Why a Teach Truth Day of Action

We are inspired by the range of activities that grassroots educators, librarians, and allies are planning around the country. 

In Cleveland, they are giving awards to Ohio school board members who refuse to sign the anti-DEI directive. 

In 10 cities, they are showing the documentary Banned Together about young people taking on book bans and curriculum censorship.

In D.C., they are marching — with a marching band — from the National Museum of American History and Culture to the National Museum of the American Indian. 

In Columbia, South Carolina; Athens, Georgia; and more cities — educators are teaching banned history in public spaces. 

They are using our downloadable quotes and timelines on the struggle for Black education for gallery walks. 

There are events in Alaska, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Nevada, Puerto Rico, and many more states. Close to 200 events in 35 states in all. 

We’ll hear from our speakers about why these events are so important. 

Thank you so much, Jesse, and as you said my name is Princess Moss and I am a proud music teacher from Virginia. I am also the vice president of the nearly three million member National Education Association. As a music teacher, I believe that all students, no matter their race or place, deserve great public schools where they can learn, grow, and thrive, no exceptions.

However, over the past several years some politicians have been trying to censor the lessons taught in our classrooms. They’re trying to ban books and exclude certain kids based on what they look like or where they live. They’re trying to divide and distract us from their failures to provide all of our kids everything they need to learn, grow, and thrive. But together we can make our voices loud and clear to protect the freedom to learn and teach truth across the country.

On June 7, thousands will join the 5th annual national Teach Truth Day of Action and lead the resistance through the coordinated assault on inclusive education and the orchestrated campaign to whitewash history. From Alaska to Puerto Rico, as you’ve heard Jesse say, educators in more than 200 cities are hosting events to defend the freedom to learn. They’re doing banned book swaps, historical walking tours, film screenings, and teaching lessons that celebrate Black history, Indigenous resistance, immigrant rights, and LGBTQ+ pride.

Just this past May 31, in Washington, D.C., NEA sponsored the Freedom Town Hall Rally with authors Kwame Alexander, Amanda Jones, Meg Medina, Jason Reynolds, and more to defend creative expression and to defend access to all books and the freedom to learn. On June 7, there is the march to defend history and museums, which you’ve heard about, that will be on the mall. I’m excited because there will be a marching band and teacher pledges, and NEA is a proud co-host to this nationwide initiative led by the Zinn Education Project, in partnership with the National Education Association, and co-sponsored by more than 80 prominent civil rights and advocacy organizations, aims to defend the right to an honest and inclusive education and to resist the rapidly growing government efforts to censor history and restrict learning in K–12 classrooms.

This year’s day of action takes place amid a full-scale assault on public education, from the presidential Executive Order to dismantle the Department of Education to the federal initiative to defund public schools and ban discussions on racism, climate change, gender, and systemic oppression. Educators are under relentless attack and the very future of public education is at stake. These attacks have been coupled with state-level censorship laws and local, district crackdowns designed to whitewash history, silence marginalized voices, and intimidate educators.

NEA calls on educators, students, families, and allies to rise with us. As educators, we have the professional and moral responsibility to defend a truthful education and the rights of all of our students, no matter their race, gender, identity, or immigration status. This day of action is a commitment by educators to teach full and accurate U.S. history and current events, and to affirm the humanity of all of our students. It is a call to raise awareness of the dangers of lying to students about the existence and persistence of structural and systemic racism and all forms of oppression.

This is more than a day of action; it’s a line in the sand. We will not lie to children, we will not erase the past, we will welcome every student, every one of them, and we will not back down. Thank you very much for the opportunity to share our thoughts and our commitment from the National Education Association to this very important work.

Thank you so much. It’s an honor and a privilege to be amongst the people that are fighting for our future. I want to start off by saying that Transgender Law Center is the largest national trans organization advocating for self-determination for all people. Since 2002, we’ve been organizing, assisting, and forming and empowering thousands of individual community members towards a long-term national trans-led movement for liberation.

