UN Demands U.S. Schools Follow Its Dictates

The United Nations and its “human rights” bureaucracy are unhappy with American education — especially President Donald Trump’s policies and proposals. Instead of local or parental control, the UN is pushing for radical changes: more federal power, less educational choice, government oversight of private schools, and the promotion of controversial ideological content — all at taxpayer expense. It also wants education globally redefined as a UN-backed “human right.”

The eventual goal is a UN-controlled, highly centralized “education” system that transforms children and society by changing minds, attitudes, and beliefs. Indeed, the UN has been openly calling for just such centralization for decades in official agreements adopted by governments worldwide. And now, the UN is naming and shaming those nations whose governments do not fully submit to the demands. Naturally, the United States is in the crosshairs as one of the chief villains.

UN Investigates U.S.

The UN’s latest attack on U.S. education, parental rights, state and national sovereignty, and the Constitution came in the form of an investigation and “country report” to the UN’s dictator-dominated Human Rights Council. The outfit, which regularly praises mass-murdering regimes while condemning Western nations, frequently targets the God-given rights of Americans enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.

Invited in by Joe Biden’s administration, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education Farida Shaheed, a radical Pakistani activist, was highly critical of U.S. education after a trip to multiple states. To remedy the “problems,” she offered a range of “recommendations” for policymakers. Among other demands on education, the United States needs more federal involvement in and oversight of government and private schools, not less, argued Shaheed in her report, which was dated April 14 of this year following her in-depth investigation of U.S. education policy in April and May of 2024.

Blasting Trump’s efforts to shut down or at least reduce the power of the U.S. Department of Education, Shaheed claimed such policies would hurt low-income students, weaken “civil rights,” disrupt “higher learning,” and produce other alleged horrors. “The loss of federal oversight could deepen inequities, harm marginalized students and undermine social mobility,” she argued.

The final report does acknowledge that, under the U.S. Constitution’s 10th Amendment, education is not a federal responsibility. However, it frames that as a problem to be solved. And it then proceeds to claim that the U.S. government, as a “state party” to various UN schemes, is obligated under “international law” to impose the UN’s agenda on education nationwide.

Perversion, Leftism, and Racial Obsession Needed

Aside from blasting what remains of local control and decentralized policymaking on education across America, Shaheed also called for more ideologically driven mandates. The goal: Make sure children learn what the UN thinks they must learn. This continues a long pattern of demands from the UN.

States including Florida and Texas were singled out by the UN for passing laws trying to protect students — especially young students — from indoctrination with Marxist-inspired critical race theory; LGBT prop­aganda; diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI); gender ideology; and sexually explicit material.

Shaheed claimed the laws produce a “chilling effect” undermining “inclusive education” — a euphemism for grotesque “sex education,” racial collectivism, and gender propaganda. “Censorship laws restricting classroom discussions on race, gender identity and other ‘divisive concepts’ limit students’ access to critical knowledge,” she claimed, blasting state efforts to protect children from racial, sex, and gender indoctrination as “censorship.”

State and district policies keeping porn and other obscene material out of tax-funded schools are supposedly hurting children, too. “Book bans and content restrictions silence marginalized voices, preventing students from accessing a full and accurate understanding of history and social dynamics,” claimed the radical UN activist. It was not clear why the UN has not spoken out about the very real book bans and content restrictions that have targeted Christian materials in government schools for decades.

The Broader Push: Globalized Indoctrination

The latest attack is part of the broader UN push to standardize education globally. As outlined in UN agreements going back dec­ades, one of its primary goals is to shift the attitudes and values of children toward UN-approved beliefs. In short, education is the key tool in bringing about the UN agenda for what globalists frequently call the “New World Order.”

In an interview last year with the UN’s education agency, Shaheed brazenly called for governments to control what is taught everywhere. There is a need for governments to ensure “that standards are outlined that all private sector providers must adhere to in accordance with the right to quality education,” she said.

