School districts across the country have spent millions of federal dollars meant for low-income students pushing leftist concepts in the classroom, an education watchdog found.
Defending Education released a report on Wednesday detailing how 55 school districts have used federal funding to push DEI, restorative justice, and Social Emotional Learning. The funds, many of which have been allocated through Title I and Title II of the Every Student Succeeds Act, are meant to help schools with high percentages of students from low-income families.
Despite the intention of the funds, they often have gone toward things like racially-focused programs, training teachers to grade with equity, racial equity consulting, and other DEI initiatives. The report, which was first shared with The Daily Wire, found that $19,022,259 in federal funding, primarily through Title I, II, and IV, was spent by districts on DEI, restorative justice, and Social Emotional Learning.
“Instead of prioritizing reading, writing and arithmetic, school districts across the country have spent nearly $20 million in federal funds on organizations and consultants promoting progressive ideology in K-12 education,” Defending Education Investigative Reporter Kendall Tietz told The Daily Wire.
“Programs centered on social emotional learning, as well as race- and sex-based content, often seek to influence students’ thoughts and beliefs by framing their understanding of the world through the lens of identity politics. Time and again, district spending illustrates how lucrative far-Left programming is for education activists,” she added.
The Hayward Unified School District in California in 2022
allocated $110,000 in Title funds for the Crescendo Education Group to train teachers in “equitable grading.” This means that teachers were
taught “grading and assessment practices that are more accurate,” “bias-resistant,” and “motivational.”
Similarly, Jefferson Union High School District in California
spent nearly $300,000 in Title 1 funding for Crescendo Education to provide training on equitable grading from 2022 to 2024.
Hayward also
used $200,000 in Comprehensive Support and Improvement funds for a contract with the organization “Woke Kindergarten” to push teachers to
adopt a “healing-centered & liberatory learning practices made possible by developing their understanding of teaching through an abolitionist lens.”
Woke Kindergarten contracts with Hayward Unified School District.
In nearby San Rafael City Schools, the school board used Title IV dollars in both 2023 and 2024 to create a “Black Girls Group,” described as a place for “young Black girls to discuss, understand, and combat racism while fostering a sense of belonging.”
Another California school that has used federal funds to push racialized programs is West Contra Costa Unified School District, which approved over $330,000 in Title I funds in 2022 and 2024 for Improve Your Tomorrow’s College Academy program, whose mission is to “increase the number of young men of color” going to college.
In Illinois, the Township High School District 211 approved $55,000 in Title II grants for professional development trainings with Courageous Conversations, an organization that says it wants to pursue “racial equity” by uncovering “personal and institutional biases.”
Indianapolis Public Schools has spent hundreds of thousands of Title I funding on contracts with the Racial Equity Institute, another group of consultants steeped in racial ideology. Other districts, like Lorain City Schools in Ohio, have spent over $13,000 in Title IV on services from the LGBT Community Center of Greater Cleveland for “services.” It is unclear what those services were.
Defending Education’s report also highlights how school districts have used federal funds to implement Social Emotional Learning concepts, pointing to contracts with organizations like Panorama Education, the Committee for Children, and Project Wayfinder.
Advocates of social emotional learning say that the thinking behind it is that schools teach students how to regulate their emotions, develop healthy identities, build positive relationships, and make responsible decisions.
According to Defending Education, 17 school districts have used federal funding to pay Panorama Education $2,427,721 using federal grants for their survey platform or related services. Panorama Education, which has backed Social Emotional Learning techniques, says that it allows local districts to tailor use of its platforms to their own needs and that it only provides the technology and doesn’t push any ideology.
The Committee for Children told The Daily Wire that its SEL programs “are evidence-based and focused on helping young people develop skills to support safety, well-being, and academic success. They are not political or ideological in nature. They are welcomed and actively used across thousands of communities in all 50 states, just as they have been for more than 40 years.”
The Education Department has indicated that it may be scrutinizing schools’ implementation of Social Emotional Learning concepts to ensure that it is not being used as a workaround for restrictions on DEI. In an FAQ sheet, the Education Department said that some schools have looked to use SEL to push DEI through other means.
“Other schools have sought to veil racially discriminatory policies with terms like ‘social-emotional learning’ or ‘culturally responsive’ teaching. But whether an initiative constitutes unlawful discrimination does not turn solely on whether it is labeled ‘DEI’ or uses terminology such as ‘diversity,’ ‘equity,’ or ‘inclusion,'” the departments wrote in February.
The Trump administration has directed all federal funding to be cut from schools receiving federal money if they push racial and gender ideologies on students. Already, the Education Department has taken action to cut off funding for entities pushing radical ideology, including $1 billion in “mental-health grants,” many of which were going toward training leftist activists.
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