Defending honest education in our public schools is critical to transgender liberation. We must fully fund public schools where all students can feel welcome and respected, learn about a wide range of cultures, and have their rights protected regardless of their races, backgrounds, or genders. In the last few months we’ve seen widespread attacks on the ability of educators to actually focus on the task at hand. The Trump administration threatened to cut federal funds to California schools over transgender athletes just last week. They did this in Maine earlier this year.

Let’s be clear. What the Trump administration is doing is bullying transgender kids off of sports teams to rig the rules for billionaires, making all but the wealthiest families fight for scraps. We see this playing out again all over the country after transphobic siren songs are used to sow mistrust in our teachers and school administrators for trying to create spaces in which every student feels welcome and invited to learn. They introduce bills that privatize education. After all of this, it is very clear that anti-trans rhetoric is a part of their strategy to defund public education, aiming directly at the heart of Brown v. Board of Education.

How starkly this differs from the vision, how starkly this differs from their supported belief in the importance of our youth and the future. Now, where we believe that fully funded public education is a core part of every young person’s experience in this world, and their ability to shape the future is where we can see how starkly our vision differs from our opposition.

I want to share an example that’s near and dear to my heart. It is very personal. Oklahoma Union Public Schools, a school district that covers parts of Tulsa and some of the suburbs, received bomb threats for six consecutive days a few years ago. The children who had to be evacuated from their schools were predominantly low income, predominantly children of immigrants, who were unaware that the threats had come because of a post from Libs of Tik Tok that had shared a critical video about one of its school librarians. The point that this school librarian had made in this video that was re-shared by Libs of Tik Tok was “My radical liberal agenda is teaching kids to love books and be kind.” [This was followed by] six days of consecutive bomb threats. Six days in which parents had to go pick up their kids, if they were able to get the time off of school. I was told by teachers at the school that oftentimes kids had to linger after these bomb threats had been called in, worried that something was actually going to happen and completely unaware that they were being used as pawns to score political points. This same Libs of Tik Tok creator was later appointed to Oklahoma’s state library committee. That is our opposition’s vision of the future.

Where you all come in, and where the people who stood up in Oklahoma come in and take a special place in my heart, is the recognition that it requires courage these days to uphold our love of reading, our love of knowledge, our love of the future for our children, and our love of the future for this country. It is only through this deep love and solidarity, whatever race, class, genders, backgrounds we come from, we must be loud about our values. That is how we will navigate this moment and that is how we will win. Thank you.

Thank you very much, and I really appreciate the invitation. You know, in 2021, when the censorship bills first hit Ohio, I reached out to some of my educator colleagues and asked them to send me some students, because it was time for students’ voices to be heard. So, I was able to work with 13 students from five different school districts. We met every week on Zoom and they wrote letters to editors, they were interviewed by the TV and radio, and they spoke at their school board meetings about the importance of honest education. So that’s why it’s so important for students to be able to be taught an honest education, because if they can’t talk about the inequities and the causes of those inequities in their schools, then it has the potential to diminish their ability to be active civic participants, to understand the world they occupy, and to hopefully build a better society. And this was really evident.

There’s a part of history that seldom gets taught in schools. I’ve been told by history teachers that those who do teach history always add it to their agenda, but that’s Reconstruction. Something that [W. E. B. Du Bois] called a moment in the sun for African-Americans. I was doing some research and I ran across a response from a student in Philadelphia who learned about Reconstruction, and this is what he said:

I didn’t know how much power Black people had gained in this short time, and always just assumed it went immediately from slavery to Jim Crow. It is important for students to learn about this era because it represents a period of mass change that reveals that Black people don’t need saving, but have seized and defined freedom on our own. And that’s what the folks who are censoring and who are whitewashing education, that’s what they don’t want. Africana means to know. They don’t want us to know that we don’t need to be saved, that we can define freedom on our own, and that we understand that we are a powerful people and we have contributed a whole lot to the development of this country.

So that’s why the Teach Truth Day of Action is so, so important. We have some school board members all over the country, but especially in Ohio we have school board members who understand what their job is, and that’s to put students first. 

At our Teach Truth Day of Action, we’re calling it Finding Joy in Teaching. We are going to be giving what we call Guardians of Justice awards to school board members who believe that their students are the most important thing and that they are going to look out for their students because that’s their job.

I’m wearing the pin now, I hope you can see it. It’s a Guardian of Justice award. We’re going to be giving awards to school board members along with a certificate.

So far we have three districts that are going to be actually showing up, including Cincinnati Shaker Heights School District and the Cleveland Heights University Heights District. They are going to come to our event on June 7. We’re going to hold on to the awards and as we continue to hear from more school board members we will mail them their Guardian of Justice awards and their certificates. We want to encourage people: Don’t be intimidated. Don’t be afraid. We have a democracy to protect and it’s our job to do that. So, I want to thank you for this opportunity.

I am proud to be here today to speak on behalf of Authors Against Book Bans, a nationally led, grassroots organized group of over 5,000 book creators across the U.S. and world, united in our deep concern over book bans, and the censorious culture war being waged on our institutions of learning.

As Authors Against Book Bans, we stand for the freedom to read and the freedom to write. What this means, practically, is not just the opportunity to make a dollar here and there — but to practice our craft without fear of retaliation, censorship, or bigotry. It may seem lofty goal, but it’s one that is essential to democracy, and freedom itself. There is no liberty without knowledge. And achieving that goal starts in the classroom.

We are all too aware of the odds facing educators these days. Of the cruelty and unjust maligning they are subject to — all for the crime of doing their jobs. And while we know that noisy cohorts of minority voices from groups such as Moms for Liberty seek spread lies about groomers or indoctrination, we also know that we, as creators can see those falsehoods for what they are. And we stand with educators. We trust you to do your jobs. Even if and when that will require you not to comply with mandates that will befoul the very foundation of everything we all stand for — which is, above all else, truth.

Educators and creators both have a deep understanding that while the truth may make us uncomfortable, angry, or deeply sad, that it is that same discomfort that will allow children to grow. That same anger that will serve as a catalyst for positive change. And that even our sadness, our grief is a necessary component for solidarity — that same solidarity that will always be more powerful than any administration that comes or goes.

It would be so easy to simply not make a fuss. To do what would cause the least amount of problems in our lives, and to call it a day. At least, it would be in the short term. But every day we make a compromise out of fear is another day we sentence ourselves to live through more of it. Every time we sit when we ought to stand, we are making it all the more impossible for the children we serve to see that they have power in their voices and in their hearts.

Truth has never been the easiest cause to serve. Lies are so cheap. But the more air we give those lies, the more powerful they become, until we are engulfed in them, a firestorm of falsehood and cruelty, of capriciousness and arbitrary suffering that need never have been.

On behalf of Authors Against Book Bans, thank you for listening to us today. Thank you for joining us in this difficult but essential fight. Thank you for teaching the truth, even when it would be easier to teach a lie.

Let us remind those that would eradicate truth that they have picked a fight with the most passionate, the smartest, and the most powerful cohort possible: Readers.

And after all, what have we been reading about this whole time in those school libraries they would defund? Stories of bravery. Of courage. Of truth. So let’s fight like it.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak on behalf of the American Association of School Librarians. We are living in a moment that calls for courage and clarity. Across the country, state legislators are proposing laws that would limit what learners can access — books, ideas, and voices that reflect the rich diversity of our communities and of our world. And behind many of these efforts is a small but organized group actively spreading misinformation about school libraries and the dedicated professionals that run them.

But here’s a truth I want to share. Librarians are not the problem. They are champions of intellectual freedom, defenders of curiosity, and protectors of every student’s right to explore and learn. And right now, librarians need you because they are being unfairly attacked, as we heard earlier, simply for doing what they were trained and called to do. The good news is that we are not powerless. In fact, we have more influence than we sometimes realize.

So what can we do? We show up, we speak out, and we hold the line. That means making our voices heard by visiting, calling, and emailing state leaders, school boards, and school administrators. Let these leaders know that you support the freedom to read and the right to access diverse ideas. The First Amendment doesn’t just protect the right to speak, it protects the right to receive information, and when books are banned that right is denied. We can lift up the people doing the work, too. Send a message to your local librarian or library administrator [and] tell them thank you. Tell them that their work matters. Tell them you’re standing beside them. A few kind words can carry tremendous weight during these difficult times. Speak out in your communities, and if you see efforts to restrict access to books, write a letter to the editor or an op-ed. Use your voice to counter fear with facts and censorship, with compassion, and don’t forget to report censorship.

