Posted on 07/12/2021 2:30:26 AM PDT by Libloather
(Reuters) - Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker signed a bill on Friday requiring public schools to teach Asian-American history, the first such step by a U.S. state amid rising concerns about violence against people of Asian descent.
The bill mandates the teaching of a unit of Asian-American history in public elementary and high schools starting in the 2022-2023 school year.
"We are setting a new standard for what it means to truly reckon with our history," said Pritzker, who signed the legislation into law at a high school in Skokie, a suburb of Chicago.
Educating children about the contributions of Asian Americans in U.S. history would help curb the proliferation of false stereotypes and discrimination, the Democrat governor said.
Led by advocacy group Asian Americans Advancing Justice in Chicago, supporters had been promoting the bill since early 2020. But it gained traction in the state legislature following the deadly attacks on Asian women in the Atlanta area in March.
Many Asian communities have been on edge amid a wave of violent incidents targeting them following lockdowns to cope with the coronavirus pandemic, which emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan.
The Teaching Equitable Asian American History Act says the curriculum should include teaching of the efforts made by Asian Americans to advance civil rights, as well as their contributions to the arts and sciences and to the economic and cultural development of the country.
Grace Pai, Executive Director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice in Chicago, said the bill would benefit the more than 100,000 Asian American students from kindergarten through high school in Illinois.
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
What’s wrong with plain old American American history? History about Americans that loved America no matter their race, creed or national origin?
The main problem with any of this other than it flat out is advocating for balkanization is the way it is taught is to bash whites.
FT
Chicago. They should teach African history to stop the rising violence against African American people by other African American people. It’s all about awareness.
Get your decoder ring out. Any other “brand” of history is just a not-so-subtle attack on white America.
Exactly right. It is taught to bash whites based on a time when it was the way of the world. To which America as whole moved away from such practices. Wrote the laws to stop such practices and punish those who continued them.
That is the biggest problem I have with all this race baiting teaching, it is no longer about: this happened and the nation thought it wrong, so we changed. And this is how we changed through laws, opportunities, etc.
I find it incredibly confounding when they essentially are biting the hand that offered to help them up. We do have a say in the black community, we do have a say in the black experience. All my life I have heard black people tell white people to stay out of their affairs. Well, if they are coming to us for change, then we do have voice, say, etc. in their failed affairs. We do have a right to voice our frustrations with them.
I wonder if they’re going to be teaching about the attack on Pearl Harbor? Oh wait, I’m sure that happened because of something bad that we did……….
Hate to say it but the ones committing most of the violence against them either aren’t in school anymore or not paying attention, relying on a racist grading system to graduate.
“We are setting a new standard for what it means to truly reckon with our history.”
What does this mean?
He needs to reckon with English.
the problem with that approach is that white male historical figures might be looked upon favorably; the propagandists certainly do not want that!
There are 21 million Asian Americans. There are 44 million German Americans (nearly as many as African Americans at 47 million).
Where the hell is the justice in ignoring us German Americans? I demand German-American history be taught in our schools!
Where are my reparations, too? Where is my history month?
I totally agree.
I wonder if they’ll include the bit about how Jack Kennedy and his brother killed Diem and HIS brother.
Duckworth’s doing?
A semester to study the history of dry cleaning?
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