CNN removed from Pennsylvania middle school classrooms due to bias

A school board in Pennsylvania has voted in favor of getting rid of mandatory daily broadcasts of CNN in the classroom, allowing the opportunity for more patriotic content to be shown instead.

The February 14th meeting where the issue was decided on was recorded and made available to watch on YouTube. It provides a snapshot into how local schools debate issues like having CNN in classrooms.

According to Tribute Live, the motion passed with a 5 to 4 vote for Norwin School Board on Monday evening regarding the routine showing of the 10-minute program during the "homeroom" portion of the school day.

Officials agreed to make it a voluntary thing, allowing teachers and students to watch the program if they so wish, or other programs pertaining to specific topics like Veterans Day or the National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day.

"I feel questioning the bias of news source(s) is another way of seeing what is being taught to our children, and it should be reviewed," one parent said at the school board meeting.

One of these school board directors that voted to discontinue the daily showing of CNN, Christine Baverso, reportedly made her motion after Megan Zobb, a seventh grade global studies teacher, said there are times when the teachers use the time slot to show patriotic-related programming.

CNN 10 is a compact version of daily news designed for students in grade 6 to 12, with Carl Azuz as the main anchor.

At the Norwin School Board meeting to deliberate the topic, there were mixed opinions on the usage of the show. In favor of it was an eighth grade social studies teacher who argued about the "civic engagement" merits that CNN 10 reportedly provided. But one opponent of the CNN 10 routine said it was exposing kids to the levels of bias associated with the CNN brand.

Elsewhere, another CNN pet project, CNN+, is facing turbulence amid shake-ups at the network that saw the departures of both Jeff Zucker and Allison Gollust. They left the outlet after the investigation into Chris Cuomo led to questions about the pair’s involvement in coverage of Cuomo’s brother, the former governor of New York.