Category: Education

As public school districts across Colorado take steps to protect students from ICE raids, Mesa Valley School District 51 says it is “obligated to comply”

First page of the letter sent to “District 51 families and colleagues” saying the District “will remain politically neutral,” and telling parents to update their student’s emergency contacts

On January 20, convicted felon, sexual abuser and now President Trump rescinded the decades-old federal policy (pdf) of not pursuing immigrants in “sensitive places” (pdf), including schools, hospitals, churches, synagogues, mosques, funerals, weddings, parades and public demonstrations like marches and rallies.

U.S. Department of Education policy says that in the U.S., all children are entitled to a public education (pdf) regardless of their immigration status.

News from today indicates Trump is going after immigrant kids. White House “border czar” Tom Homan, who is carrying out Trump’s mass deportation, says the data they seek on children won’t be used for enforcement, but rather to “ensure that children were placed in the best possible homes,” according to the Washington Post.

But Trump recently enacted a change in federal policy that will now allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents enter and arrest immigrants in these places.

As he started his term, Trump promised to prioritize removing “violent criminal” immigrants, but has since changed his stance and now considers every undocumented person in the U.S. to be a “criminal,” even though being in the U.S. without legal status is a civil and not a criminal violation.

Trump says he seeks to pursue criminals, but as the first U.S. president who is a convicted felon, Trump himself is a criminal.

Mesa County Ballot Issues 4A & 4B: School District 51 Bond issue and Mill Levy Override

Ballot issue 4A asks if School District 51 can take out a bond (loan) for $190 million with a maximum repayment cost of $410 million and use the money to renovate, make additions to existing school buildings and upgrade classroom technology. Plans include doing high-priority repairs like roof replacements, adding fire sprinklers, upgrading classroom technology, making schools more secure and making it easier for disabled kids o access all school facilities.

Many of the local public schools were built in the 1950s-1960s and need maintenance and upgrades to keep them functional, up-to-date and safe into the future.

The bond measure won’t raise taxes because it replaces an existing bond that will be fully paid off on December 1, 2024.

Ballot Issue 4B authorizes the school district to extend the current mill levy override so the District keep getting a tax already in place that was approved in 2017 and keep the $6.5 million it generates annually to continue paying for additional student instruction days, updated instructional materials, teacher training and priority maintenance to extend the life of its buildings. (A “mill levy override” is a voter-approved increase in property taxes that provides a school district with additional funding.)

Prop. 129: Establishing Veterinary Professional Associates & Prop. 130: $350M in one-time Funding for Law Enforcement

Proposition 129 – Establishing Veterinary Professional Associates 

Prop 129 would create a new category of veterinary professional called a Veterinary Professional Associate (VPA), analagous to Physicians’s Assistants who work with M.D.s (Photo: Unsplash)

This measure would create a new a class of veterinary medical professional analagous to Physician’s Assistants (PAs) who work with M.D.’s in human health care. It would require a Master’s Degree in veterinary clinical care or the equivalent to become a Veterinary Professional Associate (VPA) and would require VPAs to register with the state board. It would allow registered VPAs to practice veterinary medicine under the supervision of a licensed veterinarian.

The Trump campaign’s most recent blatantly racist social media post

Racist post by @TrumpWarRoom on Instagram on Tuesday, Aug. 13, 2024

On Tuesday, the official Instagram account of Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, “@TrumpWarRoom,” posted a blatantly racist meme implying that if Vice President Kamala Harris wins the presidency in November, placid suburban neighborhoods will be overrun with hordes of Black people and immigrants.

It can’t be a mistake because the Trump campaign tweeted the exact same post on X.

The meme showed a peaceful middle class neighborhood next to a photo of mostly Black recent immigrants waiting outside the Roosevelt Hotel in New York in hopes of securing shelter. The nice neighborhood is labeled “Your neighborhood under Trump,” and the photo with Black people is labeled “Your neighborhood under Kamala.”

Trump’s comment accompanying the post is, “Import the third world. Become the third world.”

Trump has a long, well-documented history of racism and emboldening racist ideology.

Mesa County Public Library to offer class on how to tell good sources from bad on the internet

The Mesa County Central Library will hold a very important 90 minute class Monday, June 24 from 3:00-4:30 p.m. on how to evaluate online sources for credibility and authoritativeness to help boost internet users’ ability to tell fact from fiction.

This class is sorely needed in Mesa County, especially by Republican local elected officials who have demonstrated a lack in the ability to tell  credible sources of information from websites that peddle lies and false information to readers.

In 2020, Mesa County Commissioner Janet Rowland displayed a chilling inability to tell fact from fiction after she publicly promoted the Infowars conspiracy theory that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control was intentionally inflating the number of Covid deaths. Rowland wrote on her her social media that hospitals were being pressured to inflate the numbers of Covid deaths because it meant they would get more funding. The truth is that hospitals make money by treating people, not by listing specific causes of deaths on death certificates. At the time, Rowland’s false theory was being promoted by Laura Ingraham of Fox News — one of Rowland’s most frequently-cited news sources. Fox News has a reputation for knowingly

Stephen D. Daniels, Janet Rowland-appointed Chair of the Mesa County Board of Public Health, is a prodigious spreader of disinformation on social media, including about vaccines and gender issues, without citing credible sources. (Photo: Mesa County)

telling lies to the public.

