The Orange County Board of Education is having the department’s staff develop an ethnic studies curriculum for its ACCESS program that can also be made available to school districts across the county and elsewhere.
In 2021, a new state mandate required ethnic studies be offered in all California high schools by 2025 and made a graduation requirement by 2030. The state provided a framework for the courses, leaving school districts with the responsibility of creating the curriculum.
Related Articles
New details emerge about the 14-year-old suspect and victims in the deadliest school shooting this year
Do we really understand coffee? California’s new Coffee Research Center says ‘No’
Orange got rid of crossing guards. Might the city bring them back?
Black students are still kicked out of school at higher rates despite reforms
Cal State LA, UC Irvine awarded $1 million grant for materials science
Trustee Jorge Valdes said his intention in suggesting the county department create the curriculum was to have an option “that is historically accurate.” Valdes did not provide specifics of what would be considered historically accurate, but said he wanted the public to be part of that conversation.
“There’s going to be a comment period where people can send us their commentary on what they may not like, or what they think needs to be changed,” he added during an interview before Wednesday’s board meeting when the decision was made. “We will evaluate those comments and then make a final decision on it.”
Superintendent Stefan Bean will make the final decision on what goes into the course curriculum and what gets left out.
The county department’s ACCESS — Alternative, Community, and Correctional Education Schools and Services — program serves more than 2,300 students annually in community day schools, county correctional programs and independent study programs. The county education department does not regulate school districts’ policies or curriculum, but could offer its ethnic studies curriculum for their use.
At Wednesday’s Board of Education meeting, Valdes said the idea of the OCBE staff formulating its own ethnic studies curriculum came after learning more about other models available, which he considered historically inaccurate or skewed.
Trustee Ken L. Williams said he rejects ethnic studies models that are “anti-American” and identified “oppressors and oppressed.”
OCBE staff, Trustee Tim Shaw added, has been working on a curriculum about the Vietnamese refugee experience. “Our staff has experience in developing a particular curriculum, this isn’t too far above and beyond the norm around here,” he said.
The Santa Ana Unified board in April 2023 approved two ethnic studies classes that are now at the center of a lawsuit. The Anti-Defamation League and Jewish advocacy groups sued the district, alleging among other things the courses were created behind closed doors, excluding the public, more specifically the Jewish community, from the process. A SAUSD spokesman said he couldn’t comment given the pending litigation.
“To be clear, I want to be very open and transparent in the process,” said Valdes, who offered the Santa Ana case as an example of why the county department should develop its own curriculum. “I don’t want to do what Santa Ana Unified has been accused of doing, which is doing something entirely in secret.”
When asked before the board meeting how the department’s curriculum would navigate the Israel-Hamas conflict, Valdes repeated that the OCBE will create something “historically accurate” that will be presented to the public for review and commentary.
“I’m going to ask (Bean) to engage in a comment period where people can send us their concerns or make statements about what they think is correct or not correct,” Valdes said. “But at some point, there’s going to have to be a judgment call made and we as the department are going to have to make a judgment call on what we believe is historically accurate.”
Trustee Lisa Sparks said as an educator who has developed curriculum, she is an advocate of academic freedom.
“I am very supportive of us creating, particularly staff and teachers – the curriculum creators – putting together something as a template for districts to use, for the ACCESS (program) to use,” Sparks said. “Ultimately it’s a template that we hope teachers would use as a tool, but they, in the vein of academic freedom, are going to be able to add their own flavor to such a slide deck or set of curriculum. I support the idea of providing tools and help for educators. Ultimately, educators will make the final decisions in their classroom.”
Related Articles
New details emerge about the 14-year-old suspect and victims in the deadliest school shooting this year
Do we really understand coffee? California’s new Coffee Research Center says ‘No’
Orange got rid of crossing guards. Might the city bring them back?
Black students are still kicked out of school at higher rates despite reforms
Cal State LA, UC Irvine awarded $1 million grant for materials science
Leave a Reply