Philly Teachers Involve School Students In Online Activist Group Chat

As reported by Benjamin Weinthal for Fox News, School District of Philadelphia (SDP) teachers have involved current high school students in the district in their extreme political activism.

Philadelphia Educators for Palestine (PEFP), a sub-group of the Racial Justice Organizing Committee (RJOC), has a Signal chat.

The group, run by teachers Hannah Gann and Keziah Ridgeway, invited current SDP high school students into the Signal chat.

Administrators for the group chat include Hannah Gann, Keziah Ridgeway and Norman Shaw Macqueen, a teacher at an elementary school in the district, and another core member of the RJOC.

Ridgeway had previously been placed on administrative leave while under investigation for allegedly threatening Jewish parents. Ridgeway is back teaching in the district but is suing SDP nonetheless.

Students were present in the chat for promotion of an event which praised October 7 and sharing community commitments which include “ All resistance is righteous. We reject any false equivalences between the violent systems that oppress us and our responses to them.” and “We support efforts for the radical redistribution of resources, including land back, right of return and reparations.”

A group member who expressed discomfort at having school students in the chat was kicked out the group by Keziah Ridgeway.

The revelations regarding the Signal chat come as SDP is under investigation by the House Education and Workforce Committee for antisemitism. The situation has become so untenable that even Governor Josh Shapiro has weighed in, a spokesman for Shapiro telling Fox News:

Governor Shapiro takes a back seat to no one on these issues, and as he has repeatedly spoken out about, antisemitism and this kind of hateful rhetoric is unacceptable and has no place in Pennsylvania — especially not in our classrooms. This is a matter the Governor has made clear the district needs to take very seriously.

Involving students in a private group chat with adults and teachers to encourage not just political activism but a radical political activism that demonizes zionism, glorifies political violence and rails against the police and capitalism is a new low.

Philly Educators for Palestine Grounding Commitments

We recognize that the dismantling of racism and imperialism will require liberation from the confines of capitalism.

All resistance is righteous. We reject false equivalence between the violent systems that oppress us and our responses to them.

Ismael Jimenez, the Director of Social Studies Curriculum for SDP, “liked” the group’s commitments on the RJOC’s facebook page.

Other members of the Signal chat include Adam Sanchez, a senior editor at Rethinking Schools and Mimi Eisen, the program manager at the Zinn Education Project.

PEFP worked with Rethinking Schools to hold a “Teaching Palestine” study group for SDP teachers. Gann, Ridgeway and Nick Palazzolo, another RJOC member and SDP employee, also contributed to the Teaching Palestine book.

Shared In the Chat

Hannah Gann advertised the October 7 “Rally for Rage and Resistance” in the group chat, to “honor the martyrs” and “uplift resistance.” At least one current SDP student attended that march with the PEFP group.

When the NAVI K-12 Extremism Tracker covered the PEFP’s involvement in the rally and the rally organizers outspoken support for Hamas, Gann responded “white tears.” No member of the group chat expressed reservations about the rally’s characterization of October 7 as “Palestinian resistance fighters bravely [breaking] out of the prison…”.

Messages to and from students

Both students were added to the group after having the group link shared with them or being directly added by an admin.

Member Kicked Out Of Group

A member of the group noted that he was uncomfortable with having school students in the chat and that having them in the chat was against SDP policy. Keziah Ridgeway booted that member out of the chat.

The group admins all agreed that it WAS appropriate to have current school students in the chat with adults and teachers. The students “have been involved with PEFP for some time now.”

Ridgeway, who often switches her name in the chat and was at this point going by Missandrei the Great said that teachers who are uncomfortable with students being in the group chat were not in the right “organizing space.” Ridgeway was clear that she “want[s] [the students] in this space.”

In other words, involving students in their activism is a key principle for these Philadelphia school teachers. And they do not care that it goes against district policy.

Hannah Gann weighs in. She agrees with Ridgeway that “engaging with young people is a core part of who we are…as organizers.”

Gann mentions that not only do these students attend PEFP teach-ins, they lead sessions within those teach-ins.

Here is an example of a recent PEFP teach-in that these school students attended:

How would you explain the word Zionism to young people

Contemporary Manifest Destiny.

A 19th Century Supremacist Ideology

Student - MY FAVORITE EDUCATORS. I LOVE YOU GUYS

Ridgeway - WE love you too! By far our favorite students.

Another teacher agrees that it is “good to have a few student voices in the chat.”

When a member of the chat points out that having students in the group chat is a violation of district policy, Ridgeway removes him from the group without further discussion.

Ridgeway tells others who are uncomfortable that they are free to leave.

We work with students all the time and have been doing so for years.

Ridgeway reached out to the group member who had been booted out to see if they’d be “open to a conversation.” Ridgeway made it clear that she had been speaking to the students involved in separate, private discussions with them.

A New Group Chat

After Fox News reached out to Ridgeway and Jimenez for comment on its story, Hannah Gann announced that the PEFP signal chat would close down and a new one would be formed for all members who filled out a form pledging their agreement to the group’s “grounding commitments.”

We would like to create a new group chat for Philly Educators for Palestine where all members agree to uphold and embody these principals. We want to ensure that everyone feels aligned, protected, and unapologetic as we organize together.

It is unclear at this time what action SDP plans to take.