Day: March 13, 2010

Texas curriculum Revisions

Some highlights of new social studies standards adopted by the Texas State Board of Education:

Adds references to “laws of nature and nature’s God” to a section in U.S. history that requires students to explain major political ideas. Replaces “democratic” in references to the form of U.S. government with “constitutional republic.” In addition to learning the Bill of Rights, the board specifies a reference to the Second Amendment right to bear arms in a section about citizenship in a U.S. government class. Requires economics students to “analyze the decline of the U.S. dollar including abandonment of the gold standard.” Ensures that students learn about “the conservative resurgence of the 1980s and 1990s, including Phyllis Schlafly, the Contract With America, the Heritage Foundation, the Moral Majority and the National Rifle Association.” In teaching about the civil rights movement, students must learn about the violent philosophy of the Black Panthers in addition to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s nonviolent approach. Specifies that Germans and Italians were interned in the United States as well as the Japanese during World War II, to counter the idea that the internment of Japanese was motivated by racism. Requires that the history of McCarthyism include “how the later release of the Venona papers confirmed suspicions of communist infiltration in U.S. government.” The Venona papers were transcripts of some 3,000 communications between the Soviet Union and its agents in the United States. In sociology, requires the teaching of “the importance of personal responsibility for life choices” in a section on teen suicide, dating violence, sexuality, drug use and eating disorders.

Associated Press and New York Times

In addition  students also will use A.D. and B. C. instead of C.E. and B.C.E.  According to MSNBC:

In addition to learning the Bill of Rights, the board specified a reference to the Second Amendment right to bear arms in a section about citizenship in a U.S. government class.

Conservatives also included a plank to ensure that students learn about “the conservative resurgence of the 1980s and 1990s, including Phyllis Schlafly, the Contract With America, the Heritage Foundation, the Moral Majority and the National Rifle Association,” …

Why are objectives being decided by politicians?  How about professionals in the various fields of study being the leaders with a good sprinkling of teachers, psychologists (to remind everyone of age appropriateness) and parents revising the curriculum.  What you learn should not be political.  Objectives should be neutral and not based on who won the last election.  If there is a bright side, because of technology advances in the printing industry, states can tailor some of their own curriculum and Texas will not have as much influence as it has had in the past.

The Hispanic community felt very under-represented according to the New York Times:

Battles over what to put in science and history books have taken place for years in the 20 states where state boards must adopt textbooks, most notably in California and Texas. But rarely in recent history has a group of conservative board members left such a mark on a social studies curriculum.

Efforts by Hispanic board members to include more Latino figures as role models for the state’s large Hispanic population were consistently defeated, prompting one member, Mary Helen Berlanga, to storm out of a meeting late Thursday night, saying, “They can just pretend this is a white America and Hispanics don’t exist.”

“They are going overboard, they are not experts, they are not historians,” she said. “They are rewriting history, not only of Texas but of the United States and the world.”

The curriculum standards will now be published in a state register, opening them up for 30 days of public comment. A final vote will be taken in May, but given the Republican dominance of the board, it is unlikely that many changes will be made.

One thing not made clear in the last post about Texas textbooks is that the meetings held last week were about curriculum changes.  The textbook companies will all try to accommodate these changes.  In the past, California offset the more conservative Texas.  That has not happened because of California’s financial woes.

What objectives are just unacceptable?  Which show political bias?  Which are welcome changes?

(The scroll box is easier to read if you increase the size of the page to 125%  found bottom right hand corner of the page)

New York Times has more on the story.