Opinion
Minister LaGrange Protected Charter And Home Schools Yet Is Being Targeted For Her Nomination
Article submitted by Wyatt Claypool of the National Telegraph
The performance of a lot of Alberta UCP Cabinet Ministers has left a lot to be desired over the past couple of years, but the one Minister that absolutely does not describe would be Red Deer-North MLA Adriana LaGrange.
LaGrange has been genuinely doing amazing work as Education Minister, helping to reform the public education system, and promoting the growth of the charter and homeschooling systems with more support typically monopolized by the public system.
She has also helped focus classrooms back onto straightforward teaching of mathematics and English in grades K-6, as well as started cutting politics out of the social studies curriculum, which she frequently took note of after being appointed Education Minister in April of 2019.
It is concerning that anybody would think that these were appropriate questions for a Gr. 10 Social Studies test. Alberta has a great story to tell about our responsible energy sector, and educators should not be attacking it. We'll get politics out of the classroom. #abed #ableg pic.twitter.com/GXFMNBxnXO
— Adriana LaGrange (@AdrianaLaGrange) November 28, 2019
After The National Telegraph contacted both Parents For Choice In Education and the Alberta Parents Union both pro-school choice and education reform groups had almost nothing but good things to say about Minster LaGrange.
Frankly, an even bigger endorsement of Minister LaGrange’s work is just how much the NDP and left-wing Alberta Teachers Association (ATA) hate her.
Regarding the latter, despite how hostile the ATA has been towards the UCP government and the reforms made to the education system, Minister LaGrange was able to wrangle the ATA into signing a new collective agreement with the province while she simultaneously took away the ATA’s arbitrary power to discipline teachers and gave the responsibility back to the province.
This all raises the question of why someone would want to challenge LaGrange for her nomination.
Well, it seems that certain political organizations new to the scene simply want their people in the legislature.
That organization is Take Back Alberta, which originally campaigned to remove Premier Jason Kenney in the leadership review vote has now moved on to trying to take out anyone associated with Kenney’s government, or at least anyone who hasn’t endorsed their preferred UCP leadership candidate.
Ironically many of the people backing Take Back Alberta are the same political insiders that either helped to install Kenney as UCP leader back in 2017, as well as Erin O’Toole in 2020, and who have contributed to the feeling of alienation within grassroots in conservative politics in Canada.
Take Back Alberta is backing a man named Andrew Clews whose claim to fame is founding an Alberta anti-mandate group called Hold The Line (with only 1,000 followers), and predictably his pitch to UCP members in Red Deer North is that LaGrange is not pro-freedom enough.
In an interview with True North, Clews said:
Even to date, I have not heard (LaGrange) voice any type of support for the rights and freedoms that we once had as Albertans, I’m not impressed with how our government has handled the pandemic, how they have so casually given rights and taken rights away from Albertans…we need to elect leaders to go to the Alberta legislature and stand for freedom.
While most people would agree the UCP government did a poor job standing up for Albertan’s civil liberties over the past two years, it would also be wrongheaded to think Minister LaGrange had much to do with it.
Yes, LaGrange did not stand against Kenney in the strong and principled manner that MLA Drew Barnes did, and while what Barnes did was highly commendable and important, LaGrange was not exactly a big supporter of lockdowns and mandates. She mostly just stuck to her ministerial work while Kenney and other members of his cabinet hard-charged on mandates.
Clews himself even tactically admits that LaGrange never publicly supported the lockdowns and mandates by focusing his criticism on the fact she was not publicly against them, not that she was publicly in favour of them.
On the issue of education, Clews basically endorses the job Adriana LaGrange has been doing as Education Minister.
Clews stated that:
We need to reform the funding for our school system so that the funding goes to the child and follows the child as opposed to going automatically into the public school or Catholic school system…
Frankly, unless Andrew Clews believes that LaGrange should be magically reforming the education system overnight, she is doing exactly what he said he wants to be done, but seeing as she is not the premier, she has had to move slower than she would want to.
Part of LaGrange’s support for charter schools has been making more funds available to them in order to reflect the increase in the proportion of students attending charter schools.
We need to actually evaluate our elected officials on their overall performance and not nitpick on one specific aspect of their record in order to justify throwing them out of office.
I, (the writer of this article), was strongly against lockdowns and mandates, and the reporting I did here at The National Telegraph contributed significantly to protecting unvaccinated workers, as well as getting Dr. Verna Yiu removed from her position as the CEO of AHS for incompetence in the management of ICU beds.
With that in mind, I don’t take much issue with anything LaGrange did or did not say over the last two years. She would be close to the bottom of the list of people I’d hold responsible for the lockdown regime, and on issues regarding education, I’d say her record, for the most part, is unblemished.
Very few politicians could ever be reelected if Adriana LaGrange was someone deemed unworthy of continuing her work in government, but the people behind organizations like Take Back Alberta do not seem to care about any limiting principles. Their goals seem to be more based on political ambition than anything truly connected to the conservative grassroots.
