Several hundred students, community members, and educators packed a Jefferson County Board of Education meeting in suburban Denver on Thursday night, lambasting the conservative-majority board’s proposal to censor the district’s history curriculum.
The proposal—to establish a committee that would review course materials to ensure they promote patriotism and avoid encouragement of “civil disorder, social strife or disregard of the law”—was the catalyst for two weeks of student walk-outs and teacher ‘sick-outs,’ the latter of which closed several high schools on two days in September.
Since September 19, thousands of high-schoolers have taken to the streets with signs reading, “How will we learn from our mistakes if you don’t teach us about them?” and “Keep your politics out of my education.”
They were similarly vocal during a two-hour public comment period Thursday evening. The Denver Post reports:
While board member Julie Williams, who has cited the Texas Board of Education as a model, refused to recall the proposal entirely, the protests appeared to have brought about a partial victory.
Early Thursday morning, in advance of the board meeting, superintendent Dan McMinimee sent a letter (pdf) to board members proposing a compromise: rather than establish a new committee, McMinimee suggested reorganizing existing curriculum review groups in the district to involve more student, teacher, and community voices.
That compromise proposal—stripped of the controversial section about patriotism and civil disorder—was successful Thursday night. But not everyone viewed it as a win.
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