Formal AG’S Opinion Rejects Effort to Give the State Board of Education Authority to Set Rules for Local Textbook Adoptions
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 4, 2015
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office today released a formal opinion saying that the State Board of Education does not have authority under Texas law to set rules for how local school districts adopt textbooks. The opinion is in response to a request from the SBOE’s then-chairwoman Barbara Cargill, R-The Woodlands, in June. The AG’s opinion is available here: https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/opinions/opinions/51paxton/op/2015/kp0043.pdf.
The following statement can be attributed to Dan Quinn, communications director at the Texas Freedom Network:
“We’re certainly pleased to see the attorney general agree that this attempted power grab by certain board members wasn’t supported by state law. It’s important to remember that the board just last month stubbornly refused to establish even basic qualifications for the people it asks to review the textbooks that go into our kids’ classrooms. So rather than playing politics and pretending that they know best how local school officials should do their jobs, maybe these board members should spend more time putting their own house in order and earning the trust of Texas parents.”
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Founded in 1995, the Texas Freedom Network is an education watchdog based in Austin and has monitored and opposed textbook censorship by the State Board of Education for more than 20 years.
