The States of Arkansas, Idaho, and Oklahoma have previously implemented legislation to restrict teachers and school administrators from indoctrinating or propagating critical race theory in the classroom. Currently, at least 11 more states are in the process of drafting similar laws.
According to the Daily Signal, this latest development comes as the U.S. Department of Education under the Biden administration has adopted a stance favoring the teaching of critical race theory in schools.
Critical race theory, the way it's taught, is that people are oppressed or oppressors depending on their skin color.
Arizona, Louisiana, Missouri, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Utah are among the states having laws pending that address critical race theory.
The Utah State Board of Education is reviewing the notion of "equity" in education. "Equity" is a prominent phrase on the left and a component of critical race theory.
"We are seeing a push here to get [critical race theory] in the curriculum," board member Jennie Earl said.
Earl claims that politicians are more concerned with adhering to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 than with outlawing critical race theory.
"We would just be upholding the laws that are already on the books," Earl says of proposed legislation.
The head of the National Education Association's New Hampshire branch calls such legislation "repugnant."
"The pandemic is laying bare systemic inequalities in education," says Megan Tuttle of the NEA.
Utah won't be able to adopt similar legislation until 2022, when the state will no longer have the authority to do so.
In South Carolina, Republican member Bill Taylor has suggested a legislation that promotes openness in order to enable parents to find out more about the educational curriculum in elementary and secondary schools. The South Carolina Academic Integrity Act has 25 co-sponsors, but he first filed it during the last week of the legislative session, which means it will take until January for the bill to be submitted in the official legislature.
The state representative said: "What it really principally does is, it requires full transparency on the part of all the schools to ensure that parents are aware of the details of what is being taught to their children."
The South Carolina measure forbids schools from utilizing certain instructional material, such as The New York Times' controversial 1619 Project, which claims that America's historical foundation date was 1619, when the first slaves were transported to Virginia from Africa, rather than 1776. The law requires the state to withdraw support from any school that fails to publish curriculum.
"If parents are doing their job and are involved in their child's studies, they need to understand what is being taught to their kids," Taylor argued.
Taylor, who had previously served on the California House of Representatives' Education Committee for 10 years, claims that the critical race theory curriculum is "more devious and not as well intended."
"I'm for students in K-12 and the university level to learn everything, the good and bad," the lawmaker says of history. However, he contends that "if we pit people against each other in various groups and have this identity politics in schools, that does not serve America well."
