race or religion?  The likely answer is that it would expose an element of hypocrisy in NCCJ’s teachings and programs; negatively judging whites and Christians as “privileged” and calling for negative discriminatory treatment of them by reallocating resources (e.g., via reparations) or social standing would embody the very “racism” and “religionism” that NCCJ claims it opposes and is working to alleviate.

The “Social Justice Definitions” page opposed diversity of opinion or belief on sexual orientation with its definition of “Heterosexism” as “[t]he belief that heterosexuality is the only normal and acceptable sexual orientation”. Therefore, NCCJ would deem it “heterosexist” to believe that homosexual behavior is outside the norm or unhealthy based on someone’s understanding of biology, or numerous CDC and other official reports of the abnormally and sometimes dramatically higher infection rates for a host of sexually transmitted diseases as a result of such behavior.  It would also be deemed “heterosexism” to believe homosexual behavior to be immoral or sinful based on one’s religious beliefs. Since NCCJ apparently teaches that the three most prominent religions in this country are each wrongful in that regard, one must wonder how NCCJ reconciles that position with its stated purpose of promoting inclusion and opposing bias or bigotry when that is supposed to extend to religious groups. The predictable effect of these teachings is to pressure people to agree with them, including by abandoning their own religious convictions or teachings of their professed faith, to avoid the pejorative label of being “heterosexist.”

NCCJ’S Publications Feature BLM, Ibram X. Kendi, and Other Major CRT Promoters

Consistent with BLM’s support seen above from NCCJ’s contact person for SPIDEE, BLM was directly promoted by NCCJ on the Bulletins section of its website for over two years until it was curiously deleted, as with other pages mentioned here, less than two months after it was first mentioned here in the initial publication of this article in late October 2022^[i] (see the page in archived form here: Black Lives Matter – NCCJ (archive.org)).  Here, a promotional webpage dedicated to BLM was introduced as “an informational bulletin that can be used in clubs, classrooms, meetings, shared with friends and family…”  In addition to BLM’s alarming associations with the deadly and destructive riots of 2020 discussed above, BLM advocates defunding the police on grounds that “police don’t keep us safe” (see here), a view that is apparently rejected by the overwhelming majority of African-Americans, considering a Gallup survey showed 81% of African-Americans want the police presence in their neighborhoods to either remain the same or be increased.  BLM also teaches, including in its BLM At School detachment, 13 Guiding Principles that include “disrupt(ing) the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure” under Principle 11 (Black Villages) and “freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking” under Principle 6 (Queer Affirming) (see here and here).  BLM At School also presents recommended K-12 school curriculum materials teaching CRT-themed and LGBTQIA+ concepts to students at levels down to elementary school (see here and here).

A public statement that NCCJ of Greater Dayton released shortly after George Floyd’s death concludes with a list of linked “Resources”, including Anti-racism resources for white people – Google Docs, containing a litany of radical CRT-promoting authors, lecturers, and materials:

• Ibram X Kendi, a prominent proponent of CRT ideologies of “systemic racism” and “white privilege” who publicly asserts that any policy or system that permits unequal outcomes among racial groups is a “racist policy”, and who has explicitly advocated for the use of racial discrimination to remedy past, and what he believes to be present and future racial discrimination (in other words, it ironically promotes what by definition is actual racism under the guise of combatting perceived racism). He blatantly opposes capitalism as “racist” while supporting “anti-capitalist policies”^[IV].  He has also stated that the equity gaps between black and white Americans cannot be eliminated without reparations for slavery, and anyone who opposes reparations is a racist (see here).
• The 1619 Project, a New York Times publication that – like CRT – espouses the false notion of the U.S. being based on systemic racism, and has been widely criticized by historians for its many historical inaccuracies.
• A presentation by Kimberlé Crenshaw, one of the most prominent CRT scholars and promoters.
• “White Fragility” by Rogin DiAngelo, which asserts that whites are collectively responsible for contributing to nationwide white supremacy in the country.
• “Me and White Supremacy” and ”White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack”, among other CRT-related titles.

What’s Wrong with These CRT/Critical Theory and Sexual and Gender Teachings for DEI?

Worsens Bigotry, Discrimination, and Division Rather than Ameliorating It

Research has shown that most diversity programs, with their emphasis on peoples’ differences, fail to achieve their stated aims of fostering inclusion and positive intergroup interactions, and instead breed division and resentment, and that by contrast, programs that are more effective in achieving those aims are those that focus on our common humanity and shared identity while honoring our various differences (see here). Another study found that these approaches to DEI – as taken by NCCJ – tend to “increase prejudice and activate bigotry among participants by bringing existing stereotypes to the top of their minds or by implanting new biases they had not previously held” (see here).

DEI, “anti-bullying” and “anti-racism” programs that advance these CRT and Critical Theory-related teachings of “privileged” versus “oppressed” groups, as seen above with the GSA Network and NCCJ, fall squarely within this category of DEI programs that have been shown to be unsuccessful; they focus on our demographic differences.  Teaching people to generalize and judge individuals based on their demographics as members of a “privileged” (bourgeoise) class that enjoys “unearned” advantages at the “expense” of an “oppressed” (proletariat) class under societal systems of oppression is not only false and revealing of the neo-Marxist CRT concepts from which they are derived, it also explains why such programs would produce the opposite results of those they are purportedly intended to achieve.  

The predictable result of teaching people to make these blanket judgments of individuals based on their race, sex, religion, and other demographics as oppressors with unearned advantages at other groups’ expense is that it will condition them to view members of those groups in a negative light.  It conditions people to think and act exactly like racists, sexists, and bigots, by negatively judging and generalizing them based on their demographics rather than viewing them for who they are as uniquely individual human beings.  It clearly flies directly in the face of NCCJ’s stated purpose of “eliminating bias, bigotry and all forms of discrimination” or teaching about “the danger of stereotypes”; it will instead exacerbate and spread stereotypes, bias, bigotry, discrimination, division, resentment – and perhaps even – bullying.  In fact, according to the parents of one Oakwood school student, their child experienced explicit threats of violence from other students for daring to mention her belief that there are only two genders that are not fluid or decoupled from biological sex.

Ironically, these teachings run afoul of two of Martin Luther King’s oft-quoted ideals: his advocacy for a society in which his children “will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character”; and this one:

Stated otherwise, you cannot drive out “bias, bigotry and all forms of discrimination” as NCCJ supposedly aims to do, by injecting more of it into our society, including our schools.

Amounts to Political and Social Indoctrination

By conditioning members of certain demographic groups to believe they are “privileged” “oppressors” who enjoy “unearned” benefits “at the expense” of “oppressed” groups, these approaches to DEI clearly have a shaming effect that pressures them to undertake the steps these programs prescribe (i.e., “do the self-work”) to escape their loathed “privileged” status and gain acceptance as an “ally”.  This obviously requires that such groups must submit to, and openly profess their agreement with, the underlying, radical political and social beliefs and theories on which these “privileged” and “oppressed” classifications are predicated.  For example, a white person must accept the CRT precepts of “white privilege”, ubiquitous “systemic racism” and “white supremacy”, and that, as NCCJ’s “What Is Privilege” publication states, they enjoy “White Privilege” in the form of “unearned access, resources, and social status systematically given to white people at the expense of people of color”.

