This letter, from the President of the Montclair Jewish Community Relations Council to Montclair Superintendent Ruth Turner, was received anonymously by NJ Ed Report today.

Ruth Turner, Superintendent of Schools

Montclair Public School District Montclair, NJ 07042

July 20, 2026

Cc: Ravi Srinivasan (Montclair Civil Rights Commission), Dr. Lily Laux (NJ Commissioner of Education)

Dear Superintendent Turner:

One year after the Montclair Public School District entered into a Title VI resolution with the United States Department of Education concerning allegations of antisemitism, the District is once again confronted with conduct that tests its commitment to protecting Jewish students and families.

Rodney Jackson, a middle school history teacher in the Montclair Public School District (MPSD), has been actively sharing virulent, bigoted social media posts on his publicly accessible Facebook account under his own real name. This behavior puts Mr. Jackson’s fitness as a trustworthy educator into question. Given past reports to your office regarding Mr. Jackson’s blatant disregard for the feelings of his Jewish students, the fact that his bigotry explicitly targets the Jewish People, in addition to the only Jewish nation, should come as no surprise.

This letter is not principally about Rodney Jackson.

This letter is about whether the commitments the District made following the Title VI resolution are reflected in its actions. Resolution agreements do not restore trust. Policies do not restore trust. Public statements do not restore trust. Trust is restored when institutions act consistently with the principles they profess.

MPSD Policy 4282 (Use of Social Networking Sites) explicitly states that out-of-work conduct on social media can render a staff member unfit and serve as grounds for certifying tenure charges, emphasizing that such staff behavior must not exemplify discrimination.

Imagine, for a moment, that a teacher had publicly shared material recycling familiar bigotry about another protected group. Imagine a teacher promoting racist conspiracy theories about Black Americans, dehumanizing rhetoric about immigrants, or material depicting Muslims or LGBTQ individuals as inherently dangerous or less than human? Would there be uncertainty about whether the District should investigate? Would there be hesitation about whether such conduct reflected on that teacher’s professional judgment?

We demand that the MPSD launch an immediate, decisive investigation into the full extent of Rodney Jackson’s conduct and apply every available disciplinary remedy under district policy and state law. Mr. Jackson’s public digital footprint includes the following (images at end of this letter):

● Promoting Nazi Imagery: He has shared and promoted content from a social media profile featuring a prominent Nazi Swastika.

● Trafficking in Conspiracy Theories: He has promoted the debunked conspiracy theory that Israel was responsible for the September 11 terrorist attacks.

● Inverting the Holocaust: He has shared content characterizing the 1947 arrival of Holocaust survivors in British Mandate Palestine as a ‘betrayal of humanity,’ perverting history to cast survivors of the world’s most mechanized genocide as aggressors.

● Amplifying Dehumanizing Propaganda: He has shared a video produced by a self-proclaimed aspirant for a “top 10 antisemites” list. The video transitions from standard anti-Israel rhetoric into a diatribe claiming Jewish people believe that they are a “different species” practicing a “Luciferian religion” to “rule the world.”

While the MJCRC speaks as a Jewish communal organization, our concern here extends beyond our own community. Mr. Jackson’s public dissemination of malicious, falsified propaganda suggests an ideological bias so severe that his grasp of historical reality seems irreparably compromised and begs the question: Why is someone with these beliefs teaching our children?

Mr. Jackson is a respected staff member, liked and admired by his students, and known for his political activism. Unfortunately, none of these factors change the nature of his behavior in this instance, nor do they answer the question about his job fitness.

None of Mr. Jackson’s posts qualify as political discourse. They are an attack on Jews, intended to dehumanize and delegitimize. Full stop.

Further, while apologists for Mr. Jackson may suggest his social media activity was misconstrued or inadvertently antisemitic, such a suggestion strains credulity given the consistency and scope of his actions as a whole.

Why these posts are problematic:

● A history teacher should not legitimize a swastika. The swastika is the emblem of the regime responsible for the systematic murder of six million Jews and millions of other innocent people. It represents one of the most universally recognized symbols of racial hatred in modern history. Whatever Mr. Jackson’s intent, publicly re-sharing content from an account prominently displaying a Nazi swastika demonstrates a profound failure of judgment, at best. A history teacher, of all people, should immediately recognize what that symbol represents and understand why lending credibility to such a source undermines the trust placed in educators.

● A history teacher should not promote antisemitic conspiracy theories. Falsely alleging that Israel orchestrated the September 11 terrorist attacks is not criticism of Israeli policy; it is the revival of one of history’s oldest antisemitic tropes—the claim that Jews secretly manipulate world events, engineer catastrophe, and operate as a hidden force behind global suffering. Variations of this conspiracy have fueled discrimination, persecution, and violence against Jews for centuries and are being used to endanger our community here, today. (In addition to instances substantiated in the Title VI settlement there have been a firebombing of a community synagogue, swastikas etched in playgrounds, and two recent MPS graduates were arrested by the FBI for planning terrorist attacks on Jews and LGBTQ targets, to name a few.) No credible evidence supports the claim that Israel was involved in the attacks of September 11. A competent history teacher has the ability and a professional obligation to distinguish evidence from fabrication and should never lend credibility to demonstrably false conspiracy theories – especially against a protected minority.

● A history teacher should not distort the history of the Holocaust. Characterizing the arrival of Holocaust survivors in British Mandate Palestine in 1947 as a ‘betrayal of humanity’ fundamentally reverses the historical record. When the Holocaust ended, hundreds of thousands of Jewish survivors remained displaced throughout Europe after much of the world had refused to accept them as refugees. For many, British Mandate Palestine represented one of the few remaining places where they could go. Portraying those survivors as aggressors rather than refugees transforms victims into perpetrators and inverts one of the defining moral realities of the twentieth century. History teachers bear a special responsibility to preserve historical truth, not to distort it.

● A history teacher should not amplify dehumanizing propaganda. The material Mr. Jackson shared ultimately describes Jews as believing they are a “different species,” portrays them as seeking to “rule the world,” and associates them with a “Luciferian religion.” This is not political commentary; it is classic dehumanizing propaganda. Throughout history, campaigns of persecution have depended upon convincing ordinary people that targeted minorities are somehow less than fully human or inherently malevolent. Educators have a corresponding obligation to reject and recognize such rhetoric for what it is. Publicly amplifying material that dehumanizes and delegitimizes an entire people calls into question the judgment, professional responsibility, and moral leadership expected of anyone entrusted with educating children.

We recognize that MPSD must follow its own procedures and respect Mr. Jackson’s rights as an employee. Nothing in this letter asks the District to skip a single step of that process. But fairness should not be confused with paralysis, and we trust the District to know the difference. Consistent with applicable law, we expect you to understand these concerns, take appropriate action and communicate about the process as transparently as possible.

We await your decisive response.

Sincerely,

Joshua Katz

President Montclair Jewish Community Relations Council

joshkatz@montclairjcrc.org

Please see screenshots on the following pages and this link to one of the videos referenced in the above letter.

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/189RExXRma/?mibextid=wwXIfr