Dear Editor, 

Liberties are lost a little at a time, then all at once. Last week, the Fairfax County School Board deleted the parental and community input into Family Life Education (FLE).  It is time to ask what gives the school authority to teach family life, which is distinctive and varied.  Most families do so competently, and FCPS lessons don’t help those who don’t. 

Parents gave authority to public schools for academics: reading, writing, math, science, and social studies. Public schools have no competence in value-laden content inherent in FLE topics. In the 1980s, a cottage industry of “sex education” was developed by people with an ideological agenda. They promised to limit it to preventing teen pregnancy and drug abuse. Strong parental objections were overcome with assurances that schools would not usurp the parental role. Nothing would be taught without parental and community participation. That promise was broken on March 13, 2025.

FCPS never respected the spirit of that covenant. Only one-third of the FLECAC (FLE Curriculum Advisory Committee) are from the community. The rest are paid FCPS personnel. Parents have always been on the losing minority opposing radical, controversial material contrary to family and community values. Parents could only object by opting children out of controversial FLE lessons. In response, FCPS moved controversial lessons into other subjects, such as Health and Social Emotional Learning, where parents cannot object to the indoctrination.

When the School Board was more reasonable, it responded to parents’ objections raised through personal statements and the media. Today’s Board campaigned on political ideologies rather than improving education. Declines in test scores on academic subjects show the results of that misdirection.

FLECAC’s façade of community involvement allowed meetings to be open to public viewing but not comment. Even that proved too much for FCPS.

Kids, parents and child development experts know that discussions about puberty are embarrassing. Sit-coms are written about it. So, children are taught in sex-separate classes. But FLECAC recommended mixing sexes for delicate topics. Parents were surveyed; 84% opposed the change. FCPS Superintendent Michelle Reid responded, “Honestly, the majority doesn’t always dictate, right?”  Reid created a pilot program putting little boys and girls together to discuss embarrassing topics. 

Children as young as 5th grade, not in the pilot, can decide if they want to go to the boys’ or girls’ class on puberty (without parental knowledge). Are the teachers so incompetent that they think if a little boy “feels” confused enough, he will get a period and need tampons?

FLECAC was poised to push gender ideology in 1st grade. Weather prevented the January and February meetings. In March, with growing controversy, the School Board abruptly disbanded the “state authorized advisory committee” of FLECAC and announced it would be an internal committee under the superintendent (Ms. “The Majority Doesn’t Dictate”), ignoring the history of promises to parents and the community. 

Bye-bye, transparency in FLE in Fairfax Schools. “We have your kids, and there is nothing you can do to stop us from grooming them!”

Mary Beth Style, MSW

Former two-term FLECAC member  – Centreville