One of the tasks of the Texas State Board of Education is to update curriculum standards and textbooks for Texas schoolchildren. The Texas school system is so large — 4.8 million textbook-reading schoolchildren as of 2011 — that revisions made by the board are often included in school books across the country, though digital technology has lessened this effect in recent years. In 2010, the board got a lot of attention when it approved over 100 amendments — many of which had a very clear conservative political agenda — to the social studies and economics curriculum standards. Here are some of the more pointed proposals.
Thomas Who?
Thomas Jefferson, the Founding Father considered by many to be the author of the Declaration of Independence, is also credited with coining the phrase “separation of church and state.” According to The New York Times, that coinage didn’t make him very popular with the conservative members of the board. They removed Jefferson from a list of great Enlightenment philosophers — including John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Voltaire, Charles de Montesquieu and Jean Jacques Rousseau — who inspired political revolutions from the 1700s to today. They also removed the word “Enlightenment” and added Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin. After much criticism, they added Jefferson back, but left out “Enlightenment” resulting in a standard very different from the original.
Texas Board of Education member David Bradley wants to set the record straight on global warming.
“Whether global warming is a myth or whether it’s actually happening, that’s very much up for debate,” Bradley said. “Don’t listen to anyone who tells you otherwise.”
Bradley is not a climate scientist, but he’s about to make big decisions governing what Texas students learn about climate change.
In November, Bradley and the rest of the state’s 15-member board will vote to adopt new social-studies textbooks for public schools from kindergarten to 12th grade. When he does, he says that part of his mission will be to shield Lone Star schoolchildren from green propaganda.
Instead, Bradley plans to push for textbooks that teach climate-science doubt—presenting the link between greenhouse gas emissions caused by human activity and global warming as an unsubstantiated and controversial theory.
Natonal Center for Science Education:
Among the most problematic claims about climate science in the social studies textbooks submitted for state adoption: a statement that fossil fuel emissions have caused a hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica; a claim that scientists “disagree about what is causing climate change”; and a quotation from a notorious climate change denial organization presented in rebuttal of the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change.
“The scientific debate over whether climate change is happening and who is responsible has been over for years, and the science textbooks Texas adopted last year make that clear,” explained NCSE’s Minda Berbeco. “Climate change will be a key issue that future citizens of Texas will need to understand and confront, and they deserve social studies textbooks that reinforce good science and prepare them for the challenges ahead.”
But the social studies textbooks under consideration too often fail to reach that goal, added Kathy Miller, president of the Texas Freedom Network Education Fund. “In too many cases we’re seeing publishers shade and even distort facts to avoid angering politicians who vote on whether their textbooks get approved,” Miller said. “Texas kids deserve textbooks that are based on sound scholarship, not political biases.”
According to the Austin American-Statesman (September 10, 2014), the Texas state board of education is scheduled to have a public hearing on the social studies textbooks on September 16, 2014. Thomas Ratliff, a member of the board, told the newspaper that the board considers only whether the books have factual errors and cover fifty percent of the state standards: “If there’s a complaint about the standards, that ship has sailed.”
Seems the Texas State Board of Education is not the only culprit, the publishers share some blame on climate misinformation also as explained in this arstechnica scientific method report:
http://arstechnica.com/science/2014/09/texas-textbooks-butcher-climate-change-coveragein-social-studies/
Good link. The publishers (and authors) can be blamed only for giving Texans what they want, and for the people who have power over textbook selection at least, that seems to be including bad science and political-religious bias. Just good ol’ capitalism at work—-the books would not have been written that way if there was any expectation on the part of the publishers that they would be told that they were “wrong” and needed to be done over.
This is my single pet peeve. The USA was the first country formed based upon ideas from “the enlightenment” without reference to god. Since then, religion has crept in and Jefferson would never recognize America today. IMHO, the only way for humanity to proceed forward (beyond all of the religion-caused problems starting with “Christian crusades” and “Christian inquisitions” up to “Islamic jihad” (re: ISIL), Islam’s wish for Sharia Law, and Islam’s wish to create a modern Caliphate) is to teach all humanity about the enlightenment.
Then if you decide to keep religion, just keep it to yourself.
Here is a nice whitewash of this topic.
“The climate activist group National Center for Science Education embarrassed itself yesterday by making basic errors attacking climate science in Texas.”
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2014/09/16/activists-make-embarrassing-errors-attacking-texas-climate-texts/
I did not post my favorite quote of the month that was in the article.
“NCSE’s embarrassing errors might be excused as mere ignorance if not for the activist group’s agenda-driven purpose. Unlike the Heartland Institute, whose scholars strive to adhere to the science wherever the science takes them…..”
Whitewash? How “gentle” of you. Forbes is going to become the Rush Limbaugh of the print world if it contijnues to print insane and distorted crap like this from James Taylor and the heartland Institute. Apparently, it’s speak untruths to those who WANT to believe them and be rewarded at Forbes.
The NCSE is a well-respected organization that has fought the religious crazies for many years over the teaching of evolution and has more recently moved into supporting the proper teaching of climate change science.
Up until a couple of years ago, Forbes motto was “Capitalist Tool”. They are now using “Change The World”. More total horsepucky from the lying mouthpieces of the greedy rich. “Change the World” means go back to the days of the Robber Barons and beyond—-perhaps to a corporate feudalism modeled on the ancient forms. Forbes is indeed a fully bought and paid for “tool” of the capitalists who are destroying the world with their greed.
Truly wonderful news. The digital revolution is making it even easier than ever before to rewrite history…
Richard Feynman in one of his books, I’ll dig out a reference when I have access to my collection, describes the frustrations he had when asked to judge science books for school use suitability. Few were.
I sat on some “textbook selection committees” (the “formal” name) for science texts back in the 70’s. The main concern back then was the breadth and depth of the science content and “process”, as well as the provision of much supplementary material. The present scourges of “politics” and “religion” had not entered the science education picture and didn’t need to be dealt with. Science books and programs had made great strides in the 60’s after Sputnik and the passage of the NDEA (National Defense Education Act), and that progress was still being “polished”. It wasn’t until Reagan and his cronies appeared that everything started going downhill. I would not relish sitting on such a committee today, particularly in one of the benighted “red” parts of the country.
It would be interesting to see when Feynman was involved in the process and exactly what his criticisms were. I would suspect that he may have been a bit “demanding” in his expectations. Please try to provide a source.
When an ardent young earth creationist is chairwoman then what chance does truth stand.
Cargill, she isn’t connected to the agribusiness giant by any chance.
They probably didn’t like Jefferson’s view of America – a bunch of folks homesteading, keeping out of the world theater – either.
This textbook thing is just a small corner of the vast web that the “conservatives” weave as they try to take the country back to the days of the Robber Barons and beyond.
ALEC has been very busy on the education front as well as in voter suppression and gerrymandering, trying to get legislation passed that will destroy the education system as we know it. Along with home-schooling, there has been a push to allow “virtual schools” that will allow fundamentalist and capitalist propaganda to be pumped into little brains via the internet. Look up the company K-12 for an eye-opener there. Yes, destroy public confidence in teachers (and bust their unions), defund public education and “privatize” it by giving $$$ to “contractors” (the free market lives), shrink government until it can be drowned in a bathtub, etc.
Imagine how easy it will be to “brainwash” in virtual schools. An evil seed can be written into the curriculum and planted one day and erased the next—-no incriminating “textbook” for “committees” to flip through.