by Staff Reporter | Dec 6, 2025 | Education, News
By Staff Reporter |
A North Valley elementary school increased the number of Pride posters in its hallways after parents complained about a lesson in which students were taught to play a song about dancing at a gay bar.
As the Arizona Daily Independent (ADI) reported, parents learned after the fact about a recent lesson in a music class at Desert Trails Elementary in which students were directed to play boomwhackers to “Pink Pony Club,” a charting pop song about transitioning to an LGBTQ+ lifestyle and dancing at a gay bar.
The song is by lesbian starlet Chappell Roan, who gained popularity in 2024 from another hit single about her sexuality, “Good Luck, Babe!” Roan, who dresses in the style of drag queens, is widely viewed as an LGBTQ+ icon and advocate.
According to reports and social media chatter, parents were not offered an opt-out or even made aware of the lesson beforehand. According to the ADI, the Paradise Valley Unified School District cleared the teacher to resume classes this week on the promise that he would abide by parental notification requirements in the future.
The educator who implemented the lesson was hired earlier this summer: Jerry Michael Nanney, who goes by Michael Nanney.
Nanney claimed to the school and parents that he didn’t know the context of the song.
“Pink Pony Club” discusses a woman’s desire to leave behind her religious upbringing in the South and join the progressive community out West. The lyrics of the song define identity through sexuality.
In the song, Roan narrates the horror of the woman’s mother “scream[ing]” as “she sees her baby girl” dancing at a club. The woman in the song explains to her horrified mother that she’s “just having fun.”
“And I heard that there’s a special place / Where boys and girls can be queens every single day,” states the song lyrics. “I’m up and jaws are on the floor / Lovers in the bathroom and a line outside the door / Blacklights and mirrored disco ball / Every night’s another reason why I left it all / I thank my wicked dreams.”
As noted elsewhere in other reports and online, “pink pony” has multiple meanings. The term can refer to sex, as well as male genitalia.
The artist, Roan, disclosed the pink and some of the narration for the fictitious club were inspired by a hometown strip club, and the atmosphere and content within the song were inspired by her first visit to a gay bar in California.
All of this information, along with the music video for the song in which Roan, drag queens, and gay men dance suggestively, is available and easily accessible online.
Sleuthing parents and community members with Scottsdale Unites for Educational Integrity uncovered social media activity by Nanney that undermined his claim that he didn’t know the meaning of the song. Online, Nanney had shared posts by accounts dedicated to drag queen news and culture.
Reports uncovered, further, that Nanney leads the choir for an LGBTQ+-friendly church in Sun City.
These discoveries make Nanney’s claim of no knowledge of the song unlikely.
Nanney also reported obtaining the song as a choice from a list made by other educators who, the district would later confirm, were not within PVUSD.
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by Staff Reporter | Dec 5, 2025 | Education, News
By Staff Reporter |
An art exhibit at Northern Arizona University (NAU) allegedly displayed a poster mocking Charlie Kirk’s assassination.
The poster depicts the Turning Point founder and former CEO in a black and white screenprint, surrounded by blood red. A Nazi symbol follows the directory of the fatal bullet that went through Kirk’s neck. Beneath, the artist included the phrase, “Cowabummer,” a slang term used to express sarcastic empathy.
The artist signed only their initials: “A.S.”
The original poster of the print, Libs of TikTok, didn’t indicate where the print was displayed on campus, or when, but that a follower had sent it.
There were several recent art exhibits at NAU.
From mid-September until Thanksgiving Day, the Clara M. Lovett Art Museum featured the exhibit “Prints. People. Power.” The exhibit featured prints from three artist collectives, only one of which remains active: Arizona Print Group.
Additionally, NAU’s Beasley Gallery is featuring Resonance: BFA Capstone Exhibition to showcase graduating BFA candidates from NAU’s School of Art + Design. The exhibition launched Nov. 21 and will last until Dec. 12.
Kirk was assassinated on Sept. 10 while speaking at Utah Valley University, nearly a month to the day before his 32nd birthday. The man charged with Kirk’s assassination, Tyler James Robinson, was politically aligned with progressives, especially on issues pertaining to LGBTQ+ culture and ideologies.
Robinson was in a homosexual relationship with another man, Lance Twiggs, who identified as a woman and was in the process of transitioning genders.
