Governor Pete Ricketts is rallying parents to condemn a proposed health education curriculum that teaches very young students about LGBT ideology.
Republican Governor Pete Ricketts of Nebraska has denounced the controversial proposal of the state's health education curriculum that would set the stage for incorporating ideologies of the LGBT agenda into very young minds.
The governor joins a number of conservatives who are criticizing the proposed Nebraska Health Education Standards, which was started in March 2020 and will be the foundation for K-12 education education in the state, if approved by the State Board of Education during the Fall season this year.
The proposed Nebraska Health Education Standards proposes that children in all levels including kindergarten will " learn characteristics relating to identity, sexuality and healthy relationships" through discussions on "different kinds of family structures," which includes "same-gender" among others, the Christian Post reported.
For first-graders, curriculum will include how to "define gender, gender identity, and gender role stereotypes," while third-graders will be subjected to topics of "sexual orientation" and "bodily autonomy," building on the first-grade curriculum by enabling students to "discuss the range of ways people express their gender and how gender-role stereotypes may influence behavior."
Meanwhile, the proposed Nebraska Health Education Standards will also offer concepts of gender identity and sexual orientation for fourth graders to enable them to "distinguish between sex assigned at birth and gender identity and explain how they may or may not differ," "explain the difference between cisgender, transgender, gender non-binary, gender expansive, and gender identity," and "define sexual identity and explain a range of identities related to sexual orientation," all of which subjects young children to convoluted ideas in the LGBT agenda.
In response to the controversial school curriculum teaching the LGBT agenda to kids, Nebraska Gov. Ricketts penned a statement criticizing these proposed plans and calling on the state Department of Education to immediately "scrap" it.
The 56 year-old governor, who is also a father to three children, argued, "The new standards from the department would not only teach young children age-inappropriate content starting in kindergarten, but also inject non-scientific, political ideas into curriculum standards."
"The sex education standards represent a significant shift in approach to health education, and many of the new themes are sensitive topics that should be addressed by parents at home and not by schools," Gov. Ricketts wrote. "The draft standards were developed with the help of political activists, and without the input of key mainstream organizations."
The Nebraska governor urged parents to "speak up now" and make their objections known to the Department of Education. The proposed school curriculum teaching the LGBT agenda to kids has also drawn ire from conservative groups.
Nebraska Family Alliance policy director Nate Grasz told the Lincoln Journal Star that his organization opposes the proposed standards, which he believes would "subject young children beginning in kindergarten and first grade to politicized, unscientific and ideologically driven content."
Grasz explained that the thought of teaching very young kids ideas about gender identity and genitalia has "troubled a lot of people across the state" and if approved, will cause a "mass exodus" of students and teachers from public schools.
Teachers will, per Grasz, feel like "they can no longer in good conscience teach" such controversial standards tantamount to indoctrinating very young children with the LGBT agenda.