"Anti-Woke" or "Avoidance" Curriculum? Protests are a part of U.S. history. What story will Texas' textbooks tell?

Under the auspices of taking down "woke curriculum," House Bill 1804, covered by Bridget Grumet in today's Austin American-Statesman, amounts to a serious whitewashing and micromanaging of a public school curriculum that is already whitewashed. This bill clearly reflects the continuing politics over CRT from the from the 2021 legislative session.  The Rs are milking this for every last drop to establish, if you will, an "avoidance curriculum," that seeks to muzzle critical discourse, pedagogy, and thought.

If this were otherwise, we, in the Ethnic Studies community would not have been advocating all these years for Ethnic Studies—meaning Mexican American, African American, Asian American, and Native American Studies. What we should be doing instead is advocating for Morales' HB 45 that creates a pathway to a high school diploma via the taking of Ethnic Studies courses.

I love this meme that is so appropriate to the politics of this moment:

"Imagine, if you will, a country so ashamed of its history that it punishes people for teaching that history."

Imagine that. Legislators should consider taking an Ethnic Studies or sociocultural course so that they can see how they themselves benefit from a broadened, expansive view of the world. Anything short of a more inclusive, critical curriculum that tells it all—the good, the bad, and the ugly—reflects a deep-seated shame that they themselves have of their own history. Still, the rest of us shouldn't have to pay the price of their willful ignorance.

-Angela Valenzuela

Grumet: Protests are a part of U.S. history. What story will Texas' textbooks tell?

Bridget Grumet

Austin American-Statesman

Writing letters and asking nicely hadn’t worked.

So on a warm March day in 1990, Maria R. Palacios joined the dozens of people who left their wheelchairs and crutches at the base of the U.S. Capitol, then crawled up the 83 stone steps toward the building where the Americans with Disabilities Act was stalled.

The next day, Palacios watched as about 100 of her fellow protesters, some of them in wheelchairs linked together in chains, were arrested for refusing to leave the Capitol Rotunda — a pressure campaign that helped push Congress to finally pass the landmark civil rights legislation for people with disabilities.

“When we talk about the importance of civil disobedience, we’re talking about survival,” Palacios, who lives in Houston, told me by phone this week. “At some point, when we have had enough, that is when we pour out into the streets, and we are willing to sacrifice, and we put our bodies on the line.”

I don’t know how you tell that story without appreciation for the activists or the righteousness of their cause. But that is what a proposed measure in the Texas House would require.

House Bill 1804, aiming to rein in what critics have called a “woke” curriculum, says textbooks “may not include selections or works that condone civil disorder, social strife, or disregard for the law.”

“Condone” is a loaded word. American history turns on moments in which protesters have stood up against some form of injustice, using civil disobedience, a decision to violate certain laws, to make a point. Is it “condoning” their tactics to note when they succeeded? Should teachers and textbooks be neutral about the discrimination that demonstrators sought to end? Is the key takeaway from their experience the trespassing arrest?

The greater concern is that some threads of history will become so politically charged (and legally fraught) that teachers might simply avoid them.

“It’s erasing history,” Palacios said, as I told her about the bill. “They don't have the right to erase history.”

(Indeed, this issue isn't solely about history. On Tuesday afternoon, troopers cleared out scores of chanting protesters from the Texas Capitol, at least one of them in handcuffs, as lawmakers considered a measure banning gender-affirming medical care for youth.)

Rep. Terri Leo-Wilson, a first-year GOP lawmaker from Galveston, did not respond to my request to discuss her bill. In a statement to the Dallas Observer last week, however, she said, “What HB 1804 requires is that when acts of civil disobedience are covered in materials it is noted when those movements have used illegal means to accomplish their purpose.”

Fears of ‘creating social justice warriors’

Though HB 1804 has a deep bench of supporters — five authors and 50 co-authors — it’s still pending in committee.

This sweeping bill touches many aspects of education. It would require science textbooks to “clearly” distinguish scientific theory from fact. It would also require any materials discussing America to “present positive aspects of the United States and its heritage.” (It’s unclear how much information about our nation’s shortcomings would be allowed.)

The committee substitute version of the bill drew attention last week for adding language that would ban content on sexual orientation, gender identity and sexual activity from any instructional materials used before high school.

Texas needs to “instruct students in math, science (and) other subjects in an objective manner, and not spend a high amount of time and resources on creating social justice warriors,” Jonathan Covey, policy director for Texas Values, told the House Public Education Committee last month.

I agree that it’s not the job of schools to create activists (and I haven’t seen any evidence they are). But textbooks should not tiptoe around the role that civil disobedience played in our history, either.

Touchstones like the Boston Tea Party and the civil rights movement would remain in some form, I’d imagine. But what about other movements, such as those for disabled access?

“Rosa Parks was asked to move to the back of the bus,” Palacios said. “Disabled people, even to this day, continue to fight for the chance to get on the bus.”

On basic rights, there’s no counterpoint

The Coalition of Texans with Disabilities has raised concerns that HB 1804 “would block the factual teaching of the disability rights movement in public schools,” alongside other civil rights movements.

J Canciglia, an advocate with the coalition, pointed to a long history of protests: Disabled activists shutting down New York City traffic on Madison Avenue in 1972. Protesters holding sit-ins at government buildings in 1977. And, of course, the demonstrations culminating in the 1990 passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

At the same time, HB 1804 says instructional materials must “present contrasting points of view regarding significant political or social movements in history in a balanced and factual manner.”

One would hope we’re not still debating whether people deserve basic human rights. The cost of accommodations for those who are disabled is hardly a counterpoint.

“Students with disabilities deserve access to the works of these key historical figures within the movement,” Canciglia told the House Public Education Committee. “They also deserve to be free of ‘contrasting views’ regarding the acquisition of their rights.”

A fair presentation of history shouldn’t strip out the advocacy and even civil disobedience that led to change. The next generation of Texans should be able to find their origin stories in our history books, and that includes people who have struggled in numerous ways to be recognized and treated with respect.

And what about those who are fortunate enough to live without the sting of discrimination? They need to learn the history, too.

“It’s because of the other people who have been on the frontlines of activism, it's because of the people who put their bodies on the line and whose lives have been risked — it’s because of those people that you’re able to say, ‘Well, I have not been oppressed,’” Palacios said. “I say to them, ‘You’re welcome.’”

Grumet is the Statesman’s Metro columnist. Her column, ATX in Context, contains her opinions. Share yours via email at bgrumet@statesman.com or via Twitter at @bgrumet. Find her previous work at statesman.com/news/columns.