They Came for the Schools

One Town's Fight over Race and Identity, and the New War for America's Classrooms

By: Mike Hixenbaugh

Narrated by: Mike Hixenbaugh

Length: 9 hrs and 5 mins

Publisher's summary

The urgent, revelatory story of how a school board win for the conservative right in one Texas suburb inspired a Christian nationalist campaign now threatening to undermine public education in America—from an NBC investigative reporter and co-creator of the Peabody Award-winning and Pulitzer Prize finalist Southlake podcast.

Award-winning journalist Mike Hixenbaugh delivers the immersive and eye-opening story of Southlake, Texas, a district that seemed to offer everything parents would want for their children—small classes, dedicated teachers, financial resources, a track record of academic success, and school spirit in abundance. All this, until a series of racist incidents became public, a plan to promote inclusiveness was proposed in response—and a coordinated, well-funded conservative backlash erupted, lighting the fire of a national movement on the verge of changing the face of public schools across the country.

They Came for the Schools pulls back the curtain on the powerful forces driving this crusade to ban books, rewrite curricula, limit rights for minority and LGBTQ students—and, most importantly, to win what Hixenbaugh’s deeply informed reporting convinces is the holy grail among those seeking to impose biblical values on American society: school privatization, one school board and one legal battle at a time.

They Came for the Schools delivers an essential take on Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis, as they demean public schools and teachers and boost the Christian right’s vision. Hixenbaugh brings to light fascinating connections between this political and cultural moment and past fundamentalist campaigns to censor classroom lessons. Finally, They Came for the Schools traces the rise of a new resistance movement led by a diverse coalition of student activists, fed-up educators, and parents who are beginning to win select battles of their own: a blueprint, they hope, for gaining inclusive and civil schools for all.

©2024 Michael Hixenbaugh (P)2024 HarperCollins Publishers

Loved it

A concisely told bird’s eye view of the recent right-wing attacks on public schools.

Informative,..scary as hell…a wake up call for ALL Americans

When my son first told me he was and his young wife and my grandson were moving to Texas to pursue teaching jobs for better pay I was afraid…and that was twenty years ago! Each year they are down there I get a little more scared. My son is a math teacher & coach and his wife is a librarian. I worry about them daily and look anxiously forward until they are able to leave there forever. I don’t know understand how a man so morally bankrupt has become the guiding star for so many folks on the right. They are not able able to see and acknowledge their own hypocrisy. I want to ask these folks

Love your podcasts and now your book!

As a Texas native, former student of the largest district in the state, daughter of a public school teacher, and teacher myself, I have witnessed first hand what he talks about in this book. I am one of those fighting for the SEPARATION of church and state. Mike, you did good!

A MUST LISTEN for parents of public school student

Outstanding expository writing by Hixenbaugh. He lays out the ugly truth about the Southlake Carroll ISD and its board of trustees' attack on diversity inclusion and accessability in Southlake, Texas public schools in stark detail. An attack that resulted in four Dept of Education civil rights violations against ther district the same week of the book's publishing – validating the author's multi-year effort. Even though Southlake, TX is home to taxpaying households that are Christian, Muslim, Jewish and Atheist, led by men and women or same-sex couples and with members that may have physical or mental disabilities...Southlake Carroll ISD demonstrated an unwavering allegiance to Christian Nationalists located outside of the district.

Read or listen to this book and then join others who are working for diversion, equity and inclusion in your local schools.

Unfortunately, just another one sided ideology driven book lacking educational value

Read it and thought it was well written, but definitely biased. He clearly has let his personal beliefs in leftist gender and race ideologies inform the book too much. Even his voice in the narration of the book reveals his bias. There is actual video readily available of the 20+ year olds (he calls them kids) protesting in front of the Carroll schools and by his narration of their voices as they yelled "Hey hey, ho ho, racist parents have got to go!" to parents faces as they walked into the building, you'd think they were singing a nursery rhyme. They weren't. They were nasty about it and their public and social media harassment was atrocious, but you wouldn't know it from the book. It's not so much journalism as it is activism. There are some big holes in logic as well, the desire to paint even himself as a victim gets in the way of the believability of his experience as a "hard hitting award winning journalist". I thought for sure he was going to become human when he said he was putting his own child to sleep while listening to a Grapevine school mom speak at a board meeting about losing her son to gender ideology, but no, instead he chose that opportunity to blame "Christian Nationalism" of all things for her troubles. No Christian brought the spectre of gender confusion into that home, it is more likely that exposure to divorce, social media and Oregon was the cause. There are 2 sides and in every chapter the author fails to seriously show any other view and therefore fails to convince the reader that his side is the way.