Had required teachers to ‘believe and acknowledge that microaggressions are real’
The Pennsylvania Department of Education has repealed its teacher “cultural competency” standards following a lawsuit brought by the conservative Thomas More Society.
The DOE’s 2022 “Culturally Relevant and Sustaining Education” guidelines had included nine “competencies” teacher professional development and training workshops “were required to incorporate,” The Philadelphia Inquirer reports.
These mandated teachers to “reflect on their ‘own cultural lens’” and to create lessons which “enable students ‘to identify and question economic, political, and social power structures.’”
Teachers also had to create a class environment which “challenges ‘stereotypes and biases about the intelligence, academic ability, and behavior of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) and other historically marginalized learners.’”
Last year, backed by the Thomas More Society, a group of teachers, parents, and school districts in the western part of the state sued the DOE alleging these standards did not follow the “required rule-making process.”
The standards also infringed on teachers’ First Amendment rights, according to plaintiffs’ attorney Thomas King III. For example, they required teachers to “believe and acknowledge that microaggressions are real,” King said.
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The settlement agreement — made public Wednesday by the plaintiffs — includes a new “Common Ground” framework that will be issued to K-12 schools statewide, with “examples of considerations for professional development.” The examples list different factors that could affect students’ school experiences, including poverty, military families, farming families, homelessness, trauma, and disabilities. The document doesn’t mention race, bias, or discrimination, among other differences with the prior guidelines.
The agreement includes three areas of competencies: cultural awareness; trauma-aware, mental health, and wellness; and technological and virtual engagement. But those sections are blank, with each reading “competencies will be inserted/linked here on website.”
King noted the settlement does allow school districts to follow the original guidelines if they so wish.
Donna-Marie Cole-Malott, co-director of the Pennsylvania Educator Diversity Consortium (which helped develop the original cultural competencies) said her group “stands ready” to assist in the creation of new guidelines. According to her faculty page, part of Cole Malott’s research at East Stroudsburg University involves “the lived experiences and literate lives of Black girls and their social and academic identity development.”
In 2020, the Thomas More Society challenged similar standards in Illinois, one of which noted teachers will “embrace and encourage progressive viewpoints and perspectives that leverage asset thinking toward traditionally marginalized populations.”
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