Indoctrinating children and adults into this ideology poses still more profound potential harms. It would lead to false understandings of the causes of racial and other demographic disparities, as due to “systemic” racism or “oppression” whose existence CRT and Critical Theory proponents can never specifically identify or prove. Further, it ignores well-documented causes of these disparities, such as in the oft-cited example of disparate crime and incarceration rates caused by rates of criminal activity as discussed above, or in many other types of disparities that research shows is more likely due to differences in family structure, educational, career and other life choices and well-intended but failed domestic policies, for example. Ignoring or failing to recognize these true causes in turn prevents us from formulating effective solutions for individuals and our society at large. Worse still, this ideology leads its believers to reject objective standards and metrics, and to minimize or outright dismiss the vital role that virtues of hard work, supportive nuclear families, individual accountability and responsible and moral decision making that are essential to individual and societal success and to the true alleviation of these disparities. As seen with Ibram X Kendi’s call for racial discrimination^[iv] and other such writings of these CRT/Critical Theory ideologues, this belief system advocates solutions rooted in compelled, centralized redistribution of wealth, opportunity and resources based on demographic identity group status rather than merit, combined with an unprecedented imposition of government over the citizenry that would eviscerate our individual rights and freedoms, our just and merit-based system of government, our societal cohesion and our prosperity, all in pursuit of an unattainable, neo-Marxist egalitarian Eutopian paradigm that has brought economic decline, poverty, real oppression, moral and societal decay and suffering wherever it has been attempted. This would be the ultimate harm to our society if these principles were to take root from efforts such as this to indoctrinate impressionable youth into this cause.

Regarding the sexual and gender components of these teachings, a person who might otherwise accept what until just recently was the almost unanimously-held belief that gender is binary, unchangeable, and synonymous with biological sex must adopt the beliefs of gender/transgender theory by recognizing they are “Cisgender”, which NCCJ’s privilege publication defines as someone who merely has a “self-perception and expression of gender” that happens to coincide with their biological sex that was “assigned at birth”.  They must then confess to enjoying “Cis Privilege” “at the expense of trans people”, or acknowledge that any disagreement with gender/transgender theory is “oppression” in the form of “transphobia”.  A heterosexual must confess to their “Heterosexual/Straight Privilege” and take prescribed steps to resolve it;  presumably, this would include accepting the content on Heterosexism in the “Resources” section of the NCCJ privilege publication, such as agreeing that it is oppressive “heterosexism” to view “heterosexuality as inherently normal” and “moral” in contrast with homosexuality, or to oppose gay marriage.  This would effectively require some to reject the teachings of their religious faith and it displays a lack of tolerance or respect for diversity of religious and moral beliefs.

How can NCCJ claim to be promoting those noble principles and supporting tolerance for diverse religious beliefs when its teachings on “heterosexism” and “Heterosexual/Straight Privilege” and “Cis Privilege” are effectively teaching that the beliefs of the most prominent religions in this country are wrong, thereby pressuring followers of those religions to reject those teachings of their faith as manifestations of “heterosexism”, “cisgenderism” or heterosexual or “cisgender” “privilege”?  Are the Bible, the Torah and the Quran, along with the major Christian, Jewish and Muslim denominations to be rejected and denounced as “heterosexist” or “cisgenderist” due to their scriptural passages and teachings concerning homosexual behavior, affirming marital relationships as between men and women or affirming the male-female binary? The predictable result of these teachings is to pressure people to agree with those terms and their underlying activist positions on sexuality and gender identity to avoid these pejorative and shaming labels, thereby pressuring them to reject any religious or moral beliefs to the contrary.  This runs entirely contrary to NCCJ’s stated purpose of promoting “diversity”, “inclusion”, opposing “bias” and “eliminating…bigotry” for demographics that include religion; in fact, it does quite the opposite, it fosters bias and bigotry towards followers of those faiths and their beliefs, and possibly even bullying.

CALL TO ACTION: DEMAND DISCLOSURE AND TRANSPARENCY

• Contact NCCJ and respectfully demand that they disclose the SPIDEE curriculum, instructional and other program materials that are used to organize and run the club and its student meetings, including any materials presented to students.  NCCJ can be reached at:
  • https://nccjgreaterdayton.org/spidee/
  • amiller@nccjgreaterdayton.org
  • lmiller@nccjgreaterdayton.org
  • hbrown@nccjgreaterdayton.org
  • 118 West First St. Suite 630, Dayton, OH 45402
  • 937.222.6225 

• Ask the Oakwood school administration to explain what standards are used to determine which outside organizations are permitted to operate student clubs and programs in Oakwood schools and have this sort of direct access to Oakwood students.
• Contact the Oakwood School District Principals, Board of Education, and Superintendent and send a clear message that Oakwood schools are no place for hosting this sort of activist and divisive political, sexual and gender indoctrination.
• Reach back to the OCSS community on Facebook or via e-mail to let us know what you discover!

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[i] Suspiciously, the web archiving site Wayback Machine shows that the pages “What is Privilege?”, “Black Lives Matter” and “Social Justice Definitions” were published for over two years (at least back to July 2020 for the Black Lives Matter page and September 2020 for the other two), but were each taken down in December 2022, less than two months after these first two web pages were critiqued in the initial publication of this article in late October 2022.  This was likely in response to this article; emails obtained from the Oakwood School District show that the key NCCJ staffers Lake Miller and Adriane Miller met with NCCJ’s Board to discuss “concerns” about this article and then arranged a November 17, 2022, meeting with Principal Waller and Traci Hale (and possibly others) “to discuss the article and anything needed to move forward from this and best avoid any future targeting.” (see here)  Less than a month later, all three of these pages, and others showing the contents of seminars discussed in this article, were taken down after more than two years of publication. The link to the archived versions of these webpages, as they were previously published, are now provided in this article above via Wayback Machine’s website.

Here are the original links for the “What Is Privilege” and “Black Lives Matter” pages that were originally published in this article, which clearly no longer work: What is Privilege? – NCCJ; Black Lives Matter – NCCJ.  Why did NCCJ no longer want these pages displayed on their site so shortly after they were brought to light and critiqued in this article?  Since they clearly believe these teachings are true and should be incorporated into societal practice, why erase them now after more than two years of publication?  This is part of a pattern of hiding that NCCJ has displayed in dealing with the community, which was first observed in its response to Oakwood parents and residents who requested copies of the SPIDEE program curriculum as noted early in this article.  Apparently from this timeline of events, NCCJ has been made aware that parents and other community stakeholders object to these teachings and their imposition into community schools, and the organization has decided to withhold them from the public going forward.

[ii] Beliefs that racism is systemic or structural and is the cause of racial disparities, and that whites hold “white privilege,” are all core concepts of CRT. See:

• The American Bar Association publication, “A Lesson on Critical Race Theory”: https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/civil-rights-reimagining-policing/a-lesson-on-critical-race-theory/
• The following article citing prominent CRT theorist Kimberlé Crenshaw on these core CRT concepts: https://abcnews.go.com/US/critical-race-theory-classroom-understanding-debate/story?id=77627465
• Critical Race Theory: An Introduction (3^rd Edition) by Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic at: pages  40; 162-171 (regarding “white privilege”, also defined on page 168); and 115-116 (paragraph 7), 197 and 242-243 (criticizing capitalism).
• The NAACP Legal Defense Fund website, whose webpage on CRT defines it as follows: “Critical Race Theory, or CRT, is an academic and legal framework that denotes that systemic racism is part of American society — from education and housing to employment and healthcare. Critical Race Theory recognizes that racism is more than the result of individual bias and prejudice. It is embedded in laws, policies and institutions that uphold and reproduce racial inequalities.”

[iii] Critical Theory and later Critical Legal Studies, from which CRT was developed, are more general theories that advance – among others – the belief that our society is fraught with forms of systemic oppression that favor privileged demographics to the detriment of oppressed demographics.  These theories evolved out of what became known as the Frankfurt School in Germany beginning in the 1920s by philosophers and social theorists who were heavily influenced by Karl Marx, namely Max Horkheimer, Max Weber, Antonio Gramsci, Herbert Marcuse, Theodor Adorno and Michel Foucault among others.  These theories played a key role in advancing Marxist and Leninist ideologies initially in academia, leading to their racial application known as Critical Race Theory.  Critical Theory seeks as its primary goals, “emancipation from slavery” as perceived by its theorists, or “’human emancipation’ in circumstances of dominance and oppression”.  As with its CRT progeny, Critical Theory opposes capitalism as well; the theory seeks “the transformation of capitalism into a ‘real democracy’ in which such control could be exercised.” See here, here and here, for example, for more information on Critical Legal Theory and Critical Theory.

