The new book «School of Woke» details how a combination of big tech money and major political connects allowed Critical Race Theory to find its way into progressive classrooms across the nation.
Few issues have emerged as cultural flashpoints quite like Critical Race Theory. Better-known as CRT, the ideology — which places race and racism at the center of learning — has become a cornerstone of academic curricula nationwide. Some parents embrace it, others despise it – and Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis tried to ban it from Florida public schools entirely. In his new book “School of Woke,” author Kenny Xu explores the intriguing path CRT has navigated to reach this critical juncture and the roles that big tech, big money and political elites have played in the process.
In the summer of 2018, Merrick Garland, who had just lost his bid to become a Supreme Court Justice, walked his daughter Rebecca Garland down the aisle of the luxurious St. Vrain wedding venue in Longmont, Colo., her arm clutched in his.
He was leading her to her about-to-be husband, Alexander “Xan” Tanner.
Xan Tanner, then 27, was the wunderkind cofounder of Panorama Education, a New York Times-profiled full-service “analytical software and services company” based in Boston, Mass.
A millionaire and a Mark Zuckerberg acolyte, Xan Tanner sat at the pinnacle of what was increasingly becoming the height of liberal fashion — Yale grad, big-tech CEO, education activist.
But what was behind his fortune?
The New York Times may have described Panorama in cagey language in its coverage of the Tanner-Garland wedding, but the reality is that Panorama Education is not a software company at all but rather an educational technology company whose lead business model is data, particularly data about children.
Along with his fellow Yale graduates Aaron Feuer and David Carel, Tanner created a student-surveying platform that focuses on the mysterious concept of “social-emotional learning,” which Panorama defines rather vaguely as “supporting the whole student.”
Yet what’s curious is his quick rise to riches.
There’s nothing technologically savvy about Tanner’s product, which could have been created on SurveyMonkey. But strangely, Zuckerberg chose Tanner out of many potential investment opportunities and elected to fund him. Tanner ended up raising more than $16 million personally from the tech billionaire and $76 million from others by using Zuckerberg’s name between the years 2017 and 2021, as Forbes reported.
Zuckerberg had a very intense interest in “fixing” public schools, and his $1 billion Startup: Education fund, which he established in 2012, was actively looking to invest in educational do-gooders like Tanner. The fund was made to “[improve] education for the nation’s most underserved children.” Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, believed that they could “solve” education in America by leveraging what he knew best — the power of big business.
But the Facebook CEO needed loyal servants for his cause.
And Xan Tanner, with his prestigious background and social-justice bona fides, fit the profile.
