California school terminates contract with controversial ‘Woke Kindergarten’ program

A San Francisco Bay-area school has cut ties with “Woke Kindergarten” after nationwide backlash against the program’s curriculum and its founder’s statements.

Glassbrook Elementary spent $250,000 in federal funds meant to help boost test scores for some of the country’s lowest-performing schools on the program, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, but after two years with Woke Kindergarten, students’ scores are reportedly worse. 

The head of Woke Kindergarten, Akiea “Ki” Gross, has shared social media posts indicating she thinks America and Israel have “no right to exist” and wants to see the world “free of” those countries. “Y’all are the villains. We’ve been trying to end y’all,” she wrote of them.

Hayward Unified School District (HUSD) spokesman Michael Bazeley told Fox News Digital the school terminated its contract with Woke Kindergarten on Monday and specified the consultant was never an employee.

A general view of Glassbrook Elementary School in Hayward, California.  (Google Street VIew)

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Bazeley said HUSD had become aware of certain “statements by Woke Kindergarten staff,” and, “Although we respect freedom of speech and the right for individuals to hold a variety of political views, the social media and other public statements of the vendor do not align with the values of the district and those of many of our community members.” 

“The personal political and social views are separate from the work Woke Kindergarten did with us,” Bazeley said.

Woke Kindergarten describes itself on its website as “supporting children, families, educators and organizations in their commitment to abolitionist early education and pro-black and queer and trans liberation.” The organization also has “Woke” words of the day like “ceasefire” “abolish” and “Woke Wonderings” about challenging the “legitimacy of the Supreme Court” and abolishing the police, money and the military. 

Even though the school is parting ways with this particular vendor, it is still pursuing “anti-racist” education.

The head of Woke Kindergarten is Akiea “Ki” Gross, who has written about “trying to end” the U.S. and Israel. (Instagram/screenshot | Woke Kindergarten)

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“We will continue to support Glassbrook Elementary School as its teachers, staff and administrators proceed with the work of supporting the students and families in the school community,” Bazeley said. “Anti-bias/Anti-racist teaching, restorative practices, multi-language learning, literacy and mathematics will remain a focus for Glassbrook, building on the work that school has undertaken over the past several years.”

The spokesman said that even as the district terminates the contract, it still asserts that the Woke Kindergarten curriculum was mischaracterized.

“The controversy over this program—including the widespread media attention, the mischaracterization of the Woke Kindergarten work, social media posts by the vendor, and the public response—is all distracting the district from doing the important work of supporting our students,” he said. “We concluded that now was an appropriate time to terminate the contract.”

The school has reportedly received “threatening and racist” messages in the wake of the news coverage.

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On Thursday, a Glassbrook Elementary teacher, who publicly criticized his school district’s investment in “Woke Kindergarten,” reported he had been placed on administrative leave over “allegations of unprofessional conduct.”

Bazeley told Fox News Digital at the time, “We don’t comment on private personnel matters,” but denied the teacher was put on leave for “retaliatory purposes” or that he was being punished for speaking to the press. 

Fox News’ Chris Pandolfo contributed to this report.