The Temecula school district, in the midst of a conservative Christian revolt over LGBTQ+ curriculum materials, has fired the superintendent. Behind closed doors before Tuesday night’s regular meeting of the Temecula Valley Unified School District, the board voted 3-1 to fire Jodi McClay. Her firing was mentioned to the public during the meeting. At that time, McClay left the dais, waved to the audience, and said, “Thank you.”
The Temecula school district, in the midst of a conservative Christian revolt over LGBTQ+ curriculum materials, has fired the superintendent.
Behind closed doors before Tuesday night’s regular meeting of the Temecula Valley Unified School District, the board voted 3-1 to fire Jodi McClay. Her firing was mentioned to the public during the meeting. At that time, McClay left the dais, waved to the audience, and said, “Thank you.”
The crowd reacted to her dismissal with boos and claps.
The Temecula school district board gave no explanation for McClay’s firing.
This board is the same one that had three members elected in November with the support of a far-right anti-gay group and that recently rejected an LGBTQ-inclusive textbook, with board members calling pioneering gay politician Harvey Milk a pedophile.
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McClay had worked in the Temecula school district for 25 years. A coalition of former Temecula school district officials wrote a letter expressing concern about her ouster, saying she has “established and maintained a solid record of instructional excellence.”
“She is a person of outstanding character and a leader of the most excellent caliber,” the letter added.
In May, the board rejected a social studies textbook and curricular materials designed for kindergarten through fifth grade. It included mention of the LGBTQ+ rights movement, but no mention of Milk, the San Francisco city supervisor who was the first out gay elected official in California and was assassinated by a fellow supervisor in 1978.
The accompanying materials for teachers did mention Milk.
The pilot program, which included material approved by the California Department of Education, was approved by 47 Temecula school district teachers who had taught the material in 18 elementary schools.
During the May discussions, board member Allison Barclay, who voted to approve the curriculum, said, “It was piloted. We followed every policy, and procedure. The options were out there for parents. Thirteen-hundred family’s kids learned from this curriculum. We did not receive any complaints.”
Curriculum that deals with LGBTQ+ history is mandated under California’s FAIR Education Act, which was signed into law on July 14, 2011, and went into effect on Jan. 1, 2012.
It amends the California Education Code to include the Fair, Accurate, Inclusive and Respectful reference to contributions by people with disabilities and members of the LGBTQ+ community in history and social studies curriculum.
During Tuesday’s discussion of the program, board President Joseph Komrosky called Milk a sexual predator.
“Why even mention a pedophile?” Komrosky said.
He was apparently referring to a relationship between Milk and Jack McKinley, which began when Milk was in his early 30s and McKinley was 16. When the two met in New York, the age of consent in that state was 14, and McKinley had turned 18 when the pair moved to California.
Komrosky’s remark drew criticism from Gov. Gavin Newsom, who tweeted that it was “an offensive statement from an ignorant person.” Newsom added, “This isn’t Texas or Florida. In the Golden State, our kids have the freedom to learn.” Indeed, state law requires that public schools teach LGBTQ-inclusive history.
Attorney General Rob Bonta has denounced Komrosky’s statement as well, and the state’s Department of Education is investigating the district, although officials haven’t said why.
Komrosky and the two other board members who voted to fire McClay, Jennifer Wiersma and Danny Gonzalez, are conservative, evangelical Christians who were elected last year with the support of the Inland Empire Family PAC.
The PAC endorses candidates who are against Critical Race Theory and “perverted sexual training,” according to the group’s website.
The Temecula board voted in December to ban Critical Race theory, an academic concept taught in higher education curricula, but not in K-12 schools.
The term, however, is used as a dog whistle by right-wing activists as a catchall for all lessons about the U.S. legacy of racism — lessons they say are divisive and induce guilt in white students.
Critical race theory is an academic concept that is more than 40 years old. The core idea is that race is a social construct, and that racism is not merely the product of individual bias or prejudice, but also something embedded in legal systems and policies.
The basic tenets of Critical Race Theory, or CRT, emerged out of a framework for legal analysis in the late 1970s and early 1980s created by legal scholars Derrick Bell, Kimberlé Crenshaw, and Richard Delgado, among others.
One board member, Steven Schwartz, was absent from the Tuesday meeting.
Former Assistant Superintendent Kimberly Velez will become superintendent on an interim basis.
