With the proliferation of federal meddling and control over government schools, there has been an explosion in “psychological profiling” and manipulation of children. In fact, there is now so much of this going on that even experts who track the trends say they are having trouble keeping up with it all. Of course, all of the data is being vacuumed up in federally funded databases for future exploitation.
Among other concerns are the unconstitutional federal mandates purporting to require states to administer tests that track everything from attitudes and beliefs to mental health and social-emotional learning (SEL). As part of the federal government’s National Assessment of Educational Progress (NEAP), known as the “nation’s report card,” government is even unleashing “mindset surveys.”
Under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which FreedomProject Media has spent a great deal of space exposing, there is an ongoing deluge of psychological quackery being imposed on innocent American children. From SEL schemes embedded across Common Core programs, to ESSA-mandated state tests that contain “social” and “emotional” assessments and surveys, the threat is now ubiquitous.
Much of the quackery, psychological manipulation, and intrusive data-gathering is concealed behind innocuous sounding terms such as “21st Century Skills.” While parental consent is almost never sought, the schemes to track and manipulate children’s values and attitudes are often disguised behind phrases such as “promoting grit,” ensuring a “welcoming school climate,” pushing “positive youth development,” fighting “bullying,” checking “wellbeing,” and much more.
The technological tools being weaponized for these programs are becoming more sophisticated than virtually any parent realizes or could even imagine, with even the measuring of “brain waves” and emotions now being explored. One tool highlighted recently in education circles includes “psychographic questions” that are “meant to reveal the influence of students’ personalities and attitudes.” And that is just what we know about.
In a post highlighting the danger of these sorts of developments, Dr. Karen Effrem, president of Education Liberty Watch, pointed to just some of the reasons why parents, taxpayers, and voters ought to be very concerned.
For one, this puts government “in charge of setting norms for the thoughts, beliefs and attitudes of children, which is supposed to be the job of parents and religious institutions in our constitutional republic.” Government, she said, should have “no role, authority, or duty to do this, period.”
Secondly, the surveys, assessments, and associated curricular resources can (and no doubt will) be used to push controversial political agendas such as the LGBT movement, environmentalism, gun control, and more. In fact, this has been happening for generations, but it is becoming far more sophisticated now.
Because children develop in different ways and at different rates, the surveys and assessments can wrongly label children as being abnormal or defective in some way, continued Effrem, who is trained as a pediatrician. That, too, is already happening.
Of course, the privacy concerns are obvious. “Data privacy and security are becoming things of the past, so having this kind of subjective and controversial data in children’s lifelong data dossiers, also created by federal law, is extremely dangerous to their freedom of conscience, privacy and futures,” she warned.
And last but not least, even though it never seems to matter to America’s would-be “federal masters,” “these types of surveys also violate several parts of federal law,” Effrem said. Of course, with no authority over education or children, any federal meddling in schools whatsoever also violates the U.S. Constitution.
America is entering into a Brave New World without precedent, but it is absolutely clear that even Americans’ most basic freedoms are under mortal threat. Government schools are the conduits to bring in this nightmarish dystopia. Americans need to resist the agenda using all legal means possible.
