Sunday, May 23, 2010

Don't Mess with Texas

The Texas Board of Education has been updating the curriculum requirements for the state. This update has attracted quite a bit of negative press comment. Liberals accuse the Texans of being too conservative. And, due to the large size of the Texas school book market, they fear that Texas standards will become defacto national standards as text book publishers revise their books to meet the Texas standards.
I've read the Texas curriculum. It's posted on line here.
I don't see anything wrong here. The curriculum is spelled out in plain English, rather than ed major jargon. It is concrete, listing persons, places, events, and concepts to be taught. The selection of material seems perfectly reasonable to me. They want students to know American history, some fundamental economics, and recent important events such as the end of the cold war, and 9/11. It is NOT watered down. The curriculum goes far beyond anything taught in my high school, and I went to a pretty good school.
In My Humble Opinion (IMHO) the Texas curriculum is perfectly reasonable and centrist. The critics are drawn from far out in left field.

No comments: