Rewriting History According to the State of Texas

According to popular folklore the state of Texas has always been the biggest and best in the United States or at least that's what we tell the world. So it comes as no surprise when educators in the state of Texas write curriculum for textbooks for public school systems that will be used all over the nation. The state of Texas is one of 22 states that have a process for the approval of adoption of instructional materials including textbooks.

Recently social studies educators in Texas were selected to a committee to write the curriculum for the social studies textbooks that would be used by the state of Texas and other states. These members of the curriculum committee met for several months in the shadow of the University of Texas. They were selected for this assignment from an application process.

Upon completion of the curriculum writing, the committee sent their completed documentation to the state elected Texas Board of Education. The board should be a bipartisan group, but according to published reports, it leans heavily toward being very conservative as is the state. Texas governor, Rick Perry at the time of the curriculum writing was in his second term as governor. He has since been elected to his third term.

The State Board of Education and the curriculum writers were at odds with the completion of the writing of the curriculum. The board decided to make changes to the curriculum some of which are listed below.

1. On a vote of 7-6 the State Board of Education decided to add key organizations and people involved in the conservative resurgence of the 1980's and 90's including the Contract with American, the National Rifle Association and Phyllis Schafly among others.

2. They voted against requiring the textbooks to cover Senator Edward Kenney. They were defeated in their attempt to leave out such people as Thurgood Marshall, Hillary Clinton and such organizations as LULAC.

3. They attempted to leave out the names of the Clarence Darrow and Marcus Garvey.

The board tried unsuccessfully to strike from the textbooks hip-hop as a cultural movement and replace it with country music-in the end they added both.

The Hispanic members of the board lost their efforts to include more Hispanics as role models for the states ever increasing Hispanic population. After much discussion and disagreement, the State Board of Education voted to accept their new curriculum for social studies that will be used by over 4.7 million children in the state of Texas and millions of others in the United States.