Ultimately, education, whether in private or public schools, must teach children to become so-called sustainable global citizens, UN leaders and agreements have been saying openly since at least the 1990s. Agenda 21 and the 2030 Agenda both state that clearly.

In chapter 36 of Agenda 21, signed on behalf of the U.S. government by George H.W. Bush, the UN says clearly that “education is critical for promoting sustainable development.” The UN agreement goes on to say that “formal and non-formal education” is “indispensable to changing people’s attitudes.”

“It is also critical for achieving environmental and ethical awareness, values and attitudes, skills and behaviour consistent with sustainable development,” continues the UN agreement, adding that this government-controlled “education” to change children’s views must “include spiritual” development and “should be integrated in all disciplines.”

When the UN speaks of “spiritual development,” it means something very different than what American Christians might assume. In fact, the UN’s World Core Curriculum is based on the teachings of Lucifer Publishing Company founder Alice Bailey, according to the man who wrote them, Assistant UN Secretary-General and “father of global education” Robert Muller. Yes, really.

Common Core, funded by billionaire glob­alist Bill Gates and imposed on the states by federal power, was a blatant attempt to align U.S. education with the globalist vision of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). In fact, just before starting the Common Core project, Gates signed a deal with UNESCO vowing to help create global standards, curricula, and teacher-training programs in line with the UN agency’s vision.

Advertisements promoting Common Core to Americans even boasted that the scheme was aligned with “international standards.” That way, American children would learn from the same programs as their counterparts in France, China, and around the world, and their progress could be compared with international peers, the ads said. With the advent of UN-backed “social-emotional learning,” the push for centralized and “spiritualized” education has become even more brazen.

2030 Agenda: Master Plan for Indoctrination

Separately, the UN’s 2030 Agenda — including its Sustainable Development Goals, known collectively by UN leaders as the “master plan for humanity” — is even more transparent than Agenda 21 in its demands. It calls for children to become “agents of change” for implementing the UN plan. And in Goal 4 of the 17, governments worldwide must indoctrinate children and “all learners” into a broad range of UN-backed ideologies by the year 2030.

“By 2030, ensure that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including, among others, through education for sustainable development and sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence, global citizenship and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture’s contribution to sustainable development,” reads the UN agreement adopted in 2015.

The push for global standards began decades before that, though, with the 2030 Agenda being simply the culmination of previous deals. At the UN’s World Conference on Education for All in 1990 in Thailand, world governments adopted the Jomtien Declaration. In Article 10, that agreement states that “basic learning needs” and “basic learning content … required by all human beings … is a common and universal human responsibility.” In other words, it is a UN responsibility. In Article 5, the agreement notes that all children must be subjected to “the same standards of learning.”

A decade later, the UN and its members adopted the Dakar Framework for Action: Education for All. In that agreement, governments agreed to “implement integrated strategies” in education “which recognize the need for changes in attitudes, values and practices.” “Changes in attitudes, values and behaviour are required,” the international agreement stated again.

In 2019, the UN and its members went even further in the Beijing Consensus on Artificial Intelligence and Education. The agreement calls on governments worldwide to use AI in education to shape the values of children to be consistent with UN views on gender, globalism, environment, governance, and more. From data gathering to attitude manipulation, the AI component will become increasingly powerful in the years ahead.

These are just a few of the international agreements that Shaheed alluded to throughout her report on the United States. And while many have never been ratified by the U.S. Senate as required for treaties to be binding, the UN still considers them to be a key part of “international law.” They are not constitutional, because the federal government does not have power over education, and cannot grant itself such powers without an amendment.

Tax-funded Universities and “Freedom”

Another area of attack by the Pakistani activist-turned-UN “expert” was the government’s effort to rein in college campuses’ violent pro-Palestine and pro-Hamas riots funded by billionaire extremist George Soros and other insiders. Among other concerns, she denounced “disproportionate disciplinary actions.”