The American Library Association documented 821 attempts to censor materials in 2024, affecting over 2,400 unique titles. That is fewer than last year, but it’s still one of the highest numbers ever recorded. We can’t let fatigue or discouragement make us silent. Every report of censorship matters, and here’s the most important thing: You matter. Your presence, your words, your advocacy, they create ripples that inspire others and protect the rights for all. So, let’s move forward with hope, with determination, and with courage, with the belief that truth, access, and freedom are worth defending, because together we can make a difference. Thank you.

Thank you so much. I’m really here representing the Public School Strong organizing initiative. What that is is that it’s educators, students, family members, and community members building power together at the school board level all across the country and coordinating this local work in a way that builds statewide and national impact. So, as Princess noted, the classroom censorship issue is a key part of an existential threat to public education in this country. Taking on an attack at that scale can feel so daunting for regular folks. So what we’ve done is given folks tools to get started, tried and true first steps of getting a team together and supporting them through actually reaching out in your local community and doing this in a way that connects all of these federal attacks to actually how is this going to impact my local school, my community, and how do we actually speak out about what the real needs in our community actually are.

So, to give you a little bit of a picture of where this all is coming from, this started in North Carolina back in April 2023. We were facing attacks from Moms for Liberty groups all across the state at once. And these were places where there wasn’t an organizer physically there. So we had one organizer that put out the call to individuals that were really alarmed by the chaos at school board meetings. They joined a Zoom call and got started with just how do I go from being an individual taking action to actually being a group, a team, and how do I show up there and not just have it be this parent group versus another parent group but really start to speak to what brings all of us together? Because public education is actually really popular. 

So, within four months they were able to get volunteer teams up and running in 62 out of a 100 counties throughout the state, and basically the pro-censorship groups were run out of these school board meetings and the teams were then able to go on to the next fight around extreme budget cuts at the state level. We see actions like the Teach Truth Day of Action as really key. You start locally. You start talking to your neighbors and friends about what’s really going on and start connecting the dots. We believe that it’s really important to go start with local decision makers. The most local decision makers are your school board members, and we saw that this dynamic that was happening in North Carolina is not unique to that state, so we really built out supports so that any individual from anywhere in the country can participate in Public School Strong and get the support they need to get started, even if they feel isolated wherever they are.

We now have thousands of people from across the country on our organizing platform and we are all in on the Teach Truth Day of Action. Folks have started creating their actions to engage their communities on this important issue, connecting them to teams that can then push school boards to pass resolutions that push back on censorship and for fully funding public education. We draw on relationships with statewide groups in Ohio, Michigan, Tennessee, Maine, Colorado, California, Indiana, Florida, New Jersey, [and] Arizona. As you see, it’s all across the map. And that’s because this is an all hands on deck moment and everyone is needed.

I want to leave you with a little glimpse of what has been possible by having this strategy. It’s an example from Tennessee, which faced a huge uphill battle last year with the school voucher bill, in a state with pro-voucher supermajorities leading that state. And they were backed by billionaires that were running advertising and door-knocking campaigns against public education. In the face of these overwhelming odds, they managed to defeat this voucher bill that would have siphoned hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars from public schools and given them to private and religious schools. How did they do it? They started with these Public School Strong teams, and each team got homegrown local pressure to get school boards to pass resolutions saying this is not good for our area. From there these teams moved on to pressuring legislators and making sure that they saw from their constituents that this was critical and that we needed to make sure that vouchers don’t go through. They were able to accomplish something that few thought was possible, and that’s because they demonstrated broad support throughout the states, not just the cities. And we see that on this issue of censorship, this is something that we need to be focusing on, talking to our neighbors, and showing that there is broad support for public education and that every child, regardless of zip code, deserves quality, fully-funded public education.