The scathing letter<\/a> accuses the San Francisco Board of Education and district leaders of quietly pushing a $7 million, required course for ninth graders called \u201cVoices\u201d<\/a> that has largely been concealed from concerned parents.<\/p>\n A \u201cwheel of power and privilege\u201d sorts individuals into categories of race, sex, gender identity and other characteristics. Obtained by CA Post<\/p>\n \u201cChildren are being sorted, labeled, and instructed according to race-based ideological frameworks that no parent consented to and that no reasonable reading of federal civil rights law permits,\u201d said Lee Cheng, a civil rights attorney and co-founder of Friends of Lowell Foundation, which successfully sued SFUSD to reinstate a merit admissions system after it was branded \u201celitist\u201d and scrapped<\/a> in 2021.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is precisely the kind of state-sponsored racial classification that federal civil rights law was written to prohibit,\u201d Cheng said.<\/p>\n San Francisco ninth graders are presented with a \u201cwheel of power and privilege,\u201d created by educator Sylvia Duckworth, that sorts individuals into various vectors of \u201cpower,\u201d such as race, gender identity, religious identity, marital status, disability and \u201cindigeneity.\u201d<\/p>\n Superintendent Maria Su has backed the district\u2019s controversial ethnic studies requirement. San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images<\/p>\n The textbook\u2019s goal is to give students \u201cterms and tools they need to analyze the impacts of race and ethnicity in US history and the present day,\u201d according to its website. Voices is broken out into units on Indigenous Studies, Black Studies, Latino Studies, and Asian American\/Pacific Islander Studies.<\/p>\n Friends of Lowell Foundation calls it a \u201cthoroughly politicized document\u201d that, rather than informing students about their world, teaches \u201cracial determinism and despair.\u201d<\/p>\n The foundation alleged in a 53-page memo<\/a> that the district hid the curriculum from parents \u2014 requiring in-person appointments during work hours to view the Voices textbook, obfuscating agenda items at the Board of Education and scheduling discussions of ethnic studies on Jewish and Muslim religious holidays, violating families\u2019 civil rights.<\/p>\n Voices\u2019 \u201cDefining Whiteness\u201d section. Friends of Lowell Foundation<\/p>\n The year-long ethnic studies requirement also deprives students of the chance to take electives that help them get into college, said SFUSD parent Liz Le.<\/p>\n \u201cIt puts San Francisco students at a unique disadvantage and that comes with legal ramifications,\u201d said Le. \u201cWe\u2019re losing students are we\u2019re losing money.\u201d<\/p>\n In 2021, California lawmakers made one semester of ethnic students a requirement for high school students.<\/p>\n Attorney Christine Linnenbach speaks at a rally opposing the ethnic studies course. Christine Linnenbach<\/p>\n San Francisco chose to expand the requirement to one year, initially launching a \u201chome-grown\u201d ethnic studies course that was riddled with controversial content<\/a>, such as referring to Chairman Mao Zedong\u2019s Red Guards as a \u201csocial movement,\u201d the US as the \u201cso-called United States,\u201d and comparing parental authority to a \u201csystem of oppression.\u201d<\/p>\n San Francisco Superintendent Maria Su announced a \u201cnew approach\u201d to ethnic studies<\/a> after a massive backlash to the prior program.<\/p>\n Though Voices is now the district-approved ethnic studies curriculum, individual teachers are still using the old lesson plans, The Frisc reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n An ethnic studies lesson still in use by some teachers focuses on \u201cResistance!\u201d Friends of Lowell Foundation<\/p>\n \u201cThe United States is not a perfect country \u2026 but these students are being taught to hate their peers and hate their country, and that\u2019s really at the core of this,\u201d said Christine Linnenbach, attorney and president of the Friends of Lowell Foundation.<\/p>\n The San Francisco district lost thousands of students over the past 10 years, triggering a plan to close schools<\/a>.<\/p>\n Critics say they aren\u2019t opposed to ethnic studies and support giving students an honest view of American history. But the foundation says the Voices curriculum makes unsupported, sweeping claims that collapses diverse histories into \u201cnarrow themes of oppression, resistance and activism.\u201d<\/p>\n Le pointed to a section on \u201cwhiteness\u201d which claims that \u201cwhite\u201d is not just a race, but a reference to one\u2019s position \u201cin the racial, ethnic and socioeconomic hierarchy.\u201d<\/p>\n Mayor Daniel Lurie has been asked to meet with the parent advocates. REUTERS<\/p>\n She said an ethnic studies guest teacher at her teenage child\u2019s school had led a discussion about \u201creal life monsters\u201d that grouped police officers in with Hitler and serial killers \u2014 and other lessons she called \u201csimplistic, almost discriminatory.\u201d<\/p>\n Linnenbach believes it\u2019s part of a larger effort to force a political agenda on students.<\/p>\n \u201cEverything is framed, through these policies and the curriculum, in terms of race. It\u2019s not acceptable to create this victim\/victimizer relationship where 14 year old kids are learning to despise one another based on the color of their skin,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n The Friends of Lowell Foundation demanded a meeting with Mayor Daniel Lurie and city officials to discuss the alleged legal violations. Although SFUSD is largely supported through state funding, the city of San Francisco provides support to the district.<\/p>\n SFUSD parent Liz Le said the ethnic studies course hurts college-bound students.<\/p>\n The district didn\u2019t respond to a request for comment. <\/p>\n Lurie\u2019s office pointed to a statement he made last year in support of an \u201ceffective program that aligns with local and state requirements and effectively serves our students across the entire district.\u201d<\/p>\n Only 41% of San Francisco eighth grade students were proficient in math last year, compared to a target of 65%. Third-grade reading proficiency was just 51.8%, below a target of 62%, the San Francisco Standard reported.<\/a><\/p>\n Linnenbach said she is prepared to escalate the issue to the Department of Justice and even the White House if her group\u2019s concerns aren\u2019t addressed.<\/p>\n \u201cThis issue is happening up and down the state of California,\u201d she said. \u201cWe have decide to take our issue to out elected leaders because school districts, not only in San Francisco but in California, are not responding to the needs of parents.\u201d<\/p>\n Download The California Post App, follow us on social, and subscribe to our newsletters <\/p>\n California Post News: Facebook<\/a>, Instagram<\/a>, TikTok<\/a>, X<\/a>, YouTube<\/a>, WhatsApp<\/a>, LinkedIn<\/a>![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/d23e033a4b42f7be3c292ca433b21796.jpeg\"\/)
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