Photo: Rachel Zein for the Texas Tribune
Author: Brian Lopez, August 11, 2022
Author of 'Critical Race Theory' Ban Says Texas School Can Still Teach About Racism
For the past year, Texas educators have struggled with a new law targeting how history and race are taught in the state’s public schools.
Now, eight months after the enactment of a law designed to de-emphasize the role of slavery and racism in American history in Texas social studies classes, state Sen. Bryan Hughes, R-Mineola, the author of the state’s so-called “critical race theory” law, appeared before the State Board of Education in an attempt to offer better guidance about the law he helped craft.
“That bill is not an attempt to sanitize or to teach our history in any other way than the truth — the good, the bad and the ugly — and those difficult things that we’ve been through and those things we’ve overcome,” Hughes said. “No one is saying that we don’t have systemic racism. But what we’re saying is, we’ve made a lot of progress. We have a long way to go. But the way to get there is to come together as Americans.”
His testimony came as the board was considering how to update the state’s social studies curriculum standards, known as the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills, or the TEKS. It’s a process done every eight years for the state’s 5.5 million public school students.
The drafts of the updated curriculum are available online. Some changes being considered include the addition of a course on personal financial literacy and separate courses that focus on Asian and Native Americans.
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