sacramento | Sixth graders in America’s most populous state will soon learn that Romans, not Jews, crucified Jesus.
But that lesson could have been otherwise skewed had some of the textbooks approved by California this week gone through in their initial forms.
At its Nov. 9 meeting, the Board of Education voted unanimously to adopt revised versions of 10 educational programs, including textbooks and related materials.
Close to 200 of nearly 1,000 edits and corrections had been put forward by the Institute for Curriculum Services, a project of the S.F.-based Jewish Community Relations Council, which spent months reviewing the proposed educational programs for bias against Judaism or inaccuracies in their depiction of Jewish history.
This kind of watchdog activism is crucial, says Amanda Susskind, Pacific Southwest regional director of the Anti-Defamation League.
“If in our view a textbook is disseminating myths or untruths to children that perpetuate negative stereotypes about Jewish people or any other group of people, it is not only appropriate but necessary for us to respond,” she said.
These textbook adoption meetings are not heavily covered by the mainstream media, despite the fact that, as speaker after speaker reiterated, this is where tangible decisions are made that affect what and how children learn.
“You may be wondering why I and my colleagues are here today, why this meeting is being covered by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, and why would Jews all over the world care about your actions today,” JCRC educational consultant Jackie Berman told the board during its five-hour public meeting.
“The answer is clear. The sixth-grade textbooks you are about to adopt contain the lessons that children will learn about the religions of the world, Judaism among them.”
Getting the coveted seal of approval from California means big money to educational publishers. California is the nation’s largest purchaser of school textbooks. Not only do other states often follow California’s lead in their own adoptions, but as one board of education member noted at the meeting, publishers “write for our state.”
In its adoption approvals, the board followed recommendations made a month earlier by the state’s curriculum development and supplemental materials commission, save one.
The exception was the sixth-grade program submitted by Oxford University Press, which had been rejected in September by the state curriculum commission largely because of complaints from the Hindu and Jewish communities.
The board voted to accept Oxford’s program, noting that the publisher had spent the last month working closely with Hindu and Jewish groups to correct errors, and had issued a written and verbal apology to the board.
“Oxford has been very cooperative, and we have reached agreement on changes with them,” said Susan Mogull, a policy analyst with the Institute for Curriculum Services, which had criticized the Oxford program in September.
“We’re so pleased with the results,” said an obviously relieved Casper Grathwohl, Oxford’s reference division publisher, who had flown in from New York.
Close to 80 speakers addressed the education board, the vast majority Hindu and Sikh community members who said they felt slighted by all the publishers’ offerings.
These complaints highlight some of the difficulties faced by board members as they waded through hundreds of pages of corrections and edits submitted to them.
Brandishing one of the heavy documents, board member Ruth Bloom asked her colleagues how they were supposed to judge the content of all these textbooks and related materials in order to make educated decisions. “How do you teach about religion in the context of history?” she asked.
“Accurately and with respect,” responded board president Ruth Green.
A special JTA investigation recently revealed how some Islamic organizations with political agendas were involved in the dissemination of biased and distorted teaching materials. It also showed how some anti-Israel groups were heavily involved in consulting with publishers on the development of textbooks.