When it came to the escalating attacks against Jews, Shaheed claimed not to see it. “I do not know antisemitism is actually on the rise,” she responded when asked if she would be investigating one of the major issues that caused Trump to take on Harvard, Columbia, and other once-prestigious universities.

She expressed deep concerns over Trump’s efforts to protect taxpayers and students from rogue universities feasting on public money, too. Under the guise of “respecting institutional autonomy,” the UN rapporteur claimed the U.S. government is obligated to do what she said.

“While the Harvard case has drawn global attention, it is emblematic of a much broader pattern of coercive assault on academic freedom and institutional autonomy: from book and subject bans in schools to discriminatory censorship laws and punitive measures against universities, their students and faculty,” Shaheed said.

Blasting what she described as “criminalization” of student protests, Shaheed suggested that international legal mechanisms are required to override American policies developed by Americans. “The Special Rapporteur … has consistently expressed her serious concerns in allegation letters sent to the Government of the United States,” the report says.

Redefining Education as a Globalist “Human Right”

Among the most alarming demands by the UN rapporteur: a redefinition of education itself to bring American schools in line with the UN’s vision on “human rights” and “equity.” Those two loaded terms mean something very different to the UN than the traditional understanding held by Americans, of course.

“The Special Rapporteur strongly encourages the federal Government and all States to consider expressly recognizing education as a fundamental human right for everyone,” Shaheed said, as if the notion of education being a human right were simply common sense and common knowledge. Note that governments would be responsible for upholding this so-called human right.

By contrast, consider the definition of education in the 1828 Webster’s dictionary, the first American dictionary. “To give children a good education in manners, arts and science, is important; to give them a religious education is indispensable; and an immense responsibility rests on parents and guardians who neglect these duties,” it says in part. (Emphasis added.) Note that parents are responsible, not governments.

Indeed, for virtually all of human history, educating children has been the responsibility of parents, sometimes with an occasional role for private providers, extended families, and churches. But under the UN’s agenda, indoctrination pretending to be education becomes a “human right” enforced at the barrel of a government gun, with parents merely “stakeholders” to be “overcome,” as UNESCO put it in its 2022 Global Education Monitoring Report.

Shaheed was clear, too. “The right to education requires States [governments] to deliver free, quality, public education for everyone,” the UN’s final report on the United States declared. (Emphasis added.) That is clearly an ominous call for forcing all children into federalized government “education” based on UN principles while marginalizing alternatives to government-controlled schools.

It goes without saying that the UN’s view of “quality” education would be very different from the views of, say, Christian Americans. As the UN’s own agreements make clear, it believes children should learn globalism, environmentalism, feminism, multiculturalism, and even UN-approved “spirituality.” Notice that this government-provided “quality” education must be provided to everyone. The target on private, non-state education providers is obvious.

In fact, the UN Human Rights Council has long advocated hijacking control over private schools, too. A decade ago, the dictator-controlled outfit even claimed governments have an obligation to monitor and regulate all non-government education, imposing government standards on all. This is supposedly needed to ensure the “human right” to education.

Incompatible Views on “Human Rights”

Perhaps even more significant than the issues above is the total incompatibility of the UN’s understanding of human rights with the traditional American and Christian understanding of God-given rights. Under the biblical understanding and the American system of government, unalienable rights pre-exist government. Indeed, governments exist to protect those rights, not grant them, America’s Founders said in the Declaration of Independence.

Under the UN’s bizarre version of “human rights,” however, rights (actually privileges) are granted by governments and can be restricted or abolished at will. Adding insult to injury, those fake, government-imposed rights may “in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations,” according to Article 29 of the UN’s own Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

In other words, the UN’s supposed human rights are the revocable, government-granted privileges of people to take from their neighbors by force, instead of the unalienable, God-given rights protected by the Constitution. Obviously, the two views on human rights are not just different, they are fundamentally incompatible with each other. The fact that some of the world’s most brutal communist and Islamist dictatorships sit proudly on the UN Human Rights Council exemplifies the conflict well.

