A professor at Roosevelt University made an astonishing admission about the nature of her work training future K-12 teachers in her “middle school theory and practice” course. While her remarks may not come as a surprise to parents who have long followed the threats of far-left ideology seeping into education in the forms of transgender identity and Marxist critical race theory, they seem particularly noteworthy, all the same.
At the beginning of a Zoom school board meeting, Ralph Martire, a professor of public policy and public administration at Roosevelt, greeted Gina Harris, a teacher at Maywood Elementary and a new professor at Roosevelt University. Martire suggested Harris will get along well with the university’s mission.
“I’m so glad you’re there to you fit in so well with their, you know, the university’s philosophy and mission,” Martire said.
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“I mean, it’s all social justice. All day, every day, I get to talk about the things I love. I’m really living the life over here,” Harris replied.
Martire responded as if “social justice, all day, every day” is exactly what education exists to promote.
“Yeah. I always flip out the kids that take my master’s class on fiscal policy and public budgets,” he said. “The first three or four classes are devoted to philosophy of social justice and how you organize society. We don’t talk about one, you know, budgetary item. They’re like, ‘Oh, man. Professor Martire, this is a really weird way to teach a budget.’”
“Now it’s part of everything, right, what a foundation,” Harris replied.
West Cook News, which originally reported the interaction, noted that Harris is a liaison officer between the school district and the National Education Association (NEA) and its state affiliate in Illinois. Martire, in addition to teaching public policy, runs the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, an organization funded by the state’s public employee unions. It advocates for higher taxes, and more government spending, particularly on employee salaries.
These professors are not just advocating for “social justice” in their free time — they’ve consciously incorporated it into their classes as if the classes exist to promote their preferred political ideology.
Tragically, this ideological invasion represents a growing movement in academia and elsewhere. Parents and teachers across the country are complaining about how schools force Marxist critical race theory and transgender identity into the curriculum in elementary schools and high schools. A teachers’ union even complained that a school reopening plan amid COVID-19 constituted “structural racism.”
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Organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center are explicitly demanding that schools teach the claims that America is “systemically racist,” and it seems the education establishment is rushing to comply with such demands.
The interaction between Harris and Martire sheds light on the broader and terrifying trend.