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I've blogged about this BEFORE, but now that everything is official, it was time for an update.
Incase you missed it, Texas' new state social studies standards are set. For the next ten years.
Deep sigh.
Teachers in Texas are now required to cover the Judeo-Christian influences of the nation's founding, but not the Founding Fathers' rationale for the separation of church and state (i.e. religious freedom - the most basic and fundamental constitutional protection we enjoy as citizens). Curriculum standards also will describe the government in the United States as a "constitutional republic," rather than "democratic", which fascinates me to no end. Because, really? Being a democratic nation has nothing to do with the Democratic Party. Just like being a republic has nothing to do with the Republican Party (which is what I have decided all these new descriptions are really about). And, not that anyone is asking me, but I do not believe words like "conservative" and "liberal" should play a part in academic standards for Texas' 10 year olds in the first place. The kids just need to know what happened. They will form their own opinions about how it affects them as they grow older. Or at least they should.
Of course, "what happened" is always up for interpretation. But the juicy bits of the story are already removed in textbooks to begin with. It has all been boiled down to dates, names and facts: 1899, Open Door Policy, Secretary of State John Hay. How the Open Door Policy affected U.S. foreign policy in the 20th century is up for analysis. But that doesn't change anything. Many of the U.S.’s policies in the 20th century were fundamentally imperialistic. So what? Shocker! Americans were influenced by Europeans! You dress it up and call it “expansionism” all you want. It doesn’t change what it was.
Just because you don’t like something in history doesn’t mean you should strike it from the record or give it a face lift and call it something new. Personally, I think Joseph McCarthy was an opportunistic whack job, but I still think it is important to learn about him and McCarthyism. It shows how terrified people in the U.S. were of Communism in the 1950s. You can even find references to it in the pop culture of the day in movies like Invasion of the Body Snatchers. What IS wrong is to reinterpret something into something it never was. Because, Joe McCarthy? Still a whack job.
But what did Thomas Jefferson do? He was stripped from a world history standard about enlightened thinkers. Was it because he was too much an advocate of freedom of religion and the separation of church and state for the conservative "experts" on the panel?
Grumble, grumble.
I know we can’t teach everything in history, but certain things are just plain important. It is disconcerting to know that these new standards will affect textbooks all over the country. Quite frankly, a state ranked 49th out of 50 in education shouldn’t have that kind of power no matter how many textbooks they buy.
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