Parents are winning — and the Department of Education is leading the charge

It’s back-to-school season. And this year, parents have a lot more to celebrate than just the excitement of fresh school supplies and predictable schedules. Parents across America have been sidelined, silenced and shut out of their children’s education for too long. Records have been hidden. Administrators have stonewalled. Parents have been treated as obstacles rather than partners. But today, the tide has turned — and the U.S. Department of Education deserves some credit for the pro-parent momentum. This administration has done something commendable: It has taken existing federal parental rights laws — laws that sat unenforced for years while school districts brazenly ignored them — and enforced them with teeth. Something past administrations wouldn’t even consider, much less do. The result has been authentic investigations, real consequences and needed accountability. Finally, parents are being heard, and schools are taking notice. In just one week surrounding National Parents' Day on July 26, the department stood firmly with parents and held schools to account. It launched a crackdown on school districts that have been facilitating students adopting new so-called gender identities at school (with different names and wrong-sex pronouns) — all while actively concealing it from their own parents. It opened new parental rights investigations into Denver Public Schools in Colorado and Bethel School District in Washington for possible violations of the Protection of P…