By Benjamin Todd Jealous
NAACP President
In Arizona, they just passed a law that would make the study of the role of African Americans, Latinos, Asian American and Native Americans illegal. They banned “ethnic studies” ignoring the reason those studies were created: that for too long history books have left out people of color from the central narrative of our nation’s history.
Texas wants to rewrite their history books to do the same thing. This year, they want to change the record on slavery, celebrate the Confederacy and shed a positive light on Jim Crow laws. .If the proposed textbook changes happen, children won’t learn about civil rights icons like Malcom X, or Sam McCollough, who gave his life for Texas independence. And they won’t learn that Texas seceded from the Union to fight for the Confederacy in the Civil War.
In many ways, as Texas goes, so goes the nation. Standards in Texas influence the contents of history books used in schools around the country meaning the numbers of miseducated children could grow exponentially.
Texas students must compete for college seats and jobs with students from other states, who will arrive equipped with a more complete and mainstream education.
Advanced Placement exams, which let students earn nationally recognized college credit while in high school, are not tailored to any particular state’s ideology. Similarly, International Baccalaureate exams are benchmarked to world-class university standards.
By narrowing our students’ exposure, we cut them off from opportunities for accelerated learning, and free college credits that will be recognized around the country and the world.
Every voter on a referendum should know how our Constitution and laws have evolved to expand civil rights to all citizens. Yet the Texas board’s current proposals would minimize those brave men and women’s contributions to our national story.
To make informed decisions about the limits of government power, students must known about its past abuses, such as those perpetrated by Senator Joseph McCarthy. Yet the proposed standards would gloss over such injustices. Students who have studied poll taxes and their abolition will have a better perspective on when taxation is used inappropriately.
All of these are questions confronting today’s voters, including those high school students who have turned eighteen. In order to exercise the rights and responsibilities conferred to them by their fellow citizens to safeguard their families and communities, students today or tomorrow need a strong grounding in our nation’s full history.
We are – and have always been – a nation of immigrants, which has folded various strands into our collective story. So it is vital for those citizens who will work alongside diverse peers to have an accurate understanding of their coworkers’ background and culture. Minimizing or misrepresenting African-American and Latino culture and history can lead to distorted beliefs regarding our fellow Americans.
What’s more, it can lead students from those ethnic groups to have a skewed picture of themselves and their place in the world. Studies of high school dropout rates out have shown that students became disengaged with classes because what they were learning didn’t seem relevant to their lives. And in a 2006 national study, more students cited disengagement and disinterest in their lessons as a factor in leaving school than those who reported serious academic challenges.
When, according to conservative estimates from the US Department of Education, Texas loses about one in every four high school students before graduation, can we really afford to drive any more young people from the schoolhouse door?
If learning about Ceasar Chavez or Thurgood Marshall will inspire a student to study government or law, we cannot afford to pass up that opportunity. If learning about Hendrick Arnold’s role as a guide and spy during the Texas revolution inspires young people to military service, who are we to deny them their dreams?
Our future is at stake when the State Board votes on May 21. Will we decide to prepare our youth for success in the 21st Century or let nostalgia for the 19th hobble our graduates and leave large groups of students behind? Rewriting history is not promoting patriotism, it is institutionalizing ignorance.
And it’s an indulgence that Texas and the country cannot afford. Anyone who is passionate about the accuracy of the state and nation’s historical record should be appalled at these proposals and should let it be known. Our children are entitled to broad exposure to all the facts of American history, government and economic theory.
We urge the State Board to vote down these proposed changes, take some more time to set out broad guidelines ensuring all students are equipped to compete and thrive, then follow the thoughtful recommendations of their fellow Texans who are educators, economists and historians.
I will be in Austin when the board convenes to join the Texas State Conference of the NAACP to raise our voices for accuracy and fairness. Join me and fax a letter opposing changing the text books to the state board at 512-322-0757. Tell them that erasing civil rights from history is wrong. Tell them to make sure our children get the world class education they deserve not a racially biased and ideological revision of our history.
Benjamin Todd Jealous is President and CEO of the NAACP.
