Book Review: ‘They Came For The Schools’

NBC investigative reporter Mike Hixenbaugh weaves together the past, present and future of who controls classrooms in They Came for the Schools. He anchors his debut nonfiction book in Southlake, a north Texas suburb that has become shorthand for the reactionary culture wars snaking throughout the nation’s public schools.

It is not hyperbolic to say that They Came for the Schools is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the current battles in education.

The book’s publication comes as the U.S. Department of Education announced it’s seeking to negotiate with Southlake’s school district over four federal civil rights complaints that allege multiple racist and anti-LGBTQ incidents.

For those new to the conversation, it’s both primer and call to action. For those following the past few years of book banning and educational gag orders, it’s a deep dive that connects the dots of the years-long campaign to turn the clock back.

Hixenbaugh, who created the award-winning Southlake podcast with fellow NBC correspondent Antonia Hylton, expands here on their extensive reporting in the Dallas-Fort Worth region. He is adept at showing the cyclical nature of efforts to make schools more welcoming and inclusive. This isn’t the first time that attempts at change have been beaten back by right-wing parents and lawmakers. It’s just the most recent example.

The space the book provides gives us room to learn more about the students, parents, school administrators, and educators who have been pushing for change. We meet parents who came to Southlake for its top-ranked schools, only to see their children face slurs and hate speech. We meet teachers who believe in making sure all kids feel welcome and who got run out of the district. And we meet administrators and local elected officials who are full of the right words one year and enable exclusion the next.

Southlake isn’t the only area Hixenbaugh spotlights, but he maps how the Southlake playbook spread from north Texas to suburban districts around the nation. Schools have always been battlegrounds, he writes.

“After all, it’s in our schools – in social studies curricula and civics lessons and mandatory reading lists – that America is grappling with how to tell its story to new generations, how to teach kids what’s right and wrong, what’s true and what’s false,” he notes in his prologue. “And this grappling has gotten ugly.”

He shows the eerie parallels between Southlake’s incorporation and the issues of today. School choice? A push for In God We Trust? Infusing Christianity into schools? It was all there in the mid-1950s, in the wake of the Brown v. Board of Education decision to desegregate schools.

Nonfiction writing can sometimes feel like homework. Thankfully, that’s not the case here. Hixenbaugh shepherds the reader through a ton of reportage with thoughtful portrayals of the people behind the decisions. Members of any marginalized community will cringe in recognition at the litany of hate and bias incidents that students detail in the book – starting with the viral video featuring Southlake students spouting the n-word — and the abject failure of many grownups to do anything about it.

And everyone should cringe at the finger-pointing of parents who turn school board meetings into circuses.

“Guess what,” a husky white man wearing an American flag hat bellows at one meeting in Southlake replicant Grapevine-Colleyville, Texas, “teachers shouldn’t be forced to use your freakin’ made-up fantasy pronouns!”

“He ended his remarks by screaming ‘Wooooo! Get some!’ and slamming his fist on the lectern,” Hixenbaugh reports.

It’s easy to snicker at the more out-there speeches, but random commenters aren’t what’s really driving this change. Hixenbaugh illustrates how conservative activists eager to dismantle inclusion efforts have taken over school boards and created systems that churn on fear, with the backing of right-wing, deep-pocketed donors (hello, Patriot Mobile!) and salacious yet inaccurate talking points. At the same time, policymakers in Texas, Florida and elsewhere are busy enshrining these reactionary sentiments into law.

Crucially, he also provides an overview of the influence of Christian nationalism, the chilling movement that hinges on Christian Americans controlling nearly every aspect of life in the United States.

It’s a sobering read, but an important one. Hixenbaugh delivers it all with precise storytelling that keeps you rooting for the families, the teachers, and most of all, the kids.

(Mariner, May 14, 2024)