[iv] See Ibram X. Kendi’s most popular book, widely promoted among DEI programs and activists, titled “How To Be An Anti Racist”.  It includes the following quotes relevant to its extreme teachings referenced in this article:

• He defines a racist policy as “any measure that produces or sustains racial inequity between racial groups”.  p.37.  Again, this is a tenet of CRT, i.e., unequal outcomes observed among racial groups are deemed to be the result of, and conclusive evidence of, systemic racism.  A system is therefore racist by virtue of merely revealing unequal outcomes among racial groups.  The role of individual decisions and behavior, or any other non-racial factor, however, well-supported by research and evidence as a cause of the unequal outcomes, is discounted or completely ignored.
• “Institutional racism’ and ‘structural racism’ and ‘systemic racism’ are redundant. Racism itself is institutional, structural, and systemic.” p.38.  Thus, he ascribes to this core tenet of CRT, that racism is systemic or structural, and is a ubiquitous, interwoven fixture in our society.
• Rejecting colorblindness: “The most threatening racist movement is not the alt right’s unlikely drive for a White ethnostate but the regular American’s drive for a ‘race-neutral’ one.” p.41.
• “There may be no more consequential White privilege than life itself.”  P. 45.
• Explicitly supporting racial discrimination (i.e., racism) to engineer equal outcomes (i.e., “equity”):  He defends “assisting an underrepresented racial group into relative wealth and power until equity is reached” by stating: “The only remedy to racist discrimination is antiracist discrimination. The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination.”  P. 40.
• Opposing capitalism (all from Chapter 12):  He describes capitalism and racism as “conjoined twins,” advocates “anti-capitalist policies,” and even states that “[t]o love capitalism is to love racism,” and “[a]nti-racist policies cannot eliminate class racism without anti-capitalist policies.”  He further asserts that “[c]apitalism is essentially racist. Racism is essentially capitalism. They were birthed together from the same unnatural causes, and they shall one day naturally die together from unnatural causes, or racial capitalism shall live into another epoch of theft and rapacious inequity, especially if activists naively fight the cojoined twins independently as if they are not the same”.

• Camp Singles Out, Negatively Generalizes and Effectively Shames Kids by Race and Other Demographics, Essentially Promoting Racism
• Promotes CRT and Critical Theory Beliefs of “Systemic Oppression”, Systemic Racism and White and other Demographic “Privilege”
• Teaches Kids They Are “Privileged” and Owe “Responsibilities” for Being White, Male, “Cisgender” and/or Middle Class
• Includes Content That Pressures Kids to Agree with Controversial Teachings on Sexuality and Gender Identity

Fair Use Disclaimer

Imagine enrolling your teenage daughter in an exciting and ambitious overnight camp, promoted as a camp aimed at combatting prejudice, “learning to bridge divisions that keep us apart” and “building an inclusive community”, with opportunities to engage with other youth of diverse backgrounds.  You then find out that as part of the camp experience, she was lined up by camp activists and practically shamed, and taught that because she is white, she is “privileged” and enjoys unfair advantages over “oppressed” groups at their expense. Activists at the camp taught her this is due to ominous “systems of oppression” throughout our society that also unjustly privilege her for being “cisgender” and middle class, systems that she contributes to and must work to dismantle.  Imagine your daughter also being effectively taught that her religious or science-based beliefs about sexuality or sex and gender identity are wrongful, as “heterosexist”, “cisgenderist” and manifestations of “privilege”.  But wait, isn’t negatively generalizing people based on their race itself an act of racism, you might ask?  Will this combat prejudice, “bridge divisions” and bring people together, or will it actually foster more demographic prejudice, resentment and division?  It sounds more like political and social indoctrination, does it not?

This is not a dystopian hypothetical, but an actual activist camp known as Anytown that is being promoted to students in Oakwood High School.  Anytown is one of multiple programs conducted by an outside activist organization, the National Conference for Community and Justice (NCCJ), that has been operating in Oakwood schools due to the active support of Oakwood School District leadership. Emails obtained from the Oakwood School District show NCCJ was brought into the District at the recommendation of Board of Education leader John Wilson, who praised NCCJ from his years of working with the organization and even noted his familiarity with Anytown.  One must wonder if he was aware of Anytown’s (and NCCJ’s) divisive and problematic activities and teachings reported here.  An overview of NCCJ and its various programs is reported in this OCSS article.

Emails show NCCJ has been recruiting students to participate in Anytown by enlisting the help of top District staff, and students participating in NCCJ’s programs such as SPIDEE, its activist student club.  For example, in an email to Oakwood school counselor Joan Bline with a promotional flyer for Anytown, NCCJ staffer Lake Miller writes “[o]ur school and community contacts have been great assets in helping us to recruit for Anytown. We wanted to see if this is something you may be able to help spread the word about to Oakwood students.”  In an email exchange with NCCJ staffer Hannah Brown, SEL Interventionist Bridget Fiore eagerly confirmed distributing the Anytown flyer to all high school classes and asking Principal Waller to publish it in the family newsletter.  Other emails to Principal Waller, Hillary Waugh, and Rachel Keyes, and numerous emails to students in the SPIDEE and Anytown programs, show NCCJ staff encouraging students to recruit their peers for the camp, even by offering each student a free gift for every two they recruit.

While the Anytown camp appears to include some redeeming activities ostensibly aimed at alleviating prejudice and promoting positive interactions among diverse students, a review of available information about the camp, including as offered in the Dayton area, shows it is ingrained with the same harmful and divisive teachings that are consistently interwoven throughout NCCJ’s publications and adult and youth programs as shown by this OCSS article.  These include Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Critical Theory concepts of “systemic” racism or oppression and resulting white or other demographic “privilege” and “oppression,” as well as content that pressures kids to conform to controversial teachings about sexuality and gender identity, likely without regard to any religious, moral, science or public health-based disagreements they may have with those teachings. Please review this article along with the brochures, videos and student testimonials concerning the Anytown camp, and ask yourself if you think this camp should be promoted in our public schools, to your children or to others in our community with these racist, divisive and controversial teachings.   Are these beliefs that you would want your children or others in the community to adopt about themselves, about others, or about our society as a whole?

NCCJ Videos, Instagram Testimonials Show Students Taught They are “Privileged” And Instilled with Shame and Guilt Based On Their Race, Sex, Gender Identity and Income Level

The “Privilege Walk”: “If You Are White, Take A Step Forward!”

Multiple videos featuring the Anytown camp show children are led through a “privilege” exercise where they are lined up side-by-side, and directed to step forward or backward in response to questions as to whether certain positive or negative life circumstances apply to them.  As shown by this video, an NCCJ activist in a shrill voice leads students through the exercise with questions focused on socioeconomic and other life circumstances, asking kids to step forward if their family has a summer home or they were raised in a community that was safe from harm and violence. In one case, white children are explicitly singled out and told “[i]f you are white, take a step forward!”, effectively being told their race is itself a “privilege”: https://youtu.be/S7pSSThosLs.

(Student in Tears) “I felt like the privileged one because I was the white girl, and it’s not fair!”

