Dupage Policy Journal

Former Glenbard South history teacher Matthew Janecek has taken to YouTube to decry practices in Illinois schools.

Janecek said he felt he owed his former community an explanation on why he left the school district.

“After 22 years of myself being in the classroom as an American, a world history teacher, why I've decided to step away and resign from that world and chart a different path as it pertains to educational ventures. So there's a couple of things that when we wrap up today, I'll let you know that's on the horizon and things to look for in the future,” Janecek said in a video.

Speaking from Texas where he is building a new home, Janecek said he will be returning to Illinois, but when he does he will teach in a non-denominational Christian school.

Janecek said he chose to leave the public school system due to influences that are changing the public school education environment.

“There is a blind obedience and allegiance of the national teachers unions of the AFT and the NEA to align politically 100 percent with the policies of the Democratic Party, which are for many people, very divisive,” he said. “And this blind acceptance that a race-baiting industry in our country that's pushing CRT (critical race theory) and pushing controversial federal enforcement ideas like having the FBI watch over people at public school meetings.”  

He said teachers unions have been taking an increasingly aggressive role in shaping school policy.

Janecek said the result is the continued polarization of education along political lines.

“National, state and local governments are impacting the direction and trajectory of education. So people that have no idea necessarily what's happening inside classrooms are dictating curriculum and policy,” he said.

Along the same lines, former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas has called for that system to be dismantled. It is the nation’s third largest.

With so many children in public school, the budgets to operate the institutions are among the highest of any public entity.

Janecek noted that type of money causes corruption.

He called the web of moneyed interests involved in school system an “educational industrial complex of corporatism” and noted the federal dollars connected to COVID funds have made the situation worse.

“To schools across the country, despite the fact that that is one of the most divisive subjects right now and that the attorney general's family is linked to corporations that produce the material that will be purchased by school districts around the country,” he said.

Janecek’s commentary follows a year of school board protests across the country.

“The conflict of interest exists and not just in that place alone, but. So there is so much money involved in the world of public education. Look at the contracts to Apple Computer. Look at the college board and getting kids to sign up for AP tests in the S.A.T. and then steering or altering those tests.”

The Illinois Association of School Boards denounced the National Association of School Boards when it asked Attorney General Merrick Garland to have the FBI investigate threats against school board members.

It was later revealed Garland’s son-in-law runs Panorama Education. According to its website, 'Panorama Education is an independent education technology company that partners with schools and districts to support student literacy and social-emotional learning."

Plainfield School District 202 paid the company a combined $142k over 2019, 2020 and 2021.

Janecek said the way curriculum is being structured is inherently political and at an annual cost to taxpayers.

“They've begun to control the language of even testing so that the system needs to be purchased continuously by schools so that the students can learn to answer the questions the way the company wants them to answer so that they can continue to sell the product,” he said.

Janecek noted the school system also appears to be taking a step back when it comes to learning.

He said expectations of the local school system have also changed, adding that his grading has been affected by school policy.

“Grading has been revisited. Grading is no longer to be considered punitive in nature that it would be making somebody feel bad for not knowing something – to make a long story short – and that retakes and no zeroes and uniformity and everyone taking the same tests,” he said.

Notably, Glenbard School District 87 Superintendent David Larson wrote a letter to teachers asking them to relax standards.  

Larson also was criticized for pushing vaccinations on students as well.

Last year, Larson faced criticism for releasing a video that included a  link to a Black Lives Matter (BLM) web page with links to donate, vote, sign petitions, and a protest map.

“These are the larger cultural issues, and the institution doesn't as much value the pursuit of truth. The institution has in recent times become an obstacle to the pursuit of truth. It's actually standing in the way,” he said.  

He noted that the school system has been fighting against using the Socratic technique to ask difficult questions and show student how to think and expose flaws in arguments.

“Today that's interpreted as a negative experience that is could be potentially be biased in nature,” Janecek said. “So many teachers refrain from that. That's another reason that I stepped away.”

Janecek reported the state of the public school system in America is in trouble as forces are succeeding in dividing the country’s people.

“CRT and white privilege are toxic things, toxic ideas that are attempting to poison the well of unity of the people,” he said.

He noted that freedom of thought within such institutions is at an all time low.

“What is the status quo today? It's obedience to a narrative without the ability to speak freely. Challenge authority. Ask questions. Challenge science with new questions,” he said.

Janecek said the pursuit of truth does not seem to be the goal of modern education in the country’s public schools.

“Many of the institutions are working toward a monolithic uniformity of thought on certain political and social grounds, it's dangerous. But the high level achieving people of the world are realizing this is happening. And they're having to go to the private world, private market to find solutions, to find the opportunities to pursue truth outside of the confines of the institution,” he said.

Janecek added that the will of the populous is still the same and that by moving to a private school he feels he is still able to live out his calling as a teacher.

“This is what people still want,” he said. "They're just having to look elsewhere for it. And it's ironic to think that in an institution that used to claim tolerance for ideas, the public institution greater tolerance is actually provided today in a non-denominational Christian school toward the pursuit of truth.”