Robinson is scheduled for in-person oral arguments on Jan. 16 and 30. His legal team asked the judge to limit media coverage in the courtroom due to concerns for a right to fair trial; the judge did impose restrictions on filming and photography to prevent further public exposure to the image of Robinson wearing shackles.
Rep. Eli Crane said if the print were indeed featured in an NAU art gallery, then NAU was “another shameful example of what’s wrong with higher education in America.”
As with many other college campuses across the country, NAU students have been captured on film targeting TPUSA tables with vandalization, theft, and threats on violence.
One student vandalized a table and stole a sign. Another handed the table workers a note with a death threat depicting Kirk’s assassination.
“A good Nazi is a dead one,” said the note. “Free speech!”
As far as public reporting goes, NAU has yet to address these incidents.
As of last month, TPUSA reported receiving around 350,000 new student registrations and over 135,000 new chapter requests.
Efforts to establish chapters on campuses have been met with resistance at high schools and postsecondary institutions, in large part due to TPUSA’s Professor Watchlist. The list documents professors accused of discriminating against conservative students.
Only one NAU professor is on the TPUSA Professor Watchlist: Heather Martel, an associate professor of history and associate faculty in the women’s and gender studies program.
Martel made the watchlist after telling a student in her history class that he wasn’t allowed to read the Bible before class in 2017.
Kirk was last on NAU’s campus in October 2024 as part of his “You’re Being Brainwashed Tour.” This latest tour, which was his last, was titled “The Great American Comeback Tour.”
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Ethan Faverino | Dec 4, 2025 | Education, News
By Ethan Faverino |
Eight Arizona state lawmakers have joined Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne in demanding immediate action to revise the Structured English Immersion (SEI) framework, warning that the current language, loaded with Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) ideology, violates state law, undermines classroom neutrality, and jeopardizes $866 million in federal education funds.
In a November 25 letter to the State Board of Education, Representatives Michele Peña (LD-23), David Marshall (LD-7), Michael Carbone (LD-25, Majority Leader), James Taylor (LD-29), Leo Biasiucci (LD-30), Lisa Fink (LD-27), and Senators Hildy Angius (LD-30) and Tim Dunn (LD-25), threw their full support behind the Arizona Department of Education’s (ADE) proposed revision.
The legislators accused universities and institutions of exploiting “vague and permissive language” to inject “ideological, divisive, and race-based content” into mandatory SEI coursework—material that has no place in research-based English language instruction.
The lawmakers cited constituent complaints that SEI courses, intended solely for neutral English acquisition methods under A.R.S. § 15-756.01, have instead become vessels for racialized theories that divide classrooms, distract educators, and shift instructional time away from statutory requirements.
The letter also highlighted a direct threat to federal funding. President Trump’s recent Executive Order explicitly prohibits the use of federal dollars for DEI programming. The existing SEI Endorsement Course Framework is not compliant, and keeping it as-is exposes Arizona to unnecessary and avoidable risk, the legislators warned, urging the Board to authorize ADE to open the rulemaking process immediately.
Superintendent Horne echoed the urgency in a statement released December 2, praising the legislative coalition. “I am very thankful to the eight lawmakers who sent a letter calling on the Board to start the process to revise Arizona’s teaching standards and remove DEI language,” Horne said. “This is essential not just because DEI language improperly emphasizes race over individual merit, but it threatens $866 million in federal education funds under the President’s recent Executive Order.”
He added, “Removing DEI terms from state teaching standards is the right thing to do. We must rid race-based ideology from the classroom and ensure teachers spend their time teaching math, science, language, history, and the arts. The support of these legislators is especially helpful to convey the importance and urgency of this task, and I urge my fellow board members not to further delay this process.”
The lawmakers criticized the Board’s decision to table the issue at its October 27 meeting and form a study committee, calling the move a delay tactic designed to slow or obstruct needed reforms. They insisted that the question before the Board was never about voting on specific changes but simply whether to begin the public stakeholder process to restore instructional neutrality and legal compliance.
ADE has prepared to launch the month-long rulemaking process covering teacher standards at Arizona’s three public universities. The State Board of Education is scheduled to revisit the proposal at its December 8, 2025, meeting.
