In a Euro-white backlash against Critical Race Theory (CRT) – a race-centered bogeyman of a curricula not actually taught in schools – conservative antagonist have camouflaged an alternative form of indoctrination of school children with a new curriculum called Classic Education and a college level test that competes with the SAT and ACT, called the Classic Learning Test (CLT). What is the Classic Learning Test (CLT)?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On its website<\/a> and in professional terms, \u201cClassic Learning Test (CLT) offers online and paper assessments for grades 3-12 that evaluate English, grammar, and mathematical skills and provide a comprehensive measure of achievement and aptitude. Unlike other tests that change according to educational or cultural trends, CLT exams emphasize foundational critical thinking skills and are accessible to students from a variety of educational backgrounds.\u201d The \u201cclassic\u201d in Classic Learning Test refers to our use of\u00a0classic literature and historical texts\u00a0for the reading selections on our exams. By engaging students with this meaningful content, CLT assessments offer a more edifying testing experience and reflect a holistic education.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yet in actual terms, \u201c<\/strong>Critics say that the emphasis on Western civilization<\/a> in classical education centers white Europe and America as most important, per the Tampa Bay Times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So-called “classical education is really a wolf in sheep’s clothing,” said Julian Vasquez Heilig, a professor of educational leadership, research and technology at Western Michigan University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Really what it’s about is using selective Western thinkers to foment a specific moral ideology,” he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The intrigue: Classical education is largely pioneered by Hillsdale College, a small, Christian, classical liberal arts college in Michigan. This school has helped DeSantis reshape Florida education, the Miami Herald reported.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n In other words, conservatives lied and said that CRT was being taught to children in K-12 schools and brainwashing them to believe that white people were bad and to hate the country. They launched attacks on school board meetings using staged parents who believed the lies about CRT told by conservative politicians who actually want to indoctrinate all children using their own agenda and curricula that emphasizes a whiter history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These conservatives have connected with Christian schools and Euro-historians to create a new historical paradigm based on more Western thought and ideology, excluding theories of other countries and cultures. They whitewashed history more than it already was by pretending to combat their own lies of hate being taught through CRT, and magnifying reasons to love the founding of America through CLT.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Regardless of what conservatives tell the nation, this is not about the \u201cchildren,\u201d but more about changing the agenda of the country from a color-blind Democracy to a white\u2019s only Republic. The reason for the change is further defined by placing emphasis on making the rich richer like it was back during the founding of the country, when slavery and free labor reigned and grossed profits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to an interview about the formation of CLT with its founder<\/a>, \u201cQuestion:<\/strong> Moving onto the inevitable politics of this all, Ron DeSantis recently introduced legislation to encourage the adoption of the CLT across Florida\u2019s schools and colleges. It\u2019s not hard to imagine a Brian Kemp and other conservative governors following suit, with Democratic governors like Gavin Newsom performatively rejecting it. What\u2019s to keep the CLT from being the conservative test and the SAT from being the liberal test, further dividing our education system along political lines?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Answer:<\/strong> I think it depends on what you mean by progressive and conservative. There is no question that the CLT is conservative in the sense that it values the intellectual tradition that gave birth to America. However, many aspects of a classical education, many of what are considered the \u201cuseless arts\u201d (poetry, theater, philosophy), have often been preserved by folks on the left. I believe that both sides of the political system have their own love\/hate with the classical tradition. Conservatives tend to love that classical education values tradition and the great books of the Western canon, but as\u00a0exemplified by Marco Rubio, republicans have often failed to value disciplines such as philosophy or classical literature. We make the case that the wisdom of the past should be paid forward, neither neglected by conservatives nor censored by progressives.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Further camouflaged in the theology of the CLT agenda is the Christian nationalist input. Along with the Classic Learning Test comes the Hillsdale College spin on Classic Education<\/a>, which states: \u201cIn studying the origins of our country and its history, in all of its triumphs and tragedies, students acquire a mature love for America, one which appreciates our unprecedented founding, a product of reflection and choice, and measures the health of our republic in light of the standards set forth in our founding documents. From that knowledge, we become citizens capable of judging rightly what ought to be preserved and what changed, and in making this judgment we fulfill a central part of our human nature, becoming free citizens.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It all sounds innocent enough and profoundly intellectual, but the bottom line is conservatives want to eliminate the dark history of America and replace it with a sunshiny description of whites loving their slaves and the slaves being appreciative of that love, with the ultimate goal of Blacks and other people of color today somehow giving them the respect they are losing because of that same history being revealed more and more to their children. <\/p>\n\n\n\n