Rowland’s new Director of the Mesa County Board of Public Health, Stephen D. Daniels, is also prodigious spreader of lies and disinformation on his social media. His posts target a wide range of subjects including the U.S. Department of Justice, gender issues, religion and the efficacy and safety of vaccines, including ideas spread by anti-vaxx presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who claimed that Covid-19 was “ethnically targeted” to attack caucasians and Black people, and to spare Jews.

Janet Rowland, whose college degree is a bachelor in Bible studies, is running for a 4th term as County Commissioner, after lying to the public on her social media about Covid topics and never apologizing to the public for spreading disinformation. (Photo: Janet Rowland campaign website)

In 2019, while still a State Senator, Ray Scott cited a full-on wacko nutbag information source in a tweet about climate change in which he wrote “NASA admits that climate change occurs because of changes in Earth’s solar orbit, and NOT because of SUVs and fossil fuels.” To support his claim, Scott cited an article published on a website called “NaturalNews.com.”  NaturalNews.com had been discredited as an off-the-wall, full-on wacko conspiracy website and was rated #1 on the list of the Top Ten Worst Anti-Science Websites. Scott also said that studies about climate change made no sense and that we “have better things to do” than to address the crisis.

Let’s hope some of these Republican elected officials attend this talk.

Former State Senator Ray Scott cited a full-on wacko website as a source of information on climate change in 2019. The site was rated #1 on a list of the top ten worst anti-science websites.

D-51 employee raises a red flag about the way D-51 conducts lockdown drills compared to other school districts

A highly experienced School District 51 employee who came here from the front range with over 20 years experience in conducting lockdown drills in other school districts is raising red flags about the way D-51 conducts its lockdown drills, and the trauma it is causing students. The employee describes a heartbreaking experience during a lockdown drill with a room full of kindergarteners during the 2023-2024 school year and the lasting  effects it had on students. The employee has brought the problem up with school counselors, the D-51 School Board and Tim Leon, Director of Safety and Security for District 51, and even proposed different ways to conduct these drills that are used in other school districts that don’t traumatize students the way D-51’s drills do, and offered research by the National Association of School Psychologists on how to mitigate the negative psychological effects that lockdown drills have on young kids, but the employee’s urgings have been ignored at every turn.

Former Mesa County Commissioner Rose Pugliese elected state House Minority Leader

Rose Pugliese supported disastrous former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters in the 2018 election despite the fact that Tina was completely unqualified to be a County Clerk. Tina was running  against Bobbie Gross, who was already certified to run state and local elections, was managing the DMV and had more than a decade of experience in the Clerk’s office.

Former two-term Mesa County Commissioner Rose Pugliese, who moved to Colorado Springs in 2020 to run for the state House District 14 seat (and won the seat), has been elected Republican House Minority Leader in the Colorado Legislature. She replaces Rep. Mike Lynch (R), who resigned as Minority Leader on Wednesday, 1/24/24 after it was revealed that he had been arrested in September, 2022 on suspicion of driving under the influence (DUI) and possessing a firearm while intoxicated. Lynch pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 18 months probation and 150 hours of community service.

Mesa County Public Library to host educational seminar about menstrual health for teens 14-18 on Sat., Jan. 27, 1-2:30 p.m.

The downtown Mesa County Public Library will host a free educational workshop on menstrual health on Saturday, January 27 from 1:00 – 2:30 p.m. in the Library’s Monument Room. The event is aimed at teens aged 14-18 of all genders and their caregivers. It will include an opportunity to ask questions and get medically-accurate answers from experts in the field.

Many people may know the basics of the menstrual cycle, but not everyone knows what is a sign of a illness and what’s not. This holds true even for adults. This seminar will go beyond the basics of the menstrual cycle to tell teens how to recognize if a period is normal or not, where to get free period products and how to use them, and how to talk more openly about periods without embarrassment or shame.

The workshop will be led virtually by two period professionals who are medical students or physicians-in-training who are specifically trained menstrual health education for this program, which was developed by physician experts.

Mesa County Commissioner Cody Davis uses offensive term in public hearing about the county budget


To be fair, Mesa County Commissioner Cody Davis (R) probably had no idea what he was saying when he said it, but it was highly offensive.

23 minutes or so into the Commissioners’ meeting on December 12, 2023 to approve the annual budget (video), Commissioner Davis discusses how difficult it is for him to understand the budgeting process and said,

“Mongoloid” is an offensive term used to refer to people with Down Syndrome

“If I didn’t have help sometimes, reading this budget I’d feel like a knuckle-dragging Mongoloid.”