More Globalism Needed

The implications of this redefinition of education as a UN-granted human right are enormous. Consider Article 26 of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the organization’s foundational human rights document. It states clearly that education must be “compulsory” and that it “shall further the activities of the United Nations.”

In short, if parents, private schools, tutors, and even government schools are not promoting the UN’s agenda in education, they are depriving children of their human rights enshrined in UN agreements. Depriving children of their UN-defined human rights is considered to be a very serious offense. And with the growing power of UN kangaroo courts such as the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, it is only a matter of time before legal action begins if these plans are not stopped.

Shaheed has been very explicit on the issue of indoctrinating children with UN-backed ideologies as a human right. “There is a growing understanding of the need to embed sustainable development values … in educational processes, and efforts are being made to incorporate sustainable development principles into educational curricula to prepare students for the challenges of the future,” she boasted in a Q&A with UNESCO last year.

Complying With International Agreements

Another major call in Shaheed’s report is for federal-level reforms such as ratifying and complying with even more international treaties, beyond those already signed by previous U.S. leaders. Among those recommended are the highly controversial UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

Those agreements, which flagrantly violate the U.S. Constitution, have been cited by governments to assign a government bureaucrat to oversee every child from birth to adulthood. They also mandate that all decisions involving children be made in the “best interest” of the children — as defined by government, rather than parents.

If adopted, Shaheed’s recommendations would bring U.S. education policy even closer to the ultimate goal of UN-dictated and -monitored global standards. Naturally, this would involve bypassing not just local and parental authority, but even state and national control.

In her comments to UNESCO, Shaheed also claimed that the “evolving right to education” means reinterpreting and developing even more treaties, “international jurisprudence,” and “soft law instruments” at the global level. Citing the “Abidjan Principles on the human rights obligations of States to provide public education,” she emphasized yet again that governments must also “regulate private involvement in education” and “limit undue influence of private actors.”

Freedom in the Crosshairs

In the UN’s push to reframe government education as a human right that must be enforced by authorities, parental rights, state sovereignty, and academic freedom are all in the crosshairs. The UN no longer even hides the agenda. And as the Pakistani UN rapporteur explained, the U.S. government has already made major progress in that direction. But far more work remains for U.S. education to comply fully with the UN’s vision.

The human rights report on education represents merely the latest salvo in a globalist war on what remains of not just local control over education, but what little remains of traditional education itself. Instead, the UN is openly pushing for a centralized indoctrination system based on ideologically driven mandates in compliance with UN agreements — all under the guise of “human rights,” “quality,” and “equity.”

The special rapporteur’s proposals, if implemented, would fully align U.S. education with the radical agenda of the UN and UNESCO. It would also further the transformation of American classrooms into globalist indoctrination centers and dismantle the very foundations of American liberty and self-government — and not just in education.

The UN report makes that clear. Without the “systemic reforms to funding, governance and assessment” called for by the global outfit, there will be an erosion of the “role of education” in fostering what Shaheed refers to as “social progress,” the report says. The UN’s vision of “social progress,” like its understanding of “human rights,” is entirely incompatible with traditional Christian and American values and jurisprudence.

It Must Be Stopped

Because culture and politics are both downstream from education, the UN’s vision for restructuring education will — if it succeeds — further fuel the fundamental transformation of every element of American society that has been accelerating for decades. The same changes are being sought worldwide.

Thankfully, the Trump administration announced on July 22 that the U.S. government is withdrawing from UNESCO, the key UN agency involved in education. But that will not affect the massive UNESCO influence that already permeates U.S. education via textbook publishers, Common Core compliance, teachers unions, professional development for teachers, colleges of education, and the endless education-focused agreements coming out of the UN.

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