JACKSON – Members of the governing body gave support to a state assembly bill involving sex education and questioned different legislation that would mandate grief counseling in high schools.
Councilman Nino Borrelli noted a township resolution that “supports Assembly Bill A-4801 that is sponsored by our former council colleague 12th District Assemblyman Alex Sauickie that directs the State Board of Education to rescind the graphic and perverse sex education and health and physical education standards which they adopted during the height of the pandemic.”
The state’s Comprehensive Health and Physical Education guidelines are 66 pages long, and actually contain very little about sex ed. However, some expressed concern about things like anal and oral sex being mentioned – although districts had control over how little detail they would include.
Politicians attacked the guidelines, asserting that introducing gay fictional characters or information about real LGBTQ+ people in history to children at a young age would turn children gay. Parents said these are conversations that belonged in the home.
The state’s guidelines can be found here: nj.gov/education/cccs/2020/2020%20NJSLS-CHPE.pdf
Every school district adopted policies to work the state guidelines into their curriculum their own way, so the districts still had some amount of home rule. Many already had feedback from parents.
“They mandated it to be taught to public school children. The bill also prevents the State Board of Education from adopting or mandating any similar curriculum standards in the future,” Councilman Borrelli said.
He added, “under this bill local school boards of education would also establish a curriculum advisory committee of parents and guardians of students enrolled in the school district. Their meetings would be open to the public. New health and education curriculum standards would then be adopted by local school boards within 100 days of the bill’s enactment.
“Parents and guardians should be in the know and in agreement of what is being taught to their kids in the schools. They are the parents and guardians,” Borrelli added. He noted support of this bill furthers the Council’s efforts “to fight back against the wrong policies of the state education bureaucracy, Governor Phil Murphy and the Democrat controlled state legislature.
“Jackson will continue to stand up for parents’ rights and what is right and decent and what makes just common sense in protecting our school children from totally age-inappropriate instruction and indoctrination,” Councilman Borrelli added.
Councilman Steven Chisholm said according to a recent news article “Jackson was the safest large town in New Jersey. That is pretty good news for those of us that live here so congratulations to our Jackson PD (Police Department) for actually helping it make it so.”
Chisholm noted the police department’s recent arrest of a shoplifting ring at the Jackson Outlets shopping plaza. “Kudos to them for helping to keep our town safe. That is why we support the Jackson PD – they are a great bunch.”
Council members each offered congratulations to Mayor Michael Reina, Jennifer Kuhn and Scott Sargent on their recent victories in the election for mayor and the two council seats that each have four-year terms.
Referencing the election, Chisholm remarked “this is the greatest and freest country in the world and we’ve become a laughing stock. Elections from Mercer County to Las Vegas, Michigan to Arizona a week plus and they can’t figure it out. We’ve had Jimmy Carter go to third world nations to be an observer and this is what we get here at home.”
“Florida had a problem 20 plus years ago. They can now count votes seven and a half million of them by 9 p.m. These other states can’t get it right and we wonder why everybody doubts the effectiveness and results of our elections in these different areas,” Chisholm added.
The councilman said, “this needs to be fixed. We need to fix our own house this is a problem. Get it right America. If this is what we are going to do, this is what we need to have happen. If we can send rockets into space, why can we not fix an election machine?”
Chisholm criticized a local state senator’s recently introduced legislation mandating grief classes for high school students in New Jersey. “In an of itself this doesn’t sound like a bad idea. Nothing wrong with that and God knows we’ve had plenty of problems with people and grief.
“Suicide is through the roof. Drug abuse is through the roof but the question becomes is this really what we should be mandating?” Councilman Chisholm asked.
“How about we mandate English, reading, writing, arithmetic – things that can actually make New Jersey one of the top five instead of one of the bottom five states to live in the states,” Chisholm added. “Perhaps we can make America ahead of China and 20 other countries again.”
The councilman instead suggested that grief counseling be a matter of the families, the church and social workers. “The government should be focused on…how about civics? How about you teach our kids what our country is all about because our nation is the freest in the nation because they are not seeing that.”
He also advocated for Sauickie’s bill in hopes of “getting that fixed.”
Council Vice President Andrew Kern congratulated Sauickie who was his former running mate four years ago, on his election to the state assembly.
Council President Martin Flemming said, “I to wish to congratulate our mayor and welcome our new councilman and councilwoman. Hopefully we can work well together.”
Chris Lundy contributed to this story.
The post Officials Oppose Sex Ed, Grief Counseling appeared first on Jersey Shore Online.