Another NCCJ video titled “All About Anytown” also depicts the privilege exercise.  Questions once again include those relating to their socioeconomic status, such as whether they attended an elementary school with good materials and facilities, whether they ever went hungry (see here starting at 2:30: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ur1UWwf_r4 ).  The reactions of the teenage participants make it clear the exercise instills racial shame and guilt, and that it is intended to imply these favorable or unfavorable circumstances are occasioned by their race.  The exercise typically concludes with white kids disproportionately among those standing ahead of the starting line, and African-American and other racial minority kids left standing behind it.  One African-American teen comments that, “[t]hey kinda like, divided us up, according to like, our color.  That’s just what I saw.  It kinda felt a little wierd.” Another youth states he felt like he wanted to cry, and then felt mad and asked “why!?”. Two white girls admit they felt guilty (one at 3:30 and another at 3:58), with the second in tears, exclaiming “I felt like the privileged one because I was the white girl, and it’s not fair!”  Near the end of the video, a student states “We cannot be tolerant of racism”, clearly implying these inequalities are all due to racism. Note it is quite likely this “privilege exercise” is also used in the SPIDEE “student run” club in Oakwood schools, since NCCJ curriculum materials obtained from the Yellow Springs School District reveal NCCJ’s SPIDEE students conducting the “privilege exercise” in their work with 8^th graders in NCCJ’s Changing In The Middle program, and those programs are run by the same NCCJ activists who operate SPIDEE and other NCCJ programs in the Oakwood School District (see here). Further, records obtained from the Oakwood School District do show that “privilege” is among the topics taught in the SPIDEE program there, including in SPIDEE students’ presentations to 6th graders at Harman and Smith schools.

News Report Shows Kids Segregated and Judged By Race, Admitting That Anytown Appears to Shame Them (“Everyone is Checked For The Privileges They Have”)

A local news feature on the Anytown camp titled “The Anti-Racist Camp Republicans Can’t Ban” (see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT_Jzzv_tv0), further illustrates the program’s focus on singling out and judging kids as privileged or oppressed based on their race, and its apparent effect of instilling collective racial guilt and shame in the process.

• At the 2:20 point, a camp staffer notes that when he attended Anytown in 1990s the camp “had almost like a little bit of a colorblind approach” and now, “it’s changed there is like, we’re going to take a look at white privilege.  We’re gonna take a look at like, how that plays out through different identities.”
• At the 5:00 mark, the clip notes students are segregated by “shared experience such as race and sexual orientation”.
• At 6:18, a student states that, after their talk, “another thing we could agree on as a group is that white privilege is very dominant in our culture”. 
• At 8:20, one student states that “everyone is checked for the privileges they have and don’t.”
• At 8:46, a student states, “I feel that in some ways that it is in a way trying to inflict in some shame with how these programs are. I don’t think it’s intentional I wouldn’t say that’s all they’re trying to do but with some of the programs here it can appear that way.”

But is the camp not intended to shame kids based on their race and other demographics, as being “privileged” or otherwise?  Remember, these clips above were not undercover “sting” videos by partisans cherry picking damaging excerpts of footage to portray the camp in a negative light; in fact, the first two were clips of the weekend or week-long camp are footage handpicked by NCCJ to show the public what the Anytown camp is about.  This is evident from the second video’s title, “All About Anytown”.  The fact that NCCJ selectively featured these clips of kids expressing shame and guilt for their supposed white privilege indicates that is among the intended effects of this Anytown exercise.

Testimonials of Anytown Participants Also Show Teachings of Racial/Demographic “Privilege” and “Systemic Oppression” – For The Dayton-Area Anytown Camp

A review of recently-published testimonials on NCCJ of Greater Dayton’s Instagram page also show these radical teachings are imposed on kids in the Dayton-area Anytown camps, with kids noting how they were taught they are “privileged” and owed “responsibilities” based on race, sex, income level and even gender identity.

• One testimonial states that Anytown “educates students from across the greater Dayton Area in order for them to come together to collaborate about identity based allyship”.  “Allyship” is a common term used in CRT-based teachings, where the supposedly “privileged” groups learn to submit to these teachings and experience social redemption by becoming “allies”  (hence the term “identity based allyship”).
• The testimonial of Justin Duran, now among the NCCJ staffers working with students in the Oakwood School District according to emails obtained from the District, states that his participation in Anytown in 2007 “sharpened my sense of integrity and passion for social reform.   I really had to check my privilege and learn to grow my understanding of what it means to be a better leader and ally to those around me.”
• Another attendee states “I was able to be helped in understanding the immense privilege I have as a middle-class, white woman…”.  Is being in the middle class a privilege?  Was it taught to be something occasioned by her race or other demographics?  Was she made to feel guilty about it?
• Another attendee, who returned as an Anytown camp counselor, notes that “Throughout the years I told my coming out story in the heterosexism module (of the camp program) to hundreds of delegates….Anytown is also where I learned about privilege and my responsibility as a cis, white, able bodied, middle class, male which I am still learning … today.  It is where I confronted my biases and challenged my beliefs.”  One must ask, what are these “responsibilities” one is judged to have based on their skin color, socioeconomic class they were raised in, or if they accept their biological sex as their gender?  See the discussion below on how NCCJ’s teaching on “heterosexism” can pressure kids to adopt controversial views on sexuality.
• Another attendee recalls, “During Anytown, I had to take a step back and educate myself about systemic oppression….It helped me recognize the privileges I had in support systems a caring household as well as other factors in my life that play into it.”  Is having been raised in supportive household an undeserved “privilege” that should be a source of personal guilt, and is it presumed to be the result of one’s race or other demographics?

Teachings on Sexuality and Gender Identity

Brochures for the Anytown program, such as the flyer in the emails from NCCJ staffers linked above, show it includes teachings about sexuality and gender identity, with the statement that in the camp “delegates tackle tough questions regarding gender identity, race, religion, sexual orientation”.  One of the testimonials above also notes the camp includes a “heterosexism module”.  Heterosexism is mentioned and defined in NCCJ’s other materials, such as its recently-deleted “Social Justice Definitions” page, as “[t]he belief that heterosexuality is the only normal and acceptable sexual orientation”. Controversial teachings on gender identity, such as the “privileges” and responsibilities” that “cisgender” people supposedly have per the above testimonial, are mentioned in NCCJ’s other publications, such as its recently deleted “What is Privilege?” page.  The page names a host of supposed demographic privileges (white, Christian, upper-middle class) to include “cisgender privilege”, and it defines “cisgender” as having a “self-perception” and “expression of gender” that aligns with one’s sex “assigned at birth”.

What’s Wrong With These Teachings: Likely Spurs Division, Bigotry and Resentment, Shows Intolerance for Diverse Religious, Moral and Other Beliefs; Undermines Stated DEI Purposes

As discussed more fully in the comprehensive OCSS article on NCCJ and its programs (see here), these teachings only serve to worsen division, bias, racism and other forms of demographic bigotry and resentment.  These teachings on demographic privilege compel kids to view others not for who they are, but for their race or other demographics, and then to negatively generalize or judge them as “privileged” or “oppressed” based on those demographics. In other words, they effectively condition kids to think like racists and bigots.  Clearly, viewing people as privileged (having “unearned” advantages “expense” of “oppressed” demographics as NCCJ defines it in “What Is Privilege?”) based on their demographics would lead kids to view those people or themselves with resentment and shame, particularly if they believe they are in one of the “oppressed” demographics.  Teachings on “heterosexism” and “cisgender privilege” pressure kids to adopt controversial beliefs about sexuality and gender identity that may be contrary to their religious, moral, science or public health-based convictions. These may include their closely-held religious beliefs or sexual morals, views based on well-documented and profound health problems seen with certain types of activity relating to those topics, and basic beliefs rooted in science and human nature regarding the male-female binary and the relationship of gender to biological sex. Moreover, they effectively teach that the beliefs of our society’s most prominent religions on those subjects are wrong and to be rejected as “heterosexist”, “cisgenderist” or manifestations of sexual or gender “privilege”, which runs entirely contrary to NCCJ’s stated purpose of promoting “inclusion” and opposing “bias” on demographics that include religion.

