Kansas school district fines math teacher who rejects mask mandates and CRT agenda

He wanted to teach math to sixth graders as he had for the past thirteen years. But the school’s push for ideological "equity" training and mask mandates for the unvaccinated led Josiah Enyart to quit.

According to Fox News, a Kansas math school teacher wouldn’t put up with a mask mandate for unvaccinated teachers and a renewed critical race theory push at the same time.

But the Comanche Elementary School administrators wouldn’t let Josiah Enyart leave freely. His contract has a one thousand dollar penalty for resigning after a specific deadline.

Local reporting by The Sentinel goes further into the background of the situation. Enyart said it was the "final straw" after the Shawnee Mission School District enacted a mask policy for unvaccinated teachers.

The accelerated focus on racial identity ideology also irked the sixth grade math teacher.

"It’s all critical race theory stuff, that was kind of the start where I realized, they’re really trying to bring this in and make it something." Enyart told the outlet.

Combing through the social media posts for Shawnee Mission School District shows Josiah Enyart won the Jedel Excellence in Mathematics Education Award for his work in April 2020.

The school's archive of the story shows his colleagues praising Josiah's teaching abilities.

Principal Missy Green shared their comments. One of them said: "Josiah is an excellent teacher and mentor. He builds important relationships with his students, so that they trust him and develop a desire for self-improvement and recognize they are the keys to their own success."

The onset of COVID and remote learning had brought the school’s discipline hierarchy into disarray.

Now as educators try to recover, "equity" is being factored into the foundation.

As seen in Oregon at the start of this week, the Governor approved a bill suspending basic proficiency requirements for graduation. Kate Brown’s office said it was done to help "Oregon’s Black, Latino, Latina, Latinx, Indigenous, Asian, Pacific Islander, Tribal, and students of colour."

But Josiah Enyart in Kansas isn’t going to let even his own kids have to deal with the public education system. He’s pulling them out and homeschooling.

"I’m not going to continue to have my kids bossed around by these people and have no power as a parent, no power as a teacher, and for my kids to have no say."

As also mentioned by The Sentinel, SMSD in Kansas has been a long proponent in pushing critical race theory related teachings. The so-called "deep equity training" mentioned dates back to September 2019, if not earlier.

From the SMSD school district newsletter for Summer 2020:

"Equity is woven throughout the strategic plan. The district is partnering with Corwin to conduct Deep Equity training across the district. Deep Equity is a comprehensive and systemic professional development process aimed at producing the deep personal, professional, and organizational transformations that are necessary to create equitable places of learning for all children and equitable workplaces for all staff. The Deep Equity professional development is designed to help educators dismantle disparities through sustained, collaborative efforts to achieve systematic change."

The GoFundMe campaign started to raise the money for Josiah Enyart has already exceeded $1000. At the time of writing it's at $7573.