Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders has not shied away from discussing the impact her high school experience has had on her maturation. While delivering the Republican Party’s rebuttal to President Joe Biden’s most recent State of the Union address, the Little Rock Central High School graduate spoke glowingly about her alma mater’s importance in American history. Most notably, a group of nine Black students helped integrate the area’s school system in 1957 following Brown v. Board of Education.
“I will never forget watching my dad, Gov. Mike Huckabee, and President Bill Clinton hold the doors open to the Little Rock nine — doors that 40 years earlier had been closed to them because they were Black,” Sanders said, according to ABC News.
“Today, those children once barred from the schoolhouse are now heroes, memorialized in bronze at our state house. I’m proud of the progress our country has made and helping every child access to a quality education regardless of their race or income, is the civil rights issue of our day.”
In the weeks following her State of the Union rebuttal, Sanders has begun to roll out the LEARNS Act, a piece of legislation that will alter how education in Arkansas from kindergarten through 12th grade. The act calls for higher salaries for teachers, universal pre-k and a universal school voucher system. The act would also prevent discussions of “gender identity, sexual orientation, and sexual reproduction” before fifth grade and ban discussions that would “indoctrinate students with ideologies, such as Critical Race Theory.”
Students at Sanders’ alma mater have pushed back at against the governor’s educational proposals and her references to the school. In response, students staged a walkout and signed a letter calling out Sanders.
“Ambition. Personality. Opportunity. Preparation. Carved into the face of the monumental Little Rock Central High School, four statues overlook the campus grounds, each representing a different principle for which the school stands,” the letter reads, according to ABC News.
“Almost a century after these pillars were embedded into the walls of the building, Central High remains a beacon for these fundamental components of education. Today, because of Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders and her omnibus education bill, the proposed LEARNS Act, these ideals are in danger.”
Thus far, the letter has garnered more than 1,300 signatures. Sanders nor her representatives have publicly discussed the matter either.
