Texas Teacher Accused Of ‘Indoctrinating’ Her Students By Teaching Them Their ‘Constitutional & Legal Rights’ Was Ultimately Fired
They claim it was because she posted about it on TikTok. But the message they sent is clear.
ESB Professional | Shutterstock The unconscionable attempts in states like Florida and Texas to completely reform education systems by prohibiting teachers from discussing things like slavery or LGBTQ issues have been a source of non-stop shock and awe for years now.
In most cases, this is all done under the guise of "protecting children" from supposedly corrupting influences (a ludicrous notion on its face).
But one Texas teacher's experience in 2023 gives a glimpse into what the true motivations of some conservative educators really are, and it underlines how not only morally bankrupt but patently absurd the right-wing movement to reform education truly is.
The teacher was fired after teaching students about their constitutional rights.
Former Austin, Texas teacher Sophia DeLoretto-Chudy went wildly viral in 2023 after exposing the actions of her school administration and the Austin Independent School District on TikTok.
It all began when she was "pulled into a check-in meeting" with an administrator who presented DeLoretto-Chudy with a document detailing a "list of concerns." Chief among them was a passage that read, "We've noticed an intentional attempt at teaching your students about their legal and constitutional rights."
The inclusion of the word "intentional" is a wild choice. If DeLoretto-Chudy had accidentally taught kids about the constitution that conservatives normally regard with near-religious reverence, there would have been no problem. As it was, the reprimand left DeLoretto-Chudy understandably shocked. But this "check-in meeting" was only the beginning.
DeLoretto-Chudy was accused of 'indoctrinating' students by teaching them they were not legally required to recite the pledge of allegiance.
The bone of contention seemed to center on one particular lesson that DeLoretto-Chudy shared with her class: The fact that, as a matter of free speech, among other supposedly "inalienable rights," they are not actually required to participate in the pledge of allegiance by the Constitution, though Texas has a state law mandating that they do so.
This began after her students asked about the origins of the pledge of allegiance. After digging into the history together, they found that it was created and instituted in schools in the 19th century to supposedly unite a post-Civil War country that was bitterly divided over slavery.
When DeLoretto-Chudy subsequently taught, during Holocaust Remembrance Week, about the way Hitler specifically targeted children with propaganda to disseminate his ideology, DeLoretto-Chudy said her students quickly made the connection to the pledge of allegiance and decided they no longer wanted to participate.
"My administration doesn't believe that they are staying seated [in assemblies] for reasons that they can fully articulate and fully understand," DeLoretto-Chudy, "and is concerned that I am 'indoctrinating' my students."
The notion that teaching basic facts of history and constitutional rights adds up to "indoctrination" should be shocking, but this is America, where things like Holocaust denial, among other horrific concepts, have ipso facto been written into education laws in states like Texas.
In 2021, Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed into law Texas House Bill 3979, which forbids educators from discussing "controversial" topics unless they "explore such issues from diverse and contending perspectives without giving deference to any one perspective." A school district curriculum director demanded this law be applied to the Holocaust just weeks after the bill was signed.
DeLoretto-Chudy was subsequently fired for exposing her school administration's actions on TikTok.
Three months after posting her first TikTok about the uproar at her school, DeLoretto-Chudy was first placed on leave and then terminated. She told Buzzfeed News that her school claimed, in statements sent home to parents, that her firing had nothing to do with her performance but rather for "embarrass[ing] my administrator in a TikTok."
She said the statement sent to parents clarified that none of the items on the "list of concerns," nor any parent complaints about the subject matter she taught, were why she was fired. "I was pulled from teaching and investigated strictly because of the TikTok that went viral overnight," she told Buzzfeed.
In a follow-up TikTok, DeLoretto-Chudy further explained, "It's literally only because I whistle-blew on TikTok instead of going through the appropriate channels to file a grievance." She even offered to post a clarification video scripted by the school district but was denied.
Of course, getting fired for posting a TikTok about work is nothing new — pretty much any HR person would tell you that's a terrible idea. But it's hard not to suspect that this was simply a dodge to ensure DeLoretto-Chudy had no legal recourse after being fired for teaching simple facts that Texas' radical right-wing government — which has banned or restricted more books about LGBTQ or race issues than any other state — deems too "widely debated or currently controversial," to use the law's wording.
This educational radicalism, which Republican politicians have vowed to implement nationwide in their Project 2025 plan for a second Trump Administration, is having dire consequences in Texas. Already faced with a debilitating teacher shortage, 77% of Texas teachers said in 2023 that they were considering leaving the profession.
DeLoretto-Chudy is one of them. She has instead since pivoted to advocacy, helping run the non-profit Texas Voter Project, which seeks to engage younger people in the electoral process in the hopes of changing Texas' course.
The people running Texas' schools may be too cowardly to stand up for their abhorrent, bigoted beliefs with their whole chests when called to the mat by people like DeLoretto-Chudy, but she and many other Texans — including her students — certainly are willing to stand up for what they believe. And if we retain our representative democracy in November, it surely won't be long before they rise up and turn the tables.
John Sundholm is a news and entertainment writer who covers pop culture, social justice, and human interest topics.