Divided NC board OKs new social studies documents. But where’s Sandra Day O’Connor?
A divided State Board of Education approved new documents Thursday to help teach new social studies standards, despite concerns from Republican members that the documents don’t list former U.S. Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O’Connor.
She was the first female justice on the Supreme Court.
The state board voted 7-3 for the new guidance documents, which include a glossary of instructional terms for social studies teachers and “unpacking documents” that suggest how elementary school teachers will use the new standards. The board will vote in July on the unpacking documents for middle schools and high schools.
GOP board members questioned Thursday how the examples were picked, including the omission of O’Connor from a list of women “who have contributed to change and innovation in the United States.”
“I know we cannot think of every person in history, every event in history, every major theme in history,” said board member Olivia Oxendine. “But I cannot for the life of me understand how in this particular standard within the unpacking documents how we missed Sandra Day O’Connor — the first female to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1981. I don’t know how we missed that historical figure.”
Ginsburg and not O’Connor listed
Instead of O’Connor, the examples in the 5th-grade document include women like former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, abolitionist Sojourner Truth and suffragette Susan B. Anthony.
State Superintendent Catherine Truitt said that the most significant way of ensuring that people aren’t left out is to leave it up to teachers to determine what to do. That’s why she said the examples in the documents aren’t meant to be a checklist of people to cover.
Truitt, a Republican, said the examples are meant only to provide a frame of reference for teachers. She said teachers aren’t required to use the supporting documents.
“Someone may very well look at that list and say, ‘Oh, I understand. Sandra Day O’Connor would fit perfectly in the lesson that I’m going to choose,’” Truitt said.
But Oxendine said they can’t leave everything up to local schools. She said someone of the magnitude of O’Connor is too important not to be mentioned in the state documents.
“The state level guides, exemplifies and sends the message to the districts these names, these places, these events in history are so important that they appear in our state adopted documents,” Oxendine said.
Democratic board member J. Wendell Hall also said he agreed that O’Connor should have been listed. But he voted for the new documents, unlike GOP board members Oxendine, Todd Chasteen and Amy White.
Two Republican board members — Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson and State Treasurer Dale Folwell — were not at Thursday’s meeting. They had voted in February against the new standards.
Will standards be delayed?
Teachers are supposed to begin teaching the new standards as early as July for the 2021-22 school year. But that could change.
Last week, the state House rewrote a COVID-19 school relief bill to include new language that would delay the social studies standards to the 2022-23 school year. GOP lawmakers said the delay would give the state more time to finish the documents and train teachers.
The state Senate rejected the House’s changes to the bill on Monday. A committee of lawmakers will try to work out differences between the House and Senate versions of the bill.
State board chairman Eric Davis said Thursday that they’re not requesting the delay. Board member Jill Camnitz added that high school schedules have been built and teachers have been hired based on the standards being used this fall.
“Our students are eager for the opportunity to celebrate our achievements while exploring the effects of the past,” said Camnitz, who chairs the board committee overseeing the new standards. “We have to move forward now.”
Standards are controversial
The new social studies have been a source of controversy even before their adoption in February in a split 7-5 vote by the board’s Democratic majority. The standards call for including the perspectives of historically marginalized groups.
Critics accused the social studies standards of incorporating “Critical Race Theory,” a “scholarly framework that describes how race, class, gender, and sexuality organize American life,” according to the UNC-Chapel Hill history department. This view holds that systemic racism has been and continues to be a part of the nation’s history.
Critics call it Marxist, anti-American, racist and destructive. Concerns about Critical Race Theory led state Republican House lawmakers to pass a bill last month that puts new rules on how schools teach about race and history, including not promoting teaching that would make students feel guilt or discomfort due to their race or sex.
Concerns about Critical Race Theory accounted for 88% of the public comments to the state’s plan to use $1.2 billion in federal COVID-19 relief for schools. The Department of Public Instruction said Critical Race Theory isn’t part of the plan but that many people cited it to argue the state should reject the federal funds.
The documents approved Thursday do not include new language suggested by White that would have said that “America is a great nation.”
Instead, Camnitz said Thursday that the new documents reflect the wording of a preamble adopted in February that talks about the “achievements” and the “sins” in the nation’s history.
“Let us study the past so that we can understand where it might lead us today,” Camnitz said.
This story was originally published June 17, 2021 at 12:31 PM with the headline "Divided NC board OKs new social studies documents. But where’s Sandra Day O’Connor?."