Further, these teachings amount to political, social and sexual indoctrination, by training and even pressuring kids to adopt activist world views derived from CRT, Critical Theory, and on sexuality and transgenderism.  “Systemic” racism and oppression, and its supposed role in causing white and demographic “privilege”, oppression and inequality are core concepts of those theories^[1].  Equally concerning, as shown with Anytown’s “privilege” exercise above, they instill false narratives about causes of inequality, such as that one’s skin color is the driving cause of one’s life circumstances relating to socioeconomic status, without any regard to the well-documented role of important life choices.

Interestingly, the first NCCJ-published video above even concludes with an NCCJ staffer asserting that NCCJ is working to override the influence of religious institutions and parents on these subjects: “We are carefully taught by our parents, our schools, our religious institutions…we are carefully taught about those things and it is NCCJ’s mission to unlearn those.”  (see here at 1:42).

Call to Action

If these activities seem inappropriate for our children in Oakwood Schools, the administration and Board of Education should be contacted with your concerns.

Board President John Wilson, wilson.john@oakwoodschools.org; Board Vice President Laura Middleton, middleton.laura@oakwoodschools.org; Board Members Debbie DiLorenzo, dilorenzo.debbie@oakwoodschools.org; Lauren Kawai, kawai.lauren@oakwoodschools.org; and Deron Schwieterman, schwieterman.deron@oakwoodschools.org

Acting Superintendent Allyson Couch, couch.allyson@oakwoodschools.org, and OHS Principal Paul Waller, waller.paul@oakwoodschools.org.

Let us know if you have thoughts or feedback on this article by sending a note to admin@oakwoodstrongschools.com.

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Footnotes

[1] Beliefs that racism is systemic or structural and is the cause of racial disparities and that whites hold “white privilege,” are all core concepts of CRT. See:

• The American Bar Association publication, “A Lesson on Critical Race Theory”: https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/civil-rights-reimagining-policing/a-lesson-on-critical-race-theory/;

• The following article citing prominent CRT theorist Kimberlé Crenshaw on these core CRT concepts: https://abcnews.go.com/US/critical-race-theory-classroom-understanding-debate/story?id=77627465;
• The NAACP Legal Defense Fund website, whose webpage on CRT defines it as follows: “Critical Race Theory, or CRT, is an academic and legal framework that denotes that systemic racism is part of American society – from education and housing to employment and healthcare. Critical Race Theory recognizes that racism is more than the result of individual bias and prejudice. It is embedded in laws, policies and institutions that uphold and reproduce racial inequalities.”; and

• Critical Race Theory: An Introduction (3rd Edition) by Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic at: pages 40; 162-171 (regarding “white privilege”, also defined on page 168).

Critical Theory and later Critical Legal Studies, from which CRT was developed, are more general theories that advance – among others – the belief that our society is fraught with forms of systemic oppression that favor privileged demographics to the detriment of oppressed demographics.  These theories evolved from the “Frankfurt School” in Germany beginning in the 1920s by philosophers and social theorists who were heavily influenced by Karl Marx, namely Max Horkheimer, Max Weber, Antonio Gramsci and Herbert Marcuse, among others.  These theories played a key role in advancing Marxist and Leninist ideologies initially in academia, leading to their racial application known as Critical Race Theory.  See here, here and here, for example, for more information on Critical Legal Theory and Critical Theory.

Introduction

Recently, a student club titled SPIDEE (Students Promoting Inclusion, Diversity, and Equity through Education) began operating at Oakwood High School.  While SPIDEE is portrayed to students and the public as a “student run” club, the club, its concept, its contact person for students, its curriculum, the initial running and organization of its student meetings, and then the supervision and logistics of those meetings are all the work of an outside activist organization that created it: the National Conference for Community and Justice (NCCJ).  In SPIDEE meetings, NCCJ staff work directly with and train OHS students, who then present SPIDEE’s curriculum to sixth graders in Harman and Smith schools.  NCCJ and SPIDEE students have asserted the club’s purpose is to promote ostensibly respectable objectives of fostering diversity, equity, and inclusion and opposing bias and bullying.  If that is the club’s sole purpose and function, then it should be wholeheartedly welcomed.  However, a review of NCCJ’s publications and public workshops reveals the organization advances radical and controversial Critical Race Theory (CRT)-oriented and other social and political agendas similar to those used in “student run” groups across the country that are run by other activist groups such as the GSA Network. 

These agendas include: teachings of ubiquitous white supremacy and systemic racism; lumping individuals into “privileged” or “oppressed” categories and effectively judging them based on their demographics such as race, sex, income, and even religion; advancing controversial sexual and gender-related agendas; and promoting the BLM organization and key CRT figures such as Ibram X. Kendi and Kimberlé Crenshaw.  In short, they are more akin to political and social indoctrination than genuine attempts to reduce bias, prejudice, and bullying.  Further, they display characteristics of DEI programs that studies have shown to fail rather than those that have been shown to succeed in achieving their stated purposes.  But is that also what SPIDEE teaches?  At this point, it is unclear, since NCCJ’s website on the SPIDEE program gives no meaningful, specific information about SPIDEE’s curriculum or teachings and NCCJ staff have repeatedly failed to honor, or have outright ignored, repeated requests by multiple Oakwood school student parents and residents to disclose SPIDEE’s curriculum and program materials.

Please peruse the article below for more details, and pay close attention to what NCCJ publishes and appears to promote on its web pages and public seminars.  Many web pages promote key CRT figures and teach us to judge individuals based on race, sex, or religion as being privileged beneficiaries who enjoy unearned benefits at others’ expense.  At the time of this writing, there is an upcoming free, public seminar on “The Role of the White Accomplice” (click HERE to register) that will surely cover these concepts.  Note their similarity to the contents of the GSA Network’s publications and actual student club materials (not to mention their similarity to certain professional development materials presented to Oakwood school personnel).  Then ask yourself: Is this what we want to teach our children to believe?  If this is what SPIDEE teaches, would it really achieve NCCJ’s and SPIDEE’s purported goals of reducing bias, division, discrimination, and bullying, or would it do the opposite by actually inciting and spreading more of it, and would it in fact amount to controversial political and social indoctrination?

If you share our concerns and desire for more transparency and disclosure about the SPIDEE program, please see the CALL TO ACTION section below for the NCCJ contact information to inquire about SPIDEE, and for questions that should be asked of NCCJ and the Oakwood school administration.  If you aren’t doing so already, please follow our Oakwood Community for Strong Schools (OCSS) website and Facebook group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/oakwoodstrongschools) for information and updates about this and other topics impacting our treasured school system and community, and sign up here for regular email updates.

1. A “Student Run” Organization?  Not Really.
2. What Does the SPIDEE Program Teach to Students?
3. Why We Are Concerned
   • Contact Person for the SPIDEE Program
   • Growing Trend of Activist Groups Injecting Their Agendas Into Schools via “Student Run” Clubs
   • What About SPIDEE’s Sponsor Organization, NCCJ?  What Does It Teach?
     • NCCJ’s Publications and Seminars Promote CRT Ideologies, BLM, and Judgment of Individuals Based on Race, Sex, Sexual Orientation, Gender Expression, Income and Religion
     • NCCJ’s Online Seminars and Workshops on “Privilege” and “The Role of the White Accomplice” (vs. an “Ally”)
     • NCCJ’S Publications Feature BLM, Ibram X. Kendi, and Other Major CRT Promoters
   • What’s Wrong with These CRT-Related Teachings of “Privilege” and “Oppression” for DEI
     • Worsens Bigotry, Discrimination, and Division Rather than Ameliorating It
     • These Approaches to DEI Amount to Political and Social Indoctrination
4. Where does that leave us with SPIDEE?
5. CALL TO ACTION: DEMAND DISCLOSURE AND TRANSPARENCY

A “Student Run” Organization?  Not Really.

