ISLAMIST GULEN MOVEMENT RUNS U.S. CHARTER SCHOOLS
By Stephen Schwartz
American Thinker
amist_guelen_movement_runs.html
March 29 2010
A secretive foreign network of Islamic radicals now operates dozens of
charter schools — which receive government money but are not required
to adopt a state-approved curriculum — on U.S. soil. The inspirer of
this conspiratorial effort is Fethullah Gulen, who directs a major
Islamist movement in Turkey and the Turkish Diaspora but lives in
the United States. He is number thirteen among the world’s "50 most
influential Muslims," according to one prominent listing.
Gulen has been criticized as the puppet master for the current Turkish
government headed by the "soft Islamist" Justice and Development
Party, known by its Turkish initials as the AKP, in its slow-motion
showdown with the secularist Turkish military. But Gulen is also known
in Muslim countries for his network of 500-700 Islamic schools around
the world, according to differing sources favorable to his movement. A
more critical view of Gulen’s emphasis on education asserts that his
international network of thousands of primary and secondary schools,
universities, and student residences is a key element in solidifying
an Islamist political agenda in Turkey.
But in startling news for Americans, the Gulen movement operates more
than 85 primary and secondary schools on our soil. A roster of the
Gulen schools and of the numerous foundations that support them has
been released to the public by the patriotic group Act! for America.
The Gulen schools are often designated as "science academies" and are
concentrated in Texas, Ohio, and California — with others scattered
across the rest of the country.
Two states that host Gulen charter schools are Arizona and Utah. In
the former, the Daisy Education Corporation (the Gulen movement loves
friendly-sounding institutional names) operates three schools in
Tucson: one serving kindergarten through the eighth grade, another
designated as an elementary school, and a middle-high school, all
under the rubric of the Sonoran Science Academy. In Phoenix, it runs
a satellite kindergarten-to-10th-grade campus with the same name.
The appearance of Gulen charter schools in Tucson has produced critical
attention in local media. The Tucson Weekly published a report at the
end of 2009 noting that the Sonoran Science Academy in the southern
Arizona town had been named "charter school of the year" by the Arizona
Charter School Association. But writer Tim Vanderpool reported that
according to one dismayed parent, who declined identification while
pointing out the Gulen movement’s history of intimidating critics,
"the Sonoran Academy seems constantly to be bringing Turkish educators
into the United States, and subjecting students to substitute teachers
while the teachers await work visas."
Vanderpool submits that "several Sonoran Academy parents believe
the school has a hidden agenda to promote Gulen’s brand of Turkish
nationalism, advance sympathy for that country’s political goals such
as winning acceptance into the European Union, and discourage official
acknowledgment of Turkey’s genocide against the Armenians during World
War I." Such issues are exotic, to say the least, for Tucson parents.
Earlier in 2009, the Beehive Science and Technology Academy, a high
school in Salt Lake City, came under similar critical scrutiny from
the Salt Lake Tribune. That major daily’s writer, Kirsten Stewart,
reported that the Utah State Charter Board had begun an investigation
of the Beehive school following complaints from a former teacher
and an alarmed parent. The complainants asserted that while "Beehive
advertises itself as a public charter school offering college-bound
seventh through 12th graders a foundation in math and science … the
school has another mission: to advance and promote certain Islamic
beliefs. They point to questionable financial transactions and hiring
practices as proof of the school’s covert ties to Turkish Muslim
preacher Fethullah Gulen."
But while Fatih Karatas, principal of the Sonoran Science Academy
middle school in Tucson, flatly denied any connection with the Gulen
movement, Beehive principal Muhammet "Frank" Erdogan in Salt Lake City
admitted such links in the case of his school. The Salt Lake Tribune
quoted his admission that along with him, "many of Beehive’s teachers
and founders also support Gulen’s ideals." The paper also described
how "Adam Kuntz, a first-year history teacher at Beehive, was fired
[in spring 2009], he alleges, for taking academic freedom concerns to
the state board. Earlier in the school year, Kuntz had a run-in with
Erdogan over a lesson plan on World War II and the Holocaust. Erdogan
wanted Kuntz to revise the plan and during a tape-recorded meeting,
questioned conventional accounts of the genocide."
Kelly Wayment, a parent of three children in the school, was removed
from his post on the Beehive administrative board after he e-mailed
other parents about Gulen movement influence in the school. Wayment
told the Salt Lake Tribune that as in the Tucson case, teachers
"tend to be from Turkey and central Asian republics living here on
work visas."
Americans should ask both why and how the Islamist Gulen movement
has managed to establish such a large presence for Turkish religious
political indoctrination in publicly financed education — and should
unite to oppose it.
Stephen Suleyman Schwartz is executive director of the Center for
Islamic Pluralism in Washington, D.C. This article was sponsored by
Islamist Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum.