Teachers rally against Horne’s new hotline
State superintendent of schools wants public to report ‘inappropriate lessons’; many of the calls have been pranks
Teachers rallied at the Arizona Capitol on Wednesday to oppose Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne’s new hotline for members of the public to report “inappropriate lessons.”
The protesting educators called for the hotline to be shut down and for teachers to be recognized for the difficult work they do in challenging teaching conditions.
“Things have gotten really bad with COVID especially and the amount of mental health issues,” said Chandler physical education teacher Ashley Gee. “More is piled on teachers and we just need support.”
The Horne administration announced its “Empower Hotline” last week and told members of the public to report “inappropriate lessons that detract from teaching academic standards.”
The hotline was a key campaign promise for Horne, who ran on a platform that promised to focus on math and reading instruction and “declare war” on conversations about emotions and identity.
But teachers who marched Wednesday said the hotline’s broader purpose is increasing mistrust of public schools and making an already difficult job even harder.
The hotline isn’t addressing the main concerns they hear from parents, they said.
Chandler librarian Pauline Gray said she has only had two parents formally inquire about what books are in the library, despite conservative efforts to get some books on race and gender removed from shelves across the country.
“We’re available to meet with any parents, and answer any parent questions,” Gray said.
The group of teachers in red Tshirts marching Wednesday near the Capitol recalls the five-year anniversary of Arizona’s #RedforEd teacher strikes.
The movement, beginning in April
“It is still very early. We should welcome all kinds of communication and transparency.” Tom Horne
State superintendent of public instruction
2018, brought thousands of educators into the streets to call for more funding for schools and better teacher pay.
Years later, Arizona’s average teacher salary has gone up, according to the state’s auditor general, but multiple rankings have put Arizona’s per-pupil spending near the bottom nationally.
Meanwhile, the political division around education has only intensified, deepened by the tumult of COVID-19 school closures and debates about gender and race.
For instance, Washington Elementary School District’s termination of a student teacher agreement with Arizona
Christian University in February because of the school’s anti-LGBTQ position led to threats against school board members as well as a federal lawsuit.
Since the 2018 protests, both Gee and Gray said they have seen educators leave the profession.
Many of the teachers who replaced them were not certified, Gray said. “I’m not sure if the families recognize that,” she said.
Gee said she had not been out on a march with a group of teachers in years.
“Today felt like a mini version of Red for Ed,” she said. “We got a pay increase, but that wasn’t the only thing we were after.”
Hotline receiving many prank calls
When news of the hotline broke last week, it elicited a wave of reaction.
Fox News dubbed it the “anti-woke” hotline.
Social media users called for people to flood the hotline with praise for teachers and fake reports, a strategy that helped push Virginia’s governor to shut down a similar hotline last year.
So far, Arizona’s hotline has received nearly 600 emails and 200 phone calls, many of which are prank calls, Horne said.
But that won’t deter him, he said.
“It is still very early,” Horne said. “We should welcome all kinds of communication and transparency.”
The Arizona Department of Education directed one call to the police because it alleged possible sexual abuse, but has otherwise not started any investigations into teaching content from the hotline, Horne said.