Last May, parents observed the following poster throughout the halls of Oakwood High School, inviting students to join a “student run” organization titled SPIDEE (Students Promoting Inclusion, Diversity, and Equity through Education):

The representation of the organization as “student run”, however, is misleading at best.  The email address that the poster provides for students to contact and get involved in the club isn’t the address of a student or even a staff member of Oakwood schools, but an outside adult who works for the Dayton chapter of a nationwide activist organization called NCCJ, the National Conference for Community and Justice.  Interestingly, the poster doesn’t make clear to students who the contact person is or her role as an outside activist. Furthermore, it is clear from NCCJ’s website (https://nccjgreaterdayton.org/spidee/) and the presentation NCCJ and some students gave to the Oakwood Board of Education during its August 2022 meeting (see here starting at 3:18) that NCCJ, not students, designed and operates the SPIDEE program and concept, designed its curriculum and instructional materials, organizes and runs the initial regular program meetings with students, and only then transfers the running of those regular student meetings in Oakwood High School, with NCCJ staff then continuing to handle the “logistics” of those meetings and sit in on them to provide ongoing advice and coaching.  A SPIDEE club member nevertheless repeated the representation that the club is “student run” during the presentation to the Board of Education, while mentioning that NCCJ staffers had been running the meetings, which had been “more student run” only over the previous couple of months.

Based on remarks from an NCCJ staffer, Lake Miller, during the Board of Education meeting, those trained high school students then give presentations to sixth graders in Harman and Smith schools to promote the SPIDEE program, which they plan to do three times this year, and it serves as preparation for them to get involved in SPIDEE once they reach ninth grade, or to get involved in other NCCJ programs such as “Agents of Change.”  He noted there are discussions about possibly expanding SPIDEE’s role at the middle school level as well, and that SPIDEE-trained high school students can get involved in running “Change at the Middle,” an NCCJ program for middle school students currently operated in other school districts.

Given the obvious role NCCJ plays in the design and operation of SPIDEE, one must ask, how did this “student run” club come to operate in the Oakwood school system?  Was it at the organic request of students, or was it initiated by outreach from NCCJ or other outside organizations, and/or Oakwood school administrators or staff?

What Does the SPIDEE Program Teach to Students?

NCCJ’s SPIDEE webpage states that its lessons “focus on diversity and inclusion, the danger of stereotypes, and the value of differences”, and its programs are “designed to promote anti-bullying behaviors and positive-decision-making in the lives of the students served.”  In its presentation to the Board, NCCJ presented itself as a “diversity, equity, and inclusion nonprofit dedicated to eliminating bias, bigotry, and all forms of discrimination”.  A SPIDEE club member then asserted that the SPIDEE curriculum for Oakwood schools was made to be “special so that it could really touch on the heavy subjects that we think are really important and that can make Oakwood a better community and make everybody feel more accepted and included”.

If the SPIDEE program is simply focused on teaching students to foster an inclusive environment that eschews and works to eliminate bias, prejudice, and bullying while leading students to treat each other with equal respect and dignity without regard to demographic differences, then the program should be welcomed as a valuable addition to the Oakwood school system and community for so long as it adheres to those laudable aims and does not incorporate divisive or the controversial teachings such as those discussed below.  It is possible that is the case.

At this point, however, it is unclear what the SPIDEE program actually teaches or presents to students.  NCCJ’s SPIDEE webpage provides only scant and very general information about what the program actually teaches.  Moreover, multiple Oakwood residents and parents of students in the school system have reached out to NCCJ via the “REACH OUT TO US TO LEARN MORE” portion of its SPIDEE web page to inquire about the program, and while they initially received a prompt and enthusiastic reply from the same NCCJ staffer whose email address appears on the above poster, or from other NCCJ staff, as soon as those residents and parents then asked for copies of the SPIDEE program and curriculum materials, they received no further answer, even in response to follow-up requests.

Why We Are Concerned

In addition to NCCJ’s failure to respond to multiple requests for the SPIDEE instructional and program materials, there are compelling grounds for concern about the scope of the program’s advocacy; specifically, that it may extend beyond the noble purposes described above and into highly controversial, divisive, and even radical political and social activism that even contradicts the stated purposes of the program and of NCCJ that are represented on its website and its presentation to the Board of Education.

Contact Person for the SPIDEE Program

The first cause for concern was an initial review of the undisclosed SPIDEE contact person whose email address appears on the above poster displayed throughout OHS, and who is also one of the two NCCJ staff members who has been running and then coaching the SPIDEE meetings.  A review of her social media postings included, among various left-wing political content, a pair of posts made just days after the outbreak of deadly and destructive riots following George Floyd’s death: one post voicing support for the Black Lives Matter movement whose name, slogans and logos were displayed by many of those who perpetrated the riots without any condemnation from the BLM organization; and, most troubling, a post that was clearly intended to defend the riots by likening them to other “riots that created change”, such as the American Revolution, and even the Marxist revolutions in Russia, Cuba, and South America:

Just five days after her above posts, it was reported the riots had already left 19 people dead (see here), and as a reminder, the riots went on to leave dozens dead, thousands injured, and approximately $2 billion in property damage, with stores looted and destroyed along with the livelihoods and finances of many of their owners, a historical 19th-century church in Washington D.C. and a police precinct in Minneapolis severely burned, a city block in Seattle overrun by violent extremists, and a federal courthouse in Portland besieged by Antifa and other rioters who attempted to set it on fire while federal employees were barricaded inside.  BLM not only failed to condemn the riots, but the Chicago BLM leader defended the looting as “reparations” (see here), and within about three weeks of this NCCJ staffer’s posting, the New York Chapter BLM leader declined to condemn the rioting and stated, “[i]f this country doesn’t give us what we want, then we will burn down this system and replace it … I could be speaking figuratively, I could be speaking literally. It’s a matter of interpretation.” (see here). This NCCJ staffer’s Facebook posts remain on display (as of October 21, 2022), and this is the individual who is given direct access to Oakwood students to influence their views on diversity, inclusion, and quite possibly, political and social advocacy.

Growing Trend of Activist Groups Injecting Their Agendas Into Schools via “Student Run” Clubs

For general background, the emergence of SPIDEE in Oakwood schools comes as a larger nationwide trend has emerged, of outside activist organizations injecting their influence into schools under the cover of “student run” clubs and organizations.  They often represent themselves to schools and the public under the reasonable and agreeable mission of promoting “diversity, equity and inclusion”, “justice” and “anti-bullying”, while imposing curricula that reflect attempts to indoctrinate children to accept CRT-themed and other highly-controversial political, sexual and gender ideologies.  One prominent example is the Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) Network, which according to a thoroughly-sourced investigative report (GSA Clubs Smuggle Gender Ideology into K-12 Education) operates over 4,000 student clubs in elementary, middle and high schools across the country – including in Ohio – under the above-stated purposes of promoting inclusion and preventing bullying. 

While the GSA Network’s presumed purposes of combating bullying and fostering respect and inclusion of LGBTQIA+ individuals would certainly be respectable and agreeable, a review of the GSA Network’s publications and its instructional materials for its student clubs show its agendas, including for student clubs, extend far beyond such aims.  As the above report shows, the organization’s administrative materials and literature advance the beliefs that “white European men created an oppressive system based on capitalism, white supremacy, and “heteronormativity”, that “to fight back, racial and sexual minorities must unite under the banner of ‘intersectionality’ and dismantle the interlocking ‘systems of oppression’”, and the GSA Network’s manifesto calls for the abolition of the police, of borders and of ICE, and “the overthrow of the ‘cisgender heterosexual patriarchy’”. 

