By: Ellen Cans
The newly approved New York City budget has allocated $10 million for the public school system to develop a fresh K-12 black history and studies curriculum. The funds set aside for what is being called “Education Equity”, comes as the country debates the critical race theory and the alleged legacy of racism in the US.
As reported by the NY Post, some of the funds will go towards preparing and teaching the new “woke” curriculum—which refers to being aware of sensitive social issues including racism. Some African-Americans welcome the initiative. “It’s something that’s long overdue,” said Queens Councilman Daneek Miller. He said over 80% of the NYC public school students are black, Hispanic or Asian but that only 5 percent of textbooks delve into historic figures from ethnic minorities. “To be blunt about it. All many people know is the arrival of Africans in America through the slave trade and then. `We freed you and that’s Ok,”’ Miller said. “There’s a stigma to that.”
He said he would like the curriculum to include more discussions about the African population before they were made into slaves. “We want people to see the contributions of Africans in history before the slave trade, before the Roman Empire. The contributions to civilization from Timbuktu and Western Africa,” Miller added.
The council Initiatives’ spending on education has close to doubled, jumping from $21.68 million to $39.6 million, with a big portion set for the new Black Studies program. The initiative comes as the country has been embroiled in debate over the critical race theory—which basically says that racism is systemic and has been ingrained in country’s legal systems and policies and has led to housing and school segregation.
Critics counter that the critical race theory is basically racial indoctrination which chalks up collective and historical blame onto all white Americans. They argue that it should not be taught in schools. Over the past few months, Republican lawmakers in about two dozen states have proposed legislation to limit teaching concepts such as racial equity and white privilege. States Idaho, Iowa, Oklahoma, Texas and Tennessee have already signed into law bans on teaching the critical race theory or other discussions about racism in public schools. On the other hand, Chicago, NY, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C. , announced that the schools will start utilizing an initiative to teach about black history, saying that America’s past has influenced the present.
