Advocates, candidate call for Native Studies course in Texas schools

Proponents of an American Indian/Native Studies course in Texas public schools are calling on State Board of Education Chairman Aaron Kinsey, R-Midland, to add the class to the board's June meeting agenda after it did not receive expected approval earlier this year.

The SBOE, which is responsible for setting Texas curriculum standards, typically meets four days at a time several times per year, and the board will hold its second meeting of 2024 on June 25-28. The agenda for the June meeting will be finalized in the coming days, and proponents of the course — including Morgan Kirkpatrick, Kinsey's Democratic opponent in the upcoming November election — are asking Kinsey to include discussion of the course as part of the board's proceedings.

"After teaching middle school reading and English for 14 years, I can attest to the fact that students are thirsty for information and history about their own heritage," Kirkpatrick, a former Lubbock teacher, said in a news conference Monday. "This rigorous community-developed and teacher-tested course holds the potential to engage students all over the state. It is the job and the responsibility of the State Board of Education to get exactly this type of engaging course into the classrooms of our state's students — not to stand in the way of the democratic process.

"Chair Kinsey can and should add the course to the June SBOE agenda," she said.

The Avalanche-Journal attempted to reach out to Kinsey for comment but calls were not returned by deadline Monday.

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A group of education advocates have worked for years to design the class, which is currently listed as an "innovative," or experimental, course. If OK'd by SBOE, the Native Studies course would join African American Studies and Mexican American Studies and become the third state-approved ethnic-studies course.

American Indian/Native Studies aims to fill in gaps in students' understanding of native history and culture and would be an elective social studies credit.

The course's designers expected to see it on the January SBOE agenda with final approval coming in April of this year, but it was not discussed during that meeting. Kinsey said at the time the delay was meant to give board members more time to review the course, according to previous reporting.

The Native Studies course has been piloted by several school districts in the state, and any district can elect to offer the class under the innovative course program. But proponents of the class in Kinsey's West Texas district say full approval is needed to expand its availability to students who need it most.

More:Texas SBOE delays Native American course approval. What it means for the proposed class

Janice Henderson, who grew up in Lubbock and is a member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, helped design the proposed course. She said Monday such a course will help native students understand their heritage in a way she was not afforded growing up, but that Kinsey had not returned her calls or meeting requests.

"As a child, I did not know I was Choctaw," Henderson said. "I knew nothing and I learned nothing about Native Americans in general, and of course, not about the Choctaw. What I did know, I learned from Hollywood, or advertisements or team mascots. … I don't want that for my grandchildren."

"I ask that our chair put this on the agenda for consideration," she added. "Do not allow us to be invisibilized."