The country’s political divide has been on clear display at school board meetings across the country all summer and this fall. That’s true too in Virginia, where education has taken central stage in the gubernatorial race.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin has latched onto the heated debates, falsely stating that CRT has moved into all Virginia schools and jumping on one of his opponents, Democrat Terry McAuliffe, for saying parents shouldn’t “be telling schools what they should teach.”

The dialogue about what say — if any — parents should have when it comes to what their kids are learning in schools has been at the center of much of the debate. One Youngkin campaign video features a Loudoun County parent who was upset over a book her high school senior was reading in an advanced placement literature class, Toni Morrison’s “Beloved.”

Loudoun County also made national headlines as a bitter fight unfolded over racism in the school district. In Central Virginia, similar fights are playing out in Hanover County.