Schools are supposed to be places that educate our young people. That’s the theory, at least. Some do the job fairly well while others are beyond awful. They’re the reason some people move into some areas and move out of others.

But schools are also known for doing more indoctrination these days than actual education. We’ve all seen numerous examples.

In Oakland, it seems a couple of schools will be all but explicitly indoctrinating students into supporting gun control.

Since the beginning of this school year, there have been at least two school shootings in Oakland, California.

A shooting at the end of August in Madison Park academy in East Oakland, allegedly committed by a 12-year-old student, left one classmate injured. Another, at Rudsdale Newcomer high school in East Oakland, left six wounded.

These shootings are part of abroader pattern of community gun violence in Oakland, a dynamic that has ripple effects throughout families, neighborhoods and communities.

The daily toll of gun violence is why some Oakland teachers are adopting an innovative and multi-disciplinary gun violence curriculum. The program, which will be used in at least two Oakland schools this year, includes learning about the history of the second amendment, surveying gun violence victims in their own neighborhoods and writing opinion pieces that draw on policy and data analysis.

First, I love out The Guardian doesn’t capitalize the Second Amendment. I suppose it’s part of their style guide since they don’t seem to capitalize any of the amendments, but it’s still jarring since that’s a proper name.

Anywho…

Now, let’s understand that what’s described, in and of itself, doesn’t sound overly objectionable. Delving into the Second Amendment is hardly a bad thing. However, we need to sort of read between the lines a bit.

In social studies, students learned about the second amendment and the history of guns in the US, while in math, they looked at statistics using information they gathered through a survey of their neighbors and other community members. They used their findings to calculate rates of gun violence and then visualized where violence was most prevalent by making a wooden map of Oakland with circuits and LED lights to mark where shootings occurred, according to Swandby.

The students also wrote op-eds about solutions to gun violence, citing policy ideas and statistics they gathered. Guest speakers, including victims of gun violence, city officials and violence prevention specialists were invited to address the entire school.

Note that there are no Second Amendment experts. Instead, we have victims who have been shot or lost someone to “gun violence,” city officials who almost universally oppose the right to bear arms, and “violence prevention specialists,” but no one with a background in the history of gun rights in America.

Yet despite that, they’re supposed to write informed opinion pieces based on what they’ve learned from these speakers and data we know comes from questionable sources, and we’re supposed to trust that it won’t be biased at all?

Yeah, right.

Kids are eager to please people in positions of authority. They’ll say whatever they’re expected to say because they’ve been raised to listen to their teachers.

What that means is that these op-eds are going to regurgitate the talking points pushed by the teachers which will then end up internalized by these students.

That’s how indoctrination works.

What’s worse is that because of this, these kids will actually think they’re fully informed on the topic as they grow into adulthood. They’re not.

Look, understand that I’m not saying that’s how this kind of thing has to go. I’m just saying that’s how it’s going to go, especially in a place like Oakland. Teaching about gun safety would make more sense, as would teaching the horrific ramifications of criminal violence.

But there’s no way teachers in Oakland should be trusted not to indoctrinate on such an important topic.