Ethan Faverino is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send him news tips using this link.
by Matthew Holloway | Nov 29, 2025 | Education, News
By Matthew Holloway |
Arizona lawmakers are urging the State Board of Education to fix the state’s Structured English Immersion (SEI) Endorsement Course Framework at its December 1st meeting, according to a letter from Rep. Michele Peña (R-LD23).
A group of State Representatives and Senators cosigned the letter from Peña, warning that existing rules risk placing Arizona out of compliance with federal funding mandates and allow the insertion of politics and racial rhetoric into courses designed to prepare educators, in violation of state law.
“Parents expect English-language instruction to focus on English-language instruction,” Peña said in a statement. “Instead, they’re finding courses with ideological material that has nothing to do with helping students learn English. The Board can’t ignore federal requirements, and it shouldn’t look the other way while universities inject political content into SEI training. The framework needs to be corrected now, and delays only create further problems for students, teachers, and the state.”
Peña warned the board that the present rule set “is harming instructional quality and undermining classroom integrity statewide.”
As noted by Peña, A.R.S. § 15-756.01 requires that the Board of Education “shall adopt and approve research-based models of structured English immersion.” In the letter, Rep. Peña adds, “SEI is intended to be a model focused only on research-based English language acquisition. That is all.”
She continued:
“The insertion of DEI-aligned language, political ideology, or racialized theories is not only outside the scope of the statute, but it also actively undermines the purpose of SEI by introducing content that divides classrooms, distracts educators, and shifts instructional time away from what the law actually requires. Arizona’s students deserve better than to have their language instruction diluted by ideological philosophies and turned into a political debate…
… We expect the Board not to delay corrective action or hide behind process barriers that were never required when these controversial provisions were inserted. Our students, teachers, and districts deserve a framework grounded in objective, research-based instruction, not ideological experimentation.”
The legislators who cosigned the letter include State Representatives David Marshall (R-LD07), James Taylor (R-LD29), Leo Biasiucci(R-LD30), Lisa Fink (R-LD27), and House Majority Leader Michael Carbone (R-LD25), as well as Senators Hildy Angius (R-LD30) and Tim Dunn (R-LD29).
As previously reported by AZ Free News, Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne issued a similar statement in October, calling upon the Board to strip Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) language from Arizona’s teaching standards.
Note: As of this report, the State Board’s public calendar shows the meeting scheduled for Dec. 1, 2025, as a meeting of the Accountability Technical Advisory Committee, while the regular State Board of Education meeting is scheduled for December 8th; this conflicts with the December 1st date provided in Rep. Peña’s statement.
Matthew Holloway is a senior reporter for AZ Free News. Follow him on X for his latest stories, or email tips to Matthew@azfreenews.com.
by Staff Reporter | Nov 26, 2025 | Education, News
By Staff Reporter |
The nation’s biggest union overseeing educators is prioritizing trainings to advance LGBTQ+ justice and defeat white supremacy as student outcomes continue to decline.
The National Education Association (NEA) plans to train educators on these topics through the 2025-26 Focus Academy schedule. Affiliate staff and member teams attend these academies to develop and implement issue organizing campaigns, per the NEA.
The NEA will kick off the holiday season with a three-day training on “Advancing LGBTQ+ Justice and Transgender Advocacy” the week after Thanksgiving.
The training is exclusive to members and allies of the LGBTQ+ community. It seeks to harmonize the LGBTQ+ ideology and strategize to defeat other ideologies opposed to it:
“With partners from the Center for Racial Justice, members of the LGBTQ+ community, and other experts participants will learn how to: establish common understandings about the identities under the LGBTQ+ community umbrella; develop a shared understanding of the anti LGBTQ+ policy landscape and how to develop counter narratives of inclusion and equity; deepen skills and strategies to confront implicit bias, micro-aggressions and stereotypes in the LGBTQ+ community; [and] develop a toolset of tactics for dismantling systems of privilege and oppression as it relates to LGBTQ+ educators and students.”
Within this academy, educators are trained on defaulting to the pluralization of genders, using pronouns, transitioning genders, and implementing the Gender Unicorn.
Then, to kick off the New Year, the NEA will train educators on “address[ing] white supremacy culture.” The NEA emphasized a need for individuals “highly skilled” in handling “white fragility and interpersonal oppressions.” Leaked materials show a term that seems to have fallen out of the wayside in public commentary: Critical Race Theory (CRT).
