Texas Textbook Controversy: Nikki Lorenzini

When I originally saw this topic, I was ecstatic. I thought, “Finally, a school board is deciding to teach on something out of the norm. To go beyond the standard.” Because, after all, isn’t that what makes a great teacher? To go outside of what the “standard” is and make children interested in the subject that they are teaching? I remember the text books I had back in school, and they were all the same. It seemed like one big giant history box with no room to learn any of the fun stuff. MLK was breezed over. Vietnam was barely touched upon. The 60’s and beyond might have well not existed.

I talked with two of my friends/co-workers who are both former teachers, and I asked them about this topic, because I wanted to see what their comments/concerns they would have regarding this topic. My one co-worker was telling me how there is actually no such thing as a standard textbook, that they are sold and marketed to specific regions by having them tailored or slanted to the individual regions. She said that in 11th grade, her US history teacher showed the class two textbooks, it had the same cover, table of contents, copyright, etc. One was from the deep south; the other was the one her class used. Her book showed a depiction of a lynching, the one from the south didn’t. My other co-worker said she thinks that we should have a country-wide mandatory standard of what kids are taught, just to make it more cohesive.

Plus, if you think about it, is the history that we are taught really that comprehensive? I know people who are not from America who have a better understanding of our history. Take a look at the citizenship test people have to take. I have a friend from Russia who said it was crazy easy, yet many Americans have a hard time passing it. So if Texas wants to make their history text books more comprehensive and to include more things that actually happened in our history, more power to them.

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