It didn’t take long for right-wingers to erupt in fury over the Fordham Institute’s new report about the disastrously bad social studies curriculum standards in Texas. Fordham’s report demolishes the State Board of Education‘s politicized new standards. The far right’s unhinged temper tantrum and lashing out that we’re seeing in reaction is revealing. […]
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)
Conservative Think Tank Slams TX Standards
We’ll have more on this later, but we just sent out this press release. This is big news. TFN PRESIDENT: FORDHAM ANALYSIS CONFIRMS THAT NEW SOCIAL STUDIES STANDARDS ARE A DISASTER FOR TEXAS SCHOOLS Conservative Think Tank’s Report Savages State Board of Education for Politicizing New Curriculum Standards FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE February 16, 2011 A […]
Dodging a Bullet?
Last month’s announcement by a prominent creationist group that it had decided not to seek state approval to sell instructional materials to Texas public schools was good news for supporters of sound science education. Now e-mails obtained by the Texas Freedom Network through a Texas Public Information Act request reveal just how bad the materials […]
Creationists Target Texas Science Classes
Politics and personal agendas dominated the Texas State Board of Education’s process for adopting new science curriculum standards for public schools two years ago. Now our first look at the developing process for approving science instructional materials based on those standards has increased our concerns that politics will continue to trump education. The State Board […]
Creationists Build a Legislative Strategy
The National Center for Science Education reports that lawmakers in New Mexico will consider what is currently the fifth anti-evolution bill filed in state legislatures across the country. The bill in New Mexico is similar to legislation filed in that state two years ago. It would encourage instruction about “strengths and weaknesses” of “controversial” scientific […]