“Recently, [Republicans] have paired these attacks with fear-mongering about Critical Race Theory, mobilizing their base with a potent mix of racist and transphobic tropes,” stated the training materials.
This focus academy training will have educators complete a campaign plan that details what racial justice looks like:
“Participants will learn how to help themselves and others: establish a common language for talking explicitly about white supremacy culture in a campaign cycle; deepen skills and strategies to confront implicit bias, microaggressions, and stereotypes; develop a shared understanding of the levels of racism with a focus on a power analysis required to make changes at various levels; [and] develop a toolset for dismantling systems of privilege and oppression.”
Defending Education published leaked materials from these academies. Per these materials, NEA leadership harmonizes and equates the issues facing the advancement of LGBTQ+ ideology and Critical Race Theory.
The materials show that the NEA blamed the lack of public support on transgenderism for minors on the political right having “exploited” general ignorance of LGBTQ+ ideology.
“Over the last ten years, Republicans in state legislatures have increasingly turned to anti-transgender rhetoric and legislation as a powerful complement to their arsenal of racist dog whistles used to whip up fear and consolidate power,” said the materials.
The latest Nation’s Report Card by the National Assessment of Educational Progress yielded additional declines in scores across the board for math, reading, and science.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Staff Reporter | Nov 22, 2025 | Education, News
By Staff Reporter |
One of the Scottsdale Unified School District (SUSD) governing board members was busted by the cops for a party attended by teens.
SUSD governing board member Matt Pittinsky threw a “rave party” for his teenage son’s birthday earlier this month that ended with police and an ambulance responding to the scene, per sources cited by the advocacy group, Scottsdale Unites For Educational Integrity.
Pittinsky’s son attends Brophy College Preparatory School, a private high school, where Pittinsky sits on the board of regents.
At a special meeting last week, one of Pittinsky’s neighbors addressed the board about the party. The neighbor said he witnessed a young girl taken to the hospital by first responders for alcohol poisoning. The neighbor questioned Pittinsky’s judgment, especially amid ongoing conversations about the potential closures of two schools: Echo Canyon School and Pima Elementary School.
“There was an underage girl hauled away in an ambulance for alcohol poisoning from a rave party at Mr. Pittinsky’s house,” said the neighbor. “Paradise Valley Police Department had to shut this mess down, and our neighborhood had a mess from it. It was quite the scene.”
Along with his SUSD seat, Pittinsky is an Arizona State University (ASU) visiting scholar for the Sanford School.
Pittinsky has also been CEO of Parchment, which manages and sends academic transcripts, and formerly CEO to Blackboard, a leading education software and learning management system company which he co-founded.
Blackboard received criticism over the years within the education and legal communities over alleged anticompetitive practices: lawsuits over alleged patent infractions and a steady acquisition of competitors that, essentially, forced educators to use them though Blackboard wasn’t their preferred vendor.
An invitation for the Pittinsky party posted by a since-deleted Instagram user, “nov.7.funcoverflow,” said the party would last from 8 pm to “GTFO” (an acronym for “get the f*ck out”), and told guests to “BYOE,” which stands for “bring your own everything.”
According to a letter from Pittinsky and his wife delivered to neighbors, the Pittinskys hired security to limit attendance to invited guests, and promised the party would last only until midnight.
However, eyewitness accounts said that police “shut down” the party several hours into the festivities. Eyewitnesses also reported at least one teenager was taken away from the party in an ambulance.
Scottsdale Unites For Educational Integrity urged parents and community members to address the Pittinsky party during the SUSD’s regular governing board meeting on Tuesday.
Much of the public comment on Tuesday’s meeting focused on voicing opposition to the proposed closures of Echo Canyon School and Pima Elementary School.
Those who did address the Pittinsky party questioned Pittinsky’s dedication to student health and safety.
Scottsdale resident Mike Bengert, a father and grandfather, asked for a complete, public investigation into the incident, as well as an apology and resignation from Pittinsky. Bengert’s remarks were met with applause.
“Hosting, permitting, or failing to prevent an environment in which underage drinking and medical emergencies could occur is deeply troubling,” said Bengert. “Why should the community trust your judgment on issues so critical to our public schools? Your actions suggest a disregard for the safety and wellbeing of the very students you are sworn to serve.”
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