Together for an Inclusive Massachusetts (TIM) and Concerned Jewish Faculty and Staff –
Boston (CJFS-B) call on the Special Commission on Combatting Antisemitism to delay its
August 7th vote on the K-12 education recommendations. Due in part to the
Commission’s lack of transparency and exclusionary process, the flawed and partisan
recommendations are unlikely to effectively address antisemitism and will undermine
safe learning and working environments for students and teachers alike.
After the Commission released its initial draft K-12 findings and recommendations on July
2nd, TIM and CJFS-B separately sent detailed comments designed to help the
Commission address several troubling flaws (see TIM’s and CJFS-B’s written testimony).
Instead of incorporating any of our feedback – or otherwise inviting any meaningful
engagement – the Commission released updated recommendations on August 4th that
exacerbate our concerns. The revision added a purported “finding” that echoes Heritage
Foundation and ADL talking points and engages in insults by describing one of our core
concerns as a “pseudo-intellectual debate[] over semantics.”
We expect and deserve far better from our elected officials and state bodies.
From the outset, TIM and CJFS-B have urged the Commission to address antisemitism in
a way that does not pit some Jewish students against other marginalized populations,
including other Jewish students. The current K-12 education recommendations fail that
critical test.
In the interest of students’ well-being and access to comprehensive and inclusive
education throughout the Commonwealth, the Special Commission must address several
flaws before voting on the revised K-12 recommendations:
- The revised recommendations reflect the views of a narrow set of invited speakers
and exclude a diversity of Jewish and non-Jewish experts among others who testified
at the only hearing that permitted public testimony. - The Special Commission has systematically excluded important testimony from nonZionist Jewish academics with subject matter expertise on topics including
antisemitism, Title VI, the Holocaust, and Jewish American history. - Members of the Special Commission have demeaned and dismissed individuals
and organizations whose views on Israel/Palestine diverge from their own
apparent political commitments. - Members of the Special Commission have publicly stated that they refrained from
contributing to the full report because they lack K-12 education expertise–a fact
that reinforces the need for the Commission to invite testimony from scholars and
experts on K-12 policy and pedagogy before approving recommendations that will
shape the educational experience for students and conditions for educators
across the state. - The Commission’s lack of transparency and exclusionary practices do a disservice
to state legislators and other state and local policy makers committed to
thoughtfully addressing antisemitism in a way that is tailored to student learning
and consistent with Massachusetts’ inclusionary values. - The Commission’s lack of transparency and exclusionary practices are atypical of
state-created Commissions, particularly ones with this level of public interest. The
legislature regularly creates Commissions to deliberate and debate key policy
priorities that need a deeper dive to supplement the legislative committee
process. Typically, Commissions bring a diversity of expertise and constituencies
to publicly debate the issues, find consensus and identify areas of differences. - The Commission has not offered a public comment period to respond to its K-12
preliminary recommendations prior to a vote. - The Commission is relying on misleading and discredited data to justify fast
tracking these recommendations. These are the same faulty statistics that ground
the false and dangerous narratives the Trump administration now wields to target
our own students and destroy our universities. - The legislature created the Special Commission with a mandate to submit
recommendations to the legislature. Instead, the Commission – an unelected,
non-representative body which was created exclusively to advise the state
legislature – intends to bypass the legislative process (and the public engagement
it would necessitate) by submitting recommendations directly to local school
districts, school committees, public and private school administrators and the state
Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. - The Commission’s continued reliance on the IHRA definition, a partisan definition
of antisemitism condemned by the ACLU and numerous Jewish and Israeli Human
Rights organizations, undermines genuine efforts at addressing antisemitism in
schools. The IHRA definition contains many ambiguous terms concerning
concepts highly contested within the Jewish community, and in practice will
restrict critical academic engagement about the state of Israel. Use of the IHRA
definition may paradoxically result in an increase in antisemitic sentiment by
conflating Jewish identity and political orientation to Zionism or the state of Israel.
We agree with the US National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism which states:
Antisemitism threatens not only the Jewish community, but all Americans. People
who peddle these antisemitic conspiracy theories and fuel racial, ethnic, and
religious hatred against Jews also target other communities—including Black and
brown Americans; Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders;
LGBTQI+ individuals; Muslim Americans; women and girls; and so many others.
Our intelligence agencies have determined that domestic terrorism rooted in
white supremacy—including antisemitism—is the greatest terrorist threat to our
Homeland today.
Instead, the Commission is rushing through recommendations that call for Massachusetts
schools to employ a contentious and widely criticized definition of antisemitism that,
where it is already in use, creates a chilling effect, undermines opportunities for critical
thinking and opens the door to punish students and educators who engage in legitimate
discourse about Israel/Palestine.
In the interest of the Commonwealth, its students, parents and educators, the
Commission should not vote on K-12 recommendations until our well-documented
concerns have been addressed. We have a vested interest in this Commission’s success
in arriving at effective and comprehensive recommendations to address antisemitism in
the Commonwealth and reiterate our interest in working with the Commission to achieve
that goal.
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Together for an Inclusive Massachusetts (TIM) is a group of Jewish, Muslim, Arab, labor,
education, student, civil rights and other organizations and individuals advocating for
justice and equity in the Commonwealth led by Alliance for Water Justice in Palestine,
Boston Workers Circle, Council on American-Islamic Relations – MA Chapter, If Not Now
Boston, Jewish Voice for Peace Boston, Mass Peace Action, MTA Rank & File for
Palestine, National Lawyers Guild – MA, Sawa: Newton-Area Alliance for Peace and
Justice, Worcester Havurah and 29 other supporting organizations.
Concerned Jewish Faculty & Staff (CJFS-B) is a membership organization of Jewish
faculty and staff from colleges and universities in the Boston area. We represent a range
of backgrounds and hold diverse views, but we are united in opposing the invocation of
Jews and Jewishness – and misguided or cynical claims of antisemitism – to penalize
Palestine solidarity activism, to stifle academic freedom, or to otherwise attack
inclusionary commitments. We believe that Jewish safety is deeply connected to the
safety of all people, and that the fight against antisemitism cannot be separated from the
struggle against all forms of oppression.
For more information, please contact Together for an Inclusive Massachusetts at
inclusivemassachusetts.org or Concerned Jewish Faculty & Staff at
concernedjfaculty@gmail.com.
