AUSTIN, Texas — The Texas State Board of Education’s preliminary vote today to approve minimally revised social studies standards first adopted a dozen years ago is a surrender to political pressure from those opposed to teaching the truth about the state’s history and diversity. […]
Textbook Censorship
The Texas State Board of Education decides what every student in Texas public schools will learn from kindergarten through high school. The board does so by adopting curriculum standards and textbooks for public schools in the state.
For decades, far-right politicians on the State Board of Education and their extremist allies have taken advantage of this flawed system to dismiss the advice of experts and scholars. They have instead worked to inject their personal views into textbooks on everything from evolution and climate change to the history of slavery, civil rights, and separation of church and state.
Resources
- Report Reveals Serious Flaws in Social Studies Textbooks
- The State Board of Education: Dragging Texas Schools into the Culture Wars (2008 report)
- Evolution, Creationism & Public Schools: Surveying Texas Scientists (2008 report)
- Culture Wars and the Classroom (2010 report)
- Senate Bill 6: Changes in the Textbook Adoption Process (2011 report)
- Texas Science Curriculum Standards: Challenges (2012 report)
- Science Textbook Review (2013 report)
- Social Studies Textbook Review (2014 report)
PSA: Ray Bradbury Called, He Wants his Novel Back.
Texas feels a lot like Fahrenheit 451 these days. Not because it is summer, though that’s part of it, but because the new school year is exposing some of the cartoonish and harmful acts the government is committing to control our students’ education. […]
Texans Taking Care of Texans: Meet This Quarter’s Super Volunteers
TFN has always fought for Texas school children at the SBOE. But our work would be impossible without the dedication of volunteers who sign up to testify, recruit others to testify, organize at local school board levels, and respond to our various calls to action. While our fight at the SBOE is far from over, we recently sat down with two super volunteers for a brief chat. This is the first installment of a running series. […]
Drafts Watch: In Which we Highlight Current Proposed Standards and Recap the Last TEKS Revisions
This month, far-right culture warriors launched their newest effort to hijack the education of Texas kids with a fresh onslaught of lies and incendiary charges. But the Texas Freedom Network and our #TeachTheTruth campaign partners are already fighting back. […]
ADVOCATES CALL ON TEXAS STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION TO TEACH THE TRUTH, NOT POLITICAL AGENDAS
Advocates today denounced inflammatory attacks on teachers and called on the State Board of Education to ensure new curriculum standards allow public schools to teach the truth […]
