Weast, Navarro, MCPS Honor Garza

You might have noticed on the CRC's web site, a link that says "John Gaza awarded Certificate of Appreciation from MCPS." (Sorry, they spell it that way.) John Garza, you might not have forgotten, is the president of the Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum, their lawyer, who has sued the school district and campaigned for years to undermine the implementation of the new sex-ed curriculum. He is also a member of the advisory board of the group that brought the "gum game" into classrooms, where students passed a piece of gum around, taking turns chewing it, to learn how germs are spread; this was the source of great embarrassment to the district recently when The Post picked up on it.

Clicking on the link takes you to a PDF file of a "Certificate of Appreciation" made out to John Garza, signed by MCPS Superintendent Jerry Weast and Board of Education President Nancy Navarro, "in recognition of outstanding volunteer service."

You just might wonder why they gave him an award. Turns out he participated in a career fair last year at Twinbrook Elementary School, to tell kids what it's like to be a lawyer. MCPS has something they call the Connection Resource Bank, a list of people who can volunteer to help out, scientists who can talk to classes, mentors and tutors, that sort of thing -- I've done it, I went around one year talking about science, and another time I talked to grade-school kids about the Internet, which was still something novel at that time. My wife went to classes one year, too, to talk about being a nurse. It's a great idea, and it sounds like it is very successful for the school district. Somehow Garza got on the list, well, there's no problem if he goes to a school and talks about his job, as far as I'm concerned. As long as that's all he talks about.

So ... why is this on the CRC's web site with no explanation? They wouldn't want to give you a false impression, would they?

Typical.