Further, the GSA Network’s instructional materials for its student clubs, which it repeatedly brands to the public as “student run” as NCCJ does with SPIDEE, include a Digital Organizing Toolkit (see here) teaching children to do the “self work” to understand “’how [their] actions, lack of actions, or privileges contribute to the ongoing marginalization’ of the oppressed”.  The Toolkit includes a Critical Theory/CRT-themed chart that groups individuals into those holding “Systemic Power (Privilege)” who are allegedly responsible for specified forms of “SYSTEMS OF OPPRESSION” and “PREJUDICE”, versus those holding “LESS OR NO SYSTEMIC POWER (OPPRESSED)”.  These groups are assigned these judgmental classifications based on their race, sex, gender expression, sexual orientation, and even their lawful citizenship status.  For example, white people are deemed responsible for “White Supremacy”, straight and “cisgender” people are responsible for “heteronormativity” and “transphobia”, and citizens are responsible for “imperialism” and “settler colonialism”.  The Toolkit includes common neo-Marxist themes of repeated calls to work for “(collective) liberation” and “dismantling” of “systems of oppression”, and features a photograph of children each with an activist fist in the air, along with a quote from longtime activist and former longtime Communist Party USA member Angela Davis.  It is clear that much of the content and apparent purpose of this toolkit strays far from LGBTQ+ inclusion or anti-bullying.  The investigative report also notes the GSA Network’s literature is replete with anti-capitalist rhetoric.  These concepts of White Privilege, systemic racial oppression, and anti-capitalist sentiment are hallmark concepts of CRT[i].

The GSA Advisor Handbook, which is the manual for GSA personnel to use in “setting up, running and sustaining” the “student-run” club, includes instructions on hiding student participation in the clubs from parents: “Know the laws in your state around students’ privacy rights and what you do and don’t have to tell parents/guardians/families.  This is important so you don’t inadvertently out a student as a member of the GSA.”  It further states, “[n]ote that in many cases, it is not required that parents/guardians know that students are part of a GSA” (see p. 24 of the Handbook).

What About SPIDEE’s Sponsor Organization, NCCJ?  What Does It Teach?

NCCJ’s Publications and Seminars Promote CRT Ideologies, BLM, and Judgment of Individuals Based on Race, Sex, Sexual Orientation, Gender Expression, Income and Religion

A review of NCCJ’s website similarly shows the organization actively promotes and teaches concepts of Critical Race Theory and Critical Theory generally, including in its online publications and in seminars it offers to the public, some of which are presented under the oft-used rubric of supporting “diversity, equity and inclusion”,  “anti-racism” and “anti-bullying”.  These include promoting blanket judgments of groups of people based on their racial and other demographics as “privileged” oppressors versus “oppressed” victims, teachings that any system or standard that yields or permits unequal outcomes is therefore systemically unjust, as well as controversial activist positions on sexuality and gender ideology.

As with the GSA Network’s Toolkit for its “student run” groups, the NCCJ, in its publication “What is Privilege” (see here: What is Privilege? – NCCJ), teaches the typical CRT worldview of grouping and judging individuals based on their racial or other demographic identity group membership as either holding “Privilege” or being in one of a number of “Target or Oppressed Identities”.  Sporting the organization’s political bias with a picture of Fox News personality Tucker Carlson as a purported epitome of privilege, this publication defines “privilege” as “unearned access to resources (social power) that are only readily available to some people because of their social group membership”, and as “immunity granted to or enjoyed by one societal group above and beyond the common advantage of all other groups”. 

The page then singles out and defines the various types of “privileged” groups to include whites, males, heterosexuals, “cisgender” people (defined as having a “self-perception” and “expression of gender” that aligns with their sex “assigned at birth”), upper and upper-middle-class individuals, and even Christians, with each group alleged to have their privilege “at the expense” of an oppressed group.  So according to the NCCJ, someone who enjoys an upper-middle-class standard of living as a result of having worked hard and made responsible choices in life is nevertheless judged to have “unearned access to resources” at the “expense” of less economically successful socioeconomic groups – a quintessential Marxist economic and political worldview.  If these concepts are taught in the SPIDEE program, it can hardly be said to serve one of SPIDEE’s asserted purposes presented to the Board of Education, to “make everybody feel more accepted and included”, particularly for students in one of those supposedly “privileged” groups.

As often seen with CRT literature and activists such as Ibram X. Kendi who promote its precepts, the page’s discussion of “white privilege”, and its link to ”11 Facts About Racial Discrimination”, each cite statistically unequal outcomes among racial groups as conclusive evidence of systemic racism and white privilege, without any consideration of racially neutral factors that have been shown be significant causes of those outcomes.  For example, it cites the disproportionately higher share of police stops, frisks, arrests, and criminal detentions involving African-Americans without mentioning, even as a potentially-relevant contributing cause, the well-documented (and tragic) fact that a disproportionately higher share of crimes is committed by African-Americans, as evidenced not only by arrest records but also by similar results shown by victim survey data, each published by the U.S. Department of Justice (see here and here), as well as by higher crime rates in African-American communities (see here and here), among other sources of evidence.  By this logic, our criminal justice system could be deemed systemically sexist and rife with female privilege based on the sheer facts that men are slightly less than half our population but account for approximately 80% of those arrested for violent crimes.

“Christian Privilege”?

Among the “privileged” groups cataloged in NCCJ’s privilege publication are Christians.  This is presented in a video (https://youtu.be/IMWNYmuhTvg) showing a man angrily lecturing the “Christian Right” and complaining of the widespread acceptance and display of Christian customs and beliefs, such as holidays and holiday greetings, various affirmations of shared Christian beliefs or values, songs promoting Christian beliefs (presumably Christmas carols and hymns, etc.), elected officials acting based on Christian moral beliefs, and even having private Christian schools.  It exudes a clear intolerance of and opposition to the prevalence of Christianity and its influence on our society and culture.  How does this reconcile with one of NCCJ’s stated purposes of “eliminating…bigotry”, as presented to the Board of Education?

NCCJ’s Online Seminars and Workshops on “Privilege” and “The Role of the White Accomplice” (vs. an “Ally”)

NCCJ hosts a series of online seminars, workshops, and “training” sessions (see here: https://www.nccj.org/mission) whose titles and descriptions show they also promote these CRT-driven ideologies of white privilege, systemic racism, and doing the “self-work” to “dismantle” “systems of oppression” seen with GSA Network’s Toolkit for student clubs.  A two-day “Anti-Racism” session “is a live, online training program that explores bias, discrimination, oppression, and privilege in the United States”, while another program is titled “The Role of the White Accomplice” where one learns “the difference between an accomplice and an ally”.  Note this session will be aired FREE from 12-1pm on Tuesday, November 15^th, 2022.  To watch it yourself, register HERE.

NCCJ’S Publications Feature BLM, Ibram X. Kendi, and Other Major CRT Promoters

Consistent with BLM’s support seen above from NCCJ’s contact person for SPIDEE, BLM is directly promoted by NCCJ on the Bulletins section of its website (see here: Black Lives Matter – NCCJ).  Here, a promotional webpage dedicated to BLM is introduced as “an informational bulletin that can be used in clubs, classrooms, meetings, shared with friends and family…”  In addition to BLM’s alarming associations with the deadly and destructive riots of 2020 discussed above, BLM advocates defunding the police on grounds that “police don’t keep us safe” (see here), a view that is apparently rejected by the overwhelming majority of African-Americans, considering a Gallup survey showed 81% of African-Americans want the police presence in their neighborhoods to either remain the same or be increased.  BLM also teaches, including in its BLM At School detachment, 13 Guiding Principles that include “disrupting the Western-prescribed nuclear family” under Principle 11 (Black Villages) and “freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking” under Principle 6 (Queer Affirming) (see here and here).  BLM At School also presents recommended K-12 school curriculum materials teaching CRT-themed and LGBTQIA+ concepts to students at levels down to elementary school (see here and here).

