How should Ethnic Studies be taught?

High schools in California will soon be required to ensure that all students take a course in Ethnic Studies. What does that mean, practically?

California’s students are caught in a political battle over this question. Teachers and school leaders have been drawn into the fracas, too.

This post summarizes the current policies about Ethnic Studies, how we got here, and the issues that school districts are grappling with.

What is Ethnic Studies?

In the Ed100 blog
Ethnic studies: Why is it controversial?

Ethnic studies is an interdisciplinary subject, which means that it involves many fields including history, literature, economics, sociology, anthropology, and political science.

The availability of ethnic studies courses in California dates back to 1968, when college students in San Francisco staged a strike to demand “a new curriculum that would embrace the history of all people, including ethnic minorities.”

As Ethnic Studies courses became increasingly prevalent in colleges, some high schools began offering it, too. In 2021, California became the first state to require a semester-long Ethnic Studies course to earn a high school diploma. Signed by Governor Newsom after multiple proposals and vetos, the law requires all school districts to complete implementation of the requirement for the graduating class of 2029-30 at the latest.

High schools must begin offering courses by no later than the 2025-26 school year. Will this be a difficult target to hit? It's hard to know. As of 2020, about half of California high school students attended a school where a course was offered. (Yes, that’s the most recent data available as of March 2024. California has dreadfully sluggish education data systems, but that's a subject for another post.)

What is the California model curriculum for Ethnic Studies?

In practice, all classes are based on a curriculum — a written plan for what will be taught and assigned. In California, like most states, the stories of historically marginalized people have often been left out of many US history courses.

The purpose of ethnic studies is to remedy this glaring omission and engage students in learning in a new way. Research indicates that providing students with lessons about their own cultures can increase attendance and improve grades. This effect was replicated in San Francisco, where the course was taken by students in ninth grade.

To provide teachers with direction, the California State Board of Education adopted an Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum with public input. The model curriculum is designed to promote critical thinking and rigorous analysis of history, systems of oppression, and the status quo, and to generate discussions about what the future can hold. It focuses on four traditional ethnic studies that were first established in California higher education:

1. African American studies
2. Chicana/o/x and Latina/o/x studies
3. Native American studies
4. Asian American and Pacific Islander studies

School districts can adapt the curriculum to address the demographics and diversity of their classrooms. However, the model recommends that “the adaptations should center on deepening or augmenting rather than scaling down any of the four disciplines.”

The authority to select curriculum lies with each school district.

In practice, ethnic studies is taught one class at a time. Each high school in the state of California needs to select and prepare faculty members to help students learn together about America’s ethnic diversity, history, divisions and unity. This preparation will take place under public scrutiny. California law requires that each district hold public discussion [see section (G)(IV)] about their planned curriculum. The Los Angeles County Office of Education has developed a useful guide for the process.

In California, the authority to select curriculum lies with each school district. Districts can either use the state model curriculum or select their own. The state can recommend curriculum, but the power to choose among available options — or to make their own locally developed curriculum — lies with school districts. All curriculum, however, must comply with state law:

What’s the controversy?

Controversy swirls around the content of locally developed courses for Ethnic Studies. This is exacerbated by rising Islamophobia and antisemitism throughout the world. Ethnic studies courses explore the causes of racism and other forms of bigotry including anti-Blackness, anti-Indigeneity, xenophobia, antisemitism and Islamophobia.

The model curriculum received significant criticism during its development process. For example, The California Legislative Jewish Caucus said the draft reflected “an anti-Jewish bias.” A coalition of Armenian, Assyrian, Hellenic, Hindu, Jewish, and Korean civic groups said the draft advanced “a political agenda that should not be taught as unchallenged truth in our state’s public schools.”

The final version of the model curriculum was modified to try to address these issues. “Try” is the operative word, though. School districts will need to pay attention as they make their ethnic studies classes a reality.

Warning to school districts

Anticipating ongoing disagreements about what and how ethnic studies are taught, the ethnic studies law admonishes districts not to discriminate. Take a moment to read these guardrails because it gives you context for the controversy.

For districts that choose to use an alternative to the state's model curriculum, the law includes specific advice:

Governor Newsom’s Education Policy Advisor has further warned school districts about using materials that do not comply with state law:

Get a feel for the controversy

A semester of Ethnic Studies involves many hours of discussion and interaction, involving individual students and faculty members. The curriculum guides the discussion. The table below quotes from two organizations that have deep differences in perspective about the purpose of the course. These are not the only perspectives — just two that have attracted notable attention.

Video examples of the disagreement

It’s useful to hear the different perspectives in this debate directly. These videos help convey the sensibility and message associated with each.

Liberated Ethnic Studies testimonials:

Killing America movie trailer:

Lawsuits and lively public meetings

Throughout California, school districts are facing strong objections to how they are teaching Ethnic Studies and how they are protecting the rights of students to a safe school environment. This controversy has increased public engagement at school board meetings and added to discussions of what and how academics should be taught in schools. For example:

• In Hayward, the district contract with the Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum Consortium was condemned, saying the model and “its leadership have a record of promoting antisemitism, anti-Israel narratives, and other forms of bias.”
• In Sequoia Union High School District, instruction about the Israel/Hamas conflict brought enraged community members to a board meeting saying a lesson contained anti-semitic propaganda.
• In Oakland and San Francisco, school districts are under investigation for civil rights violations based on discrimination complaints involving shared ancestry.
• In Los Angeles, the Deborah Project has filed a lawsuit to stop Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum Consortium materials from being used in the Los Angeles public-school system, and to enforce California law requiring that all public school teaching materials be made public.”
• In Santa Ana, ethnic studies courses discussing Palestine were put on hold.
• In Berkeley, a complaint has been filed against the school district for “failing to take action to end nonstop bullying and harassment of Jewish students by peers and teachers since Oct. 7.”

Legislative response

Citing the alarming rise in hate incidents and recent spikes in anti-Semitic and Islamophobic incidents, Senator Harry Stern has introduced SB 1421 Educational Equity. The bill proposes to create a California Office of Civil Rights capable of investigating complaints of discrimination, harassment, intimidation, and bullying, including allegations of homophobia, transphobia, anti-Semitism, and Islamophobia.

He has also introduced SB 1277 genocide education establishing a statewide teacher professional development program on genocide, including the Holocaust.

To address the lack of training for teachers, Assembly member Wendy Carrillo has introduced AB 1255, a bill that proposes to create a task force to develop criteria for a teacher credential in ethnic studies.