Jessica Costescu and Ethan Barton write for the Washington Free Beacon about education mischief in the Lone Star State.
A Houston-based education advocacy group fighting to eliminate standardized test requirements is led by a white left-wing activist who accused the Texas government of racism after it obeyed a state law written by a black Democrat requiring it to replace the city’s top school officials.
Community Voices for Public Education (CVPE) describes itself as a “multi-racial, community-based nonprofit uniting parents, educators, students, and community members to advocate for strong, equitable public schools.” Among its top priorities are implementing “restorative practices for schools in communities that have been denied resources for generations due to racist and classist public policy” and replacing Houston Independent School District (HISD) superintendent Mike Miles, whom the state appointed after the school system received failing scores for more than five consecutive years.
It also aims to “reduce the high stakes consequences of standardized testing” by ending the graduation requirement for students to pass the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness and to eliminate the Texas Education Agency’s A through F scoring system for districts and individual schools that is partially based on test results.
CVPE, which is overseen by two steering committees filled with left-wing activists, is headed by cofounder Ruth Kravetz, an HISD teacher who has repeatedly aligned with socialists and argued that the state’s takeover is a “racist” endeavor. The group has routinely partnered with the Democratic Socialists of America’s (DSA) Houston chapter, and in January, Kravetz helped organize an anti-ICE protest alongside the DSA Chapter of North Texas and Communist Party USA Dallas/Fort Worth, as well as other far-left groups such as the Sunrise Movement and Indivisible.
Kravetz, who has encouraged student walkouts, gave a lengthy interview to Section 44, a self-described “journal of Texas Marxism” made up of “revolutionary socialists,” in February 2020.
