From today’s TFN News Clips: “Do you think the Catholic Diocese of Austin promotes a Muslim agenda?” — Texas State Board of Education member Thomas Ralitff, R-Mount Pleasant, noting that CSCOPE, a curriculum program criticized by far-right activists as supposedly anti-Christian and pro-Mulsim, is used in hundreds of public school districts as well as schools […]
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)
These People Sound Like Nuts
So why is it hard to take right-wing critics of the CSCOPE curriculum system in Texas seriously? Check out this recent newspaper advertisement published by a Tea Party group near Austin: “The schools have declared war on our children in the form of C-SCOPE curriculum — COMMUNIST, MARXIST, PROGRESSIVE, LEFTIST DOGMA, PROPAGANDA, AND INDOCTRINATION at […]
Texas SBOE Chair Praises 'Leading Historian' David Barton, Who Gets His History from Louis L'Amour
At her Texas Senate Nominations Committee hearing last month, State Board of Education Chairwoman Barbara Cargill made a number of commitments should her appointment to a second term be confirmed. (It was.) Among those was a commitment to beef up qualifications required for individuals appointed by SBOE members to serve as “expert” advisers during the […]
Texas CSCOPE Witch Hunt Continues
One of the worst things about political witch hunts is that they don’t end when the victim surrenders. No, the hunters often aren’t satisfied until the victim is burned at the stake. But sometimes the hunters sound so extreme that they become almost a parody of themselves. One can only hope that’s what is happening […]
Texas Senate Confirms Barbara Cargill as SBOE Chair
Today the Texas Senate unanimously confirmed Gov. Rick Perry’s appointment of Barbara Cargill, R-The Woodlands, to a second term as chair of the State Board of Education (SBOE). This is the first time since 2005 that the Senate has confirmed a Perry-appointed SBOE chair. The governor’s previous two appointees, creationists Don McLeroy and Gail Lowe, […]
