Schools Get Into Disputes In Choosing Textbooks About Religion

Conventional wisdom is that there are no constitutional problems in teaching "about" various religions in the public school curriculum. However, as an article in today's Los Angeles Jewish Journal demonstrates, choosing appropriate textbooks to teach about religion can embroil schools in disputes with religious groups. California is in the final stages of the once-each-7-year adoption process for history and social studies materials for grades K through 8. The process decides which books local school districts can purchase with state funds. One seventh grade book, History Alive! The Medieval World and Beyond, published by the Teachers’ Curriculum Institute, was withdrawn from its trial in Arizona earlier this year after a series of protests from parents who objected to what they saw as distortions of Christianity and Judaism, with an overarching positive spin on Islam. Another book, The Modern Middle East, was analyzed by a team from the San Francisco Jewish Community Relations Council. The report concluded that the materials are studded with “misinformation, manipulation, omissions of key facts, oversimplification of complex issues, historical inaccuracy and lack of context.”