A public statement NCCJ in Dayton released shortly after George Floyd’s death concludes with a list of linked “Resources”, including Anti-racism resources for white people – Google Docs, containing a litany of radical CRT-promoting authors, lecturers, and materials:

• Ibram X Kendi, a prominent proponent of CRT ideologies who publicly asserts that any policy or system that permits unequal outcomes among racial groups is racist, and who has explicitly advocated for the use of racial discrimination to remedy past, and what he believes to be present and future racial discrimination.  He has also stated that the equity gaps between black and white Americans cannot be eliminated without reparations for slavery, and anyone who opposes reparations is a racist (see here).
• The 1619 Project, a New York Times publication that – like CRT – espouses the false notion of the U.S. being based on systemic racism, and has been widely criticized by historians for its many historical inaccuracies.
• A presentation by Kimberlé Crenshaw, one of the most prominent CRT scholars and promoters.
• “White Fragility” by Rogin DiAngelo, which asserts that whites are collectively responsible for contributing to nationwide white supremacy in the country.
• “Me and White Supremacy” and ”White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack”, among other CRT-related titles.

What’s Wrong with These CRT-Related Teachings of “Privilege” and “Oppression” for DEI

Worsens Bigotry, Discrimination, and Division Rather than Ameliorating It

Research has shown that most diversity programs, with their emphasis on peoples’ differences, fail to achieve their stated aims of fostering inclusion and positive intergroup interactions, and instead breed division and resentment, and that by contrast, programs that are more effective in achieving those aims are those that focus on our common humanity and shared identity while honoring our various differences (see here). 

DEI, “anti-bullying” and “anti-racism” programs that advance these CRT-related teachings of “privileged” versus “oppressed” groups, as seen above with the GSA Network and NCCJ, fall squarely within this category of DEI programs that have been shown to be unsuccessful; they focus on our demographic differences.  Teaching people to generalize and judge individuals based on their demographics as members of a “privileged” (bourgeoise) class that enjoys “unearned” advantages at the “expense” of an “oppressed” (proletariat) class under societal systems of oppression is not only false and revealing of the neo-Marxist CRT concepts from which they are derived, it also explains why such programs would produce the opposite results of those they are purportedly intended to achieve.  

The predictable result of teaching people to make these blanket judgments of individuals based on their race, sex, religion, and other demographics as oppressors with unearned advantages at other groups’ expense is that it will condition them to view members of those groups in a negative light.  It conditions people to think and act exactly like racists, sexists, and bigots, by negatively judging and generalizing them based on their demographics rather than viewing them for who they are as uniquely individual human beings.  It clearly flies directly in the face of NCCJ’s stated purpose of “eliminating bias, bigotry and all forms of discrimination” or teaching about “the danger of stereotypes”; it will instead exacerbate and spread stereotypes, bias, bigotry, discrimination, division, resentment – and perhaps even – bullying.  In fact, according to the parents of one Oakwood school student, their child experienced explicit threats of violence from other students for daring to mention her belief that there are only two genders that are not fluid or decoupled from biological sex.

Ironically, these teachings run afoul of two of Martin Luther King’s oft-quoted ideals: his advocacy for a society in which his children “will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character”; and this one:

Stated otherwise, you cannot drive out “bias, bigotry and all forms of discrimination” as NCCJ supposedly aims to do, by injecting more of it into our society, including our schools.

These Approaches to DEI Amount to Political and Social Indoctrination

By conditioning members of certain demographic groups to believe they are “privileged” “oppressors” who enjoy “unearned” benefits “at the expense” of “oppressed” groups, these approaches to DEI clearly have a shaming effect that pressures them to undertake the steps these programs prescribe (i.e., “do the self-work”) to escape their loathed “privileged” status and gain acceptance as an “ally”.  This obviously requires that such groups must submit to, and openly profess their agreement with, the underlying, radical political and social beliefs and theories on which these “privileged” and “oppressed” classifications are predicated.  For example, a white person must accept the CRT precepts of “white privilege”, ubiquitous “systemic racism” and “white supremacy”, and that, as NCCJ’s “What Is Privilege” publication states, they enjoy “White Privilege” in the form of “unearned access, resources, and social status systematically given to white people at the expense of people of color”.  A person who might otherwise accept what until just recently was the almost unanimously-held belief that gender is binary, unchangeable, and synonymous with biological sex must adopt the beliefs of gender/transgender theory by recognizing they are “Cisgender”, which this NCCJ publication defines as someone who merely has a “self-perception and expression of gender” that happens to coincide with their biological sex that was “assigned at birth”.  They must then confess to enjoying “Cis Privilege” “at the expense of trans people”, or acknowledge that any disagreement with gender/transgender theory is “oppression” in the form of “transphobia”.  A heterosexual must confess to their “Heterosexual/Straight Privilege” and take prescribed steps to resolve it;  presumably, this would include accepting the content on Heterosexism in the “Resources” section of the NCCJ publication, such as agreeing that it is oppressive “heterosexism” to view “heterosexuality as inherently normal” and “moral” in contrast with homosexuality, or to oppose gay marriage.  This would of course require, among other things, that some reject the teachings of their religious faith and it displays a lack of tolerance or respect for diversity of religious and moral beliefs, all under the banner of promoting “diversity”, “inclusion” and “eliminating…bigotry”.

Where does that leave us with SPIDEE?

Again, it is possible that the SPIDEE program is limited to fostering positive interactions among students of different groups, and opposing genuine bias, prejudice, and bullying; but as demonstrated above, we have compelling reasons to suspect it extends well beyond that and into these harmful and divisive ideologies, and ultimately into political and social indoctrination. 

• Are we to believe there is some sort of ideological firewall erected within NCCJ that prevents these divisive, racist, sexist, religiously and otherwise demographically bigoted ideologies advanced in its publications and seminars from finding their way into the SPIDEE program, particularly when their contents so closely resemble those of the actual “student run” clubs operated by GSA Network? 

• Considering how NCCJ and its staff who run the SPIDEE program are so steeped in this radical activism as seen above, are we really to believe and trust that they would resist what must be the alluring temptation to use their direct access to Oakwood students to expose them to those ideologies? 

These concerns are compounded by the continued failure of NCCJ staff to disclose the SPIDEE curriculum and program materials in response to multiple requests, and follow-up requests, from parents of Oakwood school students and Oakwood residents.  Why is it that the NCCJ staffers who operate the SPIDEE program are eager to reply to initial inquiries from Oakwood parents and residents and then suddenly ignore them once they specifically ask to see the SPIDEE curriculum and instructional materials?  What is it about SPIDEE that NCCJ apparently doesn’t want Oakwood parents and residents to see?

CALL TO ACTION: DEMAND DISCLOSURE AND TRANSPARENCY

• Contact NCCJ and respectfully demand that they disclose the SPIDEE curriculum, instructional and other program materials that are used to organize and run the club and its student meetings, including any materials presented to students.  NCCJ can be reached at:
  • https://nccjgreaterdayton.org/spidee/
  • hbrown@nccjgreaterdayton.org
  • 118 West First St. Suite 630, Dayton, OH 45402
  • 937.222.6225 

• Ask the Oakwood school administration to explain what standards are used to determine which outside organizations are permitted to operate student clubs and organizations in Oakwood schools and have this sort of direct access to Oakwood students.
• Ask the Oakwood school administration to explain what vetting has been used for the NCCJ staffers who are given this direct access to Oakwood students.
• Reach back to the OCSS community on Facebook or via e-mail to let us know what you discover!

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[i] See Critical Race Theory: An Introduction (3^rd Edition) by Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic at pages 86-91 and 134-135, with “white privilege” defined on page 86.