Do you use he/him/his, she/her/hers, they/them/theirs, ze/zir/zirs, or a different group of pronouns?
In the Milton Public School system, this question was asked of students as young as 10 years old on the first day of school last week, according to parents.
Milton resident Susannah Hegarty has two children in the Milton Public School system. One is in seventh grade and the other is a sophomore in high school. Hegarty told NewBostonPost that both of her children were asked for their preferred pronouns in some of their classes.
“My concern is that the school district is bowing to pressure toward political correctness, and that while there may be kids in our schools who would like to be addressed by different pronouns, that shouldn’t require the entire student body to define themselves in this way,” Hegarty wrote in an email message. “In both of my daughters’ classes, all the students responded that their pronouns were the standard ones, leading me to believe that if there WERE students who preferred alternative pronouns, they weren’t comfortable saying so in that forum.”
She also said that in a class her 10th grader takes, there was a discussion on “the importance of supporting Black Lives Matter.”
“As a parent, I don’t believe the schools should be attempting to influence the political perspectives of our kids, whether with regard to gender or race issues,” Hegarty said. “If there is a place for those discussions in the classroom — possibly in a current events or politics class — then all perspectives should be presented and students should feel comfortable expressing not just support for Black Lives Matter or their desire to use alternative pronouns, but also other — more mainstream and much more common! — perspectives. The MPS are trying so hard to avoid offending racial and gender minority groups that they’re ostracizing and undermining the majority of their students and teaching moral and political values not shared by most Milton families.”
One source who requested anonymity told NewBostonPost that a fifth-grade teacher asked students in class what personal pronouns the students prefer. Other parents have confirmed that their children were asked the same question in other grades.
Kerry White, chairman of the Milton Republican Town Committee, criticized the school district’s approach.
“The Milton Public School District is being run by a cabal of far-left activists, who are hell-bent on converting the youth of Milton into social justice warriors focused on racial activism,” White told NewBostonPost in an email message.
“Educators in the MPS have been injecting racial rhetoric, and teaching our children that their sexual orientation, and the color of their skin matters more than who they are as a person,” she later added.
White also said that the taxpayers of Milton “are tired of paying educators who are focused on the indoctrination of young students, rather than focusing on the importance of education, hard work, and good citizenship.”
Cunningham Elementary School principal Jonathan Redden and Milton High School principal Karen Cahill could not be reached for comment last week or on Sunday or Monday this week.
Milton Public Schools superintendent told NewBostonPost in an email message on Monday afternoon: “What I can say is that in the Milton Public Schools we feel strongly about developing strong and positive relationships and strive to create a sense of belonging for all of our students. We believe that we can achieve this goal by respecting the rights of students to use their preferred names and pronouns. ”
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