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A new proposal in Texas would make Bible stories required reading for the state’s roughly 5.4 million public school students.
The proposal, likely to pass on Friday in the Texas State Board of Education, sets out a required reading list from elementary school through high school, and includes Bible passages and stories for children as young as 6. If approved, the requirements will be implemented in 2030, applying to roughly 11 percent of the U.S. public school population.
The Texas State Board of Education gave preliminary approval to the proposed reading list on Tuesday, after a meeting on Monday that heard hours of testimony.
It is highly unusual for a state to implement a state-wide required reading list. Usually, reading lists are decided by educators on a more local level.
The reading list includes picture books about David and Goliath and “Daniel and the Lion’s Den” for elementary school students as young as 6, and passages about Jesus from the New Testament for fourth graders. The texts allotted for middle school students include sermons by Jesus, and discussions of God and heaven. And for high school students, texts include portions of the Book of Job, among others.
“America and Texas have been a Christian nation and a Christian state forever,” Republican board member Brandon Hall said at the meeting on Monday. “The proportion of the impact [Christians] had is why they are included. There are other faiths that are represented, but they’ve had a minimal impact, especially in our founding and our culture and laws leading up to this point.”
The proposal represents yet another right-wing attack on religious and racial diversity in Texas, which has the fifth highest Muslim population in the country. More than half of students in Texas are classified as Hispanic/Latino or Black.
On Thursday, the Board also gave preliminary approval to a social studies proposal that would focus more on Texas and U.S. history. The proposal eliminates the state’s current sixth-grade world cultures course, and removes the requirement that students understand “the impact of race and ethnicity on society” and analyze “the varying treatment patterns of minority groups.” It also added a mandate for students to study the Prophet Muhammad’s supposed “brutal military campaigns” against Christians and Jews, tying Islam to violence. In April, the Board eliminated a social studies standard that included learning about Muslim contributions to algebra and astronomy.
Monday’s public testimony also focused on the proposed changes to social studies. Ruth Nasrullah, a local Muslim activist, said in public testimony, “These proposed standards actually defy the Constitution and highlight only one group of Americans as the founders who built this country to the exclusion of others – both in the past and in the present.”
But others took the opportunity to smear Islam in their comments. Republican state Sen. Bob Hall stated that Islam is “not a religion” but “a totalitarian theocracy, not unlike totalitarian systems of communism, Nazism and globalism.”
Islamophobia has become commonplace at Texas State Board of Education meetings, prompting complaints by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and other groups.
Last year, Texas became the largest state to require every classroom to display the Ten Commandments, following Louisiana and Arkansas.
Throughout Trump’s second term, right-wing politicians and lawmakers have pushed forward their attempt to reshape public education, restricting discussions of race and racism, and adding religious focus to the classroom. Texas often leads the way in inserting Christianity into public education, while states like Florida focus on combatting progressive standards like diversity, equity and inclusion.
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