He was apparently unaware that “knuckle-dragging Mongoloid” is a highly offensive term.

For a long time the term “Mongoloid” was a pejorative term used to refer to people affected by Down Syndrome. It is also a racist term used to refer to people of Asian descent.

D-51 employees share views on the proposed closure of Fruita 8/9 public school

D-51 employees have shared their views with AnneLandmanBlog anonymously, due to fears of retribution by the District.

This message was sent to AnneLandmanBlog by a School District-51 employee who asked that I paraphrase their message rather than quote them verbatim, to help keep them anonymous. The employee fears potential backlash by the District for weighing in publicly on the way Superintendent Brian Hill is proposing to close the Fruita 8/9 public school.

Here is the message:

District 51 quietly working on plan that involves firing over 50 teachers in Fruita

Fruita 8/9 School, August 2022 (Photo: Facebook)

AnneLandmanBlog received the following communication this morning titled “A Huge Concern,” from a D-51 teacher who wants to get word out about the School District quietly moving forward with a plan to fire over 50 Fruita-area teachers, many of whom have over 20 years of experience:

People concerned about D-51 Social Studies Forums Nov. 15 & 16

School District 51 is holding forums today and tomorrow (Wednesday, 11/15 and Thursday, 11/16) to discuss the state’s new social studies standards. The forums are today at Redlands Middle School and tomorrow at Orchard Mesa Middle School, from 5:30-8:30 p.m. each day.

So, what’s up with these forums?

Instructor salaries at CMU remarkably low compared to state and nation

Classified ad placed by Colorado Mesa University in the 11/12/23 issue of the Daily Sentinel for a tenure-track assistant professor of nursing

Colorado Mesa University (CMU) has been advertising for a tenure-track assistant nursing professor for its Montrose campus.

The position requires teaching 12 course credit hours each semester, or 24 credits over an academic year, which is considered a standard, full-time teaching load. Applicants must also have a current RN license, plus a minimum of two years of full time professional clinical experience and a graduate degree in nursing from a nationally accredited school of nursing, with a Ph.D. preferred, as well as other requirements.

But the pay is only $55,000 – 60,000 a year.

D-51 School Board candidate Barbara Evanson wants to teach creationism alongside science in public schools

“I feel like we need to be teaching both ends of the spectrum when we’re teaching things in school as well….What I mean by that is if we’re teaching the Big Bang Theory then we need to teach creationism as well.” — Barbara Evanson

On October 31, the Colorado Times Recorder highlighted a locally-made video interview with District 51 School Board candidate Barbara Evanson in which Evanson says that if schools teach what is scientifically known about the origins of the universe, then they should also have to teach creationism alongside that information so kids can decide on their own what’s true.

Creationism is the religious belief that God created the universe. It is a wholly religious construct with no scientific proof behind it,

The idea of mandating creationism be taught in public schools alongside scientific information has been declared by U.S. courts to be illegal.

D-51 School Board candidate Barbara Evanson says she wants to ban “a ton” of material from school libraries

In this excerpt from an interview with “Ruth” and “Lisa” (who do not provide their last names) posted on a YouTube account named “MesaCountyCompass” on October 8, 2023, “District 51 School Board candidate Barbara Evanson says she would ban “a ton of material” from school libraries that she feels is inappropriate.

Woodland Park-based Christian nationalist group working to influence Mesa County District 51 School Board election

Truth & Liberty Coalition fliers seek to influence the local school board election by focusing on right wing culture war issues. The fliers were placed at La Milpa Tortilleria on 30 Road.

High-quality, multi-colored, bilingual fliers created by the front range Christian dominionist group Truth & Liberty Coalition are showing up at businesses around town. The fliers use right wing culture war rhetoric targeting gay and transgender students in an attempt to influence the outcome of the November 7 District 51 School Board election. The fliers appear to endorse CynDee Skalla, Jessica Hearns and Barbara Evanson.

The fliers were found at La Milpa Tortilla Factory in Grand Junction and are bilingual in English and Spanish.

“Stand for the Constitution,” which still supports Tina Peters, is working to get Evanson & Skalla elected to D-51 School Board

A slide shown at a mid-October, 2023 Stand for the Constitution meeting that indicates the group still supports criminally-indicted, election denier Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters. The same group is supporting Evanson and Skalla for D-51 School District Board.

It seems like Mesa County never seems to learn from its past mistakes.

Stand for The Constitution (SFTC), the local extremist group that pushed to get Tina Peters elected County Clerk in 2018, that continued to support Peters even after her loss of 574 of ballots in 2019 and even after her indictments on multiple felony criminal charges related to election tampering, is now working to get Barbara Evanson and CynDee Skalla elected to the District 51 School Board in the November 7, 2023 election.

Stand for the Constitution also backed the three conservative school board members Haitz, Lema and Jones who have brought rancor, questionable ethics, uncertainty, disruption and hatred to the school board.