Subsidized international schools try to evade the Trump-Rubio ban on racially divisive pedagogy.
The State Department is cleaning house on diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Its Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor recently sent a questionnaire to groups that receive aid to check if any of the bureau’s foreign assistance is supporting DEI activities. The Foreign Service Institute removed more than 1,200 DEI training courses for diplomats. But even with this overhaul, many international schools that receive State Department funds still boast of DEI commitments on their websites.
The Office of Overseas Schools at the State Department gives financial assistance to 193 international schools. In 2020 the State Department allocated $22 million to U.S.-assisted overseas schools. These schools teach children of U.S. foreign-service workers at diplomatic posts. They also share American-style education and values with foreign students. State Department-assisted schools educate nearly 140,000 students, a quarter of whom are American citizens.
Given the important role these schools have in spreading American values abroad, it matters that they comply with State Department standards, such as halting DEI activities. Yet international school consultants have been advising schools to rename DEI programs to conceal their purpose. Consultants advise schools to add apolitical terms like “belonging” to DEI to mitigate criticism. In practice, this means relabeling “power and privilege wheels” to “safety and belonging wheels.” These wheels—circular diagrams of characteristics such as “skin color” and “body size”—purport to teach students about identities perceived as marginalized in society.
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