Manufactured controversy at Natomas high school benefits no one but the chaos agents
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What Natomas parents and school administrators are trying to keep out of a local teacher’s classroom is, ironically, what he was hired to teach: politics.
History is defined by politics, and Gabe Gipe, a tenured U.S. history and Advanced Placement government teacher at Inderkum High School, has been teaching just that for the past three years. He was teaching that when a school administrator conducted no fewer than two dozen standard walk-throughs of his classroom for his tenure review and reported nothing troubling. And he was still teaching that on the day a prospective student’s parent wanted to talk to him about his college-level curriculum.
Except it wasn’t actually a prospective parent. It was an undercover provocateur recording Gipe while asking leading questions for Project Veritas, a right-wing gotcha group that has deceptively edited footage in campaigns across the country to sow discord in schools, businesses, and local politics.
Gipe was recorded discussing how he sees himself as having only so long to turn students into “revolutionaries,” offers extra credit for attending protests, displays provocative political symbols in his classroom, and stamps homework with darkly humorous internet memes of Joseph Stalin and Kim Jong Un. Regardless of where your sympathies lie, the teacher had given his would-be detractors ample ammunition.
A predictable blow-up ensued. Angry parents filled school board meetings with demands to know what, exactly, Gipe was teaching the teens in his classroom.
Natomas Unified School District Superintendent Chris Evans invited more attention by sitting down with Project Veritas on camera to answer questions and proudly posting the video on the school district’s website. He claims it was done in good faith to find out more information from the group behind the video. Perhaps it was, but that would be an awfully naive reading of Project Veritas’ motives.
Since Gipe’s placement on unpaid leave, his supporters say they have been harassed outside their homes by Sacramento’s Proud Boys contingent for speaking up on his behalf. Evans says pro-Gipe protesters showed up outside his home.
Both Gipe and the Natomas Teachers’ Association declined to comment for this story. The school district says Gipe was placed on leave pending a school board investigation that determined he should be removed for code and policy violations, but it could take several more months for the process to play out.
We often don’t give teenagers enough agency in their own education, but Gipe’s classroom, by most of his students’ accounts, was an interesting and informative place whether or not you agreed with his politics. Until this incident, Gipe’s provocative teaching style had drawn no consequential complaints. In another measure of his popularity with students, he was chosen by this year’s graduating class to speak on its behalf at commencement ceremonies.
Ideally, Gipe’s tenure review or another administrative procedure would have caught any improper practices and reined him in without sacrificing what was working about his teaching style. Instead, a practiced chaos agent seized an opportunity to bring its particular brand of curated deception to a local school district with limited capacity to deal with the consequences.
The only people who win in these situations are the mischief-makers — the ones who have no stake in the matter other than to watch it all blow up.
At its best, schools should make students question their worldview. Parents should hope that not everything taught in a classroom lines up exactly with their ideas or beliefs. That’s how good teachers encourage teenagers to think for themselves and form their own opinions. Silencing educators does irreparable harm to our children’s education, and because of this mess, Gipe’s colleagues and students are too afraid of harassment to pick a side.
Yes, Gipe seems to have gone too far in his provocations. He answers to parents and school administration and has to work within the system, but he doesn’t deserve to lose his job or have his family and friends harassed.
Nor is he at fault for teaching students about the unpopular side of historical political arguments. That is what he was hired to do.
And, yes, the superintendent seems to have welcomed public attention too eagerly. He should have told Project Veritas to take a hike and handled the matter through regular district procedures. He answers to students, parents and his employees, not outside political agents.
But Evans is not wrong for enforcing the conditions of Gipe’s employment at Inderkum and ensuring that his teaching didn’t venture too far from the curriculum or common sense. That is what he was hired to do.
If only these two men could have stood eye-to-eye and had a discussion between employer and employee about what was appropriate to display and teach inside Inderkum’s classrooms. Instead, they’re both being forced to stick doggedly to their ideology and play to a crowd ravenous for someone’s blood. What a lesson we’re teaching our children.
This story was originally published November 14, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
