A hearing-style caucus meeting, in apparent hopes of postponing the State Board of Education’s adoption of the social studies portion of the state’s educational standards, drew in several liberal activists, academicians and multiculturalists this week – but no diversity of opinion, and no SBOE members.
The Mexican American Legislative Caucus (MALC) heard invited testimony on what members perceive as a lack of multicultural representation in the state’s proposed social studies standards.
At stake are strides made by conservative members on the State Board of Education.
If the SBOE rejects the social studies portion of the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS – the state’s standards for classroom curricula, testing criteria and textbook content) on final reading in its May meeting, and punts each scheduled meeting until a newly elected board takes over in January, a new requirement that students learn about patriotism could be replaced with the old standard of multiculturalism.
Further, students could learn again to criticize capitalism rather than appreciate the free market economy, as well as learn less about America’s founding fathers and more about obscure civil rights leaders.
As it stands now, the conservative Republicans who for now call the shots on the SBOE were behind many of some 300 amendments to the social studies TEKS standards submitted by the Texas Education Agency’s writing committees.
Conservatives were concerned that Thomas Edison and Christmas were removed in the writing committee’s draft; multiculturalists were upset that figures such as Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta did not get enough sunlight.
Despite the left’s insistence that diversity be valued, the MALC hearing was little more than a forum for speeches from “cherry-picked members of left-wing advocacy groups and academia,” according to Jonathan Saenz, legislative affairs director of the conservative Liberty Institute.
Saenz, himself a Hispanic but also an influential social conservative, was not allowed to speak at the hearing, though he said he filled out paperwork to speak. MALC’s reason was that time ran out at the hearing around 5:30 p.m.
Apparently, the only conservatives that MALC missed hearing from, members said, were Republicans on the SBOE. “I find it very telling” that no SBOE member was present, said Rep. David Leibowitz (D-San Antonio).
Uphold the law … or just wait it out?
So if MALC has its way, and the SBOE defers a decision until new members take their seats, progress made by conservatives on the board may be lost to more liberal interests. After all, a moderate, Thomas Ratliff (see section on his testimony below) ousted conservative rouser and former chairman Don McLeroy in March, which is enough to upset the current conservative lead on the board whether Ratliff or the Democratic nominee wins.
But there’s another factor in play here. Commissioner of Education Robert Scott noted in his remarks that Texas law requires the board to emphasize patriotism and the free enterprise system in its social studies standards.
Texas Education Code, Section 28.002(h) reads as follows:
“The State Board of Education and each school district shall foster the continuation of the tradition of teaching United States and Texas history and the free enterprise system in regular subject matter and in reading courses and in the adoption of textbooks. A primary purpose of the public school curriculum is to prepare thoughtful, active citizens who understand the importance of patriotism and can function productively in a free enterprise society with appreciation for the basic democratic values of our state and national heritage.”
Many MALC members expressed concerns that standards teaching patriotism and free markets are politically driven by Republicans on the state board. Reps. Leibowitz and Trey Martinez-Fischer (D-San Antonio) were among those calling for postponing the SBOE’s second reading of the social studies TEKS as a means of “balancing out” the alleged conservative bias.
“Is there any reason we can’t bump this up a few months?” Leibowitz asked.
Martinez-Fischer called for “significant vetting” to be done on the standards — which at least one of the future members of the SBOE did not.
“This is just as big as decennial decisions, such as redistricting,” Martinez-Fischer said, hoping for more time — and possibly more Democrats on the SBOE.
David Bradley, a sitting SBOE member, told LSR he does not predict postponement.
“We’ll gladly postpone our vote if they will postpone the redistricting process until after the 2012 election,” Bradley said, certain of impending Republican gains in legislative representation.
Saenz told LSR postponing the social studies standards is a political move to get more Democrats elected to the SBOE, not one concerned with education standards alone.
“The bottom line is that the purpose of this hearing was to have a one-sided effort to beat up on the SBOE and to delay the final adoption of social studies standards,” he said.
Was the hearing legal?
Whether or not MALC violated any rules in hosting this politically charged hearing was a topic of conversation at the Capitol. The “housekeeping resolution” from the 81st Legislative Session (HR 3) allows caucuses (such as MALC, or the Republican House Caucus for that matter) to use the meeting rooms in the Capitol for meetings or public forums. However, state funds may not be expended for such meetings. At issue were whether or not legislative staff members were present while on the state’s clock.
Republican House Caucus Chairman Rep. Larry Taylor (R-League City) said from what he knew of the hearing, it sounded political in nature.
“A caucus is not supposed to be involved in politics,” Taylor said, “it’s supposed to be involved with policy and things like that. When you have invited testimony only, it looks to me to be very political. So I think my friends over at MALC need to be told that a caucus doesn’t need to get political.”
Where some future members stand
We got a glimpse of two likely new members of the SBOE at the MALC hearing.
Ratliff submitted that local school districts should be responsible for setting standards.
“They’re called Independent school districts for a reason,” he said – a small-government position (or so it seems, on the surface), though barely an eyebrow was raised by the Democratic legislators present who often prefer state regulation.
As a matter of fact, Rep. Pete Gallego (D-Alpine), who has a long history on SBOE-related matters in the Legislature, reflected a growing undercurrent among members who would like to see the SBOE abolished altogether. “There are those of us who are very adamant on getting rid of it [the SBOE],” he said.
Neither did Ratliff raise an eyebrow to Gallego’s comment. He said he hopes to help bring “hope” to those concerned with a lack of multiculturalism in textbook standards “that a bipartisan group can make the changes that need to be made” on the second reading of the social studies standards.
“Don’t give up hope. There’s an attempt to return balance to the standards,” Ratliff said.
Ratliff reminded the MALC members that the SBOE “has no authority to remove people from textbooks” or to “edit textbooks at the 11th hour” to reflect TEKS standards.
As far as the textbook standards writing committee selection, he said, “there ought to be more than a handshake and saying, ‘Let’s put our guy on it.’”
Dr. Michael Soto, a Democratic nominee for SBOE who faces Republican Tony Cunningham in November in the heavily Democratic South Texas district, was not so concerned with bipartisanship, and warned of electoral consequences should the SBOE not fall into step with MALC. He minced few words in charging that cultural conservatives on the board were using “code language” to assert Judeo-Christian dominance in textbook standards.
He criticized McLeroy’s “last-minute” crafting of a standard on American Exceptionalism (a scholarly word for patriotism) for the high school U.S. History standards.
Furthermore, Soto asserted, McLeroy’s wording was very similar to what can be found on Wikipedia’s publicly amendable definition of American Exceptionalism. Soto further said American Exceptionalism is an ante-bellum (pre-Civil War) concept not fit for modern student consumption.
Soto then decried what he considered to be “code words” placed into the textbook standards, and said that English Puritan leader John Winthrop was more interested in repudiating English mercantilism and embracing “a New English communism.”
“Yes, Winthrop was a small ‘c’ communist,” Soto said. “His ‘Model of Christian Charity’ sermon reads the Bible in a manner that anticipates Marx’s “from each to each” sloganeering: ‘thou must give thy brother according to his necessity,’ Winthrop instructs, ‘rather than lend him as he requires.’”
Democratic candidates Rebecca Bell-Metereau (District 5) and Judy Jennings (District 10) attended but did not speak.