If I was a UCP member in Red Deer North I would be voting to renominate Education Minister Adriana LaGrange.
———
Details on the Red Deer North UCP nomination vote are listed below:
– August 18, 2022
– 11:00am-8:00pm
– The Pines Community Hall
– 141 Pamely Avenue
DEI
University System of Georgia to ban DEI, commit to neutrality, teach Constitution
By
“The basis and determining factor” for employment will be “that the individual possesses the requisite knowledge, skills, and abilities associated with the role, and is believed to have the ability to successfully perform the essential functions, responsibilities, and duties associated with the position for which the individual is being considered.”
The University System of Georgia’s Board of Regents has recommended a number of new and revised policies for its institutions, such as a commitment to institutional neutrality, the prohibiting of DEI tactics, and a mandatory education in America’s founding documents.
The University System of Georgia (USG) is made up of Georgia’s 26 public colleges and universities as well as Georgia Archives and the Georgia Public Library Service.
“USG institutions shall remain neutral on social and political issues unless such an issue is directly related to the institution’s core mission,” the board’s proposed revisions read.
“Ideological tests, affirmations, and oaths, including diversity statements,” will be banned from admissions processes and decisions, employment processes and decisions, and institution orientation and training for both students and employees.
“No applicant for admission shall be asked to or required to affirmatively ascribe to or opine about political beliefs, affiliations, ideals, or principles, as a condition for admission,” the new policy states.
Additionally, USG will hire based on a person’s qualifications and ability.
“The basis and determining factor” for employment will be “that the individual possesses the requisite knowledge, skills, and abilities associated with the role, and is believed to have the ability to successfully perform the essential functions, responsibilities, and duties associated with the position for which the individual is being considered.”
Beginning in the 2025-2026 academic year, the school’s civic instruction will require students to study founding American documents among other things.
USG students will learn from the Declaration of Independence, the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights, the Articles of Confederation, the Federalist Papers, the Gettysburg Address, the Emancipation Proclamation, and Martin Luther King Jr.’s Letter from Birmingham Jail, as well as the Georgia Constitution and Bill of Rights.
When reached for comment, the Board of Regents told The Center Square that “these proposed updates strengthen USG’s academic communities.”
The recommended policies allow a campus environment “where people have the freedom to share their thoughts and learn from one another through objective scholarship and inquiry,” and “reflect an unyielding obligation to protect freedom, provide quality higher education and promote student success,” the board said.
The board told The Center Square that it proposed strengthening “the requirements for civics instruction” with the inclusion of “foundational primary sources” because of higher education’s duty to students.
Colleges and universities “must prepare [students] to be contributing members of society and to understand the ideals of freedom and democracy that make America so exceptional,” the board said.
As for ditching DEI, the board explained that “equal opportunity and decisions based on merit are fundamental values of USG.”
“The proposed revisions among other things would make clear that student admissions and employee hiring should be based on a person’s qualifications, not his or her beliefs,” the board said.
The Board of Regents also said it wants to “ensure [its] institutions remain neutral on social and political issues while modeling what it looks like to promote viewpoint diversity, create campus cultures where students and faculty engage in civil discourse, and the open exchange of ideas is the norm.”
USG’s Board of Regents recently urged the NCAA to ban transgender-identifying men from participating in women’s sports, in line with the NAIA rules, The Center Square previously reported.
Censorship Industrial Complex
G20’s Online Speech Clampdown Calls Set To Ignite Free Speech Fears
G20 leaders convened in Rio de Janeiro have called for enhanced responsibility and transparency from digital platforms to tackle the growing challenges of “misinformation,” “disinformation,” “hate speech,” and others on their long list of supposed online “harms.”
The summit’s final declaration highlighted the transformative role of digital platforms in global communication but noted the adverse effects of digital content’s rapid spread. It called for increased accountability from platforms to manage speech, which should raise eyebrows among free speech advocates who’ve heard all this before.
We obtained a copy of the declaration for you here.
During the summit, the leaders highlighted the transformative impact of digital platforms in communication and information dissemination across the globe. However, they also alleged negative ramifications of unchecked digital spaces, where “harmful” content can proliferate at an unprecedented pace and scale.
In response, the G20’s final declaration underscored the critical role of digital platforms in ensuring their ecosystems do not become breeding grounds for speech they don’t like.
The declaration states: “We recognize that digital platforms have reshaped the digital ecosystem and online interactions by amplifying information dissemination and facilitating communication within and across geographical boundaries. However, the digitization of the information realm and the accelerated evolution of new technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI), has dramatically impacted the speed, scale, and reach of misinformation and disinformation, hate speech, and other forms of online harms.”
The G20 goes on to say that it emphasizes the “need for digital platforms’ transparency and responsibility in line with relevant policies and applicable legal frameworks and will work with platforms and relevant stakeholders in this regard.”
The declaration even says more measures need to be taken to control what it says is the spread of online misogyny and the need to combat it “online and offline.”
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