California activist group pays students $1,400 to attend social justice trainings: report

Contracts for the California school district and the Californians for Justice (CFJ), obtained by The Free Press, showed that Long Beach Unified School District in the state paid the activist group nearly $2 million for equity, racial diversity, and other training for students and teachers. Students received the $1,400 stipends, and over $20,000 total was allocated for 13 parents who participated.

The contracts, which started in late 2019, have paid at least 78 students nearly $100,000 for participating in the training with taxpayer funds. The most recent agreement between the school and CFJ runs until June 2024.

CFJ addresses the work it does on its website, saying that it fights for the issues of "racial equity" and declares, "We must center race in our words, in our actions, and in our policies to truly address the inequities students of color face in today’s schools." Resources on the website instruct students and teachers on how to "interrupt unconscious bias" and include a report on building relationships with LGBTQ students that stated an assignment where students had to "argue about the constitutionality of making trans students use that bathroom of their" sex would make gender non-conforming students "not feel seen or safe" and that it "heightened fear and discomfort."

From the CFJ X page, a post about their "Community Schools Empowerment Summit" said that the session was all about "Black Student Power" in June 2023.

The Alameda County Office of Education, California Teachers Association, UCLA Center for Community Schooling, and California Partnership for the Future of Learning were all tagged as being in attendance, indicating that other educational institutions may be involved with CFJ.

When The Free Press reached out to the school district, a spokesman told the outlet that the school sees the stipends as "internships" that ensure "equitable participation in CFJ programs, embracing diverse perspectives in education.”

The outlet interviewed four teachers about the matter and they, on the other hand, saw the $1,400 stipends to the students as a “horrible propaganda strategy.”

A 2024 article about CFJ stated that the activist organization “has helped teachers in rewiring the way they connect with students—particularly students of color. This means, for example, breaking down old stereotypes where teachers are perceived as the ones with authority and knowledge to establishing a new viewpoint that teachers are allies and catalysts of the students’ own strengths and knowledge.”

Jay Goldfischer, a history teacher in the school district, told the outlet, “One of the reasons that they were hired is to help our students find their voice and be able to express it."

“But in reality, CFJ is not helping students find their own voices. It’s giving them a scripted voice that’s not their own," he added. “They’re teaching them parroting, which is the exact opposite of how you empower children.”

Goldfischer, who is also Jewish, also had concerns over their posts regarding the Israel-Hamas war just weeks after Oct. 7, when one said that "the plight of the Palestinian people" is an “ethnic cleansing and apartheid orchestrated by white supremacist settler colonialism bent on the goal of wiping out the indigenous Palestinian population.”

After this, other colleagues and parents pointed to the antisemitic nature of the posts, seven students and one activist spoke in a December school board meeting, supporting the group. The president of Long Beach school board, Diana Craighead, also stated in an email to a teacher that she was "concerned with the antisemitic nature of their opinions."

“However,” Craighead added, “I felt that the benefit of their support for our students outweighed my concerns.”

The latest total cost of the contract with CFJ that goes to June 2024 was nearly $900,000.